Evolution of your creatures

[Xania]

Can be natural or under any other form, like a curse, being laboratory creations or anything else.
I would like to know about how some creatures appeared, who were their ancestors, if they are now extint and if they still have related creatures around.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I've figured this out for my major "humanoid" races.

Source Race: Lightbound (extinct)
--> Angels, Fiends (spiritual Astral entities)
--> Aelvar (extinct)
--- --> Goroesi, AKA Dark Elves (a magically-engineered race that got lost in time for a while)
--- --> Cysgoroesi, AKA Shadow elves (an offshoot that took up residence way back when in Shadow)
--- --> Gwerin, AKA High Elves (the arcane-attuned descendants)
--- --> Puun Ihmisia, AKA Wood Elves (the nature/druidism-attuned descendants)
--- --> Tymoroesi, AKA Eladrin/Fey Elves (individuals who were conceived/born in areas strongly attuned to fey influences)

Source Race: Titans (extinct)
--> Jazuu, AKA goliaths and true giants.
--- --> Jashil, AKA firbolg/fey goliaths.
--- --> Giant-kin (ogres, trolls, etc). Failed giants (and their descendants).
--> Tumnii, AKA dwarves
--- -->Kharan, AKA duergar (fey touched dwarves, specifically hatred/bitterness/anger). Very rare.

Source Race: Proteans (extinct)
--> Goblinoids (all 3 are forms of one race, with goblins as the base species)
--- --> Humans (artificial hobgoblins/aelvar hybrids, anciently)
--- --- --> Dragonborn (artificial humans/dragon hybrids)
--- --- --> Serpent-kin, AKA Yuan-ti (humans/snake hybrid)
--- --> Orcs (artificial hobgoblin/porcine (mostly) hybrid)
--- --> Halflings ("accidental" product of wild magic)
--- --> Gnomes (fey-touched goblins)
--- --- --> Kobolds (artificial gnome/dragon hybrids, very rare).

There are lots of other human-descended races, mainly because one current gwerin empire loves to use them as a base for genetic experimentation. But they're not common.

[GaelofDarkness]

Well, in one setting I worked on all the humanoid races as well as the deities were related. I'll pull up my notes and see what I've got.

At first there was just Darkness and wandering, hungry spirits. Then a light fell from the sky and from it grew the Tree of Life whose branches stretched across an entire valley. The first spirits to eat from its fruit became the Illar who were ageless and powerful - basically gods. The Illar gave the gift of Light (the soulstuff of natural creatures) to others, creating life. Some were chosen to be servants of the Illar and caretakers of the other Children of Light - the first humanoids. Depending on the zone of creatures (scansorial, flying, walking, swimming or burrowing) they were shaped in different ways by the Illar. Some Illar had children with mortals, the Aenar, who were very powerful and long lived but not truly ageless. However, the Illar would not allow anyone else to eat the fruit of the Tree and ascend to be Illar, which ultimately culminated in the Bright War between the Illar and the forces of Light against the Accursed (rebel Aenar) and the forces of Darkness. This destroyed the Tree and created the sun, the moon, lightning, the fire at the heart of the world and the fire that burns within mortals's hearts against the Darkness. It also resulted in the first star, which are actually souls of fallen Illar that linger on to watch over the world.

The humanoid family tree looks something like this:


Woodlings: descendants of those who tended to the creatures frolicking among the Tree of Life's branches, they are (or were originally) adapted to forest homes. They tend to be good at going unseen and typically have a reclusive nature. They are often considered introspective, wise and in tune with the will of the Light.

Wood Elves (Branchlings)

Forest Gnomes (Twiglings)

Firbolg (Treelings)

Tabaxi (Vinelings)




Windlings: descendants of those who tended to the creatures who soared beneath the Tree of Life's branches. They can usually fly, or at least find a way to get themselves airborne when they have to. They are usually regarded as watching over what goes on around them and are somewhat less reclusive than woodlings.

Aarakocra (Stormlings - as they are said to be the only windlings who could fly in a storm, a claim none will test mind you)

Air Genasi (Cloudlings)

Sirens (Songlings)

Aven (Skylings - as it is said on clear days they stand watch and record the comings and goings of the world, which is mostly a fairy tale to get earthling children to behave but they are renowned sages of lore)




Earthlings: descendents of those who tended to the creatures who walked upon the earth. The most populous of the races by a significant amount.

Humans (Townlings - as they are noted for their prolific and often unwelcome construction)

High Elves (Seerlings - as magical knowledge was passed down to them by the Celestial Aenar and so they are believed to know how to interpret the will of the stars above i.e. the fallen Illar/gods)

Goliaths (Craglings)

Halflings (Bloomlings - for their affinity with all that grows)




Merlings: descendents of those who tended to the creatures who swam in the waters of the Valley of the Tree. They have adaptions for spending some time in the water if not living in it. Despite this, they are generally the most likely to make connections with other races.

Tritons (Saltlings - being the only Merlings who live primarily in the ocean)

Lizardfolk (Swamplings - the exception that proves the rule of merlings being friendly and open)

Tortles (Riverlings - as in this setting tortles would travel the rivers as traders of goods and news, generally boat people)

Water Genasi (Floodlings - orginally because they could direct water and help in cases of flooding but now because they are associated with floods and considered an ill omen)




Deeplings: descendents of those who tended to the creatures who burrowed between the Tree's roots.

Dwarves (Delvlings - as they delved deepest into the earth)

Rock Gnomes (Rocklings)

Earth Genasi (Stonelings)

Fire Genasi (Flamelings)




Darklings: descendants of those twisted by the Accursed into something foul. Since the Bright War, some tribes of darklings have broken away from the influence of the Accursed and now try to live alongside others amiably... to mixed results.



Orcs (Bladelings - as they made up the majority of the Accursed's infantry)

Goblinoids (Beastlings)

Goblins (Ratlings)
Hobgoblins (Wolflings)
Bugbears (Bearlings)
Drakelings - those creatures given traits of dragons who are universally unnatural fusions of Light and Dark in this setting, none inherently good or evil though their origins were as servants for the later.

Dragonborn (Blastlings - on account of the "blast" they can make with their breath weapon)
Kobolds (Whelplings)
Drow (Shadelings)




Brightlings: those who have some partial Illar heritage. Technically this includes the Illar as well, but I'll just list the Aenar family tree to keep it relatively simple. They are beings of magic and power. While mortal, they should not be mistaken as comparable to their more mundane kin.



Accursed: those who turned against the Illar and toward the Darkness in their pursuit to take the Fruit of the Tree. They had the Light ripped away from them, becoming creatures of the Darkness like the fiends and aberrations that they consorted with.

Dark Aenar: these are aenar who grew tired of watching their mortal kin die again and again long before the Bright Wars. They left the World of Light (essentially they sailed off the edge of the world) and built the City of Shadow long before the sun or moon ever rose. They have severe sensitivity to their light and rarely return to the World of Light as a result.

Night Aenar: these are Aenar who stayed loyal to the Illar during the Bright Wars but faced with the cost of victory decided to leave the World of Light and join the Dark Aenar in exile. They are not as sensitive as the Dark Aenar but do still suffer sunlight sensitivity.

Day Aenar: these are Aenar who stayed loyal to the Illar during the Bright Wars and remain in the world today. They are still worshiped as spirits or demigods and while the Illar no longer allow direct contact between the Brightlings and other mortals, they may receive offerings or petitions at shrines relevant to their porfolio in places they are thought to live. People also pray to them for various reasons and sometimes the local spirits (at least the good ones) do pass those messages on to their Aenar masters.

Celestial Aenar: the closest servants to the Illar and those with the strongest Illar heritage. They are associated most strongly with the enigmatic Illar and so also the stars. They are prayed to for funerary rites to receive the souls of the departed as well as matters regarding leadership, purpose and fate. They are viewed as the shepherds of souls dead and stewards of destiny.

Forest Aenar: those Aenar, predominantly of woodling heritage, who now dwell deep in the forests of the world and are associated with the fires of the heart that drives Darkness away. They watch over the resurgence of life in the wake of the Bright Wars and strive to keep all the Children of Light free from the influence of the Darkness. They are prayed to for fertility, prosperity, hope and also for protection from the Darkness - so if there was fear of monsters or say a witch in a village, they would pray to Forest Aenar to keep them from being bewitched.

Sky Aenar: those Aenar, predominantly of windling heritage, who now travel the heavens and gather on mountain summits. They are said to tend to lightning and they are said to deliver harsh storms as strikes against the forces of evil. They are prayed to in times of war and conflict for strength and more generally for good weather, reliable rains and to keep the ill intentions of others away from themselves.

Land Aenar: those Aenar, predominantly of earthling heritage, who now wander mortal lands (often in disguise) and are associated with the sun. They are the closest to their non-divine cousins and hold a warmth for them that others do not. They are prayed to for healing, for travelling and for protection from beasts.

Water Aenar: those Aenar, predominantly of merling heritage, who now dwell in the sea and are associated with the moon. They are said to travel the waterways of the world, tending to the needs of river as well as ocean and to watch over the dreams of mortals in the process. They are prayed to for peace, tranquility, calm heads, good thinking, prudence, sweet dreams. They are a favorite of scholars and daydreamers.

Mountain Aenar: those Aenar, predominantly of deepling heritage, who now dwell below the earth and tend to the fire at the heart of the world. They are said to have immense forges and smithies where they craft the tools, weapons and armor of the Brightlings. They are prayed to by craftspeople of all kinds as well as miners (to guide them to valuable ores), farmers (to provide fertile earth) and by anyone on any occasion they need a fire to light or stay lit.

Keepers/ Grey Aenar: There are some places that it is forbidden to go, save perhaps for a few priest(esse)s deemed worthy to tread on sacred ground. These places are guarded by the Keepers or the Grey Aenar. These are zealots who in the wake of the Bright Wars could not simply return to life as stewards of the Children of Light. Instead they dedicated themselves to protecting the scions of the Tree of Life, guarding their powerful magic and in the hopes of rebuilding a lesser version of their ancient edenic home. They are avoided, not prayed to. While they usually stand guard over their sacred lands, as the most militant of the brightlings, they can march on suspected incursions of the forces of Darkness. In folklore, these marches are greatly feared, seen as an ill omen or even a threat to any who happen to be in their way.

Wild Aenar: those Aenar who stood by the Illar and still stand against the Accursed, but they have grown ever more self-centered in the eons since. Some may well be mad, and can be hostile even to other Aenar. They dwell in inhospitable wilderness where few other than darklings ever wander. These are to be appeased rather than prayed to, though there are some who are desperate enough to leave offerings in their ruined shrines to seek revenge or power. Doing so almost always brings ill fortune, though it may not always be to the petitioner.






Some isolated few mortals are born with a strong connection to the Light. This might be a sign of distant, latent brightling heritage or a blessing from the stars above but among the servants of the Light these children are cherished as Brightmarked (aasimar).

Conversely, there are some born with an affinity for the Dark, the fire in their hearts being weakened or absent. This is not unheard of with Darklings (in particular, it is noted to happen amongst shadelings/drow) and is simply a side-effect of the experiments performed on their ancestors. With others, it is thought to be a curse or a sign the mother is a witch. These children are deeply pitied - if not outright shunned - as Darkmarked (tieflings).

Half-elves (keeplings) and half-orcs (dirklings) are what you'd expect them to be. Half-elves are assumed to be half-seerling (high elf). The shadelings (drow) are primarily twisted versions of the seerlings (high elves). The seerlings and branchlings (wood elves) have a shared cultural heritage and probably some shared ancestry because long ago branchlings were charged with guarding the first seers by the Aenar after the Bright War. Forest and Rock gnomes are no more related to each other than they are to halflings, and if someone wanted to play a deep gnome I'd just treat it as a kind of rock gnome.

[Xania]

Thanks for answering, mine is a mess and fairly undecided.


Never thought that celestials and fiends could need an origin and simply assumed they have been always there, things like lamasus or chimeras are them.

Titans are extint, just like their rivals the colossuses, wich turned into fomorians.

Don't know if elves are plant-based, evolved humans or both. They include satyrs, nymphs, dryads and forest giants.
No clue about were dwarves came from -.-

Humans are most likely extint and turned into halflings.

Acient giants (extint) turned into hill giants (standard giant for me), some of them turned into other types becoming celestial/fiend/planar touched. Hill giants still exist though.
Don't know about ogres and goliaths.

Carnivorous apes (extint) are the common ancestor of bugbears and orcs. Monster manual carnivorous ape still exist, but renamed as mangani for confortability.
Bugbears are still the strongest but all my goblinoids are medium sized, hobgoblins and goblins appeared when bugbears tried to imitate how elves act.
Most orcs are like humans are in the old Planet of the Apes movie. Orogs and probably mountain orcs on the other hand are as they are expected to be.

Gnomes are everywhere and take all the "minion creature" place, taking as much of the shape of who they are serving as possible.
Doppelgangers probably came from them.

Half-orcs are domesticated orcs, maybe half-ogres are similar or just smaller ogres. Don't know what half-elves are.

Fomorians created ettins and cyclops from hill giants, they could have created orogs and trolls too.

[GaelofDarkness]

Oh, a reply's no problem - as with any worldbuilder I love to have somebody to babble on about my strange projects to outside my normal group.

I'd say you absolutely DON'T need an origin for fiends and celestials and the like. "They've always been there" is a completely reasonable answer for beings that may well just be intelligent forces of nature. The only reason I wanted to have the divine be related to mortals in my setting was because the point of the setting was a world where the gods were basically people who were... around, if you went looking hard enough. Maybe off the edge or the world, but they're THERE.

That might be my main advice for organizing your evolutionary trees if you're ever stuck. Try to think of something you want the evolutionary trees to accomplish, an explanation of some feature of the setting or an aspect of it's founding myth, and let that guide where you put what. Sort of generic world building advice since it applies to most things, but it works!

E.g. if you want the evolutionary trees to explain why certain humanoid species can have hybrid offspring, you might want them to have recent common ancestors, have one be the result of experiments on the other or have one be created in the other's image by a deity - something like that. Or, if in a setting you wanted a lot of tension between two species, maybe they used to be one species but split when one faction started following an antagonistic power or deity (as happens with the drow and Lolth in Forgotten Realms). If you wanted to make a parallel between two creature's common mechanics - like two PC races having similar stat increases maybe - then that could be because of common ancestry long ago.

And, MOST IMPORTANTLY, it is entirely fine for there to be mystery in a setting's lore. Certain creatures or races having a mysterious origin is fine (even a good thing). Not knowing what the deal with ogres or goliaths is could just be a gap in society's knowledge. Maybe there's a bunch of wild theories running around about them, but nobody knows for sure. You'd probably want to know stuff about how they live NOW, where you might find them - that sort of thing - and if they had any major roles in the setting's history, but everything else can be a mystery. Maybe half-elves are just a race that exists in the world that get called half-elves because they look kinda like elves but, like, only a bit - maybe they REALLY hate the comparison and actually have a huge rivalry with elves that they might have no relation to at all (or maybe they do, who knows!).

I like that bugbears are the original goblinoid species, because I feel like that's often the reverse of the norm. Gnomes and doppelgangers in this setting are particularly interesting too. Are the titans linked to these ancient giants or are they distinct? If the conflict between the titans and colossi was a significant part of the setting's founding myth then perhaps that's where dwarves came from. Maybe the titans made a bunch of humans into dwarves - those that didn't end up dying off or shrunk into halflings anyways. Of course, these are just stuff that popped into my head, and you should do whatever you want!

Enjoy the world-building ride!

[jqavins]

I've posted most of this before in other threads, but since you've asked...

I'm working (very VERY slowly) on a setting (that might actually see the light of day some day) in which I'm trying to pare back the huge number of races and monsters to just a few basics in an attempt to, paradoxically, bring back the newness that D&D had when we first discovered it. I hope to rely on story telling and the setting itself to create a sense of wonder, because I find that encountering another new species every week actually gets old and detracts.

That said, part of using that to renew the game is to change the basics that I'm using. But not change them too much.

Humanoids are the sentient beings evolved naturally from a common ancestor. Orcs, goblins, humans, and probably ogres are all roughly as closely related as related as modern humans and neanderthals. Maybe more distant than that, but closer than humans and chimps. All of these are cross fertile, though the half-this and half-that are usually infertile, somewhat like mules but with the fertile ones being a little bit less rare.

The fey (a.k.a. faeries) are magical incarnations of natural and elemental forces. There are many; I haven't cataloged them all. One is a magical incarnation of magic itself. A given natural or elemental force, e.g. water, may have numerous fey incarnations such as water in a forest, the ocean, water in the desert, etc. As far as anyone in the world knows, these all arose spontaneously when pure magic concentrated and took on the forms of its surroundings. Behind the scenes, that's probably the way I'll go.

The next part is not well known, if known at all, by those that live in the world. (Which means the players won't know it, which means that I'm really just making it up for my own amusement, but what the heck?) At a few times in evolutionary history, populations of humanoids have been altered by contact with the magical forces of the fey. These are the fey-touched. The various elves are fey-touched humans; high elves are magic-touched, wood elves are forest-touched, etc. Dwarves are earth-touched goblins that live on the surface or in the mines they like to dig; kobolds are also fey-touched goblins, but formed in deep, dark natural cave systems. Fey-touched are generally cross-fertile with their root species and may occasionally manage to conceive with the other humanoids. All half fey-touched are infertile, invariably.

There are other fey-touched, but those are the major ones (and I haven't though up more yet). I'm thinking a good number of the monster-only species may come from this, including fey-touched animals. As I write this, it occurs to me that the various dragon colors and metals (or whatever I might use instead) might be fey-touched versions of some original proto-dragon that may or may not still be extent.

I'm eliminating gnomes. If I use halflings they may be another humanoid or they may be another fey-touched; I haven't decided.

[Xania]

@GaelofDarkness

True, that's how i imagine them to be, but seeing how both celestials and fiends had an origin in both settings catched my attention.

I actually like that explanation for half-elves, maybe letting it unclear if they are related to elves or not is better for this.

Thanks, for more subversion, goblins are the last breed to appear in the world.
Strangelly what i did with gnomes started when i tried to use gnoll with the "gnome + troll" meaning.
Yes, they are linked. When they got defeated the titans eventually turned into those ancestral giants, oddly becoming "better persons" than they were as titans, while the colossi turned worse.
Dwarves coming from human slaves sounds good enough for me, that explanation for elves is nice too. If i can't find something else that should serve.

[Sizzlefoot]

I had an idea about dwarves recently, that they're demon-worshippers. They believe that the demons forged dwarves in the heart of the earth and sent them digging upwards on a pilgrimage to the surface. Or maybe dwarves were demons who came to the surface and adapted to live there.

[BWR]

Not mine, but Mystara. All goblinoids (including orcs) are descended from beastmen. The beastmen were spirits of evil mortals reincarnated into bestial humanoid form as punishment. Later the bestial, chimeric creatures bred into the various goblinoid races (and subraces) we know today.

Oh, and gnolls are not related to the wolf/doglike lupins nor the humanoid jackalfolk called hutakaan, but are the result of ancient wizards messing around with trolls and gnomes - hence the name.

[Xania]

Not mine, but Mystara. All goblinoids (including orcs) are descended from beastmen. The beastmen were spirits of evil mortals reincarnated into bestial humanoid form as punishment. Later the bestial, chimeric creatures bred into the various goblinoid races (and subraces) we know today.

Oh, and gnolls are not related to the wolf/doglike lupins nor the humanoid jackalfolk called hutakaan, but are the result of ancient wizards messing around with trolls and gnomes - hence the name.


Mine could have been "created" by elves when they started to fight the bugbears, being why they try to imitate how elves act.
Don't know if i ever used those hyaena-gnolls.

[Xania]

I had an idea about dwarves recently, that they're demon-worshippers. They believe that the demons forged dwarves in the heart of the earth and sent them digging upwards on a pilgrimage to the surface. Or maybe dwarves were demons who came to the surface and adapted to live there.


I think i like the former option a little more, although being demons is weirder.

[Bohandas]

*Mindflayers will eventually evolve from githyanki before going back in time

*Beholders are some kind of opabinia

[Grim Portent]

For the setting I'm currently tinkering with loosely based on some British Isles folklore most creatures arose from different human or near human cultures, generally as a result of being nearly exterminated or having interacted with things that changed them fundamentally.

Core race is men, divided into numerous large tribes distinguished by their different cultural regions. Broadly based on the Gaelic Celts, Brythonic Celts (post Roman influence), Angles and Saxons, and Norse.

So there's the Fey, an immortal race with heavy class stratification, formerly a tribe of humans who made a bargain with something incredibly powerful and distant in exchange for becoming what they are now. They don't think of themselves as related to the mortal humans anymore and largely find them annoying or hate them for defeating them in a war and driving them underground. Their most powerful members could be considered godlike.

Trolls were also a race of men until they were driven from their tribal lands by invaders and forced to live in the wilds. Calling on various magics they transformed themselves into the long lived and magical trolls, so they could more easily survive the harsh and infertile lands they fled to and seek revenge on their enemies.

Selkies, Kelpies, Boobries, Orcs (pig monsters for this setting) and various other shapeshifting creatures were once fey who refused to leave the world when their kind were defeated by humankind and locked themselves into various bestial forms to circumvent the arrangement that was made.

Dragons and many similar monsters are humans or other mortals permanently transformed by magic, curses or just extremely severe cases of moral failings like greed or pride.

Changelings and the Foundlings are fey spirits swapped with human children and those children that have been stolen. Changelings are mostly bitter spiteful creatures, most don't fully function like humans and are physically deformed, being puppets made to be decoys. The Foundlings are similarly dysfunctional, having been twisted by their time with the fey, they tend to be hedonistic, cruel and selfish, having occupied a prize place among the court of the fey lords. Foundlings spend decades or centuries with the Fey, being treated like royalty and joining the lords and ladies on their hunts into the mortal world, but are almost always cast out once their presence grows tiresome. To most they seem like mad children who grow into wicked men, fond of violence and malevolent humour, but they possess knowledge of fey magic that few other humans can ever possess.

Elves used to be part of the fey tribes, but were cast out for an act of murder that the kings and queens could not abide. Elves are not permitted to return to the timeless realms of the fey on pain of death, so they have been condemned to an immortal life whilst being subject to the passage of time. Outwardly a young elf appears as a proud and regal humanlike being with an otherworldly air, but as they age their bodies wither and rot, cracking and splitting like a fallen tree being eaten by fungi and insects. To hide their mouldering forms they cloak themselves in glamours and illusions and sequester their homes on islands veiled by mist and fog.

[Xania]

For the setting I'm currently tinkering with loosely based on some British Isles folklore most creatures arose from different human or near human cultures, generally as a result of being nearly exterminated or having interacted with things that changed them fundamentally.

Core race is men, divided into numerous large tribes distinguished by their different cultural regions. Broadly based on the Gaelic Celts, Brythonic Celts (post Roman influence), Angles and Saxons, and Norse.

So there's the Fey, an immortal race with heavy class stratification, formerly a tribe of humans who made a bargain with something incredibly powerful and distant in exchange for becoming what they are now. They don't think of themselves as related to the mortal humans anymore and largely find them annoying or hate them for defeating them in a war and driving them underground. Their most powerful members could be considered godlike.

Trolls were also a race of men until they were driven from their tribal lands by invaders and forced to live in the wilds. Calling on various magics they transformed themselves into the long lived and magical trolls, so they could more easily survive the harsh and infertile lands they fled to and seek revenge on their enemies.

Selkies, Kelpies, Boobries, Orcs (pig monsters for this setting) and various other shapeshifting creatures were once fey who refused to leave the world when their kind were defeated by humankind and locked themselves into various bestial forms to circumvent the arrangement that was made.

Dragons and many similar monsters are humans or other mortals permanently transformed by magic, curses or just extremely severe cases of moral failings like greed or pride.

Changelings and the Foundlings are fey spirits swapped with human children and those children that have been stolen. Changelings are mostly bitter spiteful creatures, most don't fully function like humans and are physically deformed, being puppets made to be decoys. The Foundlings are similarly dysfunctional, having been twisted by their time with the fey, they tend to be hedonistic, cruel and selfish, having occupied a prize place among the court of the fey lords. Foundlings spend decades or centuries with the Fey, being treated like royalty and joining the lords and ladies on their hunts into the mortal world, but are almost always cast out once their presence grows tiresome. To most they seem like mad children who grow into wicked men, fond of violence and malevolent humour, but they possess knowledge of fey magic that few other humans can ever possess.

Elves used to be part of the fey tribes, but were cast out for an act of murder that the kings and queens could not abide. Elves are not permitted to return to the timeless realms of the fey on pain of death, so they have been condemned to an immortal life whilst being subject to the passage of time. Outwardly a young elf appears as a proud and regal humanlike being with an otherworldly air, but as they age their bodies wither and rot, cracking and splitting like a fallen tree being eaten by fungi and insects. To hide their mouldering forms they cloak themselves in glamours and illusions and sequester their homes on islands veiled by mist and fog.


Don't knew if dragons were going to exist, that's probably the best thing to do with them.
Other myths started with them appearing as tiny worms in a well, maybe they grow absorving those greed and pride.

[Jendekit]

There's a Stone Age setting of mine that I call Dawn of Humanoids, where the core pc races haven't yet evolved. The playable races are instead the common ancestors of those traditional races. In essence, it's a setting set millions of years before most fantasy settings would take place.

The playable races are:

Ebu Gogo: a short, primarily river dwelling race that eventually evolve into dwarves, gnomes, and halflings
Karabo: the oldest race, and on the verge of extinction
Shanidar: the broad, strong, and stubborn ancestors of orcs
Turkana: the plains dwelling ancestor of elves and humans
Ukuhleka: the coastal hunters that evolve into gnolls


I'll fill out more after I get off work.

[Bohandas]

PHB humans are actually crossbreeds consisting of about 50% human and 50% miscellaneous (ie. celestial, fiend, dragon, fey, elf, orc, etc.)

[Grim Portent]

Don't knew if dragons were going to exist, that's probably the best thing to do with them.
Other myths started with them appearing as tiny worms in a well, maybe they grow absorving those greed and pride.

I took a leaf from things like Fafnir and Scylla as well as the minotaur for things like dragons. Fafnir was a dwarf who became a dragon through his greed driving him to hide in the wilderness to protect his cursed treasure, Scylla was a naiad poisoned and cursed to a monstrous form because of other women being jealous of her beauty, and the minotaur was a punishment birthed from Minos' wife for his crime of not sacrificing the divine bull of Poseidon as he was supposed to.

Since I rather like the idea of most monsters being rare or unique such specific origins fit pretty well in games for me. So there's one chimera with a lion/goat/snake combo, but there might be similar monsters made of other parts somewhere, there's one minotaur or only one being who makes minotaurs, but other manbeasts may exist. Lots of manticores though.

[SkipSandwich]

For a long time my headcannon for halflings has them as "cousins" to humanity, being an offshoot of Monkeys rather than apes, with certain ethnic groups of haflings even possessing prehensile tails.

Another long headcannon has been "High Elves as Vault-Dwellers" or basiclly extraplanar refugees clinging to the remnants of an advanced magitech civilization. They must be regularly exposed to a specific type of magical radiation or else begin to lose both thier sanity and magical affinity, becoming Feral Elves(Orcs). Other subraces of elves and elf-like beings are just elves who have managed to successfully transition to a different source of magical sustenance.

Wood Elves = The Faewild
Drow = The Underdark
Genisai = Various Elemental Planes

[Draconi Redfir]

In my world, the three primary "Kingdoms" of creatures kind of resemble the relations between Humans and our real-world apes.

in the "Humanoid" Kingdom, Humans and Elves are fairly closely related cousins, only diverging in the past one or two million years or so. similar to humans and Chimps or Chimps and Bonobos. while Orcs are a more distant relation similar to Humans and Gorillas. The key thing though is that they're still close enough to interbreed. As Humans, Elves, and Orcs can not breed with the other two kingdoms, but can with eachother. The three do share common ancestors with the other two kingdoms, but they are so distantly related that interbreeding viably is impossible.

In the "Dwarvenoid" Kingdom, we have Dwarves, Halflings, and Gnomes. I don't have a lot of ideas for this particular branch, but i feel like Dwarves were the first to separate from their shared ancestor, leaving the common ancester between Halflings and Gnomes behind. Eventually, some members of that common ancestor migrated into a valley that was slowly filling with chaotic primal / wild magic. Those members evolved to adapt to that growing magic and became Gnomes as the valley became the rough equivalent of that world's Feywild. Any human or non-Gnome that tries to enter that valley without proper protective gear will be torn apart. Halflings are sort of just what's left over, evolving in a very human-like way, but shorter. I imagine Dwarves and Halflings can interbreed with no issue, though there may be issues with trying to interbreed with Gnomes due to the involvement of primal Magic. The Dwarvenoids are related to the Humanoids, as well as the third Kingdom, but that relation is much more different.

and finally the third Kingdom are the "Goblinoids", Goblins, Hobgoblins, and Bugbears. Simply due to the large difference in average size between Goblins and Bugbears, i suspect that all three share a recent Common ancestor that most resembled Hobgoblins, with Gnomes and Bugbears both branching off from it at relatively the same time. These divergences may even have been somewhat intentional, perhaps an ancient tribal Caste-system prevented smaller, weaker members from breeding outside their caste, and the larger, harrier members from breeding outside their own. The larger members may have eventually left or been left behind from the primary population and grew to live in the mountains to become Bugbears, while the weaker caste was either raised in captivity, or had several escapees who lived in hiding from their higher-caste rulers and eventually became Goblins. while the dominant caste again had a somewhat human-like evolutionary path and became Hobgoblins. Like with the other two Kingdoms, Goblinoids can interbreed with each-other, they just rarely do. They also share a common ancestor with the Humanoids and Dwarvenoids, though theirs was probably the first to branch off, leaving the common ancestor between the other two Kingdoms to evolve on it's own for awhile.



Trolls on the other hand are their own completely separate evolutionary path, not related to goblins, humans, giants, or anything else. They're Starfish. At some point, a species of Starfish figured out how to breathe air, then how to move it's larger limbs to get around, and now they're eight-foot-tall human-ish shaped creatures with no bones, Keratin teeth, and a complex biological system to allow the Regeneration Trolls are typically known for.

[Xania]

@Jendekit

That setting is appropiate for this thread ^^


@Grim Portent

True! I remembered a story about somebody turning into a dragon, but forgot the names and even him being a dwarf before.
I agree about that kind of monster being made.


@Draconi Redfir

Trolls are starfish based?

[Draconi Redfir]

@Draconi Redfir

Trolls are starfish based?

Mine are yeah. i wanted an explanation for their regenerative abilities (Re-growing entire limbs, cutting them in half creating two Trolls, etc) that was something natural and not just "Because magic." and that eventually boiled down to "They're hyper-evolved Starfish", since Starfish are capable those same regenerative feats.

[GaelofDarkness]

Huh, hyper-evolved starfish, eh? That's really interesting. Starfish are in the phylum Echinodermata - who are actually pretty close cousins to us vertebrates being deuterostomes and all. Well, "close" being a relative word. Do you take advantage of their pentamerism (five-way symmetry) to create some really freaky looking trolls, cause that'd look AWESOME. Like a troll with two eyes up front and three more hidden around it's head under all that shaggy hair ready to pop out and freak a PC out in the right circumstances.

[Draconi Redfir]

Huh, hyper-evolved starfish, eh? That's really interesting. Starfish are in the phylum Echinodermata - who are actually pretty close cousins to us vertebrates being deuterostomes and all. Well, "close" being a relative word. Do you take advantage of their pentamerism (five-way symmetry) to create some really freaky looking trolls, cause that'd look AWESOME. Like a troll with two eyes up front and three more hidden around it's head under all that shaggy hair ready to pop out and freak a PC out in the right circumstances.

not quite sadly :P Still wanted them to be roughly humanoid, so i had their evolutionary path shrink down on of their five "arms" into a head / nose area while the other four were used for locomotion, and eventually the standard two arms/legs. i DO have their Hair be what's left of the Cillia that Starfish walk around on though. so it's all thick, wirey, and probably still has some nerve endings to it, making it difficult to cut.

what i DID give them though is a semi-decentralized nervous system. To explain how a Troll can grow into two separate Trolls if cut in half, i have it so that Trolls have five "Proto-brains" throughout their bodies. One in the head, which holds most information and memories, and one in each thigh and shoulder that also double as general muscles. So long as at least one of these brains is intact, the Troll (or remains of a Troll) will be able to re-grow any missing body parts so long as it's not on the verge of starvation. Any Troll born through this method who had to re-grow their head is given the derogatory term "Genner" (for re-generation) and treated as a semi second-class citizen under the ownership of the original Troll (The one who still had the original head) and/or their closest family.

Bloodflow and breathing are a bit more tricky, as they wouldn't be able to ave centralized systems like a heart and lungs. i know somewhere in This Video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=om0xmuFbAF4) describes a primitive way to keep blood-flowing without a heart, which is what a decapitated arm would need in order to stay alive. i just haven't put in the proper research or writing on it yet. Breathing... thinking maybe they don't have sweat glands, so instead they have pores along their body that push and pull air in and out through their skin to help them cool off. That could be used to help breath maybe? not sure.

[GaelofDarkness]

To explain how a Troll can grow into two separate Trolls if cut in half, i have it so that Trolls have five "Proto-brains" throughout their bodies. One in the head, which holds most information and memories, and one in each thigh and shoulder that also double as general muscles. So long as at least one of these brains is intact, the Troll (or remains of a Troll) will be able to re-grow any missing body parts so long as it's not on the verge of starvation. Any Troll born through this method who had to re-grow their head is given the derogatory term "Genner" (for re-generation) and treated as a semi second-class citizen under the ownership of the original Troll (The one who still had the original head) and/or their closest family.

That is so cool. Seriously, that is absolutely fascinating!

[Draconi Redfir]

That is so cool. Seriously, that is absolutely fascinating!

thanks!:smallbiggrin: been working on them for a few years. and it all started out just because i wanted a non-magical explanation for their regeneration:smalltongue:

[Xania]

thanks!:smallbiggrin: been working on them for a few years. and it all started out just because i wanted a non-magical explanation for their regeneration:smalltongue:

Mine were shapeless forms with a texture reminiscent of a snail that were attracted to magical places, then when i tried to search for a non-magical explanation tried to make them newt-like amphibians, but starfishes wouldn't never cross my mind.

[Draconi Redfir]

i think for me the whole starfish thing came to mind when trying to figure out how cutting a Troll in half from any angle resulted in two Trolls. As far as i know, Starfish are the only species capable of doing anything like that. (A lot of people will think Worms, but i think that's a myth.)

[Grim Portent]

i think for me the whole starfish thing came to mind when trying to figure out how cutting a Troll in half from any angle resulted in two Trolls. As far as i know, Starfish are the only species capable of doing anything like that. (A lot of people will think Worms, but i think that's a myth.)

Earthworms can't, they can sometimes survive the back end being cut off but they don't really regenerate.

There are other worms that can though, mostly flatworms as I recall. Planarians are the best example I can think of, cut lengthwise or crosswise they can regenerate into two separate worms.

[Bohandas]

Sponges even moreso. I recall first hearing during college about an experimwnt where they forced a seasponge throuh a mesh screen and a few days (hours? weeks? I forget the timespan) later it was completely healed. They can also regenerate from any broken off fragment that contains all of their main cell types. So of you took that seperated sponge tissue and put it into a bunch of different containers then you could make almost any amount of sponges you wanted to

http://lowcountryestuarium.org/curators-corner/no-63-the-enigmatic-porifera-part-ii/

[Xania]

That's true, but making them sponge-based would be too much.

[Max_Killjoy]

Can be natural or under any other form, like a curse, being laboratory creations or anything else.
I would like to know about how some creatures appeared, who were their ancestors, if they are now extinct and if they still have related creatures around.



In one of my settings, the creation cosmology is an implication of or metaphor for the big bang, the old gods are the "mad souls" of the universe who long for the dreamlike state of the singularity, and it's implied but never stated that the world is the first world with life or intelligent life anywhere in the universe. Life may have evolved, there's a reference to the old gods wandering bored for countless ages until coming across intelligent life for the first time, thinking "Oh, someone to talk to!" and then accidentally annihilating the mortal because the mortal couldn't handle the full directed attention of such an entity. Some of the intelligent species on this little spec came into being on their own, and some are the result of morbid curiosity and meddling on the part of the old gods... the days of dark whimsy are over, though, as the old gods were usurped by post-apotheosis mortals-become-gods.

~~~

In another setting, twin solar creator deities interloped in the infinite timeless dark, and brought a world into existence. They made more deities, and with their children, they populated the world with all manner of life, culminating in the various Peoples -- the Sun People, the Earth People, the Moon People, the Storm People, the Fire People, etc. The Dark was curious what they were up to, and learned how they created life, and made its own children... Night, Twilight, Shadow, Underworld*, etc. Twilight, Night, and Shadow in turn created the Twilight People, with a mote of darkness for a soul instead of a spark of light. From Dark's attempts also came things like dragons, and monsters that turn to stone or ash in the full light of day, and other creatures. The solar deities could not stand to see their Creation stained by darkness, and so directed their favored children, the Sun People, to wipe the Twilight People and all their "cousins" of the night from the world... but in the final battle of the Bright Age, when the twin solar gods and the dark deities (Twilight, Night, and Shadow) did battle in the ruins of the Twilight People's lands, the dark gods sacrificed themselves to save their creations and obliterate the twin solar deities. The dark deities are now specters wandering the fringes of creation, while the solar deities were shattered into countless pieces, resulting in a myriad of petty local gods rising up, and dormant fragments in the hidden places of the world. One of the solar deities' children took their place, and so now there is only one sun in the sky instead of two.

* Underworld, the goddess of hidden places, the deceased, and fire, is the result of arch subterfuge on the part of the dark, for while she was born of the creator deities, she is as much the dark's child as she is theirs... and so she is also the deity of duplicity and duality, holding fire in one hand and darkness in the other.

[Sizzlefoot]

I had an idea where gnomes, goblins, etc. evolved from creatures more similar to monkeys than human ancestors.

[Xania]

In one of my settings, the creation cosmology is an implication of or metaphor for the big bang, the old gods are the "mad souls" of the universe who long for the dreamlike state of the singularity, and it's implied but never stated that the world is the first world with life or intelligent life anywhere in the universe. Life may have evolved, there's a reference to the old gods wandering bored for countless ages until coming across intelligent life for the first time, thinking "Oh, someone to talk to!" and then accidentally annihilating the mortal because the mortal couldn't handle the full directed attention of such an entity. Some of the intelligent species on this little spec came into being on their own, and some are the result of morbid curiosity and meddling on the part of the old gods... the days of dark whimsy are over, though, as the old gods were usurped by post-apotheosis mortals-become-gods.

~~~

In another setting, twin solar creator deities interloped in the infinite timeless dark, and brought a world into existence. They made more deities, and with their children, they populated the world with all manner of life, culminating in the various Peoples -- the Sun People, the Earth People, the Moon People, the Storm People, the Fire People, etc. The Dark was curious what they were up to, and learned how they created life, and made its own children... Night, Twilight, Shadow, Underworld*, etc. Twilight, Night, and Shadow in turn created the Twilight People, with a more of darkness for a soul instead of a spark of light. From Dark's attempts also came things like dragons, and monsters that turn to stone or ash in the full light of day, and other creatures. The solar deities could not stand to see their Creation stained by darkness, and so directed their favored children, the Sun People, to wipe the Twilight People and all their "cousins" of the night from the world... but in the final battle of the Bright Age, when the twin solar gods and the dark deities (Twilight, Night, and Shadow) did battle in the ruins of the Twilight People's lands, the dark gods sacrificed themselves to save their creations and obliterate the twin solar deities. The dark deities are now specters wandering the fringes of creation, the solar deities were shattered into countless pieces, resulting in a myriad of petty local gods rising up, and dormant fragments in the hidden places of the world. One of the solar deities' children took their place, and so now there is only one sun in the sky instead of two.

* Underworld, the goddess of hidden places, the deceased, and fire, is the result of arch subterfuge on the part of the dark, for while is was born of the creator deities, she is as much the dark's child as she is theirs... and so she is also the deity of duplicity and duality, holding fire in one hand and darkness in the other.


I specially like the second setting, are those petty gods a little more like angels or they still count as fully funtional gods?

[Xania]

I had an idea where gnomes, goblins, etc. evolved from creatures more similar to monkeys than human ancestors.

Now i want to make capuchin monkey-based halflings

[John Out West]

I always like to create an ecology of monsters that fit into an ecosystem, and was particularly happy when i designed this one:

The Torsos, Hollows, Doublestuffs, Dour Wood, and Night Men

Torsos are small Shadow Fiends from the Shadow Realm, the place where everyone goes when they die. Their purpose, as designed by the god of death and reincarnation, was to weaken unworthy mortals to allow other Shadow Fiends to drag them towards Reincarnation. They would do this by sucking the flesh from their skin, leaving them as a more vulnerable ghost. With their shadow body now filled with the mortal's flesh, they rush off to a nearby perch to shuffle off the flesh, which takes about 24 hours. If the mortal can find them and kill them before this, they can take their flesh back.
This is only really interesting when brought out of the Shadow Realm, either through a portal or a crack between realms, as they will continue to do their job in the mortal realm. They will find people, take their flesh, shuffle it off, and repeat, until they are killed and thereby returned to the realm of the dead.

This process creates Ghosts. Unlike typical spirits, these were not returned from the realm of the dead for some great business or vengeance, and instead are simply made hollow by the Torsos. The Hollows are extremely confused, with a tremendous feeling of emptiness which they can directly attribute to their loss of body. Seeking to rectify this, the Hollows will rush to attack anyone nearby, and once they have been subdued, they will enter into their body, placing two souls in one mortal vessel.
If the Hollows are instead defeated, their soul is stripped of power, transforms into a snowflake, and floats off in the wind until it can reconstitute. Once they have regained their strength, these Hollows become normal ghosts and lose the thirst for a body. They will seek help to enter into the Shadow Realm.

Two souls are not supposed to be in one mortal body. When a Hollow enters into a mortal, it creates what is colloquially called a "Double Stuff." One spirit will attach itself to the skeleton, while the other to the flesh, and the creatures will partially separate. Doublestuffs often have a shared lower half, while the upper half includes crouching pile of flesh, and a standing skeleton. They will scream in constant pain and confusion, with two voices, in an unearthly scream and a fleshy, gurgling groan. The confusion quickly turns to anger, and these Doublestuffs, drenched with the necrotic energy of two souls kneading together, will begin attacking anything that is nearby. The necrotic energy that fuels them makes them especially deadly, and they are able to take a serious amount of damage before dying.
Unlike the Hollows, once the body is destroyed, the souls are released to the shadow realm, allowing them to reincarnate.

Meanwhile, after sucking the flesh off of a creature, the torsos will rush off to find a perch in which to shuffle off their flesh. This is, most often, a tree that is secluded in a nearby forest. They will often choose the same tree, and after enough attempts, the tree will become soaked in necrotic energy. It will become fleshy inside, and will bleed when the bark is cut. It will begin to move, and will grow a face with a gnarling jaw. It will sink its roots into the flesh of the nearby dead, and transform them into Night Men. These Night Men have the purpose, given to them by the Dourwood Tree, to return corpses to it to feed the roots of the necrotic tree and further sustain it. Once the graveyards have been emptied, these Night Men always begin capturing the living, often alive, and burying them underneath the necrotic tree.

I DM'd a story with these guys as the antagonists for about two games, and was super fun. I'm writing a horror campaign that uses them, but its hard to get everything into one conducive campaign story.

[Max_Killjoy]

I specially like the second setting, are those petty gods a little more like angels or they still count as fully functional gods?


Demi-gods, local gods and powerful spirits, "angels", etc. Leaves room for a lot of little local cults and strangeness while also having the "big gods" be universal across the setting.

It would take one of them somehow gathering up a lot of those shards (subsuming or consuming other "petty gods", or finding lost shards across the world, or something) to rise in power to the status of full world-spanning deity.

[jqavins]

It would take one of them somehow gathering up a lot of those shards (subsuming or consuming other "petty gods", or finding lost shards across the world, or something) to rise in power to the status of full world-spanning deity.And saying that much implies that it is possible, which means it is probably inevitable.

[Max_Killjoy]

And saying that much implies that it is possible, which means it is probably inevitable.

And thus in what I'm writing, one of the characters specifically takes it upon herself to prevent an instance of this from happening.

[Altair_the_Vexed]

My currently preferred creature evolution is a merger of Zelazny, Pratchett and Darwin.

First, here's my Zelazny-inspired part:
The Real World is where the game (mostly) takes place. The Real World is a cosmopolitan fantasy setting, with many humanoid species, magical creatures, and so on, in a reasonably Earth-like planet. It even has similar continental forms to our familiar mundane Earth.
However, there are many shadows of the Real World - slightly different alternate versions of the Real World, where at least one event (possibly even as small as a molecular event) has happened differently. Over the aeons since the start of this multiverse, these alternate worlds can be subtly or radically different to the Real World.
It's possible to travel to the other worlds deliberately with magic, and in some cases there are accidental leaks between worlds.
As the Real World is cosmologically central to these alternate worlds, the leaking of other worlds impinges on it the most - there are denizens of the many other worlds here in the Real World: from the strange things that are hard to begin to understand, to the familiar-yet-different things that folk of the Real World take for granted.

Darwinian evolution:
All these alternate worlds have more or less normal Darwinian evolution - there might be some esoteric evolutionary pressure in an alternate world that doesn't make much sense in the Real World, but now that the creature is here instead of there, it has fantastic and strange abilities.
This accounts for multiple species that fit into the same ecosystem niches - they haven't had evolutionary time to wipe each other out. It also allows for the dynamic conflict setting that's typical of a fantasy setting: the various different sentient species are all competing for the same resources, and the clear "otherness" of the other species explains the heightened xenophobia.

Pratchett's collaborative reality:
The Real World is at the heart of a confluence of magical flux from the other worlds - and so the strong thoughts and emotions of thinking beings are sometimes made real. The angels, demons, fey and other exemplar creatures - creatures whose purpose for existence is to embody and exemplify a thought, ideal, hope or fear - they are created by the subconscious of the many folk of the Real World.

---

This setting lets me mess with reality in-game if need be - we can do in-character ret-con, by moving from one world to another. It lets me have creatures that are utterly fantastic (i.e. unrealistic!) along side more normal creatures, without breaking my desire for consistency. It allows for new species to arrive in the game from time to time.

Now to keep it under some sort of control, and not just have an mess of jarring different styles, I keep it fixed on a set of things that are common and consistent - Humans, Halflings, Dwarves, Elves, Goblins, Dragons, and so on. But it's good to know that there's the option to bring in something else, or drop in a new PC who doesn't necessarily fit in...

[jqavins]

The Torsos, Hollows, Doublestuffs, Dour Wood, and Night Men...Are there soulless bodies, zombies for lack of a better name? The crossing of a zombie and a hollow, whether violent or not, could potentially let the hollow take the uninhabited body as its own, becoming a person again, a version of the torso's original victim, a sort of "re-occupied zombie". The same could happen with a zombie and a doublestuff, leaving the hollow's original victim and the same sort of re-occupied zombie (both likely driven insane by the experience of existing as a doublestuff for a time).

This whole process could be conducted by a good aligned necromancer, reanimating the recently dead to make zombie raw material and "curing" hollows and doublestuffs. Or rather, curing hollows then discovering the hard way that, in the case of doublestuffs, both parties are better off dead.

[Draconi Redfir]

I had an idea where gnomes, goblins, etc. evolved from creatures more similar to monkeys than human ancestors.

I've got something similar myself. though only with Goblins. Gnomes in this setting evolved from halflings who moved into a valley that was slowly flooding with raw primal magic, slow enough that they could adapt to live in it years down the line when the magic is strong enough to tear anyone else apart without protection.

[PhoenixPhyre]

I've got something similar myself. though only with Goblins. Gnomes in this setting evolved from halflings who moved into a valley that was slowly flooding with raw primal magic, slow enough that they could adapt to live in it years down the line when the magic is strong enough to tear anyone else apart without protection.

Mine is in reverse.

Goblins came first. Some of them evolved into halflings due to random magic surges during a magical nuclear war. Gnomes are the result of fey or elemental influences on goblins (sorta goblin versions of genasi/aasimar).

[Xania]

The MM goblins were gremlins to me, since everybody i know seems to think in them like the gremlins from the movies, they would be related to gibberlings.

[Beleriphon]

I had an idea where gnomes, goblins, etc. evolved from creatures more similar to monkeys than human ancestors.

I actually had this idea in the taxonomy thread in the main RP section that goblinoids and humanoids are both mammals, but fall into different families, but the same order. So we have hominids and then cobalidids (its Latin for "goblin", and the root for a bunch of words like kobold).

[Bohandas]

Gnomes are in some way related to Xorns. Xorns seem to be related to fire salamanders in D&D in the same way that gnomes are related to fire salamanders in paraclesian alchemy

[Xania]

Now i think about it those gremlins were able to mutate to cover lots of reskinned beings, so in a way they were the ancestors of my current gnomes.

[Xania]

@Beleriphon

That means kobolds are goblins in that world?


@Bohandas

Are gnomes different from the standard ones because of that relation?

[Bohandas]

I don't know, I just realized that recently and I'm not currently in an active game where I can do domething with it