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Setting


 

The Ophidian Valley
A brief gazetteer of a cursed land of blood and sand.

Table of Contents (broken)

Map


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Geographical Points of Interest [Black]


Ashlands

In some ways, this desert is even more dangerous than the Valley to the south. It's a tangled mess of razor sharp volcanic glass, lava pools, noxious fumes, and suffocating ashstorms where most of the detritus of Ifrit's Maw lands. It's an excellent hiding place for those that don't want to be found. The yuan-ti used it as an open prison, expecting anyone deposited there to die in short order. And yet still, there are madmen and tribals who call it home. Anyone that can survive there for long is sure to be a force to be reckoned with.

As'shavi Flood Plain

South of the Dambia, this craggy plain has effectively two seasons: wet and dry. Most of the Dambia's flooding flows south, where it has carved rivulets into the land over the centuries. Areas that are usually exposed bedrock become pock marked with little pools of water and silt as the water rushes in. A variety of scrub plants grow here, which support a special ecosystem of critters that have different habits for different wet or dry periods. It's also notably home to the As'shavi people, an ethnicity of humans that have a long, strained relationship with the Dambians who inhabit the Valley.

Dambia River

The Dambia is a wide, relatively shallow river that marks the southern border of the Valley. It overflows its banks so regularly that people set their calendars by it. Indeed, the whole southern region of the Valley is dominated by this flooding cycle, which deposits arable silt all along its banks. The river region is where most of the population of the Valley resides and the only place that sees green plants year round. Settlements along its banks are almost exclusively devoted to agriculture for this reason. Without the river, life would probably be impossible in the Valley.

Estersands

The desert east of the Serpent's Spine is notably more difficult to survive in than its western counterpart. Notably more sandy, the Estersands are largely an open wasteland with hardly a landmark in sight for days on end. Things that live here are a little hardier and a little meaner than elsewhere in the Valley, most notably the colossal sandworm that hunts by feeling the vibrations of those that walk on the surface. Sandstorms are more common here, and as the dunes shift a great many lost settlements and dead bones are revealed for a short while.

Galderis

Fair Galderis lies a ways to the east. It's a forested land rich with resources and rainfall that the Valley sorely misses. Two hundred year ago, Galderis was a cesspool of warlords and petty kings that constantly battled for bloody supremacy. The value of humanoid life was very short in Galderis. And then a peasant boy heard the clarion call of the Divine Dragon, a god hitherto unknown in the world. The boy grew up to become the Divine Dragon's champion in the world, where he united the people under one banner and slowly transformed Galderis into a land of valiant knights and hopeful people. The kingdom he founded exists to this day, and the people sing to the glory of the Divine Dragon that unites them in common cause of peace and goodwill. Unfortunately, this is not actually true for all of Galderis, though the people of the Valley perceive it as such. While the truth might be a bit more grounded, foreigners from Galderis are equally regarded as meddling missionaries or heroic paladins, even if they're just humble commoners passing through.

Ifrit's Maw

This very, very active volcano is said to be the open mouth of the old yuan-ti god of earth and fire. The great flame serpent slumbers beneath the Valley, while his molten "venom" oozes out onto the surface and forms the mountains that surround it. A great deal of white ash gets coughed forth occasionally, and the prevailing winds drive it west, where it scatters over the aptly named Ashlands.

Saltsands

Legends say that the Ophidian Valley is cursed for the wicked hubris of the yuan-ti, and nowhere is that more evident than the central desert. The stories say that the land is salting itself to scrub away the taint of their civilization. Somewhere inside was the yuan-ti capitol city, where they sacrificed humanoids daily to their profane gods. The temple grounds are said to be bathed in gold and blood. Here, the land is literally turning to salt, and the blistering material spreads a little further every year. Every so slowly, the saltsands are spreading, mostly eastwards, but sages say it is a matter of time before they cover every inch of the Valley. Nothing grows in the salt. Very, very few things can survive in it. The monstrous horrors that can emerge infrequently to eat and destroy whole cities.

Sengali Savanna

To the west lies an open grassland that runs for leagues and leagues, seemingly to the horizon and beyond. It's inhabited by herds of gazelle, prides of large predatory cats, and a great number of exotic animals like elephants and rhinoceroses, not seen elsewhere in the world. Vanishingly little is civilized in any significant manner, and its native people are the centaur tribes that roam it and the tabaxi that they compete with. The lone city of the vast savanna is a stony Leonin fortress called Regisrock, which is surrounded by temporary Tabaxi dwellings as their flighty cousins migrate in and out of the region during different times of the year.  A long, perilous trade road stretches west across the Savanna, and caravans from all across the world pay the centaurs in finished goods to not attack them as they make their way to Majaeda and eventually to Galderis in the east.

Serpent's Spine

A long, twisted series of widely spaced rock formations that only barely meet the definition of mountains, the Serpent's Spine is the principle demarcation in the desert. The Spine itself is not remarkable except for its location. There are stories that say it is the literal spine of some great yuan-ti beast, but the formations are clearly just rocks. Still, people know to stay away. The most yuan-ti sightings are found there, and a number of bandits and warlords use the caves as centralized locations for their operations.

Westersands

Constituting all lands in the Valley west of the Serpent's Spine, the Westersands are more "hospitable" than their eastern counterpart. It tends to have the occasional dry scrubland or oasis separated by stony barrens and rocky buttes. If you know where to look, there is food to be found in the birds of prey, reptiles, insects, and other mammalian vermin that live in it. It's a land that might be described as starkly beautiful during the painted sunsets that bookend blazing daylight and freezing nightfall. A few small, independent settlements can be found here as well.

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Political Points of Interest [White]

 

The Bastions

Gjen-, Kien-, and Zhen-Mora are old yuan-ti fortifications to protect their realm from invasion through some of the few passes through the northern mountains. Today they're garrisoned by the standing army of the modern day Valley, still defending the people in it from invasion. The structures have largely crumbled over the centuries, and the yuan-ti left many things inside that should not be disturbed. Each holds thousands of men-at-arms and the civilian support staff that lives with them.

Gjen-Mora is the gateway to the Ashlands and by far the most ruined of the Bastions. It's largely surrounded by no-man's land, far from any civilization and manned by troublemakers and criminals. Nobody comes here willingly. It's simultaneously the least and most vulnerable to attack simply because invading it would mean trekking through the Ashlands, and anyone stupid enough to do that isn't likely to have enough men left alive to take on the lazy, undisciplined louts that garrison the place.

Kien-Mora is the first point of contact with the elves of Myth Saere. It's as much a trading settlement as military fortification, and a great many people from north of the Valley enter it through Kien-Mora's gates.

Zhen-Mora's attention is split between the pass it guards and the open plain south of Pyathis, where the Dambia enters the Valley from the west. It guards both regions from invasion, making it the only one of the Basions with a significant cavalry presence.

Esethis

While Esethis lacks the mining and manufacturing prowess of Pyathis, the city has a greater emphasis on agriculture, rivaled only by Majaeda. Most importantly, it's known for Dambian horses, known the world over as a tall, slender breed well suited for speed and desert conditions. Dambian horselords have gone to war over breeding rights for their horses, and they keep detailed records of their lineages. Esethis benefits from its proximity to Galderis, from whom it imports lumber, textiles, and other resources difficult to obtain in the Valley.

Technically, the Sheikh of Esethis is Janu Pashti Romere, but in practice he is a figurehead who runs the day-to-day affairs of the city while a Conclave of wealthy merchants, horselords, and farmers sets policy. They are a notoriously quarrelsome group, whose divided interest sometimes allows the Romeres to assume more power than they should be able to achieve.

Not surprisingly, Esethis is also the traditional seat of a number of mercantile houses. These family businesses have grown in size and influence enough to be minor powers in their own right. Not only do they seat members on the Conclave, but their reach extends to the other cities in the Valley and beyond. They don't suffer competitors lightly, keeping an iron-fisted stranglehold on their spheres of the market. A majority of the caravans that come in and out of the Valley are owned by a mercantile house, making them the lifeblood of resources in an otherwise resource starved region, and caravans passing through the Valley almost always pick up and offload something at Esethis on the way through.

Katulma'ac

Translated as Spear's Edge in the common tongue, this is the northernmost city of the As'shavi people that inhabit the flood plain that bears their name. Really little more than a large town, Katulma'ac doesn't hold a candle to the grandeur, opulence, and population of the cities of the Valley. It also lacks much of the social strife due to As'shavi cultural proclivities. It's also the only one of their settlements they allow people from outside their lands (all considered unclean heathens) to do business or conduct diplomatic relations with them. For most, this is the closest anyone ever gets to seeing As'shavi culture in its native element. The city is largely wooden structures built upon stilts. They sit above the flat ground, which is flooded and muddy half the year and bone dry and dusty the other half. Parts of the year it is abandoned altogether when the natives return to the southern reaches of their lands to observe holy days.

The great mercantile houses of the Valley would love nothing more than to establish an economic beachhead in the city, though they have been largely banned from even stepping foot inside. Still, that doesn't stop them from sending agents to negotiate on their behalf. Interestingly, the As'shavi witches often have a surplus of magic items they are willing to trade to the governments of the Valley (or even wealthy adventurers) in exchange for services their religious convictions prevent them from doing themselves. There appear to be other, unaffiliated As'shavi who would do almost anything to get firearms from the Valley, presumably to overthrow the witches.

Kolthis

About a hundred years ago, Kolthis was the singular interior city of the Valley, a gateway into the deep desert. It's proximity to a large lake made it a valuable oasis in what would normally be barren Estersands. That changed with the creeping advance of the Saltsands. According to the inconsistent reports from survivors, a particularly large and aggressive monstrosity came out of the Saltsands and crushed most of the city's buildings under its colossal weight, eating anything and everyone in its wake. The creature eventually dug a hole in the middle of the city (further destabilizing its foundations) and crawled inside to sleep off its violent binge. It is believed to still slumber there, awaiting some foolish traveler to wake it up and cause another eating rampage. Today, Kolthis regularly experiences salt storms pouring in from the west, and a great many smaller (though no less dangerous) denizens of the salts make their home in the blasted ruins. Still, a great deal of wealth and knowledge was left behind, and it's just sitting there for any enterprising person to take.

The Majestic City of Majaeda

Majaeda is the cosmopolitan seat of power in the Ophidian Valley. It sees people from all walks of life, who live in its tangled streets and crowded districts. Proximity to the Dambia makes it the principle breadbasket for the Valley, greater so than Esethis, and all highborn families with any major status in Majaeda own large swaths of arable land in the flood regions by ancient decrees. A great many crops are unsuited for growing in the Valley, but those that can are maintained by a colossal unskilled labor force that serves as Majaeda's underclass. So unlike the other cities, Majaeda has little middle class to speak of, and the stark socioeconomic differences between people in the city show in its varied construction. Palatial estates sit next to ramshackle shacks, next to landscaped public parks, next to garbage heaps. In many ways, this is part and parcel to the city's history. It has lax, laissez farie laws that make all but the most extreme things prohibited, which has enabled people from far and wide to make or lose their fortune for arriving. Crime and opportunity (not always different things) are rampant in Majaeda, and someone with a strong bent towards entrepreneurialism has a lot to gain for being there. Consequently, it is a city ripe for revolutions and change, and it was the seat of the slave revolt that spelled the end of the yuan-ti kingdom that once controlled the Valley.

While agriculture may not be the path to major social prosperity, politics often is. Majaeda is the seat of power in the Valley, and it's ruled by a hereditary Emir, the lineage of which goes back to the original slave revolutionaries. The reigning one is His Excellency Pashmael Abu-dai, third of his name. He's a young, arrogant man who took the throne after much more respected father died five years ago. Pashmael is petty and vindictive, doing his best to crush others who dissent from his brand of tight control. He has created a great many more enemies than necessary, and rumors spread of rebellions in the wake of police raids he sends. The Sheikhs of Pyathis, Esethis, and Kolthis traditionally swear fealty to the Emir, though in practice they are largely independent. The Emir plays a delicate game of give and take with them to keep the Valley united. His principle hold over them is his control of the military. Perhaps the Valley's only true power is economic, and it remains unclear how well the confederacy would fare under invasion. The harsh desert environment might be the only thing keeping foreign powers from coming in and taking what it wanted from the Valley by force.

By ancient tradition, Majaeda is the home of D'Yemeth, more commonly known as the Six-Fingered Hand. The Hand is a cult of death-worshiping assassins that is at least a millennia old. Its members still revere the yuan-ti gods of murder and blood sacrifice and are recognizable by their extra thumb located on the opposite side of the hand as their normal thumb.  It's an open secret that the Hand is used by many to silence their enemies by contracting the assassins to kill for them. Residents of the entire Valley superstitiously blame the Hand for everything from bad weather to difficulty sleeping, a mystique the assassins are happy to promote. They do what they do as an act of worship to a yuan-ti death god. The Hand would be outlawed in the Valley if it were not so conveniently useful to those in power. If you look hard enough, you will find locals who will admit they know the signs of the Hand's business, but getting anyone to cross them is a fool's errand.

Myth Saere

Elves are not native to the Ophidian Valley, though the nearest ones are from Myth Saere, a fortress-outpost constructed an age ago to monitor the movements of yuan-ti in and out of their old jungle kingdom. In recent centuries that purpose has been largely neglected, though some elves recognize the spreading of the desert where once there was lush canopy of trees as a sign that more serious troubles are afoot in that cursed land. Protected by an ancient mythallar, the fortress is now home to several hundred elves of all walks of life that trade and travel with the humans of the Valley and lands further north. By tradition, Myth Saere is a military outpost, run by an army of mage knights, though any state authority they might report to has long since become defunct, and the tower operates more and more like a civilian settlement.

Pyathis

Nestled into the foot of the mountains, Pyathis is an important city in the Valley because of its mining operations. It's situated on veins of iron, and Pyathis' economy is centered around mining whatever it can out of the rocks. Yet its most valuable resource is sulfur and saltpeter, two of the key ingredients for gunpowder. The discovery of gunpowder and the development of firearms has been of substantial boon to the Valley, making an otherwise resource starved region an important center for this new weapon of war. Not unexpectedly, the garrison at Pyathis is particularly robust to defend it all. Most people that live in Pyathis are involved in some form of manufacturing or distribution of finished goods.

The sitting Sheikh is Hallefre, a man of late middle age who is seen as a shrewd and pitiless negotiator with an absolutely inscrutable face. Although his rule can be harsh, it is generally accepted as fair and even-handed, making his city a stable bed for the market. Hallefre has a dozen children of various ages and political importance and an unknown number of illegitimate children that come from all walks of life. It's an open secret that the day the old man finally kills over there will be an army of potential heirs vying for his power.

Pyathis is also the seat of the Goldpact, a large company of sellswords that once had a reputation as discriminating, trustworthy professionals, but in recent decades have become little more than a company of greedy cutthroats. Today the Goldpact will work for literally anyone who has the most coin, and a great number of warlords and unscrupulous aristocrats use them as thugs. The Goldpact operates under a measure of legal protection in the Valley that usually makes them immune to any crimes they may commit in the employ of someone else.

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History

 

Centuries ago, the Opidian Valley was the center of a powerful kingdom of yuan-ti, whose hubris and wickedness knew no bounds. They were such a blight that it is said that even the land they lived upon was disgusted by them. Their mighty kingdom fell into ruin about the same time their massive slave population rose up against them and killed nearly every yuan-ti in the Valley.

What was once a lush jungle has slowly transformed into a blasted, arid wasteland that continues to get less and less habitable. From the center out, the sands that now dominate the Valley are turning to salt, and within a few centuries, life within the Valley will become next to impossible. The Ophidian Valley is truly cursed, and when it goes, so too will the people that live in it.

The yuan-ti were watched carefully by their neighbors as a dangerous enemy that had no qualms against raiding and enslaving anyone who came too close. With the wicked snakemen scattered, the slaves filled a power vacuum and founded a confederacy of four city-states in the south near the Dambia River. The confederacy quickly established itself as a mercantile power, largely because of their laissez farie laws and primitive firearms they had developed. As one of the world’s few sources of these weapons of war, people paid handsomely for their manufacture. Despite a general lack of resources and a limited capacity for agriculture, business has always been good in the Valley.

But today, the people of the Valley have become complacent. Dark things from the latter centuries are organizing in the deep deserts to the north and soon the quarreling civilization will be overrun by creatures they had long since thought dead. And in the meantime, the Valley is a ripe opportunity for enterprising adventurers with equal parts daring-do and foolhardiness to carve a name for themselves in the blood and sand.

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Races
There are other races out in the world, but only these see any amount of traffic in the Ophidian Valley.

Elves

When most people think of elves, they think of high elves. They're by far the most common and civilized of the two subraces, the other being the tribal, xenophobic wild elves (who have no qualms against eating non-elf humanoids) that are all but unknown in this region. The two people split long ago during a bloody civil war in their native Feywild that forever fractured their empire. The surviving elves are a scattered, diminished people who have moved on from past glories in their own ways.  The world of Ophidian Sands was a distant outpost to the elves, so it's hard to say how much of the lost empire remains intact on other planes.

 

Among high elves another schism is brewing. The so called "dark elf followers" as their opponents call them, are a socio-political and arcano-ecological movement who believe that the progress of the current age is inherently dangerous, and an armageddon is sure to follow should it continue as it currently is. They believe that safe, sane, and moral progress of technology and society can only happen through magical apotheosis. Most mainstream elves think such doomsayers are radicals that would see the world regressed into a dark age of superstition and authoritarianism, hence their common name. They trace the seeds of such ideology to the cultural split that caused the elvish civil war. The dark elves counter this by pointing to the cataclysm that brought humanity to this world as evidence in support of their prediction. Some factions of dark elves have no compunctions against violence or sabotage, though that's surely just propaganda...right?

Halflings

Halfling caravans arrive with regularity from Galderis in the east, stopping at Esethis first, where they have long standing contracts with the merchant houses there. Their route takes the road west through Majaeda, Pyathis, and Kien-Mora before reversing towards the east again. They bring with them a wealth of crafted goods and interesting people, as well as news from afar. A people with no native land, Halflings have a way of making themselves welcome wherever they roam, and some decide to stay in the Valley, seeking adventure and riches in the desert. Most people don't know or care what the subraces of halflings are, and that suits the halflings just fine. Halflings are everywhere and nowhere at the same time, sages believing they migrated with humans to this world.

Tabaxi

Tabaxi take after a variety of large predatory cats. Their sense of wanderlust occasionally takes them from their native Sengali Savanna into the Valley, though most find the heat and sand distasteful. On the Sengali they would be apex predators if not for competition with the centaurs and their own short attention spans. They're generally regarded as interesting and exotic, though sometimes they wear out their welcome pretty quickly. Most don't understand their psychology and consider their flighty behavior and strange speech patterns amusingly bizarre at best and annoying at worst.

Leonin

The dour and serious Leonin recognize Tabaxi as a cousin race, and the feeling is mutual. While a Leonin is less likely to leave his pride (and give up warring with centaurs), they are among the more relatable of the great catfolk. Their nobility and ferocity can earn them respect among humans of the Valley, though their impiety can rub some the wrong way. They have the discipline and focus to pursue serious craft and scholarship, unlike their cousins, which makes for the most orderly and developed culture among all the peoples that call the Sengali Savanna home, even if it still makes room for in-fighting to settle differences.

Yuan-ti

Centuries ago, humans lived in the fertile jungle valley north of the Dambia River, where they began to worship profane serpentine gods that demanded increasingly more and more evil acts of devotion from them. Ultimately, these power-hungry humans sought to not just worship these vile powers but to become like them. Using disturbing magic involving human sacrifices, they transformed themselves into hybrids of serpent and man. Their society reorganized into casts based upon how snake-like their bodies had become, for a great many body shapes exist among the race.  The yuan-ti founded a frightening kingdom based upon enslaving, eating, and sacrificing their neighbors in an ever growing attempt to usurp the very gods they dedicated themselves to.

 

And then something happened. Some say it was the gods, some say it was the slave uprising, some say it was the land itself became so disgusted with these yuan-ti that their mighty kingdom fell into ruin. Many centuries later, they are but a shadow of their former selves and the land has become a desert in an attempt to purge their wickedness from the earth. Most people don’t realize that the yuan-ti are still very much a threat and are currently seeking means to restore their long lost glory.

Humans

Humans come in a variety of ethnicities, some more common in the Ophidian Valley than others. Other parts of the world hold other varieties of humans. The race as a whole originated from offworld, migrating here in great waves from some disaster on a distant plane. Those ethnic groups long ago splintered and developed in the intervening centuries into the varieties of humans known today. This ancient history has long since fallen out of human memory, and few among the elves are alive who remember it.

Dambian

These are the warm-skinned descendants of the slaves of the yuan-ti, having carved out a mercantile confederation in the centuries since their masters’ demise. They are, naturally, named after the great river around which their civilization is centered. Most all humans of the Valley are Dambians, and its Sheiks and the Emir are all from this ethnicity.They are known to be as irreverent as they are shrewd, which is to say the yuan-ti may be dead, but the snakes live on in these humans.

As'shavi

Natives of the floodplain south of the Dambia river, the dusky As’shavi (pronounced ahhSHH-ahh-vee) have settled the area since at least the yuan-ti kingdom, and they have strained relations with all their neighbors due to their insular customs. They are known to be superstitious and xenophobic to a fault; Rare indeed is the As'shavi willing to associate with outsiders--likely someone outcast from their society. As'shavi caste roles are rigidly defined by their religious practices, and societal mobility is all but unheard of among them.

Wxu

This term (pronounced wh-SHOE) describes a disparate group of clans that live in the steppe lands north of the Ashlands. Their parchment colored skin and strange foreign tongue suggest they migrated to this region of the world from elsewhere. Their meager civilization is based mostly upon herding and simple subsistence farming, though they have brought extremely advanced sciences for such simple people with them from their native land--information they are loathe to part with. Wxu metallurgy is among the best in the world. Their culture is based on honor and loyalty, creating a people that are disciplined and prideful.

Galderisian

Naturally, these are the natives of fair Galderis, whose bright hair, bright eyes, and (generally) hopeful attitude makes them stand out in a world beset by cold, pitiless peoples. Their strong work ethic and commitment to faith and family makes them resilient. The best of them are forced to do battle with the corrupt few kinsmen that take advantage of Galderisian goodwill and charity for their own power and aggrandizement.

Sengali

To the west are a scattered group of tribes that eek out a meager existence on the Savanna, dominated by the centaurs and great catfolk. These humans almost exclusively raid and pillage for what they need, having little development beyond despotic, stone-tooled civilization. They would balk at the idea that their tribes consist of a unified ethnicity, instead being more interested in dominating their peers as superiors.

Snakeblooded

  Serpentine Traits (1d10)
1 Long, forked tongue
2 Vertical pupils and unusual eye color
3 Lightly scaled patches
4 Fang-like incisor teeth
5 Long, slender serpentine tail (rattle at your discretion)
6 Cobra hood around your neck and ears
7 Mottled or striped skin coloration
8 Long, extended limbs
9 Hairless head and body
10 Roll twice, keep both results; roll again for duplicates

Yuan-ti distaste for mammalian humanoids extends to their slaves as well, many of which they transmogrified with more pleasing, reptilian features. These profane rituals created a subspecies of human with snake-like traits that has survived long since their masters' demise. Snakeblooded humans bear tell-tale traits that mark them as dependents of these slaves, but their ancestry comes with a number of defensive advantages as well. Most are horribly persecuted, feared as if they were actual yuan-ti and either pushed to the edges of society at best or killed outright at worst. They are a small minority that lives in the shadows and usually pass on their serpentine nature to their children. The occasional mainline human discovers, to their horror, that their newborn children are snakeblooded, revealing a recessive trait hitherto unknown in the family line.

Ability Score Increase. Two different ability scores of your choice increase by 1.

Type. You are considered human in all mechanical effects in which your type is important.

Age. Snakeblooded humans mature and age at the same rate as their mainline human brethren.

Speed. Your walking speed is 30 feet.

Size. Like other humans, snakeblood height ranges from 5 to 6 feet tall. Your size is Medium.

Darkvision. You can see dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can't discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Desert Adapted. You require 1 fewer Survival Days when taking a long rest while traveling in the desert.

Poison Spit. You possess a venom gland in your mouth with which you can eject poison over a short distance. This capability is not magical in nature, but is otherwise identical in effect to the Poison Spray cantrip. You use Dexterity, or Constitution as your spellcasting ability for it, which you choose when you select this race.

Serpentine Ancestry. Your snake-like traits are both a help and a hindrance. You have disadvantage on all Charisma checks in which your strange snake-like traits would be a social hindrance. These same traits may instead grant you advantage on all Charisma checks in a situations in which having them is socially beneficial. To represent this, roll once on the Serpentine Traits table.

Skills. You gain a bonus character proficiency of your choice.

Venom Resistance. You have advantage on saving throws against poison, and you have resistance against poison damage.

Half-Elves

In some ways, half-elves have a charmed existence. The Valley has enjoyed cordial relations with the elves of Myth Saere for many human generations now. As a distant, independent outpost from the rest of elvish society, it relies on its non-elvish neighbors more than most. Commerce and social relations sometimes results. Half-elves are largely regarded as human by their fey kindred and largely regarded as elves by the men of the Valley--both of which result in their being either bemusing curiosities at worst and alluring exotics at best. They often pursue careers that allow them to develop their natural talents as diplomats, negotiators, merchants, and entertainers, and most half-elves can find ways to be welcome wherever they find themselves in human lands. High elves tolerate them, but consider them to be little more than amusing humans. Wild elves won’t knowingly eat a half-elf for fear of being infected by their so-called “impurities.”

Centaur

Centaurs roam the open spaces of the Sengali Savanna, most of which take after various herd animals rather than horses in that part of the world. Compared to many sapient races, centaurs are relatively primitive. They live in simple hunter-gatherer, nomadic bands wielding simple stone tools and weapons. They make up for it, however, with raw speed and strength the great catfolk they compete with struggle to match. They lack the worldly wisdom of the great cats and are closed minded about new ideas, new people, and new ways of living that keeps them from rising to any form of significance.

Lizardfolk

Primitive, alien, reptilian; lizardfolk usually make their homes in the As’shavi Floodplain, but occasionally venture elsewhere. They are a constant threat to the As’shavi, who encroach on lizardfolk territories every year. They see mammals as little more than food or competitors for food. They are mostly animistic, tending to totemic fetishes that they sacrifice to to receive power, healing, and strength. You'll rarely find one north of the Dambia River, though in they sometimes raid the river agricultural lands of small towns outside the reach of Majaeda's sphere of influence.

Kobolds

Although native to the As’shavi Floodplain, yipping kobolds have ranged all across the Ophidian Valley, but their small size and limited intellect keeps them from dominating the area. Still, their high breeding rate, rapid maturity, and cleverness with traps means that they usually come back from defeat to pose a threat quicker than anyone would like.  Among scaled folk, kobolds are perhaps the most relatable to mammal humanoids and the most willing to negotiate with them.  They are, however, craven in the extreme, often cowed into subservience by more powerful beings. 

Aasimar

The Divine Dragon’s first herald and champion, a peasant now known as Saint Seymour, was gifted with the Dragon’s own divine blood as a sign of his covenant with the newly discovered god. The royal line of Galderis has long since been blessed with this same sign of favor, and these divine-touched humans are sometimes called Aasimar. Even beyond the royal descendants of Seymour, some people of common, unrelated lineage are born with the blood of the Divine Dragon within them (who are likewise traditionally referred to as Saints), and these exceptional individuals almost inevitably rise to become storied heroes and tyrants alike.

Genasi

The Genasi are born (or made) out of circumstance, almost of all of which are unique. This typically involves a confluence of elemental magic in the world, several sources of which are very active in the Ophidian Valley.

 

Fire are the most common, which usually have a connection to the volcano Ifrit's Maw. There, a few small cult communities worships elemental power and some of their children are born influenced by it. To these cultists, fire genasi are semi-divine beings with the "blood of fire" in their veins. The more extreme among them raise these genasi children to be sacrifices pitched into the lava to keep the mountain alive, or alternatively to keep it appeased so it doesn't erupt and destroy the world. Slightly less extreme are those that worship these genasi directly, and those genasi often become the worst sorts of charismatic cult leaders who use their invested authority to lead their followers into decadence and depravity.

 

Earth Genasi are typically connected to the deep desert or the salt sands, where the wild magic that is transforming the land has changed them into what they are. Not surprisingly, this variety is more often associated with salt and sand than moist earth and stone. In the saltsands, the land is so wounded and angry that all sorts of bizarre monstrosities emerge from the deep desert. This experience often twists their worldview as much as it does their bodies, and they often emerge as madmen with a penchant for nihilism and violence in the worst cases.

 

Air Genasi are the least common, but that's simply because they're not native to the Valley. They always come from elsewhere, created or born under circumstances not possible in this region of the world. The rare few that make it this way often thrive in the open, arid air that is unmarred by trees, mountains, and tall buildings more common in other civilized kingdoms. To be in such a wide open space feels like infinite freedom to them.

 

Water genasi are basically unknown in the Valley, something about the curse on the land desiccating them if they stay too long.

Goblinoids

Goblins of all shapes and sizes have lived in the lands now called Galderis at least since humans settled there, possibly longer. They are prone to wickedness and in-fighting that is usually their downfall, but if they were to be united under a single banner, goblins would undoubtedly have the might to form a fearsome kingdom of their own. This fact the elves know too well as it was goblinoid shock troops that used to fight each other during their civil war in the Feywild. Goblinoids are rare in the Valley, finding the arid climate distasteful and have a great deal of superstition about people from there due to a hundred generations of raiding from the Yuan-ti and their slaves.

Other Races

The greater world of the Ophidian Sands setting lacks many of the traditional D&D races. Instead, it is populated by races that tend to have animal characteristics. In other parts of the world are the lands of Arakocra, Bullywugs, Gnolls, Harnegon, Harpies, Kenku, Loxodon, Minotaurs, Satyrs, Shifters, Thri-kreen, and Tortles--among others.

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Languages
Many races, like goblinoids, kobolds, and lizardfolk have their own tongues, but the languages below are among the most common heard in the Valley. The magic of spellbooks, spell scrolls, and verbal spell components must be encoded using magically active languages.

The Common Tongue [Low Galderisian]

The common, trade language spoken in most parts of the world is a debased form of Galderisian that has spread with missionaries of the Divine Dragon. It serves as a pidgin for those people who wouldn't normally be able to understand each other.

Galderisian

Formally, this is High Galderisian, as spoken by the people of the fair kingdom of Galderis.

Dambian

Dambian is the native language of the Ophidian Valley, the descendant of Old Dambian, the tongue spoken by the yuan-ti slaves. Expect this to be the default language used by people in the region.

Ssetish

The old yuan-ti tongue, full of long, hissing consonants suitable for reptilian physiology. It is usually taboo to use the language (as if doing so would summon the yuan-ti) though many scholarly folk find use for it. Old records and monuments, as well as some surviving laws are inscribed with it.

Sengali Dialects

Not so much a single language but a family of related ones that are spoken by various tribes of the Sengali Savanna, most notably the centaurs. While they share a common origin, many are not understandable to each other and few have any written form.

Elvish

This is the common tongue name for the language of the elven people. Both wild and high elves have their own dialect, though they are both similar enough that knowing one makes understanding the other relatively easy.

Felish

The tongue of the great catfolk of the Sengali Savanna. It's brusque sounding, with rolling consonants and rumbling purrs. Both the Leonin and Tabaxi dialects are mutually understandable.

Wxu-gen

The language of the people that roam the steppe lands north of the Ashlands. It's considered particularly exotic for its tonal structure and foreign pictograph characters.

Sh'ka'ashti [The Noble Breath]

The people of the southern flood plain speak a harsh sounding, gutteral language that has picked up quite a bit of the hissing sounds from proximity to lizardfolk and the yuan-ti. The language is so bewilderingly convoluted that foreigners usually give up trying to speak it.

Primordial Dialects [Ingan, Aquan, Terran, Auran]

The magically active language of extraplanar elemental beings may have a common source in the near-mythical Dark Heart of Chaos, but they are unintelligible to each other as is befitting of four mutually exclusive elemental forces. Each cannot tolerate the existance of the others.

Sylvan

The common tongue of the Feywild, this language is imminently colorful and expressive, sentences structured like art forms. A great deal of elvish spellcraft is encoded using this magically active language.

Draconic

The tongue of dragons and their kin is rigid with a gutteral, bellowing sound. It's intended to be written by scratching its straight-lined runes into hard, permanent surfaces with gigantic claws. More than any other magically active language, the language of dragons is used the world over for the encoding of scrolls, spellbooks, and the empowerment of magic items. If you're a magical practitioner this is likely the language you know and perform your craft using. Characters from more exotic traditions of spellcasting might use another language.

Celestial

The tongue of the gods is absolute power without limitation. It is beyond mortal ken. This is the debased form as expressed by the celestial servants of the gods who deliver the messages of the divine to lower beings. Some call it the Mother Tongue, source of all languages, and in Galderis it's called the Dragon's Breath. Every person hears the sound of it and sees the written form differently. Mortals feel the thrum of sacredness inherent in it and so innately reserve its use for matters of elevated importance. Divine magic of all kinds is empowered with this magically active language.

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Gods
The world of Ophidian Sands has many gods, the most established of which are from the Dawn War pantheon, as detailed in the Dungeon Master's Guide, p. 10.  Alternative references can be found here and here. According to theologians, many local gods or alternative forms of worship are just aspects of that pantheon expressed in a manner befitting the culture it belongs to. Other lesser known gods surely exist as well.

Local Religion
People of the Valley are usually fairly irreverent. They transact with gods like business arrangements (as befits their mercantile-dominated society), and have no compunctions against worshiping whatever god appears to be in the best position to give them what they want on any given day. Typically, they refer to them collectively, not bothering to differentiate any given god for any given domain or from any given culture. Who caused the sandstorm? The gods. Who keeps the Dambia flooding regularly? The gods. How did the caravan get rescued? The gods. They're all equally worthy of cursing and praising. Those Dambians that do faithfully practice religion are typically polytheistic, paying respect to a tiny pantheon whose domains they believe most affects their personal lives. Instead of a quid pro quo attitude, they offer appropriate sacrifices and honest prayers expecting real blessings but feel that the gods are not offended by soothsayers, lucky charms, or the counsel of other beings outside their respected domains.

This is a much different affair in Galderis. The people there practice a (as Dambians see it) bizarre and arrogant tradition of monotheism. They worship--in the truest, most honest sense of the word--a god they believe to be all-powerful and sovereign over all the affairs of humanoids. The Divine Dragon may not have created the world, but when he heard the cries of the oppressed and saw the works of the tyrannical, he was moved to protect all people under his wings. A great many of his missionaries proselytize to convert non-adherents in lands outside Galderis. The Dragon has inspired a message of family, justice, and hard work, which has created a strong, virtuous people. While the message may be moral, the adherents are, sadly, not always so. Corruption has enabled a few to take advantage of the rest of the adherents' general goodwill, to create petty fiefdoms of their own--veritable sheep amongst the wolves.

There is a great deal of conflict between traditional worshipers of Bahamut and worshipers of the Divine Dragon. While the former tends to be open to the Galderisian interpretation of that deity as just a sect of their own faith, the latter are quite insistent that theirs is not only different but the only true deity--despite both faiths having quite a bit of overlap in their moral virtues. This has not yet escalated into organized holy war with both faiths recognizing that their people are both better served defending against clear and present evils than fighting each other. Individual zealots may not be so diplomatic.

Further south, the As'shavi practice a very insular, pantheistic religion that promotes purity of thought and deed in pursuit of a kind of inner-divinity that they believe only their people share in. As'shavi life is marked by a bewildering array of taboos, superstitions, and asceticism used to guide one's transcendent journey. They are not friendly to the idea of conversion, as their faith is largely inseparable from their ethnic culture. A foreigner, by definition, is not their spiritual equal. They're lead by an order of female-only gurus, called witches by outsiders, as they universally practice a kind of shamanistic spellcasting. Adherents are festooned with talismans, paint, and various and sundry charms, but those branded as spiritually unclean are have their faces tattooed to mark their status.

The Wxu of the north lands have an animistic faith that is not well understood. They honor the words and deeds a large and eclectic array of personal ancestor and local nature spirits. Chief among Wxu virtues are honor, discipline, and respect, which are the pillars of maintaining what the common tongue translates as the Balance. Balance, they believe, is the safe harbor in a world that is fundamentally beset by seas of chaos and strife.

Sengali humans worship a suite of brutal deities that demand unquestioning sacrifice and fealty. They are not organized in any discernible fashion, instead warring against each other in spiritual realms for dominance in the same way the Sengali endlessly kill and pillage each other for dominance. Adherents are converted via force equally as often as they abandon a deity when the winds of fortune have changed.

Most non-humans worship a single deity (perhaps secondarily including the deity's divine family) dedicated strictly to the advancement of their race. Each has a particularly defined role in that race's daily life and they contribute substantially to that race's cultural norms, which can be fairly homogeneous.  These will be similar to the racial gods of other D&D worlds and may be aspects of (if not the common identity of) one of the Dawn War gods.

The chief exception are the leonin, who openly mock the idea of theistic worship. The certainly believe the gods exist, but they believe no gods are worthy of mortal respect. Their most ancient history tells of a time when the gods turned their backs on the leonin in their greatest time of need. Since then they have regarded gods as little more than petty tyrants who manipulate worship out of mortals for their own empowerment. Leonin dedication to self-reliance and personal honor is what they have pursued instead.

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