The Realm: A Primer for Players

The Realm of Beardsgaard is a megacontinent composed of 9 kingdoms, and 9 Prime Species that were made fully formed in the beginning by the creator (and the creator's first creation, the alchemist of River Peak Apothecary).

Full Realm Map

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The Beings

Each of those species spread out across the Realm to find a land to call their own, but many others roamed, leading to combinations of each of the species, called Legacy Beings, taking on traits of their parent species according to the place and circumstances of their upbringing.
Many physical characteristics, such as skin color in mortals, and magical physical forms in immortals are passed down by familial lines, and have evolved over the 2000 years since the Firsts were created, taking on wide variations in immortals especially.

The World

But 2000 years isn't a lot of time in the span of a people's history, so while the high magic of the old world elevated the world beyond the stone age right away, at present, the world looks rather like the Middle Ages, with immortal lands being similar to the advanced technology of the ancient world.
In the Realm, worship is based around nature, natural phenomena and ideals, but that isn't to say Gods and demons don't exist - they just walk the world as any other species does. Of course some immortals have been known to gather small followings of mortals through magic gifts and boons, but rarely does this end well for the mortal.

The Lands

The 9 kingdoms within those lands each has a distinct geography, climate, culture, which includes the prominence of magic in the kingdom and how they feel about other species, as well as technology (one needs less of that in a land of high magic. These 9 kingdoms are split into 3 land regions:

1. Shavehalla, where the immortals dwell, as traveling outside the magic of their lands is harmful to them
2. Manegard, where the elves dwell, preferring to keep to the deep magic and forests of their own lands
3. Beardenheim, where the mortals dwell, and do not travel casually beyond its borders

Building Characters in this World

This world is an eternal work in progress, and while we currenly mostly use Dungeons & Dragons 5E as our base for characters, we are in the process of reskinning and adjusting species, classes and backgrounds to this world, we hope you will join us for that ride!
When building your character, you need know less about the wider Realm than the specific kingdom or kingdoms in which you have spent significant amounts of time. As you build the basics of your character, we will provide you with the details your character would know about their part of the world that other characters may not know.
Start with what's most important to you. Answer as many as are important to you. Do you want to be:

1. A specific species, class, background or gender?
2. A fighter or a magic user?
3. Mortal or immortal?
4. Good(-ish) or Evil(-ish)?
5. From an epic or common background?
6. Classic or WEIRD?
7. Generally good at stuff or generally bad at stuff?
8. An optimist or a pessimist?
9. On-mission or constantly distracted?
10. The type to investigate the weird noise on the woods, or the type to pretend you didn't hear it?
11. Someone deeply connected to the lore of the world, or just some guy?
12. A character with allies, friends and connections, or a lone wolf?

Let us know what matters to you in a character and we'll furnish what you need to build them, from backstory to character sheets, which need be turned in one month before game day, so we can tailor the adventures according to the characters participating in them.

This world in game is a sandbox, full of personal plot hooks and NPCs (both humanoid and otherwise) for you to play with to your heart's content. Good and evil, delight and terror, friend and foe, all are relative depending on your perspective. Of course, the real world is enough of a terrifying hellscape, most welcome the fun and weird.
This is a world of extremes in tone, Tolkien meets Python with some Gaiman and Pratchett and Martin and Sanderson thrown in. If you play a serious character, you're going to get put in some ridiculously silly situations. If you play a goofy character, you're going to find yourself in some moral quandries and epic stakes.
We must emphasize, neither of these choices is better than the other, both are their own flavor of fun. Speaking of flavors of fun, we try to balance combat and RP, but as combat can take up so much of our limited play time, we try to keep a limit on it. Of course, the more RP we bring to combat, the more we can play out these stories through the whole game.
Fun and creativity are the most important bits of Realm D&D games. If you have an idea you don't see outlined in the lore already, let us know and we can usually find a way to incorporate it. We'll help you figure out where your character came from in the Realm, then the games help us all build the lore and stories of the world together. It is important for your character to have goals, dreams, and ideals that drive them toward their goals, because games are built around the adventurers in them!
Each of our real world products is named and scented after a Realm location, with lip butters named after in-game consumable items with magical effects, with Beardsgaard Barbers and Apothecary locations in all 9 kingdoms of the Realm. Is this whole thing a well-crafted excuse to build D&D and the local nerd pal community into the marketing of both of our businesses? Obviously.
We must business to live, and have carved out this magical little slice of the world to do it. We are endlessly tickled that all of you have joined us for this adventure.