The Imbrar

 

Welcome back, it has been a minute since I wrote a blog post.  Today we are looking at the Imbrar, one of the species that exist in my primary fantasy setting.  They came about as I was working to expand the setting beyond Gal Hadre and the western portion of Kreos Phal.  It didn’t make sense that some of the species common there would be common in other places and those in the other places not common in Gal Hadre.

The Imbrar hail from eastern Kreos Phal and due to their very family based culture have not spread far and wide.  Though you can find some of them throughout the Thath Imperium and Gar’Hemun they are limited in numbers even there.

So who are the Imbrar?  Well like most of the species in my main setting they are my take on a more classic fantasy idea, in the case of the Imbrar, Gnomes.  So they are short, almost never reaching 4 feet tall, and have ears, eyes and heads that appear oversized compared to humans.  They also have a broad range of hair and eye colours including ones that humans do not have.  Their sense of hearing is noticeably better than humans and they are able to sense vibrations far more sensitively than humans; but they have a very weak sense of taste, leading to their cuisine being highly spiced and almost unpalatable for most other species.  They can sometimes be mistaken for pre-teen human children by those not paying attention and only quickly glancing at them.

The Imbrar are a relatively short lived species, with their upper age limit being in their late 60s, though few live past 60.  They are considered adults at 12 years old and are not considered to have reached old age until their 50s.  They generally have single births after a six month pregnancy and about 3 in 5 of their kind are female.

They have four different ethnic groupings that verge on being different sub-species due to how different they are.  Each of them have different skin, eye and hair colourings, which is normal for different ethnic groups, but is also tied to one of the eight paths of dragon magic, with most of their kind having the ability to manifest one or two weak spells of the relevant path.  That does not however restrict their ability to learn magic from the other seven paths.

Their creation myths claim that they are the creations of both the gods and the neverborn, being one of the last things created before the war of the neverborn.  Some versions of these myths claim that there were once Imbrar of each of the eight paths but that the others were wiped out during that cataclysmic war while others say that their kind were still being developed when the war started and that the others were still theoretical when the war broke out.  The truth, whatever it is, has been lost to the passage of time.

Three of these ethnicities seem to have no problem with each other and can easily live around each other, as is the case in their homeland the Forest of Ayenvar.  They have different skin tones, hair and eye colours.  These are the Bright Clans who are tied to the path of Living Fire, the Stone Clans tied to the Path of Stone Awakened and the Hidden Clans tied to the Shrouded Path.  The fourth grouping is never spoken of openly by the other Imbrar, at least partially due to their shame over it; those are the Frost Clans whose ancient ancestors swore allegiance to the Neverborn, who have retained control over their twisted descendents ever since.  If members of the Frost Clans encounter other Imbrar, only one side is leaving that encounter alive.  Neither side will retreat and no quarter is even considered.

When Imbrar have to fight, they generally do so in decently sized groups, fighting as much as possible with ranged weapons and swarming foes if it comes to melee.  They love mechanical things especially with gears, clockwork or pulleys, as those can help them overcome their naturally low strength.  Many of their weapons incorporate gears to allow for higher draw strengths or have blades that stab with great force.

Family is of great importance to the Imbrar and they generally live in clans that average around 60 members who often all live in one sprawling structure.  Small villages and hamlets are often only one or two buildings that each contain a whole clan.  It is not uncommon for their structures to have tunnels underneath them and sometimes what are separate structures above ground are connected by a complex web of tunnels underground.  A clan in larger settlements is often entirely devoted to one or a series of interrelated businesses, for example you could find a clan that has an integrated system of lumberjacks through to carpenters making finished products or a clan that works a small mine through to smiths that forge tools.  This can also stretch into illegal activity with entire clans becoming organised crime networks.

All Imbrar have three names, first their clan name, and given the importance of their clan to them it is often the first name given to outsiders and if that Imbrar is representing their entire clan likely the only name given.  Next comes their public name which is generally used when one needs to be more specific than they are of a certain clan and finally their private or family name which will only be known to immediate family and very close friends.  Publicly using an Imbrar’s private name would result in a major rift with that Imbrar and likely physical violence, certainly a long standing grudge.

What do you think of the Imbrar?  Are there things that you think could be done to make them more Gnomish?  Which ethnicity would you want to play as in an RPG?  Hopefully I will have several more blog posts up in the near future looking at other newish species such as the Jotun and Carvax.