1st Fire (7/10/15)

Tarok, First-Week, Fourth-day, the Now-Year

Cynjak, Un-Krug and Yukkbutt converge upon the Court-of-Crows, heading first to the local watering hole Pilaf's Tavern to sate the hunger of the half-orcs. They find themselves unable to make a trade for a meal, despite the paladin's best attempts to use her musical abilities to woo the small morning crowd. K'gug, Karl and Nobro each arrive independently of the rest, and most set upon the same task. Kaarl arrives their first, and makes judicious use of his goodberries spell to sate both the half-orc strangers and the tavern keeper Pilaf. K'gug seems a bit dismayed by how people keep addressing him as vertically challenged, since he is clearly the same height as the local humans, if not taller. Nobro wastes little time seeking out his contact 'Fingers', by heading over to the local Swap Meet. There he encounters Maun, and invites him to the local tavern. The brute follows, and then proceeds to proposition Cynjak in the one way he knows how. Eventually the halfling figures out Maun is his 'in' with Nimmi 'Fingers', and the warrior heads off to find his associate. Cynjak decides to visit the Swap Meet, where he encounters both Gundo Shattermouth and a strange peddler selling hacked up groundhogs, who tells her a rumor that the 'Demon in the Ditch' has been sighted north of the village.

After Maun and Gundo wheel Nimmi 'Fingers' to Pilaf's Tavern, the charming old man asks Nobro to perform a job and prove he has the best interests of the Ten-Tribes in mind. Access to the loonroot, a medicinal mushroom has been lost, and with it the potential to heal a great number of the ailing among the local villages. He asks that the halfling round up some assistance and head to Dogrush Mire, a small wetland area near a split in the Whipwater. Nobro quickly networks the job to the half-orcs. Nobro goes off to visit the butcher Goblo, who is probably related to him, and is told that rare beast cuts are always welcome and rewarded at the slaughterhouse. The others go to speak with Ull, a drunken local sage who enlightens them on both the possible dangers of the loonroot long term, and that the 'Demon of the Ditch' is actually an ankheg, a burrowing horror not uncommon on the Plain. The group decides to reassemble the following morning and assist Nobro with his task. En route back to their various tents and Pilaf's Tavern, they meet up with a congenial fellow named Ode, a local storyteller and minstrel. He is quite taken with Cynjak, and unlike the other pigs that have attempted to shack her, she is also taken by his politeness, and decides to spend the evening with him.

Tarok, First-Week, Fifth-day, the Now-Year

Awakening, breakfast and then five of the PCs decide to travel early, collecting Cynjak en route to the western gatehouse of the Court-of-Crows. She happens to be bathing in the Whipwater, and emerges to the catcalls of local fisherman and several of her own party. The rest of the day is spent uneventfully crossing the Whipwater Plain to the fork in the river that is their destination. When evening falls, they decide to set up camp and watch and tackle the river and the Mire the next morning.

Tarok, First-Week, Sixth-day, the Now-Year

The PCs explore the surface of Dogrush Mire, but there is little of note until they find a rotted, large tree stump with a pit in the middle leading down a chute to the darkness. They find a weed and fungus-choked network of caverns below, which they begin to explore. Not long after, they are surprised and set upon by a number of small myconids, which do not prove much of a match for the party, delivering a few wounds but being annihilated in return. The PCs press on, finding other oddities like a chamber of corpses being used as gardening planters by the local fungus, and a half-submerged dinosaur skeleton sticking out of a ceiling of one of the caves. Several of them are then crushed when attempting to pass through a damp corridor propped up with rotted timbers, an old mine of some sort...since four of them are pretty heavily wounded by the event, they decide upon a short rest before continuing.

PCs: Cynjak, K'gug, Kaarl, Nobro, Un-Krug, Yukkbutt
XP rewarded: 150 per player.
Inspiration rewarded: K'gug, Kaarl, Un-Krug

New NPCs

Goblo (halfling male): A robust Halfling male with thick muttonchops, and a thicker midsection draped in an apron of stitched coyote hides, he bears many scars from his own mishaps in rendering the meat of the great beasts of the Plateau. He smokes from a fat-bottomed pipe which reeks of dung and clover, and wears various ornaments of bones he laced together with vine, in addition to a serrated bone butcher knife the size of most swords.

Gundo Shattermouth (human male): So-named for the rumor that a velociraptor bit most of his face off, Gundo possesses a frightening visage, lipless and flesh peeled below his nose and almost to his ears. His scalp is bald on top but otherwise hangs tawny brown to his waistline in the back, which is quite a ways considering his 6’6” height. Gundo is swathed in dense rhinoceros leather studded with small stones, and wields a nasty two-handed club on which he carves the faces of his greatest enemies.

Maun the Bastard (human male): As wide as his partner Gundo is tall, Maun is the equivalent of a dense stone wall made flesh. Block-headed and fully bald, he bears the tattoo of a woman’s loins on his skull and wears a leather muzzle with bone teeth that can replace those he is missing. A pair of stone axes hang at his waist, but his primary weapon is a longbow from which he fires thorny, often poisoned arrows. Maun communicates only with grunts and harumphs, and his eyes tend to drift in opposite directions, one of them cloudy with cataracts. 

Nimmi ‘Fingers’ (human male): Cruelly named for the fact that one of his hands is missing three of its digits, Nimmi is a charismatic oldster whose legs no longer function, thus is wheeled around on a primitive cart with stone wheels by his muscular attendants Gundo & Maun. His whiting hair is neatly kept in dyed bone braids, and his chinstrap beard perfectly symmetrical. He is struck by albinism, so his eyes are a pinkish-red hue. Nimmi is also one of the only men in the Court who still has all his teeth. He wields an obsidian, ruby-tipped cane in his left hand, a rare relic he bartered from an explorer of the City of the Carvers who stumbled across it.

 

Ode (human male): A solemn but smiling man of many summers, his gray hair is fashioned into a hundred knots which give off the appearance of spines, his moustache so wide that it is wrapped around the back of his head and knotted with grease. He is never found without a crude string instrument, pipes suspended from his neck and at least a pair of wood & hide drums slung on his back, but he also has a stone pick on his belt.

Pilaf (human male): A gaunt, humble man with but a few surviving strands of black and gray hair hanging from the top of his skull. He wears well-kept woolen garments and is known for his skilled threadwork in addition to mixing delicious concoctions from the fermented fruits and vegetables he stores behind his tent-tavern. Pilaf squints a lot, sensitive to sunlight, but counters when he goes outside with a shady, wide-brimmed hat of woven wheat stalks and dinosaur scales.

 

Ull (human male): A plump old man who reeks of grapes and berries, which often stain his fingers and thick graying moustache. His hair is so long as to be out of control, falling in curled cascades nearly to the floor, and he does not ever seem to bathe in the Whipwater, claiming an innate fear of water. Ull is also known to have a rather significant flatulence problem which he has no intention of fixing through diet or exercise.

Vancal the Wage (human male): A hunched, middle aged man with a shaven head and massive, flowing gray beard which is adorned with stone arrow-heads. He has a severe underbite and staggered gait, plus countless other aches and pains from his many campaigns with the Spent Men against rowdy orcs, goblins and predators. He still wears his hide armor with pride, though he is rarely sent out to the field, now more of a recruiter who does much of Captain Taias’ work for him. Vancal still leans upon a mighty stone mace which has broken many a skull in those days when it has been swung, and he talks with a slurred, boring speech that often drives prospects mad.

Timeline & Calendar of the Ten-Tribes

Timeline of the Ten-Tribes

-368 Summers. Wood elven nomads are the first to ascend the Plateau and establish a secure settlement on an islet in the small lake known as the Moonmirror. This settlement would become known as Isle-of-Idylls, the first of the Ten-Tribes. Ferrikan was among them in her youth, and is the only known resident of the Tribes to have seen their entire history play out before her.

-351 Summers. The elves begin a costly purge of dangerous local humanoids who had already occupied the Plateau, ridding the region of the Stone-Nosed Goblins and Ruddy Stump Orcs. The latter managed to avoid complete annihilation by sending off their mates and offspring to safe nooks and crannies in the Howling Tors, and thus their DNA survives today in both the Roarwater and Riverbane tribes.

-301 Summers. Small family clans of green dragonborn unify and establish the Place-of-Scales as a bulwark of defense against both the encroaching elves and their draconic ancestor, Saurvax, who keeps a dangerous lair in the Ayrie of the Ancients, waking occasionally to rain havoc upon the Plateau and surrounding regions. However, they end up making a truce with the elves.

-284 Summers. The mighty human hero Lord Hawkwynd and a train of nearly a thousand refugees make contact with wood elven scouts, who help them fend off numerous man-eating ogre tribes in the Great Arbordark. Half of the poor souls are slain or captured and bred by the ogres as both slaves and a food and pleasure source for their lewd and foul rituals. Most of the refugees, including Hawkwynd himself, fled a distant land, hundreds of miles across the Arbordark and Endless Ash, which is now referred to only as the Sunken Spires. Among them, men and dwarves and halflings of numerous hues and sub-races. The elves then lead the survivors up the Plateau and permit them to settle at a safe distance from the Isle-of-Idylls.

-282-273 Summers. At first, the larger communities of Misthome and Court-of-Crows are established near ready sources for water, hunting and foraging. But soon, some slight segregation occurs, with a large number of halflings and dwarves breaking away to settle Flaxwall and Cleftown. All of this took place over the course of about a decade. With the people came their Gods and icons, so the earliest shrines to the Six were created.

-260 Summers. The halfling hunter Bardolo discovers the entrance to the City of the Carvers, an ancient and elegant civilization that once thrived in a cavern-city near the foot of the Ayrie. He leads a larger, mixed expedition further inside, but they never return. Since that time, the curious are advised to stay well away from the place, though the lure of artifacts and knowledge remains...

-244 Summers. The craven Craxos the Black, along with a warband of thick-headed, dangerous thugs and buffoons, attempts a coup of Hawkwynd and the other elders of the established Tribes. In a vicious battle, Craxos and Hawkwynd slay each other in single, mounted combat from atop their great lizards, and the site is still marked on the Whipwater Plains. Though this clash ended the rebellion, it caused a wedge in the human populace. Craxos' sons and followers flee into the Old Barrowbriar and establish Dregroot on Bone Lake.

-219 Summers. Out of seemingly nowhere, the forest gnomes of The Nest make their presence known to the Tribes, with gifts of honey and wax. When pressed, they keep their lips sealed as to whether they were there all along or rode their wasp mounts to the place, but a cautious agreement is made to welcome them to the Tribes.

-200 Summers. Saurvax awakens and reigns terror over the budding Tribes, gassing and devouring hundreds in what is known as the Green Hell, a period of several weeks. Nothing can stop the beast, and it has its way with all the races, friend or foe, decimation their populations by around a third...

-198 Summers. Perhaps as a direct result of the Green Hell, contact with Craxos' followers is re-established when their furriers and traders emerge to bring wooden goods and artifacts from a mysterious Carver ruin that was discovered deep in the Barrowbriar. Peace among Men is once more avowed, and an added settlement, Briar's Edge, created on the border of the Verdant and Barrowbriar, where they can meet and trade.

-165 Summers. Ogres scale the Plateau to Cleftown and begin a slaughter of the local folk, the Cliffside Massacre. Once it is quelled by reinforcements from Court-of-Crows and Isle-of-Idylls, stronger and more difficult defenses are set up in the dwarven settlement. The quarterly Long Hunt is then established with the dual purpose of keeping the populations of ogres and other dangerous Arbordark predators low, while scrounging for rare herbs and medicines at the Illumen Vale, as well as possible slaves and exiles hiding out in the massive woodland.

-131 Summers. A dwarven-led expedition from Cleftown discovers an impossibly deep network of caverns deep in the south of the Howling Tors, full of dangers like pitch-skinned elves, fungus people and more frightening cousins of the surface goblins. Few return, but this leads to the commencement of the Blue Lanterns, an organization devoted to defending the Tribes and exploring the depths and far reaches where unknown threats might lie. Slipstones is also established around this time, in an underground cavern on the banks of the Whipwater as it flows down to the Northeast of the Cleft Plateau.

-106 Summers. With the exception of a single survivor, nearly an entire Long Hunt disappears after foraging at the Illumen Vale. Others have ended poorly, but none so tragic as this. Upon investigation, Ferrikan discovers that the 'survivor', Malkash, had been enchanted upon a previous Hunt by a sept of devious woodland witches who hoard over the Vale. He had been spared to lead yet another party to the witches' clutches, but was ultimately exiled from the Plateau. Future Long Hunts were armed with stronger magical users and defenses so that they could continue to harvest from the Vale.

-85 Summers. Reports accumulate from numerous scouts and hunting parties that the goblinfolk of the Plateau have organized themselves into stronger warbands, each with its own varying dementias and eccentricities. The Boneshade, Stinkstalker and Droolrot goblins become much greater threats than their scattered kin, larger than the Roarwater and Riverbane orc tribes and unable to be taken down by the Ten-Tribes' current numbers.

-63 Summers. Saurvax awakens once again, over a century past the previous sighting, but the green dragon's hunting to cut short when it is caught in a massive battle against two other apex predators, the tyrannosaurus Big Scour and triceratops Thunder-Mash. Saurvax survives, wounded, but decides against terrorizing the Ten-Tribes in its weakened state, settling for its two new meals. From this point on, local T-rexes are often referred to as 'Little Scour' in their youth, and 'Big Scour' in their adulthood, while various plays on 'Mash' are used for the triceratops, and other 'pet names' granted to local giant fauna.

-44-32 Summers. Dozens of mysterious disappearances are reported from the communities of Flaxwall, Briar's Edge and Court-of-Crows, over the period of about a decade; the three most 'open' Tribes due to their existence on the Whipwater Plain. Since many of the victims were traders, farmers and hunters, local rangers and sages surmise that these strange events might very well be the result of a stealthy strain of pteranodons who must inhabit the Ayrie of the Ancients. If this is true, Saurvax is no longer the sole threat from above...

-21 Summers. A bit of a martial 'Renaissance' begins, when dwarven, elven and dragonborn smiths begin using glyphs and writings of the ancient Carvers, as well as tales spun by the descendants of Hawkwynd's exiles, to craft more elaborate weapons. The materials available are still crude (wood, stone, and bone), but no longer are the hunters and guards of the Ten-Tribes limited to mere axes, clubs, spears, bows and slings. Swords and daggers of sharpened bone become very popular, and those who can create them thrive.

-10 Summers. The first encounter with the 'Echoes', silent killers who inhabit the Cleft Plateau and can mimic the cries, calls and communications of their victims, during and after the kills. To this day, none has been caught or even seen, only heard with their sweet, mocking, often melodious voices...

-0 Summers. The current year.

Timekeeping in the Ten-Tribes

The wood elves began the tradition of carving and painting stones to keep track of the flow of time on the Plateau, and this practice was passed down to the exiles and refugees of other races once they took up residence. Today, each of the Ten-Tribes employs both a Counter-of-Days as well as an understudy to follow in their footsteps, and pass on the tradition. Days and Weeks are marked by the passage of Sun and Moon, and they've even hashed out a general Week-to-Month structure, though most individual days outside of celebrations and rituals are unnamed.

The Flowering (1st day of the year, vows of matrimony).
Bar'k (New-Spring) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Balook (Mid-Spring) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Chuln (Late-Spring) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
The Smoldering (1 day, separates Spring and Summer, renewed pacts and bonds).
Tre'lev (New-Summer) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Tarok (Mid-Summer) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Hathun (Late-Summer) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
The Founding (1 day, exact middle of the year, celebration of the Ten-Tribes).
The Gathering (1day, separates Summer and Fall, harvest season, games & masquerades for children).
Fo'kri (New-Autumn) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Farsak (Mid-Autumn) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Shook (Late-Autumn) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
The Deepening (1 days, separates Fall and Winter, winter welcoming festival).
Sest'ar (New-Winter) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Samiak (Mid-Winter) 3 weeks, 10 days each.
Harthoul (Late-Winter) 3 weeks, 10 days each.

Court-of-Crows Map

The Ten-Tribes

Briar's Edge

Leader: Eagle Klah (human male)
Population: 570 (37% human, 20% gnome, 18% elf, 10% halfling, 7% half-elf, 5% dwarf, 3% half-orc)
Hunters-Elect: 2
Exports: Berries, boats, fish, livestock, timber, wood crafts

Considered the 'last bastion' for the sane and civilized peoples of the Whipwater Plain, Briar's Edge is an important resource point, where timber can be culled from the Old Barrowbriar forest without much danger to the cutters. Like other plainsfolk, they graze livestock, but also host a number of woodworkers and other craftsmen who thrive on the woods' edge. Traders and trappers from Dregroot, deeper into the forest, make this their one commerce stop before returning to the dangers and rewards of the shadowy woodland, so anyone seeking goods from therein, such as tasty nuts, a variety of rare berries and roots, and relics from the Glade of the Carvers should seek them here. Eagle Klah is a solemn, elderly man who is both a fair judge of character and quite knowledgeable about the deeper woodlands, a sage of the natural and an ardent servitor of Ydum.

Cleftown

Leader: Rekker 'Ogre-knees' (dwarf male)
Population: 450 (37% dwarf, 20% human, 18% halfling, 10% elf, 7% gnome, 5% half-elf, 5% dragonborn)
Hunters-Elect: 3
Exports: Game (Arbordark), herbs (Arbordark), stone crafts, wood crafts

Clefthome is built into the very face of the Plateau itself, on a series of ledges and bridges which span the Cleft itself at its most narrow. It is both the launching and returning point for the Long Hunt, where game and herbs and other acquisitions are bartered and worked and then spread to the rest of the Ten-Tribes. Well defended, access to the Great Arbordark floor can be severed by a series of winches and pulleys that the dwarves conceived, and most steep walking paths can be guarded by just a few able men and women. Domiciles are built above grown of earth and rock, positioned to best shelter denizens from the strong winds of the Howling Tors. The God-spear Rekker resides over the hardy populace, a veteran of many Long Hunts who got his name of 'Ogre-knees' from the amount of brutes he had felled. He tolerates no threat to his people, and very little mischief, so thieves and troublemakers are often sent hiking or plummeting to the 'Dark below...dependent on the severity of their crimes.

Court-of-Crows

Leader: Grand Mask (human ?!?)
Population: 970 (79% human, 9% halfling, 5% elf, 3% dwarf, 2% half-orc, 1% half-elf, 1% gnome)
Hunters-Elect: 8
Exports: Cloth, crops, fish, livestock

The most populous of the Ten-Tribes, likely due to its ready access to water, fish, and being the primary source for breeding and killer livestock for milk, meat and bones. Surrounded by a little noose of the Whipwater, the village is offered a great deal of natural protection from large predators and over-eager orc brigands who haunt and hunt the waters. Most goods of the other communities make there way here, so it is a center for trade, but also the political heart of the Ten-Tribes, where seasonal Moots are held with either chieftains and elders or their representatives. The enigmatic shaman-hero 'The Grand Mask' holds the Court, considered by most to be as close to a 'leader' for the Plateau peoples' as a whole as anyone, a potent sorcerer, but also an enigma due to the large helm of bison skull and ornate feathers that is constantly covering him (or her) up. All that is ever heard is the gravely, echoing voice. The Spent Men, a company of grizzled Long Hunt veterans, operates from this very place, highly protective of the Grand Mask and organizing patrols of the entire Whipwater Plain. They are a great source of work for any able bodied fighting man and woman.

Dregroot

Leader: Zlazash (human male)
Population: 270 (79% human, 9% elf, 5% gnome, 3% halfling, 2% dwarf, 1% half-elf, 1% dragonborn)
Hunters-Elect: 2
Exports: Berries, fish, hides, nuts, relics, timber, wood crafts

On the Eastern banks of the Bone Lake in Old Briarwood lies this quiet community, a hovel which is spread through both the ground level and sturdy branches of a cluster of the strongest trees in the forest; and heavily camouflaged as a defense against roving goblin raiders and greater threats. The leader, Zlazash, was chosen mostly out of fear. A man of short temper who wishes to keep his many wives secreted away, a good portion of the human population is directly related to him. Outsiders are tolerated, provided they bring something of value to the community, but of all the Ten-Tribes this is the place least friendly. Regardless, it's an excellent source for woodland goods, which are brought to Briar's Edge to trade elsewhere and keep Dregroot insulated. Duthar's Wives, an amazonian sect of barbarians, rangers, and druids, roam the woodland, 'keeping the peace' as best they can against the Boneshade and Droolrot goblins, and some say they also maintain the secrets of the ancient Carvers, whose most well known ruin lies not a great distance from the Bone Lake.

Flaxwall

Leader: Elder Kloob (halfling male)
Population: 310 (79% halfling, 9% human, 5% elf, 3% dwarf, 2% gnome, 1% half-elf, 1% dragonborn)
Hunters-Elect: 2
Exports: Cloth, crops, livestock, mints, relics

The largely halfling population of Flaxwall leads a quiet, pastoral life, maintaining the richest crops of corn and various grains in all the Ten-Tribes. All structures here are made from burrows and rolling rises straddling both the Verdant and the Whipwater Plain, and their paths and ways are protected by tall grasses patrolled by Stilt Sentries and, further out, dinosaur riders whose signal fires can be seen well out into the Plain. Some relics are brought here by explorers that have braved the City of the Carvers, southeast of Flaxwall in the foothills of the Ayrie of the Ancients, and most journeys into that dark, fell place are launched. Elder Kloob is among the friendliest of Ten-Tribes chiefs, always willing to lend a sympathetic ear and steer his people right, and has lots of lore and helpful tips for adventurers passing through the place.

Isle-of-Idylls

Leader: Far Strode Ferrikan (elf female)
Population: 360 (96% elf, 2% half-elf, 1% gnome, 1% human)
Hunters-Elect: 3
Exports: Berries, exotic crafts, herbs, teas

Home to the less integrated, more aloof elven-kind of the Cleft Plateau, Isle-of-Idylls is located on a lush, wooded islet on the Mirrormoon lake. One of the more insular of the Ten-Tribes, visitors are often met with suspicion and closely supervised, escorted about their daily business. The elves work their wonders on the local flora and fauna, coming up with some of the more exotic items for trade, like potions and finer spun cloths, but they rarely share their secrets, and less than a dozen non elves have taken up even a fleeting residence. Far Strode Ferrikan gets her name for being perhaps the most well traveled individual of all the Ten-Tribes. If one can gain audience with her, she will spin tales of lands far beyond the Arbordark, both civilized and savage...cursed, plagued, or thriving. She claims to have seen places where iron and bronze reign. Her Idyllguard are considered some of the more elite fighters and archers on the Plateau, never far from her side.

Misthome

Leader: Mother Henn (dwarf female)
Population: 630 (37% human, 20% elf, 18% halfling, 10% dwarf, 7% gnome, 5% half-elf, 5% half-orc)
Hunters-Elect: 5
Exports: Boats, cloth, fish, relics, stone crafts

The infrastructure of Misthome predates the Ten-Tribes, since the foundations of the village are built upon Carver ruins with cellars and sub-cellars, natural irrigation fed by the Gods' Tears. Visibility is low in the area during most times of the year, since the place holds true to its name, but it really all depends on the variable temperature. To combat this, hanging torches and other light sources provide guidance to visitors and residents alike, and the place suits those whose race grants them better visual acuity, many who sign up for the Blue Lanterns, a local organization of explorers and guards. Mother Henn is an elected leader here, a robust wise-woman who is among the more pacifistic of the Ten-Tribes, often infuriatingly so, since she guards the gateway to the potential dangers of the Ayrie above, and the lair of Saurvax, the green dragon which considers The Verdant and much of the entire Plateau to be its hunting grounds. Several expeditions or Long Hunts have been arranged to stop the creature forever, none successful, and often causing some inter-tribal unrest with the people of Place-of-Scales, who share a bloodline with the beast. Misthome doesn't produce much by way of natural resources, apart from some fishing at the falls, but some of the most skilled craftsmen and thinkers among the Tribes consider it a breathtaking, inspirational place.

The Nest

Leader: Tanziver the Wasp Rider (gnome male)
Population: 150 (96% gnome, 2% human, 1% dragonborn, 1% halfling)
Hunters-Elect: 1
Exports: Berries, fruits, honey, wax.

The forest gnomes of The Nest rarely communicate with outsiders apart from their commerce in the honey and wax their bee-farms produce, and the fruits they farm from the region. Their tiny hamlet is built almost entirely from the stalks and caps of massive mushrooms which occasionally clump up throughout The Verdant wetland. Not to say they are particularly unfriendly, in fact a traveling gnome trader is a delight to encounter out in the wild, but they are a race of strange humors and practices which many other find irritating or arbitrary, and simply do not understand. As such, you can likely count the non-gnomes who live among them on two hands. Tanziver, their leader, is a veteran and Fire-Carrier of the Long Hunt who has inherited the job, and holds on to it due to the skills of he and his Wasp Riders as they range the Verdant, protecting the gnomes from the Stinkstalker Goblins and other potential dangers.

Place-of-Scales

Leader: Wralasar (dragonborn male)
Population: 250 (79% dragonborn, 9% human, 5% elf, 3% gnome, 2% half-elf, 1% halfling, 1% half-orc)
Hunters-Elect: 2
Exports: Berries, bone crafts, herbs, hides

A river tribe east of the Waterscar Falls which carry the Whipwater off into the west of the Great Arbordark, the dragonborn of Place-of-Scales have always been welcoming, and other races live among them safely despite their intimidating presence. Though Wralasar and his kin trace their lineage to the same ancestors as the local terror Saurvax, they have proven time and again that they are valuable members of the Ten-Tribes, often on the front line in Long Hunts and when arms are raised against the various orc, goblin and ogre incursions. The dragonborn are also skilled bone crafters, and the most reliable arms, armor and tools of that material are produced here by the shores of the Whipwater, from the skeletons of dinosaurs and other large predators and livestock.

Slipstones

Leader: Grumdi the Bright (dwarf male)
Population: 120 (96% dwarf, 2% human, 1% halfling, 1% half-elf)
Hunters-Elect: 1
Exports: Gems, stone crafts

A secluded stretch of covered and open-air caverns, Slipstones is located on the banks of the Whipwater as it surges beneath the rocky hills and peaks of the Howling Tors. Though it boasts the smallest population of the Ten-Tribes, almost all of whom are hill or mountain dwarves, it actually exists in the widest amount of space, and the residents have many amenities. They scourge the caves for gems and primitive ore, and the craftsmen here make the best stone weapons on the Plateau, but they also face a lot of natural subterranean dangers...flooded caves, underdark predators, and raids from the Deeper Night, an access point which leads miles below the Tors to gods-know-what threats beneath the earth. A chapter of the Blue Lanterns of Misthome prides itself on guarding the locals as best they can, though there have been incidents here of smuggling between some of the more reclusive residents, and local humanoid menaces like the Roarwater Orcs and Redspine Ogres.