You were taught from a young age that you were a freak, a monster among civilized folk, and that you should be proud of it. The first gnolls, your ancestors, were said to be the spawn of a particularly degenerate cult of goblin druids and the dire hyenas that they raised as warbeasts. Driven belowground, your kind has served as mercenaries for kobolds and other civilized beings desperate or savage to put up with the aggression and brutality of the gnolls.
A week ago you reached womanhood and suckled on the teat of the alpha who raised you for the final time. You doubt you will see her again; You are the third alpha female she has successfully reared, and her pack is strong enough to brave the surface. She will travel to the brightlands and seek either a glorious death, or some state of true depravity - bride of a nightbeast, thrall of a vampire, experimental canvas of a wicked druid, or even pet to some great monster such as a dragon or Minotaur. Perhaps someday such a fate can be yours as well, but your adventure as a mature alpha gnoll is just beginning, and very few in your shoes live to gain the strength and reputation required to face the surface.
Marching into Cimtunnels, the largest kobold settlement in this part of the underground, you begin to turn heads almost at once. The scent of an an alpha female draws almost every gnoll in town to the streets for a look. Once a crowd is gathered, you announce your intention to form a pack. This declaration alone is enough to cause a handful of younger males to kneel and declare fealty to you, but it is when you name the alpha who reared you that the support truly starts rolling in...
You Were Raised By:Headgnasher the Mighty: Most alpha gnolls end up about the size of a human, but your alpha-nurse was a freakish physical specimen even by gnoll standards. She was the size of an average troll, and nearly had the recuperative abilities of one as well. Her milk must have rubbed off on you, as you are already 6'10 yourself and still growing. You start with laminated bone plate armor, a horned steel helmet, and a twisted maul of rusted iron.
Deathdealer: Although not the biggest or meanest Alpha Gnoll, your nurse was among the most feared. A master of poison-brewing and infiltration, Deathdealer was the foremost assassin in the wild parts of the Darklands, and she has passed these skills onto you. You start with a large steel knife, a good sized collection of iron throwing stars, silk rope, a silk climbing harness, and a portable still, and several varieties of venom and poison.
The Alpha Trumpet: Your alpha-nurse was a true beast-mistress, and ruled over a vast territory with her mighty Calvary. She taught you how to both raise and ride the most feared denizens of the darklands. You start with a silver tipped wood pike, a copper warhorn, a Titanic Mule Scorpion as a personal mount and companion, and a breeding pair of frogsharks that can serve as guard animals, mounts for smaller gnolls, and a source of hallucinagenic secretions and edible spawn.
The Soothsinger: Although no slouch as a warrior, your alpha-nurse was best known for her ability to associate with beings who might otherwise kill a gnoll on sight. She taught you the languages of the deepest dwarves, goblins, elves, and orc, and as long as you put some effort into behaving yourself, you will be welcome in the tunnels controlled by such beings. You start with a bronze bladed whip, well tailored clothes, and a traveling companion of good birth belonging to one of the above races of your choosing.
Scartissue: Your alpha-nurse made her home in the deepest parts of the darklands, among the slade barrier and whispering pools of lava. Feared as a madwoman, even among gnolls, she partook in the gifts of hell and could command the earth and fire. At a young age, Scartissue made you pledge your worship, soul, and allegiance to sealed only meters below you. Choose two suitably 'demonic' domains or concepts, and start with related gear and magic.
After properly explaining who you are, you wind up with eleven young male gnolls armed with wood and stone weapons who are willing to serve you. Four others are willing to join you but own no weapon; It is up to you to decide if you are willing to lead troops armed only with tooth and claw into battle...
In addition to the young and eager, three older and larger males, likely reared as gift brothers to the deceased leaders of failed packs, present themselves as interested in serving as your pack's alpha male. The main role of the alpha male is to serve as your enforcer within the camp, and to stop any attempt by the pack to gang up and rape you. Many alpha males are second in command of on the battlefield as well. The true duty of your alpha male, however, will be to impregnate you so that you may produce milk when you find a girl-child worthy of nursing to alpha status; This is unlikely to happen soon, and your own gift brothers can fufill the other duties an alpha male might once you round them up, so you quickly reach the conclusion that you
don't have to take an alpha male right now. This conclusion allows you the luxury of casting an extra-critical eye on the three contenders.
Potential Alpha Males: (Choose no more than one)
Woolly: A seasoned old gnoll garbed in full leather armor and equipped with an expensive looking crossbow and steel bolts. He is well scarred and missing a finger on his left hand. Woolly claims to be a troll hunter, and shows off the collection of skulls and fine wool cloth to prove it. His advanced age proves that he is a survivor, but might also prove to hinder him when you need his services.
Zit: The freakish uglyness of this particular gnoll sends your heart aflutter. His head is deformed and asymetrical, and he appears to have ripped out his own claws and replaced them with nasty barbed bronze hooks. He wields a wood staff decorated with the skulls of young gnolls, and claims to know the basics of Kobold Druidism, although he refuses to prove it on the grounds that he only ever casts with lethal intent.
Child 29: The youngest and largest of the three candidates, Child 29 speaks funny because until recently he had been a slave to more civilized folk. He claims to have fought in the gladiator pits for both the dwarves and drow, and demonstrates his impressive moves with both a chipped and rusty drowish steel sword and several unarmed martial arts.
After you get the men sorted out, the smaller beta females begin to emerge from the woodwork. Non-alpha females are farely rare amoung gnolls, as it is traditional for a chieftess to kill any young girl she decides is unworthy of being nursed as an alpha. Those few who slip through the cracks are usually raised in Kobold villages, who use them as skilled laborers and guards until they gain the opportunity to join a pack. Once in a pack, it is the duty of a beta to birth and nurse boy-children to serve as soldiers and girl-children to be judged as potential future alphas. Although like all pack members, beta females are expected to fight when able, typically only those who also have non-combat skills are invited to join in the first place; Gnoll pregnancy, although short, is particularly rough on one's stamina, so most Alpha Females prefer betas who have the means to contribute even while expecting.
You now have five beta females on their knees begging to join your pack. Your Alpha-Nurse always preached that a pack should have at most one beta female for every eight males, but nothing is stopping you from disregarding that advice.
Potential Beta Females: (Choose as Few or as Many as you Wish)
Echo: Daughter of a gnoll and a nomadic bat-person, Echo was nursed for a decade as an experiment in hopes that she would make a fine alpha female, but just didn't have the attitude for it. Capable of short ranged silent flight, and in possession of supergnollish perception, Echo is sweet and curious. She owns a copper machete, and demonstrates her skill with it, but you doubt she is cut out for the intensity of battle. She claims to be a decent cook.
Glowshine: A beta female raised in the village, skilled in making powerful recreational drugs from fungi and bug secretions. Although a bit smaller than you would like, she seems fairly wealthy for a gnoll living in a kobold village, and actually owns a steel weapon, a handaxe, which are almost impossible to find this far from the dwarf tunnels.
Dot: The current town executioner, Dot owns a lethal obsidian edged wood blade, and has been trained by the kobolds to harness a bezerker rage in battle. She claims to be a skilled butcher as well. Although powerful, you know bezerkers are dangerous, and might easily turn their weapon against friends in a blind rage.
Cra-Crawler: The youngest of the females begging to join your pack, Cra-Crawler comes across as a bit nuts, speaking mainly in riddles. She keeps a lethal semi-undead Necroid Wasp the size of your head as a pet, lover, and object of worship, and claims that it tells her the future. Some of the young males volunteer that Cra-Crawler's wasp's premonitions tend to be uncannily accurate. Most in town suspect she posses some sort of skill in necromancy or undead blood herself to control such a creature.
She-of-Matted-Fur: An older female who likely only has a few more litters left in her, She-of-Matted-Fur claims that yours would be her third pack. Her hands are shaky with age, and as such she is forced to wield a simple rock maul in battle, but claims that back in the day she was a skilled bowgnoll, alchemist, and clothesmaker, and that she can still tutor others in these skills.
With the personnel sorted out,
it comes time to name both yourself and your pack. You answered to Cinnaclaw growing up, but it is custom for an alpha female to rechristen herself when forming a pack.
Feeling your pockets, you count an assortment of five well polished opals, each likely worth what the average Kobold in this place makes in a year. The town is big enough and has a market, so it is likely you could buy whatever you might need, but goods are likely to be undersized for you and made of poor material in a town like Cimtunnels, and as a general rule, once you reveal to kobolds that you have money, you must spend it or get out of town before it is stolen. You could hang around to see if you can pick up any mercenary work, but it is likely that all the good jobs here are saved for more extablished Gnoll packs.
Regardless if you intend to hang around or not, you must eventually go and hunt down your two gift brothers, the Gnolls born of your Alpha-Nurse to provide you with milk. They nursed alongside you, were your closest childhood friends, and first ever underlings. Your Alpha-Nurse sent them away eight months ago when it became apparent that you would soon reach womanhood, in the hopes that they will have already found work and contacts to benefit your pack by the time you had established it.
Gorgtooth, the meaner and stronger of your gift brothers, was sent to Camp Decay, a settlement of underground surface people so wicked that it was said to be their fellow outlaws who drove them underground. Camp Decay sits near the major trade tunnels between drow and goblin territory, and as such there is plenty of raiding work to be done.
The crafty and deceitful Lambgore was sent to Rusty Screw Village, a gremlin settlement the pays protection to your Alpha-Nurse's pack and often has other jobs available as well.
What, if anything, do you try to buy here, and where do you travel next?
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Topic: (SG) Gnoll Chieftess (Read 12342 times)