Nonhuman(oid) Continents

[Regitnui]

Gist: What selection of non-standard races would you populate a continent with?

Right, if you haven't already gone off to post, and are reading this, let me elaborate. Xen'drik in the Eberron setting is a literal continent of adventure, populated in canon by giants, drow, and thri-keen. What if, I ask myself, the drow were the most 'human', or normal, of the races there? Thri-keen roam the deserts, firbolg hide in the forests, tabaxi haunt the narrow plains, and even stranger creatures hide in the frozen lands to the south...

[Gastronomie]

I think having obviously artificial races and monsters roam in an African sort of jungle could look cool.

Like, there's all sorts of Golems that can reproduce via gathering inorganic material and dumping some sort of life energy into the mass. Gorgons (the metal bulls in the MM) as well. The entire continent is covered in dense forests, and these artificial monsters are their main inhabitants (apart from a good number of normal, real-life-ish animals, or their hybrids, like Manticores and Owlbears).

And Nothics. An unsettling number of Nothics, hopping and leaping about everywhere in the jungle like mad monkeys.

The truth being that there used to be a wizard empire ruling the continent, but a magical disaster turned all its inhaibants into Nothics, and now the former servants of the people (the Golems) are roaming about aimlessly.

...Stuff like that.

[Plaguescarred]

What selection of non-standard races would you populate a continent with?A continent full of grassland populated by centaur & wemic or a swampy continent populated by bullywug.

[MrStabby]

Maybe a continent where lycanthropy is normal? A civilisation of wererats?

[Tiwanoz]

A large swamp/mangrove about the size of western europe stretches across the coastline. Deeper inland the mangroves switch to increasingly denser jungle, this territory is the very definition of a rainforest, and it basically rains at least twice a week, and its not exactly mild drizzle.

The jungle creeps further inland. The huge rivers that fuel the mangroves find their origins in the increasingly mountainous terrain. And behold a humongous mountain chain arises in te center of the continent, akin' to a slightly more slender version of the Himalaya's. The occasional volcano indicates the youth of this mountain range.

Across the mountains a large desert stretches for out, dotted with small but precious watering holes and oasis. Eventually the terrain switches to more steppe/savanna like terrain. Ending in coastal grasslands and marshes very much like a warmer North European plain.

The continent is inhabited by reptiles and their kin. Lizardfolk dominate the coasts, living as hunter gatherers in the mangroves. With the occasional villages and towns build within the trees functioning as hubs.

The jungle is dominated by Yuan Ti of various forms, living in Maya/Aztec like city states. Constantly at odds with eachother, Green and Black Dragons sometimes rule a city state, but quickly grow bored after a century or so. Their empires fall to infighting almost immediatly.

The mountains are home to Red dragons, lording over Dragonborn slaves. A rich existance in the mountain valleys, with vulcanic soil providing them with great boons. A Red Dragon king may occasionally war with the Yuan Ti states for precious metals or slaves.

The cold mountainlands, outside of the vulcanic valleys are dominated by a few feral White dragons. They and the Barbaric White Dragonborn hunt both rachother and whatever prey they can find.

The deserts are the homes of the Blue Dragons and their Dragonborn kin. They traverse the deserts in caravans, trading goods from one end of the continent to the other.

The Savanna/Steppes are dominated by the 4-legged and 2-armed "Centaur" lizards known as the Posleen. Exhibiting a culture similar to the pastoral horse nomads of Earth.

The Northern coastlines are dotted with pseudo-medieval Kingdoms, Principalities and such populated by Lizardfolk and various Dragonborn alike. Sailors from these lands have reported a vast continent to their north, populated by strange metallic scaled Dragonborn!

The fauna is mostly reptillian and archosaurian, with a good splash of large insects and a few stray mammals. The flora is similar to the early cretacious, and includes a dew domesticated crops similar to ours.

[Cespenar]

Now for something completely different:

-A population of awakened trees and animals governed by a small Mind Flayer elite. The mind flayers really are trying to uplift the backwater continent enough to produce the necessary parts for repairing their interplanar ship/time travel device, but have created a civilization in the process. The awakened animals gladly offer the occasional sacrifice to the mind flayers for practically being their creators.

-A city of dopplegangers. Sometimes they travel to other lands to acquire new forms and visages. These then bring these new forms to the city and set up the contemporary "mode" for a month or so. The city, needless to say, is a leading hub for arts.

[Regitnui]

I think having obviously artificial races and monsters roam in an African sort of jungle could look cool.

Like, there's all sorts of Golems that can reproduce via gathering inorganic material and dumping some sort of life energy into the mass. Gorgons (the metal bulls in the MM) as well. The entire continent is covered in dense forests, and these artificial monsters are their main inhabitants (apart from a good number of normal, real-life-ish animals, or their hybrids, like Manticores and Owlbears).

And Nothics. An unsettling number of Nothics, hopping and leaping about everywhere in the jungle like mad monkeys.

The truth being that there used to be a wizard empire ruling the continent, but a magical disaster turned all its inhaibants into Nothics, and now the former servants of the people (the Golems) are roaming about aimlessly.

...Stuff like that.

I might steal this at some point... :smallbiggrin:

[Draco4472]

Well I'd have the more monstrous races live in what would be otherwise inhospitable enviroments for humanoids.

Lizardfolk would thrive in swamps, Yuan-Ti in jungles akin to Mirkwood, Kenku in hidden mountain villages, Orcs in the coldest of tundras, environments otherwise left alone by the typical races.

So in a massive, sprawling swamp that humanoids otherwise leave alone due to the dangers of living in such a place, Lizardfolk would control the majority of the territory whether humanoids know it or not, likewise at the poles of the world for orcs in my settings, and the highest of peaks otherwise left alone by dwarves.

[Finback]

Gist: What selection of non-standard races would you populate a continent with?

Right, if you haven't already gone off to post, and are reading this, let me elaborate. Xen'drik in the Eberron setting is a literal continent of adventure, populated in canon by giants, drow, and thri-keen. What if, I ask myself, the drow were the most 'human', or normal, of the races there? Thri-keen roam the deserts, firbolg hide in the forests, tabaxi haunt the narrow plains, and even stranger creatures hide in the frozen lands to the south...

I'm thinking of Rath's Rootwater mangroves here (from Magic: the Gathering), but imagine a vast sprawling semi-tropical forest that literally sits atop a brackish sea, with tiny clusters of land here and there within. I could see lizardfolk thriving across the area - perhaps triton (or some more devolved version, a la the Rootwater merfolk) in the dim waters below. Yuan-ti might take to the treetops in an elvish style, and regularly in combat with the canopy-dwelling aarakocra.

[Deleted]

Genasi that are having a race war over the shape of their nipples.

Wait... Are genasi considered humanoids? Well, I'm going with the non-human version of the question then haha.

[imaginary]

Personally I love the idea of a land populated by giants. What must the Giant's empire have been like? Gulliver's adventures.

[EvilAnagram]

Okay, so elves, tabaxi, firbolgs, genasi, goliaths, goblins, and literally any other playable race are all humanoids.

I'm going to assume you mean none of the standard races (elves, humans, dwarfs, halflings, gnomes, half-x).

My campaign setting has a massive island chain (Australia+Oceania) ruled by dragons, populated by kobolds and lizardfolk. Their chief import is cattle. The Southeast of the main landmass is populated exclusively by tabaxi, and it's about the size of Southeast Asia. The South was the exclusive domain of giants, who ruled over goliaths and orcs, but their empire broke up, and now humans are settling the marches.

And the extreme North is Goblin North Korea.

[imaginary]

I think having obviously artificial races and monsters roam in an African sort of jungle could look cool.

Like, there's all sorts of Golems that can reproduce via gathering inorganic material and dumping some sort of life energy into the mass. Gorgons (the metal bulls in the MM) as well. The entire continent is covered in dense forests, and these artificial monsters are their main inhabitants (apart from a good number of normal, real-life-ish animals, or their hybrids, like Manticores and Owlbears).

And Nothics. An unsettling number of Nothics, hopping and leaping about everywhere in the jungle like mad monkeys.

The truth being that there used to be a wizard empire ruling the continent, but a magical disaster turned all its inhaibants into Nothics, and now the former servants of the people (the Golems) are roaming about aimlessly.

...Stuff like that.

Hey Gastromonie, your idea really got me thinking. Sounds like an totally interesting place with lots of potential for exploration and mystery. I hope you don't mind, I started another thread here (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?513219-A-world-of-golems-and-constructs&p=21640258#post21640258) to explore the idea more. I'd love to hear more of your thoughts on your own idea. :)

[DragonSorcererX]

Gist: What selection of non-standard races would you populate a continent with?

Dragons! Draconic creatures everywhere! (also Kobolds as a servant race and Dragonborn as a warrior race, like Spartans from 300 but also with Dragon Sorcerers, the dragons would look to their dragonborn troops and say: "Dragonborn! What is your profession?" And the dragonborns would answer: "[draconic roar]").

[Newtonsolo313]

Dragons! Draconic creatures everywhere! (also Kobolds as a servant race and Dragonborn as a warrior race, like Spartans from 300 but also with Dragon Sorcerers, the dragons would look to their dragonborn troops and say: "Dragonborn! What is your profession?" And the dragonborns would answer: "[draconic roar]").
Translation: i am a cobbler

[Naanomi]

The classic setting piece is the underwater metropolis filled with Merrill and triton, seedy bars with a sahaugin in the back up to no good, etc

I once played a game where we visited a valley that had walls so steep the sun only got there a short time each day; and often under cloud cover then.... it was ruled by myconids with vegepygmies as an 'underclass'; it was fun and exotic

[CaptainSarathai]

I've had a couple.

1. I did a campaign that cast the traditional races as the "savages." They even co-existed with some of the 'monsters' in the world. Then Hobgoblins rolled up, and were essentially the Roman Empire come to town.
It was "combat as war" and very grim-dark. The HobGoblins were like the Persians in 'The 300' - if you built a wall, they would send huge exotic beasts to batter it down, and gargoyle or harpy conscripts from far off lands to fly over and still wreck things. If you attempted to run, they would unleash whole packs of worgs and tribes of centaurs into the forests. The Hobgoblins always had an answer to any direct confrontation.

2. A "Gentry's Explorer Club" campaign set (timeline) in Victorian England, where the party of typical races ventured into dark and savage wilds.
Asia: Yuan-Ti
Middle-East: Genasi ruled by Djinn
Africa: Orcs, living symbiotically with massive beasts who will kill and eat you
North America: Centaurs hunting dinosaurs across the plains
South America: Kobolds, who worship the dinosaurs as primal deities
Russian/Chinese Steppe: goblins, with Hobgoblins as lead. This culture was treated as the "Ottoman Turk" threat
The Poles: aberrations, a'la Mountains of Madness

The whole campaign ran kinda 'Arkham Horror'-y. Everything but the poles was fairly normal, colonized, even. The Imperialist player races had carved everything up, more or less. But recent expeditions to the polar regions had uncovered evidence of a vast and timeless civilization, and a horrible fate awaited the world, beneath the thawing ice. To stop it, the players had to undertake missions to piece together clues from all of the "forerunner civilizations" (those listed above). This was sometimes difficult, because of strained relations with the occupied 'colonials.'
And of course, there was a faction among the humans who wanted to weaponize the artefacts and maybe even denizens of the poles, in order to destroy the other races (Indian Jones' Nazis) so a huge war was looming on the horizon, just like in the 30s.

[DizzyWood]

I kind of want to see Firbolg dino riders and Minotaur Farmers.

Farmers?!?!? Yep! Giant bull people living and working huge plantations with fields of grain as far as the eye can see. Peaceful friendly happy to trade.. until you cross them!

[Mith]

I would like to note that 1 Nothic is an unsettling number of Nothics. 2 Nothics is right out.