The History of Eldinar Part 1

Hello all…
So as some of you may already know, our upcoming game, Master of Spies (now scheduled for a Kickstarter in February 2016), takes place in the fictional setting of the world called Eldinar. What is this strange and mythical place? Well, Rob L is here with some answers to that question and more……

Master of Spied Card Game
Art by Paul Singer

1st Age- The Age of the Wyrm (2612 years)

Little is remembered of this age, and less is recorded. What is known is that the Dragonlords ruled supreme. Century upon century of harmonious existence, with little to interrupt their equanimity. Eventually, though, they grew bored with this life, and longed to turn the land into a living shrine to themselves.

DragonFaceOff_Internet_1920
Art by Jack Holiday

Whether men were there from the beginning, or were created by the Dragonlords for their purposes, has been forgotten. Only Uthrax, the Dragon King & eldest of their race, may recall how they came to be. Regardless, the Dragonlords utilized the humans as slave labor, though the humans also came to worship the Dragonlords as gods, a notion the Dragons did not dismiss.

Over the years many shrines were erected & statues carved, though most important were the massive temples & carefully tended groves deep within the spawling forest which the Dragonlords called The Verdant Canopy (later referred to by the humans as the Umbrageous Wood).

As mankind spread across the land in their labors, they encountered strange creatures, similar to them in features, but taller & fairer, with an otherworldliness about them. They claimed to have come from “across the sea” to visit this land and discover its secrets. They called themselves elves, and some stayed among the humans for a while, and a few even mated with them, producing offspring. Eventually, most of the elves returned from whence they came, but their progeny remained, and these were regarded as fate-touched by the humans.

Time passed, and the numbers of men grew, while the Dragonlords slowly dwindled (this fact was kept hidden from the ever-increasing humans who still worshipped & feared them). Long life they had, but few offspring. To counter this, some of the optimal humans (nearly always ones with elven blood) were conscripted to serve as breeding partners for the few fertile Dragonlords who remained. They maintained that the purpose for this was to bequeath their own greatest aspects to the fecund but generally weak & short-lived humans. These pairings produced more hatchlings among the Dragonlords than had been seen in centuries, and succeeded in producing a hybrid that embodied many of the foremost traits of the superior race. Mankind, however, had contributed from among their keenest attributes as well, though many of these were to remain dormant for hundreds of years……

No one knows what caused the Dragonlords to sleep. Perhaps it was an inherent hibernation instinct, perhaps it was ennui; but sleep they did. And thus the 1st Age of Eldinar ended with mankind left to their own devices, for the first time in their existence.