The Gourdmen:

The Gourdmen are a race of plant-based humanoids who, true to their name, store great amounts of water in their pear-shaped bodies. This means they are much better adapted to fighting off starvation, and only need to eat half as much as the average human. In addtion, they are good at strenuous manual labor and are very resilient in general. However, their small size and awkward body means they are neither very strong nor very agile.

Gourdmen do not have a gender (though they refer to themselves as male), and reproduce by releasing seeds that fall into the soil and eventually hatch into new Gourdmen, who are adopted by the tribe that finds them first. Because of this, gourdmen have no sense of familial attachment, and the typical mindset of a gourdman could be said to be "myself before my clan, my clan before my tribe, my tribe before my people, and my people before everyone else." That is to say, they are very self-centered and seek the position that benefits them the most, and will quarrel with competitors to secure that position. However, if a foreign threat were to encroach upon them, they would band together to drive it off.

The Standard Gourdman: Small, spindly, and spherical, these are your typical Gourdman. The most common of the three breeds.

Stiltstriders: Known for their much longer legs, these Gourdmen suffer no penalities to dexterity or agility and can cross long stretches of terrain with ease.

Ogres: Large and bulky, these stronger than normal Gourdmen are not to be taken lightly. They don't suffer from the physical frailties of the other breeds, and can make for a lethal encounter.

Tiers:

Gourdmen come in various levels of strength. Learn the different types to increase the chances of your survival. They all hate each other, so be warned that fraternizing too much with one tribe will make you an enemy of the other two.

Tribesmen: These are the most common Gourdmen. Known for their multicolored attire, these people can't be missed. Relatively weak, but underestimate them at your peril. If you raise your relation with the faction they are in, you will be able to recruit them once their tribe likes you enough.

Bloodgourds: The official fighters of the clans, these warriors are few in number, but as deadly as the guards you'll find in a city. Caution must be taken when dealing with these deceptively deadly foes. Bloodgourds can be recruited, but there are several conditions that must be met. First, you must be very well liked by the tribe they belong to. Second, you must be a better warrior than they are. And thirdly, the person recruiting them must be a gourdman as well. Only when these conditions are met will they accept you as chieftan.

Chieftans: The strongest the clans have to offer, chieftans are a much bigger challenge than the average swordsman. However, most of their power comes from their monopoly over supplies. If you want to purchase anything in a tribe camp, you'll need to speak to a chieftan.

The Tribes:

The Gourdmen Tribes are the various clans that call the continent home. There are three main tribes with different niches, all hostile to one another.

Clan Birobek: A farming society, Birobek survives off of cultivating cactus and the products that come with it. They are the oldest and most sophisticated of the tribes, and most friendly to outsiders. Those who stumble upon a Birobek encampment will find ample supplies of food and water, should they have the Cats for it.

Clan Kakkan: Originally exiled to the edges of the deserts they call home, this exposure to more moist biomes led them to encountering the infamous river raptors. While many view them as simply pests, Kakkan saw opportunity. After many decades, the Gourdmen of clan Kakkan learned to domesticate and herd these obstinate reptiles, selling both their meat and leather to those who are willing to buy. However, due to the raptor's gluttonous nature, they often will ravage the crops of those near to Kakkan settlements. Because of this, Birobek and Kakkan have poor relations, as Birobek's dependence on cactus puts them in a vulnerable position when raptors are near.

Clan Mulm: The shiftiest of the three clans, Mulm deals in drugs and alchohol almost exclusively, along with various other shady activities. While they don't have much to offer in terms of supplies, those of a more criminal character may find another use for them. The merchants of clan Mulm care little for what you are selling, and will happily buy anything regardless of its legality. As you might imagine, these unscrupulous tendencies have put them at odds with Birobek and Kakkan, and skirmishes with the two other tribes are not uncommon.

Clan Magug: The Magug tribe was founded a mere 13 years ago in the Spider Plains, but has grown to be a serious threat to the local Shek Kingdom. Due to a strange mutation, the Magug Gourdmen's spores only create more of the Ogre subspecies, making them considerably more dangerous than the typical tribe. In addition, they have rallied under their still-living founded, the All-Chief Magug himself. Under his command, they have founded a small fortress, armed and armored their warriors, and launched a series of brutal attacks on their northern neighbors. At the moment, the Shek are succeeding in pushing the scourge back, but due to their small numbers they do not quite have the strength to completely exterminate the threat, while the numerous Gourdmen are not quite skilled enough to overpower the warriors of the Kingdom, resulting in a bloody stalemate. But if someone were to find Magug's fortress and slay him, the clan's cohesion would collapse, and they would likely be unable to muster up any significant forces for a very long time.

Clan Ralka: Ralka was once a tribe of moderate influence in the south, but was reduced to nothing but scattered camps by UC aggression some time ago, and have since declared war on all who would keep them from regaining their rightful status. As it stands, they are mostly found east of their homeland, the bonefields, having been pushed into the royal valley and greyshelf where they skirmish with the southern hive. The UC has placed bounties on any Ralka clan members taken alive, as it wishes to make an example of the tribe and see the whole of the Ralka people reduced to slaves, or simply wiped out. Notably, Ralka has a majority of the Stiltstrider variant among their ranks, with common gourdmen and ogres being far rarer.

Starving Gourdmen: Orphaned or abandoned Gourdmen, lacking the supply network the clans have, often take to banditry to satiate their thirst when their supplies inevitably run out. These bandits are a medium level threat, and caution should be taken when dealing with them.

The Tark:

The nation of Tark is the result of a clan bearing the same name going through a rapid industrial revolution thanks to a generation of radical thinkers and influences from the UC and the traders guild. The result was the creation of a technocratic oligarchy that has become reknowned for its brutal determination to unite all gourdmen under its yoke. Those who are taken away to live in its capital city, Gremd, will have no right to self-defence or weaponry, and live as thralls to the Directors and their lobotomized Skeleton enforcers and the cadre of loyalist soldiers who command them.

Gremd:

The seat of power for Tark, this city is feared by all free Gourdmen as a place of oppression and slavery. Located on a narrow strip of land between the Iron Valley and the Skimsands, Gremd is protected on both sides by harsh, nearly impassible terrain, leaving only the thin northern and southern passages as viable entrances. In addition, this gives them easy access to the Skeletons of the Deadlands, who they kidnap and dismantle to use their circutry to manufacture the now-infamous Tark Battle Droids which make up the bulk of their military. But this formidable organization is not without weaknesses.

The Gangs:

Gremd has its seedy underbelly as any city does, but due to the greed of the Directors allowing crime to flourish, two powerful criminal syndicates now battle for control of the black market. While weapons are near impossible to get in the city, the gangs have compensated by developing lethal skill in martial arts.

The Tark Ragheads: Known for their distinctive green bandanas, the Ragheads originated from the underclass of the nation. Despite their propensity for crime, they display a perverse sort of patriotism, and despise the tribes as much as the Directors do.

The Rund Clan: Originally a lesser clan under Mulm, these enterprising vagabonds saw which way the winds were blowing and immigrated to Tark before its hatred of the tribes could fully manifest. But the Ragheads had already established themselves, and only a brutal gang war gave them they leverage they needed to equal their rivals.

The Gremd Streetcleaners: Less an organized gang and more a loose group of opportunists, the Streetcleaners wander the narrow alleys of Gremd looking for lost and wayward folk to beat into submission and sell to the slavers. Because they focus mostly on doing this to the other two gangs, however, the leadership of Tark has opted to simply look the other way. For now.

Tark Doctor's Union: Not really a gang, but an independent organization of medical professionals who dedicate themselves to keeping the population alive and healthy. After all, the Directors don't seem to care about that sort of thing. They are tolerated by the rulers of Tark, so long as they remember their place.