Subject: status of coders, designers etc
From: Beregar (beregar@majik3d.org)
Date: Wed Oct 06 1999 - 19:23:21 EEST
Jonathan Koehn wrote: > Can someone tell me the location of the fair elvesi cant seem to find them on the map.I need to add the location to the DezlaneansAlso i was wondering how we the designers,graphics, and coders (the ones that arent gods) would be portrayed in the gamewould we be a sage something or would we just be a mortal. eleril@majik3d.org Depends, at least earlier all coders had God status and designers were usually considered as Sages. I don't know how it is now...I'd rather not see them as normal mortals because they know way too much, unless they can keep secrets... btw. Will we keep our history so that races evolved from the "Ancients"? I'd rather see so or otherwise I have to completelly redesign Vorack. btw I'll attach the file here, don't whine if it is incomplete and has some inconsistent parts since I already started to redesign it once... - Beregar (Beregar@majik3d.org) 1. Introduction 2. Appearance 2.1 Spirit trees 2.2 Clothing 2.3 Weapons & Armors 3. Culture 3.1 Spirit groves 3.2 Tasks 3.3 Food & Trade 4. Religion 5. Language 6. mar'Nageth 7. Roleplaying 1 Introduction Vorack are race of intelligent tree spirits. They were created in ancient time to protect woods from magical madness of first races. Vorack themselves are not member of these races nor servants of them. They are also not completelly spirits or physical beings for Shinael the god of nature, created them by shaping individual spirits from massconciousness of all trees and then gave them physical body to dwell in. Vorack have one speciality over all ot her races - they have two spirits, which are both separated from, and connected with eacot her in a mysterious way. Vorack has also two physical shells which both hold different portion of their soul. Anot her is the stable one, spirit tree, where spirit that is parted from great conciousness of trees keeps it home, and another is the moving one, humanoid body, which carries Voracks' physical spirit. These two spirits are connected together with ties that only few people can understand. They are both dependant on eachother and when another suffers it affects also the other one. Vorack is complete being only when these two spirits are together and therefor he, he for there are no female Vorack, rarely leaves the forest where his spirit tree stands. Spirit trees differ both much and very little from other trees. Most of them are like any other tree, only that they are much more larger. However, sometimes their shape and color can be very different than of any other tree. Vorack is always tied to the tree from which he was born and this shows in his appearance. Those which other races understand as Vorack and which is actually only another of their physical shells are large furry humanoids with strange mixture of human and bear like features. They are seen in legends both ferocious, demonlike beings with dangerous horns and still somehow handsome looking creatures. Vorack are rare creatures and they have became hardly more than a myth from ancients times a legend about large protectors of forests in minds of common people but there are also so me other legends which young unmarried women like to tell...Rare people know about existan ce of these creatures and even rarer know where they live. Vorack tend to be suspicious to wards all other races except wood elves and some rare people who really care about woods. All rest who dare to enter in their kingdom are considered as possible enemies, except few female creatures who may find their destiny to be either very disgusting or very satifying depending on their own nature. However, usually, as long as travellers do not harm the fo rest Vorack see no reason to bother them. There are only few places where Vorack live and most important of them is located in the Western Isles of Minartan. 2 Appearance Vorack are large and strong furry humanoids. There are only male Vorack which is main rea son why there are so few of them. Vorack are born from trees and they share the same color of their tree. When Vorack borns he has all knowledge that others have memorized, he is al so born adult. Young Vorack is from 200 cm to 250 cm tall and weights about 100 to 150 kg. All Vorack are very muscular and strong and their body resembles much the one of the human especially when they are young, though few exceptions can be easily seen. Vorack have very hairy body, almost like covered with coat, sharp claws, snout which resembles the one bear has and two horns. These horns curve like ram horns but they have sharp edges and they are longer reaching about 10cm from face. Color of the fur is a dependant from spirit tree and it can be completelly black, reddish, brown or white but rarely anything else. Their eyes are always deep green and without iris. When Vorack grows older his fur cover grows more thicker and he becames even more sturdier. He grows also larger and older males can be over 300 cm tall and weight over 200 kg. Color of fur changes deeper, skin more thicker and horns grow larger and more sharper. He also grows short, wavy and sharp external bone structure in his arms and longer spikes in his back. Thicker skin, sharp bones and long horns make them even more ferocious fighters but fur, which has always been their weak point, is now even more flamable and fire is probab ly the only thing which Vorack fear. Vorack have very strong emotions when they show them. Usually they make their best to hide emotions like lust, sorrow and anger for they do not usually want to hurt any other creatu res. However, from time to time, emotions grow so strong that Vorack are unable to control themselves and while results are seldom lethal they can be very uncomfortable for other creatures. Because Vorack are most often seen in this emotionally unstable state and becau se one of their physical appearance, Vorack have been referred to "essence of manliness given a physical form" in legends through the history. Because of strong mind and its separated nature, Vorack are resistant to all spells which affect mind such as charms and illusions. Their strong and muscular body makes them unti ring fighters and trackers. Both their eyes and snout have very sharp senses making them excellent trackers, especially in night for Vorack are night livers. Their large eyes are very sensitive to light granting them excellent night vision but also makee them vulnerab le to bright light. Vorack have very strong essence which makes them resistant also those spells that affect directly soul. 2.1 Spirit Trees Vorack have two spirits, and another of them is located in the spirit tree. Normally physi cal trees have only small portion of their whole consciousnes in their physical form, most of the tree consciousnes is part of the one of all trees. To explain briefly one could say that this consciousnes is "above" the forest and in spirit world. Only small tentacles con nect it to it physical shell of tree. Spirit trees as well as talking trees however have larger portion of this consciousnes and are more aware of their surroundings. Even while trees can't really see or talk by themsel ves, they have different ways to collect information from surrounding enviroment and commu nicate with others. Tree spirit is connected to its "physical" counterpart which allows it to see everything with physical spirit sees, hears and/or feels with its own physical body This works also reversible, tree spirit can feel its surroundings and because of that phy sical spirit always knows what happens around its spirit tree. Tree spirits can also commu nicate directly with spirits of other persons which means that when Vorack decides to say something through his spirit tree, he uses ability which is similar to telepathy. Ability to sense other spirits are not only limited to those which are tied to corporeral body but tree spirits can also detect any spirit which is near them. Tree spirit is the passive one which storages information and processes it. Physical spi rit is the one with emotions and instincts. Combination of these two make Vorack resistant to spells that affect mind and feelings. However should one be able to cut connection bet ween these two spirits and results would be devastating. Tree spirit would lost connection to its physical senses and physical spirit would go insane when rational spirit is no lon ger controlling it. This is what happens when Vorack stop concentrating on their tasks and go insane - tree spirit has no longer anything to do and physical spirit overpowers it. Vorack is complete being only when his two spirits are together. When they are hungry they can merge inside any tree and gain nutrition, however they suffer from another form of hun ger too, a mental hunger, which can be satisfied only when two spirits are merged together inside the spirit tree. Both this mental hunger and distance weaken link between the spi rits. In early stage Vorack suffer from quick emotional changes which range from rage to melancholy, next stage makes him even more emotionally unstable and effects of hunger can be seen in his body as "withering" which means his fur starts dropping off and he becames weaker. In previous stages Vorack can still usually find his way to spirit tree by himself but shortly after second stage mental link has grown very weak and Vorack goes completelly insane, fortunatelly for other people he is also already very weak and can't do much harm. He can be still saved while in this last stage by dragging him to his spirit tree but soon after this final stage follow death. It's very difficult to descripe relationship of Vorack two spirits. Their physical shells and both spirits are usually separated from eachother and both spirits have born from dif ferent source, tree spirit from massconcsiousnes of trees and physical spirit is from the god. This would make one believe they are different beings but they are actually same soul and controlled by mind which both spirits form. When Vorack makes something his spirits do not have own "mind" which means that for example another would say "yes" and another "no" As a spirits, they are both concsious but they are also mindless, only when they work to gether they form a mind that can act with its own will. In this file there will be no men tions about separated nature of these spirits unless it is somehow necessary, there is on ly one word which means sum of these two spirits - Vorack. Physical appearance of spirit tree reminds the one of any other tree. They have long thick trunk, branches and leaves but never needles. Some of them have bark but most have either smooth or rough surface. Common for all them is length, sturdiness and thickness. a Spirit tree can grow over 400 meters long and over 50 meters thick though most of them are less than 100 meters long and 12 meters thick. a Spirit tree must be large enough for Vorack to enter it. Usually it takes from 20 to 30 years for them to reach necessary 20 meter height and 2 meter width. After that their growth slows and it takes many thousand years to reach 400 cm height. Color of the tree is also color of the Vorack, it varies from black and whi te to brown and reddish but rarely anything else, though there has been few exceptions whe re trees have been gray or even bluish. Tree has also a mental appearance because it is ho me of strong spirit - Vorack and other spirit creatures see a spirit tree glowing brightly with same color as its physical appearance has. 2.2 Clothing Vorack do not use clothes, they have no need for them and are actually more nuisance than help. They are resistant to cold which is partially because of fur and partially because of their nature. However most important reason for not using the clothes is a process cal led merging. Vorack live inside their spirit trees and only while merged their spirit is complete and they can rest. However, they can merge only their own physical substance, not hing else, and if they had to wear clothes they would have to undress each time when they merge. Members of Vorack race rarely leave their forests but it's not unheard that they sometimes visit in other places of Majik. Unfortunately most often when they are seen outside their groves they are in this earlier mentioned emotionally unstable state and could not care less whether they are wearing anything or not. Though even when they are sane they don't wear any clothes, should it bother the elves and other people or not. Besides it would be very uncom fortable to wear anything because of their furry bodies. 2.3 Weapons & Armors Vorack don't use weapons or armors. They have excellent natural weapons so why would they make artificial? They have also thick skin, especially older members of race, which can ea sily withstand blows from blunt weapons though it is a weaker against heavier slashing wea pons. Arrows and sling bullets make them only angry but crossbow bolt is fast and strong enough to penetrate their skin. There are also another reason for not to use armor which is same as with clothes, it would be very hard to wear them and they prevent merging proces as will weapons and other items do. However, nothing prevents a vorack from trying to wear armor or wield a weapon but it just makes them clumsier and more inefective fighters. There is still one reason why they do not use weapons or armors - forging a weapon or armor that could help them at least as much as their natural weapons and hide would require fire and as mentioned above, fire is probably the only thing which they fear. 3 Culture Vorack have both quite complicated and very simple culture and they are actually quite in telligent race. Even forests do not require constant caring and there must be some way to fill empty hours. Vorack spent most of their time caring trees, especially spirit trees, but usually no-one orders them to do anything. Their society is Geritocracy which means that age is a sign of authority. Vorack societies are always lead by oldest of the each tribe. However when person that is more older than leader of the tribe enters in the area, he has the same authoritive power as leader of that tribe. There are rare situation when any Vorack orders another to do something but sometimes older members of tribe find it necessary to chastise some younger ones. There are only few rules in the society and most important them is not to fight with each others and second is not to use fire in any case. First rule is not actually rule for all Vorack shun thought that they could kill one of their own race. However, it is said that there has been exceptions from this rule, though should one be able to ask this from a Vo rack he wouldn't get answer for they do not even admit the existance of this rule and the refor that someone could break it. However as said above, young voracks may sometimes get aggressive and olders must calm them down, sometimes with force, and this can cause quite serious damage to either or both of them. Violence isn't the only way to punish for there are few other ways to punish those who break rules. Worst of them is performed if Vorack breaks continuously rules. In such case elders of the tribe may decide to cut his spirit link off from the spirit tree. This means that poor Vorack won't be able to rest and suf fers melancholy which can be seen also in his body as slow "withering". While this punish ment is uncommon it is not that rare and it will eventually lead to death if target of pu nishment doesn't repent which he will surely do. 3.1 Spirit Groves Spirit Groves are places where spirit trees arise and Vorack live. They are centres of Vo rack life and places where they gather together and share their knowledge and decide whet her there are some greater tasks in forest which require their attention or should everyt hing continue as it is. Spirit groves are always in the heart of some forest both in physi cal and spiritual. Spirit grove can concist of from dozen to five hundred spirit trees and it is often surrounded by impenetrable wall of living trees and thorns or some other natu ral element. There aren't any real buildings in spirit grove however there are many living trees which have been shaped in many forms, many of them reminding buildings or arches. These are made by woodshapers who shape the spirit grove both by needs of society as well as to make it delight an eye. Heart of spirit grove is elder tree, the one that has tree spirit of oldest living member of tribe. Around it are placed spirit trees of lesser Vorack which too are usually surroun ded by normal trees and their branches form together with the branches of spirit trees lea fy ceiling. Often their trunks are shaped in many wondorous shapes with great care for not to hurt living rees. 3.2 Tasks Vorack do not have any real professions, they have tasks which some of them are better and more interrested to do than others. All members of the race are druidic healers and forest guards for all of them require skills to care and protect their own spirit tree as well as other trees. Hwoever there are also other tasks besides tree caring - there are Vorack who se task is act as spokemen of Shinael and other nature gods, priests, that besides perform ceremonies are powerful nature spellcasters. In addition to these there are also one impor tant tasks which is called woodshaping. Task of tree caring is most common and all Vorack have at least basic knowledge of it. Spi rit and normal trees, animals and other plants require constant overseeing and protecting to keep forest balanced. There are many plant diseases and creature which could cause harm to forest and because of that, also Vorack. All Vorack possess innate abilities to heal mi nor wounds and diseases and they are powerful enough to remove all creatures that could ma ke harm for forest. This doesn't mean that they walk around forests and heal every single diseased plant or animal and that they prevent animals from killing eachother. Vorack were orginally created to protect forests from magical influence of first races who were not de pendant on normal magical rules that bind nature together. Their task is not to hunt magic users or avoid magic but to prevent use of such magic that does not come directly from the nature and follow natural rules, like necromantic magic and magic that alters reality. Be cause such altering always happens in the fabric of nature, either because of some gods or because of some magic users, Vorack task is to heal effects of it and protect forests from creatures born from such magic or from beings that use such magic. Some Vorack have been blessed ability to act as spokesmen of gods. These Vorack are called priests and their task is to maintain religious rituals and ceremonies between gods and ot her Vorack, as well as to upkeep knowledge. In their hands is given responsibility to sto re knowledge about plants, animals, threats and everything that Vorack learn. Priests pos ses deeper knowledge about will of nature gods and command more powerful forces of nature than rest of Vorack, mainly those dealing with plants and weather. Also, their powers are not only based on gods but innate natural abilities which they have learned from the natu re itself. Their most important task, besides performing of rituals, is to create knowled ge trees which are usually remnants of those Vorack whose another physical shell has died or trees that are for some other reason unordinary conscious. Through these trees priests store all knowledge to great consciousness of trees from where all Vorack can obtain it. Besides priests, druidic healers and rangers there are still one task - woodshaping which is done by woodshapers. While all Vorack can animate and cause small, usually temporar, changes in plants, woodshapers have specialized in this task. They can shape and animate both living and unliving plants and they are mostly responsible of creation of tools, con tainers and for example living walls of wood. Every Vorack has quite much free time for as mentioned above, forests do not need constant watching. Vorack spent most of their free-time perfoming personal religious rituals which are no more difficult than wandering around the forest and marveling each aspect of great nature or learning. Vorack consider almost everything they do as a religious ritual for re ligion has a bit different meaning for them as for other races. Besides wandering Vorack spend their time practicing their skills, usually those which do not have anything to do with his own tasks. For some reason when Vorack leaves his tasks behind he becames endles ly curious and starts yearning knowledge about everything. Many Vorack concentrate on deep intellectual discussion with eachother that would certainly look strange for outsider - Hu ge furry bearlike creatures that look invincible killing machines discuss with growling to nes about creation of Majik or reason for everything. However, as much as Vorack yearn understanding, it's very difficult for them to understand other lesser races and learn from them partially because it is very difficult for them to leave from their spirit groves. However there is plenty of time for them to try for even "the moving one", humanoid body of Vorack, lives as long as their spirit trees which means many hundreds, even thousands years. Vorack need always something to do for if one of them remains too long with his own thoughts it will be very difficult for him to prevent insani ty caused by his strong emotions. 3.3 Food & Trade Vorack do not eat in the normal terms though they still need great amount of nutrition be cause of their large size. When Vorack merges inside any tree he also gets part of the nut rition which tree sucks from the ground. This is also the case of water. If Vorack is unab le to get nutrition "the moving one", humanoid body, eventually dies. However, Vorack can eat also normal food, if they must, but they w will not benefit from it as much as any nor mal race would. Eating flesh of other beings would probably cause them a bad stomach disea se. When one considers this it's sure that their predator appearance claws and sharp teeth are not meant for hunting and eating. Vorack do not normally barter with goods, neither with members of their own race nor with other races for they simply have no need for most things. However they may sometimes offer to share knowledge or some interresting items with those who know them and even in some un likely situation with strangers. Because Vorack don't have any real trade they don't need money or use it. 4 Religion Word religion does not mean same for Vorack as it means to most other races. Of course Vo rack have priests and they perform religious rituals. However they consider themselves as servants of the gods and everything they do are based on need of the nature or more precis ly, of their forest. Gods are only creatures who gave them ability to defend rest of their concsiousness, trees, and who will guide them in their. Priests are are just spokesmen of gods who give advices to priests who can share it with rest of Vorack. Meaning of rituals is to show respect and gratefulness for gods, not to please or to ask anything from them. If member of other race would oversee religion of Vorack it would look for him (or more li kely her) very simple. Vorack has only one "holy mission" which is to protect forests and they feel that when they care forests and try to learn as much as possible from everything they are true to this missions. Even those situations when Vorack is consumed by lust, ra ge or other similar feeling are considered to be necessary same way as some other races would consider religious ecstasy. All Vorack respect Shinael, the god of nature, for he is creator of them. They don't build temples for Shinael for they consider forests as large temples which they are created to protect and care. However, there are certain places in the forests which are more sacred than others, these are places where magic and forces of nature gather together and have so mehow shaped the surroundings. These areas have quite same meaning for Vorack as altars hav e for other creatures for these are places where Vorack express their respect with most im portant rituals. These areas aren't always located in the same places as spirit groves, ac tually some of them are very far from any areas where Vorack has influence. Vorack protect these areas by growing thick circles of trees around them which are then altered by nature magic in various ways. Nearly all important religious rituals are performed in these sac red places like rituals of life, death and rebirth. There are also other gods besides Shinael which Vorack praise. One of them is xxxxxx the " earth mother" who is goddess of fertility and lust. Partially because of her Vorack needs female to have a child. When a vorack wants a child he forgets politenes, good manners and all that crap and searches a mate and then drags her to the altar of earth mother where he will have sex with her wheter she wishes it or not. When Vorack has satisfied his needs he releases woman which he no longer needs. If earth mother decides to bless the woman and if woman doesn't have abortion she will eventually give birth to female child which will even tually grow charming and beautiful creature called dryad. If earth mother and Shinael both decide to bless Vorack his spirit tree will produce a seed which he plants in the ground. When tree is large enough a new body of full grown Vorack will appear inside from tree. Af ter that both child and his father return to altar for ceremony of life. Should it happen so, and almost all it happens, that Vorack is unable to find a mate he must find other ways to ease his lust. When Vorack dies, either because of old age or by accident, physical body is carried to al tar for ceremony of death. If Vorack has served Shinael and society well he may be reincar nated to new Vorack body but if Vorack has neglected his duties or Shinael decides that he has fullfilled his destiny in which case the body will merge in the nature and only tree spirit will remain. When Vorack dies, his spirit tree is moved as part of the ceremony of death. Preparation takes many days for finding and preparing a new place for tree is made by great care. Moving itself is made by means of magic and does not take much time. Later these trees have often higher level of consciousnes than other trees and they are often used as knowledge trees. If tree dies, it is restored to nature with own ceremony and be cause Vorack will soon follow tree, also he needs eventually ceremony of death. 5 Language Language of Vorack is emphatic which means it concists from expressions in addition to nor mal words. It's very difficult for other races to learn their language even if they are em phatic themselves. Most races can't produce correct growling tones and expressions. Those with emphaty ability can understand language better for they can sense feelings which are important part of language. When person who lacks emphaty ability listens two Vorack chat ting with eachother he, or she, would soon realise that Vorack use same growling patterns continously and often keep long pauses and still seem to have some sort of conversaion. If this person has also emphaty ability he/she would find that while continuous tones follow same pattern emotional expressions behind them are different. So, emphatic person would mo re easily understand Vorack even without knowledge of their language, but still could not speak it because of lack of ability to produce growling sounds. Vorack don't speak much any other languages except their own and reason is clear. It is ve ry hard for them to produce any other sounds except those growling tones. They understand better languages wich are strongly based on expressions and emotions and can rarely under stand those which express only raw, cold data... 6. mar'Nageth This is their kingdom, its name will change and I don't have yet short or long desc for it 7. Roleplaying Names: Only thing that I require is a good roleplaying name. This race isn't anyway a play er race. Battle: I have made these a race which have no use for other weapons or armors than their own. Their battle tactics is usually to wait inside some tree until their targer comes clo ser and then surprise him/her. They make simple fast kills and usually attack the spellcas ters first then those with melee weapons and lastly those with missile weapons. If someone escapes from battle they track him/her and kill unless target is already far outside from their forest. Should they go berserk because of insanity and they will attack against any one without any plan. They usually work in small groups. Religion: Vorack consider everything they do religious for religion doesn't mean same for them as to other races. They praise nature gods and perform rituals to show their grateful ness. Vorack also feel that wandering around the forest marveling it, guarding the forest and gaining knowledge are part of religion. They spend their time caring trees and forest plants and animals or by discussing or studying. When one plays Vorack he should always be interested about everything and seek knowledge and these religious experiences. Magic: Source of Vorack magic is always nature and its elements. They use quite much magic in their everyday life and it is part of them so they feel no suspiciosity towards magic. They don't use much symbols as other mages do for they gain their power directly from natu re and use it through their innate abilities. When one plays Vorack mage he possess large amount of innate spellike abilities and has only a few elements of symbolic magic. Vorack mages are especially keen to learn everything. Philosophy: Vorack are usually aggressive only towards those who harm forest. However they may sometimes suffer from insanity that either makes them very easy target or very offensi ve and dangerous. Vorack are suspicious towards all other races except elves but because they rarely show themselves no-one knows much of them. They rarely leave work unfinished so if they decide to hunt someone they will do so unless he/she leaves the forest and even in such case they may follow target at least few days. There is a chance that Vorack will not attack when it, for some reason or another, seen and those who see it are not harming forest though if they are consumed by lust they may do something else. They rarely leave forests where their spirit tree arises because they will suffer from insanity because of weakening spirit link. They are most active while night.
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