Survivors and Shadows of the Exiled Lands
In the aftermath of the Divine Reckoning, Norrath's diverse peoples faced annihilation as the gods' war tore the world asunder. Continents fractured, oceans boiled, and the very fabric of reality unraveled, fusing shattered shards of Norrath with the primal echoes of the Hyborian Age. The planes of existence—once gateways to realms like the Plane of Hate or Underfoot—collapsed inward, sealing off all planar travel forever. Luclin, the shattered moon, became an unreachable scar in the sky, its debris woven into the cursed bracelets that bind exiles to the remade lands. No mortal can ascend to its ruins or draw upon its faded magic; attempts invite only madness or dissolution.
This cataclysm culled the weak and reshaped the strong, favoring adaptable bloodlines while dooming those tied to fragile ecosystems or fallen gods. The remade world, now the savage Exiled Lands, is a brutal mosaic of deserts, jungles, tundras, and volcanic wastes, where survival demands cunning over civilization. Magic, once a bridge to other realms, is a tainted whisper, its planar roots severed. Below, the fates of Norrath's races are chronicled: the survivors who endure as playable lineages, scarred but resilient; the lost, whose essences linger as echoes, monsters, or forgotten legends; and the rare adapted or merged forms born from the chaos.
Surviving Races: The Enduring Bloodlines
These people weathered the Reckoning through divine favor, innate adaptability, or sheer ferocity, evolving to thrive in the Exiled Lands' unforgiving wilds. Their gods' merged aspects provided scant protection, allowing remnants to rebuild as nomadic tribes, cunning exiles, or predatory clans. Playable on the server, they represent the core of RP possibilities, with modded models (e.g., Ghompsty's Beastie Parts) enabling their distinct features.
Humans: The most versatile survivors, humans emerged from the rubble of swallowed cities like Qeynos and Freeport. Their patron gods—Mithaniel Marr (valor) and Karana (storms)—melded with Mitra and Crom, granting resilience in the face of indifference. Scattered across the Exiled Lands as branded wanderers, they form opportunistic bands, scavenging ruins for relics of old Norrath. In the remade world, humans embody pragmatic savagery, building fleeting alliances amid eternal strife, their numbers bolstered by interbreeding with half-elves.
Elves (High Elves and Wood Elves): Tunare's children, once guardians of Faydwer's forests, saw their verdant homelands petrified into twisted jungles or scorched badlands. The Reckoning's fusion with Ymir's frost preserved slender cadres in hidden enclaves, where they adapted to nomadic life. High elves cling to arcane echoes in crystalline ruins, while wood elves hunt as feral rangers in overgrown wastes. Their grace endures, but tempered by loss—no planar communion with Tunare's realm means their magic is a fading art, prone to corruption.
Dark Elves (Teir'Dal): Innoruuk's spiteful progeny thrived in the shadows of the cataclysm, their underground city of Neriak partially spared by merging with Set's serpentine malice. Emerging from cave-ruins as pale, red-eyed schemers, they excel in the Exiled Lands' intrigue, forming cults that sacrifice thralls at venomous altars. The sealing of planes severed their ties to the Plane of Hate, forcing a more visceral hatred—now channeled into tribal vendettas and sorcery that risks self-destruction.
Kerra: The feline wanderers of Kerra Isle fused spiritually with Vah Shir Kin during the Reckoning, their seafaring heritage warped into desert prowling. Karana's storms, blended with Crom's stoicism, shielded prides in highland shards, where they evolved sharper claws and keener senses (modded cat-like heads and features). Cut off from Luclin's lunar pull, kerra shamans interpret earthly omens, leading packs that hunt in the wilds, their agility making them unmatched scouts in the savage expanse.
Vah Shir: Lionine warriors from Shar Vahl's mountains endured as proud nomads, their moon-tied essence redirected to Karana-Crom's earthly tempests after Luclin's inaccessibility. Bulkier than kerra, with mane-like fur and roaring prowess (via beastie mods), they roam highland tundras, forging warrior codes amid ruins echoing their lost citadels. The planar collapse ended their astral journeys, grounding them in brutal honor—prides now test strength through survival rites, viewing the remade world as an eternal proving ground.
Half-Elves: Born of human-elf unions, half-elves bridged divides during the chaos, their mixed heritage (Marr twins melded with Mitra) allowing survival in fractured borderlands. With subtle elven features (pointed ears via mods), they wander as diplomats or outcasts, scavenging swallowed academies for diluted lore. No planar escapes meant relying on mortal wits; in the Exiled Lands, they form versatile clans, mediating between purebloods while harboring resentment for the gods' abandonment.
Iksar: Cazic-Thule's reptilian empire-builders from Kunark adapted to volcanic badlands, their fear-god's essence fused with Yog's flesh-horrors preserving scaled hordes in lava-ruins. Lizard-like traits (snouts, tails via mods) evolved for arid endurance, but the Reckoning's planar seal ended Void incursions, leaving their cults to primal terror-rituals. As cunning predators, iksar raid for thralls, rebuilding scaled hierarchies amid echoes of Cabilis, their savagery amplified by the world's curse.
Lost Races: The Fallen and Forgotten
These lineages perished or dwindled to irrelevance in the Divine Reckoning, their gods weakened or shattered, ecosystems destroyed, and essences scattered. Absent from playable options, they serve as lore hooks—haunting ruins as spectral echoes, mutated monsters (modded NPCs), or rare quest apparitions—reminding survivors of the apocalypse's toll. No remnants allow for revival; their fates underscore the brutality of the remade world.
Dwarves: Brell Serilis's stout crafters were entombed when the Underfoot realms imploded during the Reckoning, their god's forge-essence buried without Hyborian meld. Kaladim's mountains collapsed, sealing dwarves in eternal darkness; planar access to Brell's plane vanished, dooming any survivors to starvation. In the Exiled Lands, their fate lingers as golem-haunted mines or fossilized axes—whispers of a buried people, occasionally spawning as cursed automatons in admin events.
Ratonga: Bristlebane's scurrying tricksters, tied to unstable undercities, were drowned in the cataclysm's floods or corrupted by Bertoxxulous-Yog's plagues. Their god's mischief, melded with Bel's thievery, couldn't save them from sewer collapses; no planar escapes to mischief realms meant total submersion. Echoes persist as vermin swarms in ruins, or twisted rat-beasts (modded foes), embodying pestilent warnings to delving exiles.
Ogres: Rallos Zek's brutish warmongers fell to their own fury, the Warlord's shattered power (no meld) inciting self-destructive rampages amid crumbling citadels like Oggok. The Reckoning's quakes pulverized their strongholds, and planar wars sealed off Zek's battle-realms, leaving ogres to devolve into mindless hulks before extinction. In the remade wilds, their bones litter arenas, or rare "echo-ogres" emerge as boss encounters, symbols of unchecked conquest.
Frogloks: Rodcet Nife's amphibious zealots from Gukta drowned in boiled oceans and arid shifts, their healer's essence unable to counter the Reckoning's desiccation. No Hyborian fusion saved them; the planar ties to growth realms were severed, leaving them vulnerable to an environmental purge. Spectral croaks haunt swamp-ruins, or modded frog-abominations lurk in oases, representing divine abandonment in the water-scarce lands.
Trolls: Cazic-Thule-Yog's grotesque regenerators, kin to iksar, were consumed by fear-plagues and volcanic eruptions, their resilience failing without planar regeneration from Thule's domain. Grobb's swamps solidified into salt flats, entombing them; survivors mutated into feral horrors before fading. In the Exiled Lands, trollish remnants appear as raiding bands of undead thralls or boss variants, eternal slaves to the savagery that claimed them.
Adapted or Merged Races: Echoes of the Remaking
Rare hybrids born from the Reckoning's chaos, these aren't core playable but can inspire custom RP proposals (admin-approved). They blend lost essences with survivors, filling niches in the lore.
Erudites and Gnomes: Intellectual humans like Erudites merged into scholarly human subclans, their arcane pursuits diluted without Druzzil Ro's planes. Gnomes, Brell's tinkers, fused remnants into inventive half-elf outcasts, their contraptions now corrupted relics in ruins.
Barbarians and Halflings: Barbarians integrated into human tribes, their Karana-Crom worship unchanged. Halflings, Bristlebane's folk, scattered as elusive human variants, their mischief surviving in thief-guilds amid swallowed Rivervale.
Sarnak and Other Beasts: Dragon-kin like Sarnak evolved into Iksar offshoots, their Gorowyn citadels' volcanic graves. Fae or Arasai dissolved into ethereal elf whispers, while Freeblood vampires lurk as dark elf curses.
Aerakyn and Others: Winged aerakyn plummeted when skies tore; any survivors grounded into vah shir hybrids, their flight a lost legend.
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