The Commonwealth of Free Destrea
Demographic Breakdown
Government Type: Lottocratic Federation
Head of State: N/A
Head of Government: First Minister Jacen Royce
Governing Body: The Chamber of Commons
Political Factions: N/A
Nation's Capital: Dawnpeak
Other Municipalities: Bulwark, Arcton, Floe, New Soldev, Refuge Falls.
Population: ~320, 000
Racial Composition: 33% Human, 18% Dwarven, 17% Orc, 12% Drow, 9% Dragonkin, 6% Giant, 5% Other.
Religious & Spiritual Beliefs: 29% Secular, 22% Kinsman, 19% Omnist, 13% Aspecticist, 11% Anclican, 3% Fistic Order, 3% Unspecified.
Demonym: Commoner*
Main Exports: Oil, Coal, Machine Parts, Salt, Wrywood, Fish.
Currency: Platinum, gold, silver, and copper coins.
National Sport: Chelle
Languages: Common, Dwarvish (Traditional), Elvish, Draconic
Motto: "Divided We Beg, United We Bargain."
*Editor's Note: This was adopted so as to preempt those who might use the term as a pejorative. Like children who've developed an unfortunate nickname, Commoners use it themselves to prevent it being used against them.
Commoner Slang, Sayings, and Idioms
"Boys make excuses, men make-do."
"Waytown" (n.) - A town or village with a largely transitory population, usually due to its being located on a major trade/travel route, or in Destrean parlance, 'way'.
"Seeing wind" - Witnessing something contradictory, or impossible.
"The Commoner's Creed"
Noble of heart, if not standing.Young of spirit, if not body.Rich of mirth, if not coin.Strong of will, if not arms.
Come ye scoundrels, dissidents and rogues,Bastards, misfits, rebels, and reviled.Here you’ll find thine spirit in vogue,and be, by chance, beguiled.
By Sea, by Sky, by feet-on-Land,make then haste to Stranger's Span.Past the Chokeway, round the bend,and whence upon, take hand.
By scale, by flesh, by rocky hide,relieve in relief, confide.No sin or shame we shan't abide,come and cast thine past behind.
The Boneway, a winding road that runs from Torrhen to the Smoothstone Range. Built by the Jotünera during the Founding Era, it was later expanded upon by settlers, and today is maintained by the towns, villages, and city-states of the Commonwealth.
Cultural Trivia
As a lottocraty, The central F.D.C. government in Dawnpeak employs the peculiar method of sortition for selecting their public officials- one that no other nation has attempted in the history of the realm. The Great Kleroterion at Dawnpeak, an intricate, tamper-proof, randomized sorting machine is used to determine which eligible citizens will serve in administrative tribunals for the greatly-limited, but highly-involved central Commonwealth government.
Upon gaining citizenship, commoners have a bloodcoin made, which is bound to them using Gorelock magicks and inserted into the Kleroterion. There is a rumour that the device is designed to omit any coin whose author has put themselves forward specifically as a candidate for First Minister, as its principal architect, Arthur Klerot, once famously stated that "Anyone who would seek to occupy the highest office in the land is the last person who should have the job."
Arcton
"The Big Stink"
Population ~68,000
A peculiar city, located on an island tucked in a shallow inlet along the Frostway. At high tide, it can only reached by boat (maximum hull depth of visiting ships is limited to roughly 10 feet), but for two 6 hour periods per day, it can be approached on foot, during low tide. Airship travel is very dangerous, due to the violent storms that cross frequently along the channel.
Arcton's skyline is easily spotted from a great distance, thanks to the impressive height of its buildings, and the relative flatness of the surrounding topography in The Bleak (which lies just north of the city).
Arcton was built on a hilled island, and is divided into three tiers which are separated by altitude. The lowest tier, Monger, supplies the other two with crude energy, fish, and sea-grown vegetables, through harvesting systems deployed during high tide; it is the heavy industrial zone of the town. The middle tier, Boon, is the primary residential area of the city, and is home to most of the non-industrial businesses in Arcton. The third and final tier, The Raigh (pronounced 'Rye'), hosts the various institutional entities which govern the people of Arcton. There you'll find the Council Chamber of The Auld Barons, which (historically) has been the principle ruling body of Arcton, but new to the area is the office of the Commonwealth Magistrate, as well as The Anclevan Empire’s consulate.
Arcton is also famous for its eclectic machine contraptions, such as automatic balloon lifts, pneumatic messenger piping, and all manner of strange inventions not yet featured in many other cities in Destrea. It is said that the great artificer Arno Dagsson studied his craft here, as an apprentice of the Machinist Guild.
"The No-Go"
A mid-sized fishing town, nestled where The Bounty Strait opens out into Morbid Bay.
The shoreline of Morbid Bay is actually a stunning anomaly in the Great Wide. Due to the presence of an active underwater volcano at the sea floor, the water is far warmer and richer in minerals than in other in parts of the Commonwealth. According to legend, the Jotunera tribe which inhabited it centuries ago, over generations, gradually removed the rocks which one littered its shores every winter (while the water had receded), leaving only fine sand to walk upon. The first Floe settlers named it Morbid Bay to discourage further development of the area, keeping the beaches to themselves.
Floe
Bulwark
"The Wee Turtle"
According to legend, during the Dragonrend sometime in the founding era, the Elder Dragon Torval, after incurring a mortal wound from his former-bondmate Vorac'nath'al, famously made for himself a makeshift den using his ice breath. It was composed of two massive curved walls for the howling winds of The Great Wide to break upon.
In the centuries since, the den came to be a welcome respite for weary hunters who would traverse the region, eventually becoming a permanent camp for fishermen, pelters and the like. Over the course of several generations of expansion, it is now a small town and port-of-call along the trade routes running through the Frostway. As it is a 3 day’s ride on the Boneway (in favourable conditions) from the Commonwealth capital of Dawnpeak, Bulwark has enjoyed a modest amount of prosperity from the travellers and caravaneers who pass through it.
Its residents are on the older side, most being retirees from the larger cities of the F.D.C., while others are there in search of work, attempting to gather up coin enough to afford a hearth in Dawnpeak or Arcton. The townsfolk are trusting, earnest & kind, almost to a fault; a common barb (shared among more cynical world-wanderers) is "What's the easiest way to make coin off a Bulwarkian? Ask him for it."
"The Fourth Bastard"
Nestled in the shadows of The Bastards mountain range, past the mouth of the Frostway, lies the cold, proud city of New Soldev. The 2nd-greatest proportionate contributor to the Commonwealth's economy, and the principal supplier of natural resources in the country, New Soldev's importance cannot be understated- and its abrasive, hardboiled Magistrate, Arturro Dagsson, is never one to do so. A notoriously hard-nosed negotiator with a famously short temper, there have been repeated instances of New Soldev threatening to declare its independence from the broader Commonwealth- though some suspect this is due to personal animus on Dagsson's part toward the current First Minister.
As a rite of passage, anyone who either emigrates to, or comes of age in New Soldev must earn their citizenship by completing a rite of passage called an 'Out Trip', which is comprised of seven days spent camping in the mountain valleys beyond the city limits. They may bring with them only a set of basic survival tools, three days' rations, a state-issued flare pistol, and two weapons of their choice. They may return to the city or call for a rescue at any time, but if they do so before they've successfully lived off the land for a week, they must attempt the Out Trip again the following year. This highly contentious practise has been a long-standing tradition, since the very founding of New Soldev.
New Soldev's combustion-powered, steel pipe infrastructure might appear rudimentary or even crude at first glance, but in terms of energy efficiency, it rates the the highest among non-arcanic systems across the realm. This is largely due to their vertically-focused architectural planning, which vastly reduces the degree of heat energy loss typical of cold climate cities.
New Soldev
Shiver Falls
"The Font of Salvation"
Originally founded on a glacier by a group of mostly-Drow and Dwarven settlers, Shiver Falls is the easternmost city in the Commonwealth, lying just north of the ruins of Stön Duane. First established as safe haven for those fleeing the violence of the Dwarven Civil War of 144 DC, the Falls have seen their fair share of hard-lucked citizens who've had to struggle mightily to rebuild their lives. Their geographic proximity to Gilgas and Voran was, and remains to this day, a disconcerting omen for its inhabitants.
"Stuck-Up Summit"
A sprawling mountain metropolis often blanketed in fog, Dawnpeak is the capital of the Commonwealth and the southernmost city in the country. It is also the namesake of the famous Treaty of Dawnpeak, signed in the city by representatives from Voran, Anclevan, Gorrano, Antür, and Gilgas, which marked the end of Aegis' Wake.
Folk in most other cities and townships in the Commonwealth seem to bear a special antipathy for Dawnpeakers, beyond the usual rural-urban tensions experienced almost universally across societies.
Dawnpeak
Frostpyre
A majority-Torvali city which relatively peaceably declared its independence from its mother nation of Voran, detaining the local Primarch/garrison, then defecting to the Commonwealth during Aegis' Wake. As it is not recognized as an independent city-state, let alone a Commonwealth member, by Voran today, Frostpyre's status remains a point of contention on the world stage and a constant strain on additional peace efforts beyond the Treaty of Dawnpeak.
Nestled in the Bay of Blades, which is on the easternmost end of the Frostway, Frostpyre endures a harsh, but stable environment– sheltered from the frigid winds of the Great Wide by coal-rich mountains.
Military Structure
Ranger Corps III
Rifleers
Aircorps
The Commonwealth's Ranger Corps III is the most well-trained and versatile fighting unit in the world. While their ranks number only 600, all of whom volunteers, their breadth of skills and extensive combat experience make them a dauntingly competent fighting force. While its moniker implies that there exists a Ranger Corps I/II, it is speculated that 'RC-III''s name is intended as a prohibitive measure by the Commonwealth military.
During peacetime, Ranger teams are assigned to regions of The Great Wide to act as reconnaissance units, searching for monsters in the Great Wide– and eliminating them.
While the Rifleers' effectiveness in the early stages of Aegis' Wake was limited (they often took shortbows as side-arms, for when reloading their arquebuses in time was out of the question), their combat utility jumped significantly in the late stages due to their timely alliance with Edonius/Anclevan– and the incorporation of the carbine rifle.
The Commonwealth Rifleers newest weapon, whose design is based on the powerful long rifles of the Edonian Gun-Knights, has revolutionized conventional warfare. The chamber carries up to six slug rounds with enough calibre to pierce plate armour, and can be reloaded much faster than its ancestor, the arquebus rifle– making armoured knights and their equivalents much more vulnerable on the battlefield.
"Chainmail? Oh, sure rook. Chainmail will stop a bullet, as long as you don’t throw it too hard."
–1st Sgt. Sam Rivers, to a new Private
Had The Commonwealth's fleet of fighter and bomber craft not existed and performed as marvellously as it did in The Glacier campaign of Aegis' Wake, it is fair to say they would now be under Voranite rule.
Composed of heavy airship bombers designed to sink naval ships, and fighters to support ground troops/eliminate enemy air forces, The Commonwealth Aircorps has set the precedent for hot to conduct aerial warfare the realm over.