#RPGaDay2025 - Day 14 - Mystery

Day 14 of #RPGaDay is "Mystery."

This is an internal one for me, "What do we do about Galmar?"

Galmar is a multi-level problem I have in my dormant fantasy campaign.

First off, Galmar, God of the earth, the ground, was based off of a M.U.S.C.L.E figure from the 80's (like many of my early gods were).

Then the vast steppe, distant forest, and wasteland was labelled Galmar on the map. 

It was populated by the Galmar people: barbarian horsemen.  Most worship the god directly in the form of an elemental cult. 

And, they've made two incursions into the lands that were labelled as the Ferasean Empire, both times causing it's collapse. I used the second invasion to install the tale of the Agenmoor elves, would granted the barbarians safe passage through the forest to further sack the western edges of the human empire.

... and the main reason through the 90s I had a huge anti-elf themes in my game.  

When one of the players presented their character as a Galmar Barbarian (with no horsemanship skills, white as hell, with a few tribal tattoos, and the name Rolf Wolfsblood... essentially an Unearthed Arcana barbarian), I knew I needed to explain this like Star Trek tries to handle decades of different Klingons...  or I just treat Galmar like mapmakers treated Tartaria:  a label on a much more diverse regions than the Westerners cared to differentiate.  

I have started to separate the Galmar peoples into at least three different Khanates.  The Palle-Galmar are the closest to "civilization."  Colder temperatures, fewer horses, and some mixing with the Wrymnalians and Kulervo peoples, making characters like Rolf feasible.  There's trade, semi-permanent towns, and relations with the large elf and dwarf enclaves. 

The Onto-Galmar are more akin to the stereotype if one thinks of  "steppe-riding horsemen." Their control of vast swaths of territory, have kept human nations along the coastline of the Mer Kasp, and have forced the leaders of the Shires of Stronghome and the Gnomish City-States to keep much larger standing armies than either is comfortable with.  

The Mohro-Galmar would be my direct Mongolian cultural appropriation, but none of my campaign groups have ever been within 4,0000 miles of them, I'll save that part of the world for another day. 

Or maybe I should just buy more M.U.S.C.L.E  guys and expand the pantheon.