...and I just remembered another set.
I was writing a Final Fantasy-style world for an appropriately themed tabletop game that never actually got off the ground The Long Convoluted Backstory was that the Creator had made the world, and at the end had made the Dragons, and to each Dragon had given a chance to give three gifts - one of life, one of magic, and one of sentience. He'd then told them that they were to go out into the world and give forth these gifts, and that some day their children would surpass them. A number of the dragons had done just that.
- One used the gift of Life to craft a stone into lizardmen, and then blessed them with intellect and magic. They were your basic Proud Warrior Race Guys, a bit larger and bulkier than you might expect a normal human to be, with hard scales. They valued the ability to endure and survive above all things. They tended to be Blue Mages (who learn magic only by enduring it, and thus proving themselves stronger than it), Knights (wearing no armor, and exploiting the enemy's reliance on easily destroyed things) and Monks (who fight with no outside assistance whatsoever)
- One crafted a race of semi-arboreal anthropomorphic cats, particularly agile, graceful, and charming, slightly smaller and much more slender than the average person. They got involved in theivery, intrigue, social manipulation, and nature magic. Their greatest theft, and their greatest epic, was when one of their earlier members managed to trick/manipulate one of the dragons into giving their race a *second* gift of magic, leaving them tremendously powerful.
- One crafted a race of anthropomorphic mice - significantly smaller than the cats, and rather less graceful, but good at being quick and dexterous and dodging. Also pretty good at stealth. This was the race that had its gift of magic stolen, and they *really* don't like the cats. To make up for the missing magic, they turned to technology and gadgetry. They also tend towards thievery, though it's more on the stealth, picking locks, disarming traps side of things, and less on the social and con side. Not nearly so many spies, but rather more scouts.
- Normal humans, of course.
- One looked at all of the other races and saw that each of his brethren had made races that looked out for themselves, and none had made any to look out for each other. He gave his gifts to his own dreams, creating the faeries, who would each find and bond to and support and serve another being. They were creatures made almost entirely of magic, and the bonding process stabilized them so that they could live outside of high-magic areas. They all had a number of small magics, and most were not all that bright. From time to time, one would develop more of a personality, and stabilize in themselves. The dragon would teach them summoning (which, indeed, would summon dragons, but only if you got their permission first. The dream-dragon would grant permission to each of them before they left) and they'd go out to serve pretty much everybody.
- Finally, there was a rather flighty one who found that time was running out, and he hadn't found anybody yet. He gave his gifts to a certain cloud, in a burst of impulse... but more on that later.
... of course, those were the dragons who did as they were told. Many of the others did not like the idea that they were to be overthrown by their own children, so they refused to give the gifts away. The Creator came back again, and chastised them, and turned the gift within them into a curse, so that it would come to rest on the first critter they came near, and those beings would know them as their parents, and that if they slaughtered their children, the curse would return to them to be given anew, and those that followed would know of the slaughter of their forebears. There was the rather strong suggestion that they should stick around and help develop their children, lest they be treated poorly once the Age of Dragons had passed. He then tristed their forms from shining beautiful metallic to dark and twisted and wrong, and drove them forth from the continent of their birth.
- One of them was bright enough to land in a swamp briefly on his way out. His Curse grabbed the frogs and toads and formed them into goblins. Without a dragon to guide them, they grew up nasty, brutish, primitive, and short. They manage to survive by reproducing quickly, being able to survive on basically anything, and being pretty well adapted to the swamps, which essentially no one else is. They're somewhat amphibious, and use basic black magic.
- As they fled across the sea, one found that his new body was too large for his new wings. He fell into the ocean, and his Curse was taken by a school of shrimp. Luckily for him, he was a one-instance learner, and he figured that he ought to listen to the Creator this time. He taught them until he figured they'd learned enough, left them with the blessings they needed to call him, and fell into slumber. The shrimp-critters (I don't remember *any* of the names* wound up as little school groupminds of about 10 bodies per person, and tended to barbarians (complete with frenzy) and large-numbers ritual magic. those who wished to learn magic would Go To The Dragon, and spend years tending to his body, eating off the parasites and so forth, while they soaked up his magics. When their people faced a great danger, they could even summon him forth, at which point he would royally thrash whatever was bothering them, and then come back and eat some of them. If it was a serious threat to their well-being as a species, he would eat very few of them. If it was some petty thing, he might eat most of them. Mostly, he wants to be left alone, and he figures the easiest way for him to manage that is to make sure that his little berzerker shrimp stay alive and healthy on the one side, and terrified of bothering him unless it's Really Important on the other.
- One flew too high, ran into the aforementioned cloud, released his curse, and was consumed. That cloud, by now irretreivably insane eventually spread out over most of the world, and served as the basis for black magic. White magic drew power from the planet, which was recovered by the cloud, and black magic reversed the effect.
...The rest made it to the Dark Continent (which was Dark because the cloud eventually blotted out the sun entirely there, for reasons having to do with the Bizarre Endgame From Out Of Left Field) where they landed, gave forth their curses, and proceded to try to kill their way out of the trap the Creator had left them. It didn't work out too well. Eventually, the place settled down into various dark dragons in various forbidding places, that were mostly avoided through the Fear Stronger than Hate paradigm, while a variety of unhappy and naturally violent sentient races carried on a more or less constant war for scarce resources. at every level of complexity. Not even a nice place to visit.
- the only one I remember of these were the blood lizards. They were (not surprisingly) rather lizardlike, though they tended to be lower-slung, far less bulky, and have more of a whip-thin vicious look about them. They were all about revenge. They basically split up into bloodmages, who could cast spells at someone through their blood (it consumed the blood to do so, but if you were powerful enough, and had a reasonable amount of blood, you could pretty much just outright kill them, so not necessarily so much of a problem) and the bloodhunters, who could drink someone's blood to gain an unerring ability to track them, and some combat bonuses once they got there.
I was writing a Final Fantasy-style world for an appropriately themed tabletop game that never actually got off the ground The Long Convoluted Backstory was that the Creator had made the world, and at the end had made the Dragons, and to each Dragon had given a chance to give three gifts - one of life, one of magic, and one of sentience. He'd then told them that they were to go out into the world and give forth these gifts, and that some day their children would surpass them. A number of the dragons had done just that.
- One used the gift of Life to craft a stone into lizardmen, and then blessed them with intellect and magic. They were your basic Proud Warrior Race Guys, a bit larger and bulkier than you might expect a normal human to be, with hard scales. They valued the ability to endure and survive above all things. They tended to be Blue Mages (who learn magic only by enduring it, and thus proving themselves stronger than it), Knights (wearing no armor, and exploiting the enemy's reliance on easily destroyed things) and Monks (who fight with no outside assistance whatsoever)
- One crafted a race of semi-arboreal anthropomorphic cats, particularly agile, graceful, and charming, slightly smaller and much more slender than the average person. They got involved in theivery, intrigue, social manipulation, and nature magic. Their greatest theft, and their greatest epic, was when one of their earlier members managed to trick/manipulate one of the dragons into giving their race a *second* gift of magic, leaving them tremendously powerful.
- One crafted a race of anthropomorphic mice - significantly smaller than the cats, and rather less graceful, but good at being quick and dexterous and dodging. Also pretty good at stealth. This was the race that had its gift of magic stolen, and they *really* don't like the cats. To make up for the missing magic, they turned to technology and gadgetry. They also tend towards thievery, though it's more on the stealth, picking locks, disarming traps side of things, and less on the social and con side. Not nearly so many spies, but rather more scouts.
- Normal humans, of course.
- One looked at all of the other races and saw that each of his brethren had made races that looked out for themselves, and none had made any to look out for each other. He gave his gifts to his own dreams, creating the faeries, who would each find and bond to and support and serve another being. They were creatures made almost entirely of magic, and the bonding process stabilized them so that they could live outside of high-magic areas. They all had a number of small magics, and most were not all that bright. From time to time, one would develop more of a personality, and stabilize in themselves. The dragon would teach them summoning (which, indeed, would summon dragons, but only if you got their permission first. The dream-dragon would grant permission to each of them before they left) and they'd go out to serve pretty much everybody.
- Finally, there was a rather flighty one who found that time was running out, and he hadn't found anybody yet. He gave his gifts to a certain cloud, in a burst of impulse... but more on that later.
... of course, those were the dragons who did as they were told. Many of the others did not like the idea that they were to be overthrown by their own children, so they refused to give the gifts away. The Creator came back again, and chastised them, and turned the gift within them into a curse, so that it would come to rest on the first critter they came near, and those beings would know them as their parents, and that if they slaughtered their children, the curse would return to them to be given anew, and those that followed would know of the slaughter of their forebears. There was the rather strong suggestion that they should stick around and help develop their children, lest they be treated poorly once the Age of Dragons had passed. He then tristed their forms from shining beautiful metallic to dark and twisted and wrong, and drove them forth from the continent of their birth.
- One of them was bright enough to land in a swamp briefly on his way out. His Curse grabbed the frogs and toads and formed them into goblins. Without a dragon to guide them, they grew up nasty, brutish, primitive, and short. They manage to survive by reproducing quickly, being able to survive on basically anything, and being pretty well adapted to the swamps, which essentially no one else is. They're somewhat amphibious, and use basic black magic.
- As they fled across the sea, one found that his new body was too large for his new wings. He fell into the ocean, and his Curse was taken by a school of shrimp. Luckily for him, he was a one-instance learner, and he figured that he ought to listen to the Creator this time. He taught them until he figured they'd learned enough, left them with the blessings they needed to call him, and fell into slumber. The shrimp-critters (I don't remember *any* of the names* wound up as little school groupminds of about 10 bodies per person, and tended to barbarians (complete with frenzy) and large-numbers ritual magic. those who wished to learn magic would Go To The Dragon, and spend years tending to his body, eating off the parasites and so forth, while they soaked up his magics. When their people faced a great danger, they could even summon him forth, at which point he would royally thrash whatever was bothering them, and then come back and eat some of them. If it was a serious threat to their well-being as a species, he would eat very few of them. If it was some petty thing, he might eat most of them. Mostly, he wants to be left alone, and he figures the easiest way for him to manage that is to make sure that his little berzerker shrimp stay alive and healthy on the one side, and terrified of bothering him unless it's Really Important on the other.
- One flew too high, ran into the aforementioned cloud, released his curse, and was consumed. That cloud, by now irretreivably insane eventually spread out over most of the world, and served as the basis for black magic. White magic drew power from the planet, which was recovered by the cloud, and black magic reversed the effect.
...The rest made it to the Dark Continent (which was Dark because the cloud eventually blotted out the sun entirely there, for reasons having to do with the Bizarre Endgame From Out Of Left Field) where they landed, gave forth their curses, and proceded to try to kill their way out of the trap the Creator had left them. It didn't work out too well. Eventually, the place settled down into various dark dragons in various forbidding places, that were mostly avoided through the Fear Stronger than Hate paradigm, while a variety of unhappy and naturally violent sentient races carried on a more or less constant war for scarce resources. at every level of complexity. Not even a nice place to visit.
- the only one I remember of these were the blood lizards. They were (not surprisingly) rather lizardlike, though they tended to be lower-slung, far less bulky, and have more of a whip-thin vicious look about them. They were all about revenge. They basically split up into bloodmages, who could cast spells at someone through their blood (it consumed the blood to do so, but if you were powerful enough, and had a reasonable amount of blood, you could pretty much just outright kill them, so not necessarily so much of a problem) and the bloodhunters, who could drink someone's blood to gain an unerring ability to track them, and some combat bonuses once they got there.