Society of the Sacred Republic

The three great pillars of society in the Sacred Republic are the Church of the Eightfold Way, the Estates and the Guilds. The Estates are the remnants of the old aristocracies, who still own the majority of the land, and the Guilds are the merchant societies who control most of the money. The common folk labour, and know that they have little recourse against abusive landlords or greedy trade houses.

Demographics

Humans

Humans make up approximately 30% of the population of the Republic, most of whom are descended from refugees who fled from the Ophionic Empire(Second) at some point in the last millennium. They have significant representation in Church, Estates and Guilds alike, but they also make up more than 40% of the urban poor, and 60% of the rural peasantry. They are distributed fairly evenly between the seven Provinces.

Elves

The elves of the Republic make up only about 10% of the population, but wield disproportionate authority thanks to their historical ties to the Regime, especially in the Church and Estates. The very few high elves who do not occupy high positions in society tend to do so out of choice, opting for a secluded life. The high elves, who live in all areas of the Republic, but with principal populations in the cities of Argea, Altea and Malahma, tend to consider themselves the only truly civilised people in the world. They view their cities as their highest creations and their legacy.
Their cousins, the wood elves, are less successful in the Republic. They despise the trappings of civilisation, including hierarchy and architecture, and preserve pockets of ancient forest predominantly in Berngaard and Ardheim. They have a fraught relationship with the Church, because they are technically heretics, but their hereditary ties to the high elves offer them some protection, so long as they pay lip service to orthodoxy.
Small numbers of sea elves and drow also make a living in the Republic, but they do not have a cultural base there.

Gnomes

Gnomes are a thriving race in the Republic, accounting for some 15% of the population, but lack political influence, except in the artisan guilds. Magically accomplished, they had status in the Sovereignties and many worked in or around the old libraries. The destruction of the libraries hit their culture hard, not least because so many lost, if not their lives, then certainly their livelihoods.
The city (rock) gnomes tend to live in purpose-built houses, and to cluster their dwellings with their own folk for practicality’s sake. They are outgoing and gregarious with all of their neighbours, but some see the creation of gnomish districts as insular and distrust them on that account. Country (forest) gnomes also live in distinctive homes scaled to their stature, but these tend to be interspersed with the larger houses of village neighbours, or else located in the woods.

Dwarfs

Dwarfs are a minority in the Republic as a whole, but almost all of those who do live there – about 5% of the total population – live in the Spine mountains between Altea and Ardheim, where they largely maintain their own society (mountain dwarfs) rather than participating in the Republic at large. In the time of the Mage Sovereigns, the dwarfs were protected by their own Rune Lords, but since the War of Hubris they have stepped back and allowed the Underpriests to take up the outward-facing social role. Contentiously, they maintain their old pantheon of gods – the Underpriests are clerics, but not of the Eight, and a range of complex doctrinal fictions are maintained to conceal this for diplomatic purposes – as well as their own guilds and noble dynasties.
A few dwarfs do find homes in the villages bordering the Spine (hill dwarfs), and while these embrace the ways of the Republic at large, association with their ‘heathen’ kin means that they are somewhat distrusted by the authorities and by more pious citizens. This is doubly unfair, as many of the hill dwarfs devote much effort into trying to convert the mountain clans.

Halflings

The halflings of Yethera have a long history as wanderers, travelling in extended family bands from place to place, living on their skills as cooks, brewers, tinkers, cooks, hunters, entertainers, healers, cooks or whatever else they might have to offer, and dwelling in surprisingly cosy and comfortable wagons. They first arrived in Talahaea in the time of the Mage Sovereigns. Perhaps 10% of the population of the Republic are halflings, of which three quarters still live the traditional life, but a growing number have begun to settle, usually alongside gnomish populations whose architecture suits them. What binds all Halflings is a rich culture of tea, both the drink – which they introduced to the region, along with tobacco – and the wider rituals of the afternoon meal.

Kobolds

Few people in the Republic would believe it, but nearly 20% of the population, by numbers, are kobolds. Since being granted personhood after the War of Hubris, small groups of kobolds have moved into the city slums to form warrens there. A warren is an extended family group, including relatives by marriage and adoption, who share a communal living space. Typically such a group takes up residence in a slum house, but what few of their neighbours realise is that they burrow down into the sewers below the houses and spread out, with the more enterprising getting paid as sewermen as well as expanding their living space in the traditional way. Kobolds whose original warren is wiped out traditionally seek a new one by offering whatever remains of their birth-warren’s goods to the chief of another, even if that is just a handful of mud and a broken spear.

Orcs and Giant-Kin

Traditionally, the northern steppes were home to clans of orcs, Hobgoblins, Goblins and the like, with the mountains beyond housing herds of goliaths. With the rise of the Northern Giantlands, however, many of these races have moved south, with the hobgoblins, goblins and Bugbears collecting in the Goblin Fiefdoms, and those orcs and goliaths who could not find a place among the giants’ warbands now living and working in the Republic, usually as labourers, soldiers or even exemplars.
They make up about 4% of the population by numbers, but more by biomass.

Half-elves and half-orcs

About 5% of the population have human heritage mixed with elf or, less frequently, orc blood (although the numbers of the latter are on the rise.) They typically live alongside their human kin. There is no institutional prejudice against half-breeds, save from the high elves, who see all other races as variously less civilised versions of them.

Aasimar and Tieflings

During the War of Hubris, the tieflings of the Sovereignties suffered greatly by association with the Cambion generals and ministers employed by some – but by no means most – of the Mage Sovereigns, leading to the persecution and death of many, even with very distant infernal heritage. Since then, the Church has announced that Tieflings – who make up less than 2% of the population – are untainted by their heritage, and should be judged by their own actions, but their arcane abilities are still viewed with suspicion.
Even rarer are those touched by celestial blood, but there are aasimar in the Republic. Strangely, very few serve in the Church.

Gnolls

Once thralls to the Mage Sovereigns, the gnolls who survived the War are officially people thanks to their willingness to serve the Church, and especially the Cult of Magic. Many act as mage trackers for the Hunt. Currently, some 3% of the population are gnolls, living almost exclusively in their own communities, associated with establishments of the cult of Iuva, although a few act as hunters for lords and ladies of the Estates, or as Guild enforcers.

Others

The wild places of the Republic are still home to small communities of firbolgs, but many have moved east towards the Beast Kingdoms since their traditional duidic faiths have been proscribed. Vanishingly small numbers of goblins and hobgoblin have also found their way into the Republic. A few Dragonborn, drow and other beast kin reside in trade cities, but they are not citizens of the Republic.

Infrastructure

The Republic is criss-crossed by a network of roads, designed for the smooth transportation of people and freight. The large rivers to the east of the Spine also provide a significant transport route. The large cities act as administrative hubs, and smaller towns hold regular markets to facilitate the exchange of goods.
Aarakocra sky ships occasionally pass overhead, but while swift, passage on them is hard to obtain and nearly impossible to predict.
The largest cities are linked by railways, while small groups can travel swiftly – but not cheaply – via the Cult of Iuva’s network of teleportation circles.
Major temples each have a number of priests dedicated to service as Senders, using magic to transmit messages out to their dependent temples. Networks of messenger birds and couriers convey information in the opposite direction.

Foreign Relations

The Goblin Fiefdoms

The Riverlands

Azeranzerai

The Second Ophionic Empire

Ladonia

Technology

Metalworking

Both iron and steel are widely used, with various places and cultures – the artificers and smithing guilds in the Republic – maintaining secret methods.
There are rarer metals known only to limited groups.

Clockwork

Highly specialised craft, mostly practiced by artificers, tinkers, a small community of clockmakers, and some locksmiths, and finding a market in larger towns. A few artificers apply clockwork mechanisms to explosive timers or mechanical controls.

Firearms

Firearms are a relatively new innovation, but the Republic has run with them, using them – and explosives – to replace some of the military force sacrificed by the lack of wizards. The Artificer’s Guild are at the forefront of this development.
Some soldiers in the Republic use muskets and heavy pistols, while gunsmiths and artificers may carry more sophisticated rifles and revolvers.
Artificers also create simple grenades and a few more complex explosives.

Armour

Because of the advance of firearms, heavy armour is increasingly rare in the Republic, being the preserve of exemplars and monster slayers.

Engines

Steam engines are a technology in its infancy, the water in their boilers heated either by fire or by magic.
The best examples combine human ingenuity, dwarf precision and gnome innovation.
A very limited number of major cities in the Republic and Azeranzerai are linked by railways, but the close-tolerance engineering needed to create them still involves a major investment of time, skill and labour. The locomotives which work these lines use engines fired by bound elementals, which draws considerable protest from genasi groups in Malahma who feel that this abuses their kin.

Constructs

A few Artificers create mechanical constructs with limited or no magical elements, but advanced golems and more sophisticated creations like the Forgeborn remain the preserve of magic or Titanic science.

Type

Geopolitical, Republic