Gochin

From Codex Vocrotha

Physical Description

The Gochin are a tough, wiry race of smooth-skinned bipeds that have pointed ears, mottled, dark green skin, slanted facial features and a distinct lack of any bodily hair. They are athletic and wiry in almost every instance; while the practice of eating unfit young has finally fallen out of style, laggards are strenuously encouraged to keep up the pace. Gochin eyes are uniformly black with black pupils, so that only the whites provide any contrast. The overall effect is somewhat eerie to other Sentients; the Gochin know this and use it to their advantage whenever they can.

While Gochin tend to distinguish each other by face, physical poise and natural coloring patterns, more useful to the outsider are their methods of personal decoration: body piercing and tattoos are extremely common among the Gochin, and the most successful often decorate their entire body with both ink and jewelry. Gochin clothing tends to be simple: shifts, togas, and kilts, mostly because they're easier to make, but also because it shows off their decorations.

Sociopolitical Outlook

The Gochin have survived not because of their great scholars, not because of any inborn natural or magical abilities, and not because of some legacy of adaptation: they have prospered because they can fight. Their introduction to the world was combat in the service of the Daloric Warlord; unable to forge even the most basic weapons, they learned to make their bodies deadly weapons when their supplies ran out, for those who could not serve would die. As a result, the Gochin survived, thriving as they learned more and more of the combative arts, more and more of the lore that preserved them. When they ran out of lore to learn, they experimented, they created new lore themselves; what they lacked in numbers, initially, they made up for in savagery and prowess, and it must be said that, with their survival as a race at stake, they performed admirably.

It is this nearly instinctive combativeness, however, that is the race's heridetary weakness. Leadership is almost always contested, the mastery of a region wrested from one fist to the next as veteran warriors debate supremacy with their soldiers' lives. Were the Gochin to unite as a nation, they would easily be a match for any other force that could be mustered, as they did when they first fought for their existence. Instead, lacking an overpowering leader, they fight each other in countless internecine wars, focusing on pecking order and the competition of peers instead of any kind of outer conquest -- and it is probably fair to say that the Gochin prefer it this way.

For young Gochin, the competitive pressures to excel are at least as harsh as any Olympian in training would receive, and these pressures only increase through their adult lives. As a result, whenever a Gochin enters a new social situation, they are quick to establish the pecking order and their place in it. While they are happiest on top of any such order, they are not productive members of a group until that order, whatever it is, is established. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Gochin tend to be short-tempered and demanding leaders, but effective underlings. Conflict being central to their existence, the Gochin tend racially to worship Pag'a, though Ardus and Dalor are also popular.

Allies & Enemies

The Gochin are most comfortable in the company of races they have fought alongside; to this end, they are most tolerant of the Ur and the Tenebriel, although they know to turn a deaf ear to the Tenebriel when they start talking about politics and conspiracies. As occasional allies, the Drakkhozhn are a little difficult to understand, but they're staunch allies and nearly as good in a fight as the Gochin, so they are given similar levels of respect, if not trust. As for the Dolgothros -- well, they've worked together in the past, but they're not what you'd call comfortable allies, and they use all the tactics that a Gochin detests most: deception, misdirection, and betrayal. All in all, they're better allies than enemies, but they're even better a continent away.

Humans and Lyđuđræ share the same category: it depends on the day, and on the individual. Certain Humans understand and fit well into the Gochin chain of command; some, even, have served as legendary leaders and heroes -- but just as many have served as hateful enemies and accursed allies to the prey races, and so you just never know where you stand with them. Similarly, the Lyđuđræ have worked both with and against Gochin efforts in the past, both supplying troops with much-needed magical support and neutralizing Gochin advances with a few well-placed mind hacks. Both are best when you know where you stand with them.

Everyone else is a prey race. Nothing personal, no offense, but their purpose is to be conquered, subjugated and used for their knowledge and power, not to trade or make nice with. The prey races are weak by comparison, and need the strong hand of the Gochin to put them in their place -- at least, when the squabbles are done and a new High King lords over the Gochin.

In the meantime, it's best to deal with them nice, but in the end it's war, and they know it as well as any true-blooded Gochin does. True, there are occasionally traitors in their ranks, Gochin who'd rather be friends than fighters, but by and large each Gochin knows where his loyalties lie, and come the big fight there's no question where most of them will line up.