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Life through the seasons in the Wastelands


TurbidWater

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What's life like for Nomads during each season? Sartarites (and I assume other agricultural societies) plant in Sea season, raid in Fire, harvest in Earth ...etc. But what's it like in the Wastelands? For when the Nomads have to move from pasture to pasture, do they harvest and carry rain water with them?

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The answer to this varies according to the following:

  • The annual migration path of the individual clan concerned (and if it's one of the rare years for a Paps visit)
  • Their beast type (for rutting and birth seasons)

For my Praxian games, I use a hex map and get the players to go round the table and mark each season's rune on a map (using R for sacred time). This marks where the tribe is at the start of the every season. I usually limit the Sea season marker to within 14 hexes of Sacred time as a hex a day limit seems sensible (given it's only two weeks). Otherwise anywhere is fine.

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Marked on it are the ancestral homelands of the tribes as these are usually avoided by the other tribes. Likewise the Krjali Bog, and the Devils marsh (Chaos Box and Wolfhead are missing from this map). Once done, I then overlay the grazings map and a few other features (oases, serpents, etc). From this we have the clan map. Next we mark the rutting season (if appropriate) as that's where clans intersect to form septs to increase the breeding pool. Next is birth time, here the clan is more vulnerable to other clans raiding. Next mark appropriate High Holy days - Waha & Eiritha, but also usually Storm Bull and any other relevant to the group and that's the year done.

 

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23 hours ago, TurbidWater said:

What's life like for Nomads during each season?

To David's note, you can also consider the following:

GtG p.440: "No rain falls during Fire and Earth Seasons, and only rarely in Dark Season. During Dark, Storm, and Sea Seasons wild storms rage."

GtG p.456: "Raging Storm: The Storm Bull lives here, guarding the blasted remains of Genert’s Garden for his lost lord. This storm sometimes moves to the north, sometimes to the south, but always blowing his furious desert winds. It blows most powerfully in Dark Season, when Storm Bull blows his wrath throughout the Wastes and even beyond"

There's also some notes in the appendix on weather beginning p.662:

Seaseason: Storm Bull winds sometimes blow northwards from the Wastes at this time... When the Storm Bull Winds blow strongly straight northward into the troll wastes it brings about an unusually rapid thaw called, in troll language, the Vile Thaws.  [The northern Wastes and Pent seem more affected.]

Fireseason: The Storm Bull Winds blow outward from the Wastes of Genertela, sometimes north, sometimes south, rarely eastward, bringing sand storms in the phenomenon called the Hot Storm.

Earthseason: The Storm Bull Winds, dry this season, again blow outward from the Wastes, usually in a northern or southern direction, occasionally eastward over the Shan Shan mountains.  [Note, too, that early in Earthseason, the Doldrums (the No-winds of Brastalos) pass along the coast of the Wastes and Prax and may halt the winds altogether.]

Darkseason: the map shows the Storm Bull Winds directed towards the southwest and Prax.

Stormseason: the Gagarth winds appear almost anywhere. These winds are often called “The Wild Hunt Storm” by the locals. This wind seems to defy all reason as to its direction, origin, and strength, doing great harm wherever it passes.  

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On 7/23/2022 at 11:59 PM, TurbidWater said:

For when the Nomads have to move from pasture to pasture, do they harvest and carry rain water with them?

Most Prax beasts are very useful to their tribes as they eat grass and produce a supply of milk (drink) and meat (food).  Praxians will use buckets made of cuir-bouilli for milking and may well carry fresh water in water-skins.   Water-skins will be more important to Ostrich and Bolo Lizards as they don't produce milk, but these tribes (like all Praxian tribes) will have numerous beasts from the other tribes in their herd.  Praxians will have pots or sacks of stored grains they have foraged that they can't obtain easily, as well as stores of medicinal herbs, some of which can double as foods.  They will catch and store unseasonal rain water if they have the means, but during the seasons when it falls regularly and reliably (Storm and Dark) it is normally plentiful or is fallen as snow, and so it isn't a priority.  Due to the fact that Praxians often have an excess of milk, they have learned to make cheeses, some of which are good.  I have created a list of Praxian cheeses if you are interested.

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On 7/23/2022 at 8:59 AM, TurbidWater said:

What's life like for Nomads during each season? Sartarites (and I assume other agricultural societies) plant in Sea season, raid in Fire, harvest in Earth ...etc. But what's it like in the Wastelands? For when the Nomads have to move from pasture to pasture, do they harvest and carry rain water with them?

Seems to me that no one can carry more than a few days' water.  Praxians will always carry some water, they aren't suicidal. 

But survival in the desert in dry seasons depends on knowing where springs and wells are. (There might be no surface water, but aquifers will have water that fell during the wet seasons.  On average Prax is not impossibly dry, it's just distributed unequally.)   

Praxian migrations will be from one to another of these, except for those strong clans who can visit the Zola Fel river.

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3 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

But survival in the desert in dry seasons depends on knowing where springs and wells are. (There might be no surface water, but aquifers will have water that fell during the wet seasons.  On average Prax is not impossibly dry, it's just distributed unequally.)   

Praxians also know which plants hold water, so they can dig up those plants and eat them for their water content. Some plants might be able to be cut and provide bitter water to drink.

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4 hours ago, soltakss said:

Praxians also know which plants hold water, so they can dig up those plants and eat them for their water content. Some plants might be able to be cut and provide bitter water to drink.

You mean like barrel cactus? But  cacti grow slowly, so they are only an emergency water source.  If a lot of people relied on them daily they would be extinct.

 

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11 hours ago, Squaredeal Sten said:

You mean like barrel cactus? But  cacti grow slowly, so they are only an emergency water source.  If a lot of people relied on them daily they would be extinct.

Yes, that kind of thing.

Also roots and tubers could hold water.

We are not necessarily constrained by earthly biology, after all.

Simon Phipp - Caldmore Chameleon - Wallowing in my elitism since 1982. Many Systems, One Family. Just a fanboy. 

www.soltakss.com/index.html

Jonstown Compendium author. Find my contributions here

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For me, living in Prax is hard, living in the Wastes is worse, but the  lack of water is not  one of them, too mundane, as that is something IMG easily solved through magic. I am sure any shaman worth their salt keeps an undine, or several, for such emergencies, and that is one of the reasons to visit Zola Fel and to be in good terms with their cult. 

Food is harder to magic up, and the constant conflict makes it worse, but without magical aid I do not see how Praxians could live in large groups in the Wastes, as the carrying capacity will be extremely low. 

That is one of the problems in the Wastes, you have to spread the people, and that makes them vulnerable to all the other menaces in the land. 

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