Humans

Humans are defined by momentum. Their societies expand rapidly, their ambitions rarely remain small, and their presence is felt almost everywhere. Through force of arms, mastery of magic, and sheer persistence, humans have built nations that stretch across continents. No single trait defines humanity as a whole, save for variety itself. Human cultures range from honor-bound nomadic clans to decadent noble houses steeped in cruelty and excess, often existing within a few days’ travel of one another.

While many humans settle into familiar routines, curiosity and restlessness run deep within the race. Large numbers abandon their homes to explore forgotten ruins, chart unknown lands, or impose their will on neighboring peoples. Expansion is not always driven by necessity. Often, humans push outward simply because opportunity exists and someone is willing to seize it.

Human cultures frequently look backward and forward at the same time. Ancient empires and legendary eras are romanticized, their remnants preserved as relics and symbols of identity. Yet humans are equally quick to abandon tradition when it becomes inconvenient, replacing old customs with new ideas at remarkable speed. Objects, creatures, and even people are often collected, displayed, or employed as symbols of success or memory. Some see this as a desire for control, while others interpret it as a hunger for experience and remembrance. To many humans, what matters most is not lasting value, but proof that something was encountered, claimed, or survived.

Humans show intense interest in other peoples, particularly those with longer histories. This curiosity can manifest as admiration, imitation, or shallow fascination, often paired with an unspoken belief that human norms are the default by which all others should be measured. Even scholars who devote their lives to studying other cultures frequently struggle to overcome this bias. Humans are typically outgoing and eager to interact, yet they often fail to recognize how casually they marginalize others through ignorance or assumption.

Suspicion toward humans is not unwarranted. History offers countless examples of fear and intolerance among human societies escalating into persecution, purges, inquisitions, and wars. Humans are particularly vulnerable to rhetoric that frames difference as threat, whether that difference lies in race, belief, origin, or social class. While many stand against such movements and work toward unity, others enable extremism through silence or indifference. Humanity contains both tendencies in abundance.

Human appearance varies more widely than that of any other common ancestry. Skin tones range from deep brown to pale ivory, often shaped by climate and ancestry. Facial features, body types, hair texture, and eye color differ dramatically between regions and populations. Some humans have angular features and sharp cheekbones, others rounder faces and broader builds. Eyes may be narrow or wide, deeply set or prominent, and hair may be straight, coiled, fine, or coarse.

These traits are rarely random. Lineage, culture, and homeland often leave visible marks, allowing experienced observers to guess a human’s origins. Cultural expression further distinguishes populations through clothing, jewelry, hairstyles, tattoos, piercings, and ritual scarring. Among humans, identity is worn openly on the body as often as it is spoken aloud.

Human societies encompass every form of governance imaginable. Kingdoms rise and fall quickly compared to those of longer-lived peoples, and borders shift with regularity. Even the oldest human civilizations exist in a state of ongoing reinvention. This instability is not weakness, but adaptation. Humans excel at responding to change, altering traditions, laws, and technologies to meet new challenges.

Other races often envy this flexibility. Humans are willing to attempt what has never been tried, abandon what no longer works, and gamble on uncertain futures. Though many individuals prefer familiarity and comfort, humanity as a whole possesses an enduring drive to push beyond known limits and pursue distant possibilities.

Human population growth and ambition frequently bring them into contact with other races, particularly during periods of expansion. These encounters often lead to conflict, yet humans are equally capable of reconciliation and alliance when opposition proves costly or unnecessary. While pride can shade into arrogance, the sheer diversity within human societies allows many to accept difference with relative ease.

Stereotypes about other races are common, ranging from dismissive to openly hostile. Ignorance of foreign languages and customs sometimes hardens into fear, and fear into oppression or violence. Such attitudes have led, in rare but infamous cases, to attempted eradication of entire peoples. Despite this, most human cultures contain strong traditions of cooperation and coexistence, and movements toward tolerance are as much a part of human history as conquest.

Humans display the widest moral range of any common ancestry. They are capable of immense cruelty and extraordinary compassion, sometimes within the same society. Most humans tend toward neutrality as individuals, though nations and cultures often develop strong ethical identities.

Religion among humans is equally varied. With few ancestral obligations and little reverence for unchanging tradition, humans worship countless gods, spirits, and philosophies. Faith is often pragmatic, shaped by need, hope, fear, or ambition rather than inherited duty.

Many humans take up adventuring in pursuit of ambition. Wealth, influence, knowledge, and personal legend all serve as common motivations. Others are drawn by danger itself, seeking challenge and meaning beyond the ordinary. Because humans arise from countless cultures and circumstances, they can thrive in nearly any role within an adventuring group.