Shifting Sands Wiki

Description:

The opposite from the Massiwalli Plains. The Agricultural Coast is not landlocked or barren. The proximity to the coast brings in regular heavy rains that are used to grow a vast array of foods. Lacking a lot of good solid land to build on, most settlements are small. But the wealth from its food has paid for very good roads and facilities throughout the region.

History:

Largely seen as the sunshine coast, this was a place many people went to for holiday or for retirement. After the war, the winds had changed and made the area a lot wetter than it used to be. This washed down a great amount of nutrients from the mountains to the east. The main settlers found that they could grow more than enough food for themselves and began a lucrative trade with neighbouring regions for machine parts and luxuries required to keep the place running and a decent place to live.

Economy:

Food mostly. Some businesses have set up shop to repair and manufacture agricultural equipment and even export it but most of the organisations and settlements that exist export food and import most other materials with the exception of natural fibre goods which can be grown locally.

Key geography:

Fens, moorland and grasslands dominate the inland areas of the region. Most of them have been turned over to farming. Large salt flats extend around the mouth of the river Argon and Humble where they meet the sea. The ground is generally considered too unstable to support large settlements. The elevation ranges from sea-level in the far west where it meets the sea to 100 ft above where it meets the East Range of foothills and mountains. Beyond this the Massiwalli Plains begin.

Description:

Big spotted gnoll. Partner of Sapphire.

Description:

Machine specialist of the Blue Dragon mercinary group.

Description:

The largest settlement in the Massiwalli Plains. It is ostensibly a Sauren city but there are almost as many humans that live there and a proportion of Elves and Gnolls that live there.

History:

Carthage started as a small trading post centred around the large concrete grain elevator that now now forms the heart of the Carthage Central Record Library. This grain elevator proved to be very easy to defend and so the settlement was able to withstand bandit attacks in the early days of recovery after the apocalypse. This just provided a snowball effect, growing it to be larger, richer and better defended than any other settlement.

Economy:

The main economy is still based on trade, however the size of the population, requirement for defence and access to a lot of materials has let the economy diversify into manufacturing, mercenary work and academic work. One of the most well known companies based in the city is Tarkontech Advanced Firearms, a weapons restorer, manufacturer and innovator. The Central Record Library is the largest academic institute in the Plains.

Key geography:

Carthage is located almost equidistant from all other large topographical features placing it centrally in the Massiwalli Plains. This also places it quite a long distance from a major source of water. It does sit above a vast but deep aquifer, the source of which is unknown. It sits at 120ft above sea level and as with the rest of the Plains, experiences very little weather or temperature fluctuation throughout the year. This is with the exception of heavy winds and dust storms around mid-august.

General appearance:

Skinny, tall beautiful creatures with elongated features and tall heads. Pointy ears go without saying.

Life span:

250-300 years

Sub-types:

Woodelves, Lost Elves

Brief history:

Their history traces their origin story to a great calamity that brought a space-faring ship crashing to the ground. The survivors, though better in every way to the native races of the planet were vastly outnumbered. They spent a lot of their time isolated away as a closed nation unwilling to share anything with the 'lesser races'. A great deal of their time was spent gazing up and the stars and developing sophisticated technologies to try to locate their celestial home world with an intention to transport themselves back there and be with their own kind once more. Since the apocalypse they have seen that the age of Humans is over and now it is the Elven Age. A new expansionist agenda has seized the current generation after seeing how the world has been wrecked by human kind. They suffered greatly in the global catastrophe and see full conquest as the only way to secure their future. They are an intensely magical race and are able to tune into the powerful lay lines that course through the earth.

Description:

Small spotted gnoll. Electrical specialist and lead character in Dust Runners.

General appearance:

Humanoid hyenas. Their appearance can lean between hyena and human quite widely, as can their size and build.

Life span:

40-50 years

Sub-types:

Spotted- the main type based on the spotted hyena. Striped- based on the striped hyena.

Brief history:

Developed as a more economical soldier that can be deployed in war to cut down the political impact through human lives lost. They could be vat grown very quickly and trained through advanced VR technology. They were never developed for a long existence and so genetic compromises that had long-term health consequences were routinely taken. After the apocalypse the gnoll race almost died out. They were trained from day zero to take orders and a lot waited for orders that never came and died where they stood. It was the rogues that were the saviours, disobeying orders from long dead commanders to survive. Now, most gnolls live in nomadic clans that more resemble military units made up of the salvaged military vehicles they used to use. Their hard lives out in the desert wastes and diseases derived from their genetic instability contribute to their short average lifespan.

General appearance:

Take a look in the mirror

Life span:

70-90 years

Sub-types:

Check out the world around you

Brief history:

Pretty close to our people history. They conquered and enslaved the Sauren race during the Age of Exploration along with their own kind. Wars between nations and intention to the global damage unchecked capitalism did to the environment effectively brought about global meltdown. After the apocalypse their habitats, settlements and lives have been closely entwined with the Sauren but on more equal terms.

General appearance:

Vaguely Humanoid hogs. They are bulky, well muscled monsterous creaturs. They can range from boar-like to domestic-pig-like but mostly take the appearance of large, black-blue hogs with tusks.

Life span:

Sub-types:

Brief history:

They are semi-intelligent to almost feral in mental capacity. They can use firearms but will mostly always have a crude hand weapon used to bludgeon or slash at targets. They tend to live in heards of 200-500 individuals. While there are a number of leader-like individuals that appear to give general orders, the Hogs tend to respond mostly to primal urges and the will of the herd. They are normally seen raiding sources of food en mass. They are also one of the primary enemies of gnolls. A raid of Hogs can carry off enough gnolls to feed the heard. While gnolls are generally a bit brighter and better equipped, they are very much outnumbered in most attacks. A prepared gnoll clan can take out an entire herd of Hogs so they tend to ambush scouting parties. Though in dire times, several herds may join to launch an attack on a clan, wiping it out. Hogs and gnolls will both eat eachother. Hogs can and will also canabalise eachother, usually the young when food is too scarse to raise them. A sow will give birth to between 8 and 12 piglets at a time, 2-3 times a year. Hogs take 2 years to reach maturity and do not stop growing. While gnolls have a great ability to fight infection and recover from terrible injuries, Hogs just have an incredible fortitude. A fully mature hog can sustain incredible amounts of damage before being brought down. Older examples usually have a great many scars on their tough hide and its not unusual for one to have sustained at least one amputation.

Description:

Not quite a place as such but the place between places. I guess its like the astral plain? Its passed through on the way to other realms. This is where gnoll mystics bring their minds to when searching source realities for their magical effects. They can even move their conciousness there for protection (Lycos fled there when here physical form was destroyed in the start of Dust Runners).

History:

Economy:

Key geography:

Description:

Medium, spotted gnoll. Nature mystic from Dust Runners.

Magic and radiation can be tied together quite strongly. Areas of high concentrations of radiation also have high levels of magic and can bend reality in strange ways. There are some lost cities that are so overwhelmed with reality altering levels of radiation that entering them is certain death. Annomalies exist where one physical space may intersect another or time loops into circles or gravity suddenly becomes super strong. Sometims there are gaps where creatures from the magical or spirit realms may enter.

Outside of these wild and tangled places magic is usually sorted into two main approaches. There is Life Energy that is harvised from the planets lay lines as a natural source of energy for those who are attuned to it. The primary users are Elves who can use it intrinsically. While it can be used in a pure form to perform actions such as summoning flames to start a fire, a more convervative use would be to assist natural processes such as summoning a spark to ignight a fire. It is unknown if the planets lay line energy is replenished or strictly limited but from all indications the amounts availble have been decreasing ocer time.

The other kind of magic is reality-browesing. That is, acending the mind to a higher plain to search out all possibilities accross all possible universes to find the desired action and moving it into the current universe. In the fire example, a user would search for any possible universes for one where the fuel spontaniously combusts. The least likely the outcome, the longer it takes to search and the more energy it takes so as with Life Magic, a easier way to use magic is to find a lesser action that assists in the desired outcome. The skill with this kind of magic is to be able to draw the desired realities to the user like some kind of metaphysical google-fu. The downsides to this kind of magic is that the full reality outcome of a found event may not be entirely clear until it is applied. The Gnolls tend to get mysics born at random that have an intrinsic access to this kind of magic. They tend to be both albineo and female but not always. They need to be taught how to control these abilities soon after becoming aware of them as it is all too easy to do something that will have poor and often deadly consiquences for the users and/or those around them. Humans and Sauren do not have an intrinsic magical ability for either of the types of magic but may be able to learn after much training.

Description:

The Plains is a largely flat area that most of this headworld takes place in. It can be summed up as roughly equivalent to the Mid-West US a century after a nuclear war. It holds a number of small settlements, largely based around single industrial sites or tiny farms. The great city of Carthage sits in the middle and largely claims domain over most of it. The space between settlements is mostly inhabited with roving bandit gangs and horrible mutant creatures.

History:

This was once the breadbasket of the Union of Federal Republics. Its vast fertile lands were dotted with farm settlements and towns with larger cities at the perimeter. During the great war it did not suffer much in the way of direct hits but was mostly brought low by the environmental degradation that started before it and was largely accelerated by it. It was very quickly depopulated through death and migration and didn't begin being inhabited again until almost a century later.

Economy:

Not much can be grown in poor soils of the plains now. Most settlements get by with trade and manufacturing from salvaged plants. With the exception of Carthage, the majority of goods produced are mining products, salvage and machine components.

Key geography:

The Plains are a large area of land about 120 miles wide and 145 miles long. It is surrounded by mountain ranges to the north and west, a vast gorge to the east and and even bigger true desert to the south. Its elevation is between 100 and 140 feet above sea level. Dust storms scour the region in mid August and the temperature range through the year hovers between 29 and 36 degrees centigrade.

Description:

Leader and founder of the Blue Dragon mercinary group.

Description:

Small town in the Massiwali Plains where Sapphire comes from.

History:

Economy:

Key geography:

Description:

Small striped gnoll. Partner of Anton.

Description:

Weapons specialist in the Blue Dragon mercinary group.

General appearance:

Bipedal reptilian people who's appearance is derived from a species of carnivorous therapod. They tend to have two horns protruding from the back of their heads and crests of feathers of varying size and colour sprouting from the top of their heads and down their necks. Some may have a set of feathers on their tails too.

Life span:

80-120 years

Sub-types:

Jungle- The greatest number. They tend to have green to blue scales with much more colourful head plumes. Desert- dusty brown with darker brown stripes. Generally smaller than the Jungle kind

Brief history:

While their civilisations have lasted a remarkably long time, technological developments were slow going. Still, by the time they were conquered by human explorers they had reached a high degree of technological development in some sectors with geothermal steam turbines being used to move wagons between settlements on raised causeways. The largest and most successful Sauren civilisation was the Tarkontecs that lived in the twin jungles either side of the equator in the far West. After the apocalypse Sauren settlements tended to intermingle with human settlements. The two races have mostly lived along side each other in peace now but do tend to congregate with their own people more than in mixed groups.

Description:

The oceans are vast and mysterious. Legend has it that fleets of salvaged naval ships run by striped gnolls patrol from harbour to harbour. And that giant man-eating whales lurk just of the coastline to swallow any would be sailor wanting to seek a new continent.

History:

The seas were used for trade, leisure, piracy and warfare throughout history. Since the apocalypse the currents have changed. The winds blow differently and no one has managed to map reliable charts and lived long enough to communicate them widely.

Economy:

You can go get fish if you want or salvage what can be had from shipwrecks. Just don't lose sight of the shore.

Key geography:

Its deep and wet.

General appearance:

Practically anything. They are more limited to their power rather than physical form. Their power is shown through both physical size and complexity of appearance.

Life span:

Sub-types:

Brief history:

Description:

Ok, firstly, this needs a better name. This is where a number of spirits, great and small hang out. This is where the spirit that created Yasmin came from. It is generally a large and mountinous forest. The prominant colour is purple. There are large estates scattered throughout the realm where various spirits reside. Not all spirits are settled though. There is also a large omnipresent spirit that watches over the whole space, policing order there.

History:

Economy:

Key geography:

Description:

The main places the Sauren lived were swampy wet areas so large settlements were built on large artificial earthen mounds. Bricks were eventually used to hem in the sides to slow erosion. These evolved over time until later cities were arranged as a series of raised tiers. Those that had access to geothermal vents had trams that were pulled up and down the levels by large steam driven wheels. Because the region was split north and south of the equator, the long rainy season would alternate between the north and south. This would cause the economies to switch every year and drive vast amounts of people and goods between the regions. It is for this purpose that long causeways were built. Some were partially or fully powered by geothermal vents for driving wagons along them. There were also experimental engines that used the oil derived from tar pits in the south.

Description:

Medium spotted gnoll. Mechanical and driving specialist. Lead character in Dust Runners.

Description:

Big spotted gnoll. Friend of Anton. Lives in a different clan.

Description:

Computer specialist in the Blue Dragon mercinary group.

Description:

This is a strange forest where the ground is periodically scoured down a few feet before filling with leave detritus and river runoff. The results is that the roots of the trees there are almost fully exposed. In the next season of growth the roots grow down again seeking water and nutrients until these are then exposed. The result is about 50ft of knarled, winding and knobbly roots reaching up to trunks high up in the sky. The ground level is very dark and difficult to navigate. Strange things live there amongst the tangle of roots and rotting vegetation. This was inspired by some trees I saw on a recent walk.

From a logistics perspective, the original forest was probably on a high hill to provide the difference in height. From a narrative perspective, there could be a secret or lost underground facility that is now exposed. It contains something that a protagonist would want or need.

History:

Economy:

Key geography:

Description:

Small striped gnoll. Witch, spirit construction based on Sapphire.