Draughir
Overview
The Draughir are touched by the realm of Winter, a nightmare realm of hunger and death that nonetheless possesses hidden wisdom. They are calculating, practical to the point of expediency and protective of what is theirs, but they are monstrous in appearance, and struggle with inhuman instincts. Draughir are most comfortable in military and economic roles which give them the independence they need to make the sort of pragmatic decisions they want to take. Draughir are often drawn to positions of political power but they can find it frustrating to share power with others, if they get in the way of the draughir's ability to provide effective leadership. Draughir priests are relatively rare; while draughir can be as virtuous as any human, their pragmatic nature means they tend to prioritise solutions over principles and their virtue is often more instinctive than intellectual.
While many take dominant roles, there are plenty of draughir who actively seek out second-in-command and lieutenant roles and they make excellent companions, attendants and right-hand henchmen - they are capable of fierce loyalty, to the right commander.
The draughir lineage is intended to appeal to players who want a character who is callous and merciless towards their enemies. Draughir are often pragmatic to the point of being brutal and are an option for anyone looking to play an emotionally hardened or otherwise unsympathetic character. The draughir give options for playing an anti-hero or misunderstood outsider, as well as a character who is “wrestling with inner demons”. It also allows a player to roleplay themes of practicality, morality and personal responsibility.
Sobriquets
Other terms for draughir, both within the Empire and in other parts of the world, include: the Cold, the Wise, the Hungry, Ghul, Dread
What they are not
- Sadistic or evil: Draughir are practical to the point of expediency, they are not innately wicked or corrupt. They are prepared to do cruel things only to achieve necessary ends, they do not delight in cruelty for its own sake.
- Undead: While draughir may often have a corpse-like appearance, they are living creatures.
- Cannibals: Draughir can eat carrion and other unsavoury food if they have to to survive. They don't feel the kind of distaste that a human might when eating rotting meat or similar - but they don't hunger for such food, nor seek it out.
Iconic Trappings
Each lineage has an iconic trapping; in the case of the draughir it is pale skin. This is the most common physical mark for lineaged characters but they are not a required element. If you do not have the iconic trapping, however, you must have at least one of the other physical trappings associated with the draughir lineage.
Pale Skin
A draughir's skin is usually pallid, pale or discoloured as if from ill-health. You can use white or yellow make-up to lighten or jaundice the skin tone. You can paint every inch of your skin bone-white, but if you do this, then avoid leaving your neck visible and unpainted, as it undermines the appearance. The alternative is to apply make-up more traditionally to lighten the skin tones and give your skin a deathly pallor, if you do this then you can blend in the make-up rather than trying to cover all visible skin.
Other trappings
In addition to pale skin there are a number of physical trappings that mark someone as being of the draughir lineage. If you want to phys-rep one of the trappings with a slightly different technique or style to the ideas suggested here then that is absolutely fine. If you want to use different trappings to the ones listed then you should email us.
Prominent Veins
Some draughir have red or black veins that are clearly visible just beneath the surface of their pallid skin. You can use make-up to paint veins onto the skin; ideally they should be subtle and give a sense of being just visible.
Scarred or Gouged Flesh
Draughir skin is often calloused, lined or marked. The skin may appear heavily scarred or be marked with lines, cuts or cracks that run across the skin. The pictures on this page show examples of the kind of disfigurements that are appropriate. These can be achieved with make-up or using prosthetics.
Wrinkled Skin
Draughir skin often appears aged, although this has no effect on their vitality. The skin may be mottled with liver spots and is often heavily wrinkled, especially around the eyes. Make-up can be used to enhance natural wrinkles and make them more visible, or Collodion or other prosthetics can create deeper creases in the skin.
Predatory Teeth
Many draughir have elongated canines. A high lineage draughir may have additional canine teeth in place of regular incisors or molars on both jaws. This look is best achieved with teeth prosthetics.
Hollow, Deep-set Eyes
Some draughir have unnaturally hollow and deep-set eyes. You can achieve this look by using makeup to darken the eye-sockets to make them look deeper or using prosthetics to build up the brow and cheekbones to achieve a more pronounced effect.
Predatory Eyes
Draughir may have predatory eyes. Cosmetic contact lenses can be used to achieve this. The pupil should be the normal shape but the iris might be yellow or blood red.
Clawed Fingers
Draughir may have talons that replace their fingernails. These claws are never large enough to be used as a weapon. Clawed fingers should be black or bone white, with the claws short and protruding from the end of the finger where the nail bed would be. Wolverine style claws that protrude from the back of the wrist are not appropriate.
Gallery
Roleplaying
Draughir blood influences the character of the one who possesses it. Not every draughir expresses these effects to the same degree, but characters who demonstrate these roleplaying trappings possess stronger lineage than those who do not.
Draughir are cold
Draughir are not unemotional, they are capable of feeling jealous, angry, triumphant and many other emotions. But almost all draughir find it hard to experience any pleasure from the emotions of others: neither empathy nor sympathy are part of their nature. They are not naive or ignorant, they recognise and understand the emotions that others are feeling, they simply are not moved by them in any way. This makes it easy for them to disregard the feelings of others; when a village is starving to death a draughir will suggest eating the dead without a second thought, and will do it themselves even if the rest of the village reacts with revulsion.
Draughir have a pack mentality
Draughir are usually jealously protective and possessive towards their family and friends, but tend to treat strangers and acquaintances as potential rivals and competitors. Although they rarely exhibit much genuine empathy for those close to them, they are often fiercely loyal to those under their control or those they work with. This loyalty does not express itself as sympathy but they strive to ensure that the people they protect are safe and provided for. Draughir leaders can be socially domineering, they do not consider others' feelings and they expect those they are looking after to treat them with respect and deference.
Draughir are calculating
They do what it takes to stay alive. Everyone is either useful, dangerous or not a threat. Every situation advances the draughir’s aim or hinders it. If something is useful, it should be used. If something is dangerous, it should be destroyed or avoided. A draughir on a vital mission will leave a lame companion behind rather than risk slowing the group down. They’re the kind of people who are comfortable with sacrificing ten lives to save a hundred, with using disease or terror as weapons. They choose the most effective course of action without experiencing any moral qualms or scruples or letting ethical considerations get in the way. If the destruction of a village will slow an advancing army, that settlement is history.
Draughir are never satisfied
Most draughir are inveterate planners, they like to prepare for conflict and dangers. They fear being caught short and are never complacent that they will weather the storm. Any spare moments are spent trying to improve preparations and ensure sufficient resources are in place. This hunger can never be satisfied. This can be positive; they refuse to become complacent. It can also negative; they are never satisfied with what they achieve and find it impossible to relax.
Draughir have a distant demeanour
Draughir might express their lineage by avoiding smiling and avoiding physical contact with others. Don't express warmth towards people and avoid talking about how you feel. Try to act as if your feelings and those of others were irrelevant and not worth comment or discussion. This cannot be your only trapping - you must have at least one physical trapping as part of your lineage.
Draughir have strong stomachs
Draughir do not suffer from squeamishness the way other humans do. They can tolerate smells and tastes that might make others vomit, or incapacitate them. A draughir might walk across a corpse-strewn battlefield, or through a sewer, without feeling the need to cover their face at the stench. Likewise, they are able to swallow spoiled meat or tainted water without showing any revulsion. Combined with their undiscerning palate this allows them to survive on food and drink that other humans could not stomach.
Draughir may be overwhelmed by the Winter realm
Some draughir become increasingly preoccupied with preparing for external threats, to the point where it dominates their behaviour. They become incapable of accepting risks and incapable of trusting people who are not a part of their circle. They will go to any lengths to protect their own and they view most outsiders as irrelevant at best, little more than lumps of meat while those that are notable all become potential threats or dangers. Lone draughir or individuals who have contact only with other draughir seem to be particularly prone to this madness, which is why most draughir seek out human company.
Carrion Feaster
The draughir boon is the ability to gain sustenance from anything they can eat or drink, even if it would cause a normal human or orc to become sick. They can eat rotting meat, spoiled vegetables, and uncooked flesh, as well as drinking blood, stagnant water, or rancid milk without ill effect. They also don’t need as much food, drink, or sleep as anyone else – they can survive by eating cockroaches if they have to (as long as they get plenty of cockroaches).
If a draughir can feasibly eat something, and it is organic, they can do so without suffering ill effects unless the substance is poisonous in some way - and even then, draughir are likely to prove resistant to many naturally-occurring poisons. A draughir might eat a bowl of toadstools and suffer only a mild stomach upset where a plain human would suffer hours of agonising stomach cramps. Draughir are not more resistant to being poisoned than anyone else; this is a survival tool that also allows them to subsist on leftovers and offal while their friends and family get the stuff they need to stay healthy.
The boon does not allow them to dispose of bodies by eating them - it takes forever to eat a human body - 180lbs of raw meat and bone - even without throwing up every time you swallow a mouthful.
This trait is one of the reasons that many people consider draughir to be cannibals. In actuality, draughir are no more likely to resort to cannibalism than anyone else - indeed they are less likely, as the range of foodstuffs they can eat and remain healthy is wide enough that they are more able to survive lean months by eating things other humans couldn't long gain sustenance from without the need to consume their dead relatives. Some scholars believe that it may be more dangerous for draughir to embrace casual cannibalism than other humans - they are after all touched by Winter magic already, and thus slightly more likely to attract the negative attentions of entities like Agramant who are drawn to those who eat their own kind.
Draughir Life
Draughir children
Draughir are as warm-blooded and vital as any human, although they sometimes have a corpse-like appearance. They reproduce like any other human. While a few draughir – especially those of strong lineage – are born with clear draughir marks, others appear entirely human but undergo a transformation in later life (before they reach maturity).
The unexpected transformation of a beloved child helps fuel the fear that many feel toward the draughir. A common belief is that people who turn to cannibalism will have draughir children, or will slowly become draughir themselves.
If draughir present themselves respectfully to the Eternals of Winter they usually respond by treating the draughir as one of their own. Draughir who present themselves as equals will be treated as a rival or a threat.
Imperial Draughir
Some draughir children are killed or given away because people fear them and what they may turn into. Lone draughir children often feel isolated, because no one else sees the world quite the way they do. When two draughir meet they may become rivals, unless one acknowledges the other's authority, but groups of draughir are able to work together provided they have strong leadership.
- Varushkan draughir are able to make difficult decisions, an ability that commands respect in this harsh land.
- In Highguard, the people of Syrene are known to have significantly more children with draughir lineage than those in other parts of the Empire - but paradoxically these children are invariably fostered out to be raised in other chapters in Casinea.
Becoming a draughir
- The eternals Sorin and Agramant can both offer boons to allow a character to gain the draughir lineage
- The Cabal of the Carrion can provide a mixture over downtime that will grant an unlineaged human the draughir lineage
The heralds of Sorin are quite open about the Hungry Wolf's ability to grant a boon to those who have shown themselves as being strong, the strength that comes from suffering and hardship. The boon takes the form of a dry red wine that can transform an unlineaged human into a draughir over the course of a single night - or strengthen the lineage of one who already possesses it.
There are a number of references to Agramant offering anyone who wants to a seat at his table in order to partake in his feast of a hundred hearts. Though there are no reports of any Imperial citizen having ever willingly admitted to joining the Voice of the Pines, there was a journal recovered from the torched estates of House Carestia of Dawn that mentioned taking part in the feast can result in a manifestation of the draughir lineage in adults.
Downtime
The Cabal of the Carrion are a group Varushkan Winter mages who journey to battlefields and collect blood from the scavengers that are drawn to the dead. This blood is then rendered down into a salty, brown powder and added to water drawn from a well in an abandoned vale, stored in their bone-filled vault, and offered to any unlineaged human who asks. This unpleasant philtre begins a slow and often quite painful manifestation of draughir lineage over the course of several weeks during which the drinker is wracked with hunger, thirst, and hallucinations. When asked why they make this terrible brew available to anyone who seeks out their isolated Karovian vale, the cabalists turn evasive. They will only say that it is the consequence of a bargain that saved the founders of their cabal long years ago, and that they will continue to provide it to any who ask until they have discharged their debt.
Inspirations
Inspirations for the draughir might include the heroes Batman or the Shadow who use fear as weapons against the criminal underclass and the comic-book villains R'as al Ghul or Magneto who do terrible things with the best of intentions. Other inspirations might include a fictionalised Vlad Dracul who does cruel things to his enemies but still thinks of himself as a protector of what is his; the Livia of I, Claudius who performs and encourages terrible acts for the greater good of the Roman people; the Bride from the Kill Bill movies; Lisbeth Salander from The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo; the Sith from the Star Wars Old Republic, Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam of the Bene Gesserit from Dune, and to a degree the morlocks of H G Wells’ novel (and perhaps the 2002 movie) The Time Machine whose desperation to survive turns them into monsters. Marisa Coulter from the Northern Lights is a great example of an often heartless character conflicted by her feelings for those she cares about.
Useful Links
Draughir Images
Further Reading
General Information
Lineages