Taldor

Taldor, Empire in Decline

The mighty empire of Taldor once stretched from the Arcadian Ocean to the border of the Padishah Empire of Kelesh. Aroden himself was said to walk among the people of Taldor, and his religion, a shining beacon unto the world, radiated outward from Taldor’s gilded capital of Oppara. Taldor’s ancient Armies of Exploration established footholds for the empire throughout Golarion, and its mighty phalanxes marched for thousands of miles during the Shining Crusade to beat back the Whispering Tyrant and imprison him in Gallowspire. Now Taldor is a stunted remnant of its old glory, having lost control of its daughter territories, and is almost ignored by the powerful countries of today, which assume it will continue its slow decline for at least another century.

A Brief History

Taldor’s dominance of the Inner Sea region and its absolute hold on most of southern Avistan swelled its government to an enormous size. A byzantine network of consuls, governors, and senators developed into new and ever-expanding strata of society until Taldor became a complicated maze, an empire ruled by one but governed by tens of thousands. Eventually, Taldor’s government grew so large and spread itself so thin across the length and breadth of the empire that corruption and vile excess plagued its outer prefectures. The disease of corruption spread quickly, infecting every level of government. The prefectures further from the gilded capital of Oppara began to revolt, throwing off the chains of their degenerate and moribund governors. The Taldan Horse and Taldan Phalanx responded brutally, struggling to close an iron fist on the revolution brewing in the distant holdings.

With Taldor’s military focused to the west, its old rival Qadira took advantage of the empire’s plight and invaded across Taldor’s southern border in 4029 AR, quickly capturing Zimar and enslaving its militaristic population in order to prevent rebellion. Qadira’s armies then marched virtually unopposed to Oppara’s doorstep just across the River Porthmos. Taldor’s royalty and senatorial classes panicked and demanded the emperor recall the Taldan Phalanx at once to deal with the new threat. A token force was left behind in Cheliax Prefecture to maintain the peace, and the bulk of Taldor’s armies returned to the homeland and settled into a 524-year war with Qadira that Taldans today call the Grand Campaign.

Two years after Taldor left Cheliax Prefecture in the hands of a few scattered companies of the Taldan Phalanx, a member of the Taldan senatorial class named Aspex led a successful revolt known as the Even-Tongued Conquest, destroying the Phalanx at the siege of Westcrown and putting the first crack in the wall of Taldor’s might. Aspex led his armies of revolution across Taldor’s western frontier, annexing Andoran with diplomacy and capturing Galt and Isger by force. Unable to fight a war on two fronts, Taldor took the only choice left and signed a treaty with Aspex, creating the new empire of Cheliax and tolling the start of Taldan decline.

With the majority of Taldor’s poor entrenched in combat against Qadira for generations and the decadent royalty and senatorial classes delving deeper into perversion and excess, the Church of Aroden moved its center to Cheliax, signaling the end of the empire once and for all. Generations later, in 4528 AR, Grand Prince Stavian I outlawed the Cult of the Dawnflower in the Great Purge, convincing the populace that Sarenrae’s followers opened the door for the Qadiran military and guided them on their marches through southern Taldor. In a matter of months, every temple to Sarenrae was either burned or torn down and the Dawnflower’s clerics and followers murdered or expelled.

Seven hundred years after the Even-Tongued Conquest, Taldor still clings to life, its war with Qadira 200 years past and its military strong though underfunded. Modern Taldor is an empire in decline, with a decadent and complicated upper class ruling over an enormous and poverty-stricken lower class. Its prefectures fight border skirmishes, its noble houses joust and ruin one another, and its sparsely populated frontiers have turned lawless and chaotic. Thanks to its ancient Armies of Exploration, however, the Taldan coffers still run deep, and for 700 years now Taldor’s emperors have used their last weapon to keep the Taldan empire alive: wealth beyond imagination.

Taldor at a Glance

Government: Primogeniture empire ruled by the Grand Prince and an expansive bureaucracy

Terrain: Mostly temperate grasslands, with scrubland and high desert mountains to the south and temperate forests and mountains to the north. Taldor’s highest point is Mount Kaltafarr, a dormant volcano east of Zimar that stands 18,657 feet above sea level. The lowest point is just west of Oppara where the River Porthmos meets the Inner Sea.

Capital: Oppara (109,280)

Notable Settlements: Cassomir (32,340), Maheto (11,790), Monastery of the Seven Forms (2,594), Ridonport (6,307), Stavian’s Hold (4,311), Wispil (8,670), Yanmass (6,900), Zimar (17,540)

Languages: Common

Religions: Abadar, Aroden, Calistria, Cayden Caileen, Norgorber, Sarenrae (outlawed), Shelyn

Imports: Alcohol, Osirian artifacts, silk, spices

Exports: Iron, lumber, olives, salt, Taldan artifacts, tar, wine

Geography

When the descendants of lost Azlant settled Taldor nearly 6,000 years ago, they found lush, forested lands stretching from the Inner Sea to the World’s Edge Mountains and from the Fog Peaks to the Jalrune River. After millennia of empire, Taldor’s once mighty forests have been reduced to an expanse of druid-protected forests in the north, and the rest of the empire is now either rolling grasslands in the north and central regions or weed-choked scrublands in the south. Natural borders define the region: the Fog Peaks separate Taldor from Galt, the vast Sellen River flows between Taldor and Andoran, the Jalrune River and the Zimar Scrublands divide Taldor from Qadira, and the World’s Edge Mountains and the Whistling Plains stretch along the border between Taldor and the Keleshite empire to the east.

Major Cities

Taldor was once connected by well-constructed canals and solid, well-guarded roads. As the empire declined, the Taldan Horse and Taldan Phalanx were less able to guard the routes of travel, and the villages and hamlets furthest from Oppara shrunk and disappeared. Those that remain are either heavily guarded by local militia or ruled by rogue barons, gangs, or worse. To an outsider visiting Oppara, Taldor appears to be the height of modern society – travel a day south and the rapid decline of Taldor’s once glorious achievements becomes clear.

Cassomir: The second largest city in Taldor, Cassomir is home to both Taldor’s Imperial Navy and the Imperial Shipyards. Strategically located at the mouth of the Sellen River, Cassomir serves Taldor as a trade city, connected as it is to all of the kingdoms that call the shores of the Sellen River home. Trade ships from every nation of the Inner Sea and many beyond can always be found at anchor in Star Bay of Cassomir as the Taldan Imperial Navy performs routine searches and taxation. All craft that attempt to access the Sellen River without first being boarded and searched by the Taldan Imperial Navy are hunted down and either confiscated or sunk.

Maheto: In the northern foothills of the World’s Edge Mountains rests the city of Maheto, the heart of Taldor’s weapons manufacturing. This heavily fortified city is home to a sizeable population of dwarves who lend their skills in metal-crafting to the empire in exchange for open-ended mining rights in the World’s Edge Mountains. Many young rakes in Oppara wield Maheto-crafted rapiers – not carrying a Maheto blade is a source of embarrassment among the youth of the senatorial and noble classes. The trade roads and canals that run from Maheto to the Verduran Fork are some of the most heavily patrolled routes in Taldor.

Monastery of the Seven Forms: Built into the sheer face of a mountain high in the World’s Edge range east of Zimar, the Monastery of the Seven Forms is an ancient, underground town that grew around a monastery of the same name. Founded by Tian monks 2,000 years ago, the Monastery of the Seven Forms was a secluded school, established far from Tian so that students might learn patience in their 6,000 mile journey across Casmaron. The monastery sits on the outside of the cliff face with a breathtaking view of all the lands east to the Inner Sea.

Ridonport: Built on the only natural harbor along the Jagged Saw, Ridonport is famous as the home of General Arnisant, Taldor’s heroic leader of the Shining Crusade who sacrificed himself to imprison the Whispering Tyrant in Gallowspire. A huge monument to Arnisant, a 200-foot-tall, ornately carved marble obelisk in the city’s main square, is a testament to Ridonport’s pride. Ridonport is a very poor city, with most of its industry focused on supporting the Taldan Imperial Navy, which uses Ridonport as overflow for its larger ships when the harbor at Cassomir is full.

Stavian’s Hold: When Grand Prince Stavian III took power, the title of emperor was very weak. His father, Grand Prince Stavian II, fell prey to the petty grievances of his royal and senatorial classes and spent most of his life on the defensive, keeping his wealthy subjects happy. In order to restore power to the Primogen Crown, Stavian III launched a massive public works and military campaign to establish a foothold in the Whistling Plains. Stavian III saw an opportunity to build a large town and keep and house several legions of the Taldan Phalanx on Taldor’s easternmost border to watch for signs of Qadiran aggression.

Wispil: At the heart of the Verduran Forest, the semi-autonomous gnomish town of Wispil is the capital of Taldor’s woodcrafting and lumber industries. The gnomes work hand-in-hand with the druids of the Wildwood Lodge to carefully harvest enough trees throughout the forest so that Taldor’s hunger for lumber is fed, but the forest still remains large, healthy, and vibrant. Wood cut near Wispil is hauled overland to the Verduran Fork and floated by gnomish steersman (called “boomrafters”) who tie the massive logs together and float them to the Cassomir shipyards.

Yanmass: Originally founded as a caravanserai, Yanmass quickly grew into a small city and continues to be one of Taldor’s overland gateways to the east. Inside the walls of Yanmass, the permanent population lives in solid structures, but outside the walls sprawls a thriving population of traders from all over Casmaron. Because of the thousands of caravans that camp outside her walls, the population of Yanmass can seasonally triple, especially after the first melt and toward the end of summer.

Zimar: As the most heavily fortified city in Taldor, Zimar exists as a southern buffer against the threat of Qadiran invasion. Caught off-guard by the Grand Campaign, Taldor spent a century fortifying and rebuilding Zimar to ensure future invasions would meet with a well-organized force. Zimar is Taldor’s third largest city and rests on the Jalrune River, named for Grand Prince Jalrune who was assassinated in 3129 AR by Qadiran blades (or so Taldan history claims). The Taldan Imperial Navy keeps a dozen capital ships in Zimar, and the Taldan Horse and the Taldan Phalanx maintain scores of legions here as well.

Interior Features

Most of Taldor is flat, rolling grassland interrupted by the forests and mountains to the north and the mountains to the east and south. With nearly 6,000 years of history, Taldor is covered in abandoned cities, ruined castles, and buried temples. Most of modern Taldor is built on the foundations of Old Taldor, but the further one gets from Oppara, the more one stumbles into ruins or happens upon weed-choked ghost towns.

At the height of Old Taldor’s greatness, the modern borders were merely the glorious heartland, with the true borders of Taldor extending to what are now Andoran, Cheliax, and other neighbor states. The heartland was covered in roads and canals, with hamlets, villages, and inns that subsisted on the busy traffic moving across the empire. Today the roads disappear into wilderness, the canals are clogged with silt or debris, and the roadside inns crumble in ruin.

The River Porthmos: Known as the Mighty Porthmos, the River Porthmos is Taldor’s lifeblood. Nearly every canal, trade route, or caravan in central Taldor touches the Porthmos, and its shores are constantly choked with merchant traffic. The river’s mouth is 20 miles wide and heavily patrolled by the Taldan Imperial Navy. Without warning, they can board, search, and tax any ship travelling into and out of the river’s mouth, though in practice they reserve these activities for ships not flying the Taldan crown-and-lion. Thirty miles from the Inner Sea, the Mighty Porthmos flows beneath the Black Cliffs of Oppara, Taldor’s gilded capital and one of the largest cities in the Inner Sea region. Here the deep river is so full of shipping traffic that Opparans often joke that their glorious Grand Bridge of the Empire is unnecessary, as one can simply walk ship-to-ship to get to the southern shore. After Oppara, the Porthmos slims and winds its way through the Tandak Plains, flowing slowly and steadily toward the World’s Edge Mountains. Sixty miles before its dual headwaters, the Mighty Porthmos splits into the North Fork and South Fork and both turn rocky, rapid-filled, and swift.

From the mouth of the Porthmos to Oppara, the river is so heavily patrolled that virtually no threats exist there. After Oppara, however, the pirate traffic quickly engulfs the river as these brigands travel the Porthmos in fast, flat-bottomed sailboats and quickly strike merchant vessels before speeding off upriver. Most merchants here fill their upper decks with armed men at all times to keep the Porthmos pirates at bay. At the forking of the Porthmos lives a massive colony of giant crocodiles that sometimes roam as far as Oppara, attacking unwary swimmers or dragging fishermen from their boats. The North Fork of the Porthmos is plagued by hundreds of shambling mounds. Typically solitary, here the plant creatures work together for an unknown purpose.

The Tandak Plains: Stretching from the southern edge of the Fog Peaks to the Zimar Scrublands, and from the Inner Sea to the foothills of the World’s Edge Mountains, the Tandak Plains comprise more than 70% of Taldor’s landmass. Almost entirely rolling plains, the Tandak was once part of the great primeval forest that covered most of Avistan, but after 6,000 years of civilization, the trees are now gone and only the vast grasslands remain. The Tandak is split by two rivers, the Mighty Porthmos in the central region and the Verduran Fork across the north. Dozens of active and ruined canals crisscross the plains, which are dotted with hundreds of ruined temples, lost castles, and ghost towns. Standing tall above the south-central plains is Taldor’s third-highest point, perpetually snow-covered Mount Antios, a craggy peak named after Taldor’s tenth emperor who constructed an enormous burial site there, including dozens of gigantic statues representing himself, as well as statues of eagles, lions, and the ancient gods of Old Taldor. The winds blow steadily from west to east across the Tandak, rarely ceasing and bringing with them enormous thunderstorms in the late summer that can stretch the entire width of the empire and last for days.

Most of the dangers of the Tandak have passed as 6 millennia of empire building scrubbed the land clean of threats. Today, the Tandak’s primary hazards are roving gangs, vagabond communities, and the occasional skirmish between governors of the various Tandak prefectures. The Tandak is still home to large prides of lions, especially in the Porthmos Gap near the headwaters of the North Fork of the Porthmos River, where several prides number a dozen or more adults. Ankhegs, bulettes, giant ants, and giant bees make up the larger threats throughout the rest of the Tandak.

The World’s Edge Mountains: The World’s Edge Mountains are actually two separate ranges split by the foothills of the Porthmos Gap. The northern range is commonly called the World’s Edge Mountains and stretches from the River Porthmos northeast to end in foothills in the Whistling Plains near Yanmass. Its towering, craggy peaks are perpetually snow-capped, and most of the northern range is impassable short of magical means. At the heart of the northern range lies a wide valley, some 150 square miles in size, that’s crowded with ruins scholars believe to date back to Old Azlant. Called the valley of the Azlant, the entrance is guarded by two 500-foot-tall statues of winged men with the legs of lions. They stare ever eastward as if to guard the land from the empires there. These ruins are thick with guardian spirits, vampires, and many other undead who some say are created by a vast, magical complex deep beneath the valley. Lord Toryos, an undead dragon, rules the valley and viciously protects it from outsiders.

The southern reaches of the World’s Edge Mountains begin south of the Porthmos and quickly rise to become some of the highest peaks in all of Golarion. Though part of the greater World’s Edge range, the chain is known commonly as the Southern Range. Clouds nearly always shield its heaven-piercing mountaintops and it has but one pass – the Emperor’s Pass – that climbs high and dangerous through the range. Mount Kaltafarr, the tallest peak in Taldor, can be found in the Southern Range, as can the Monastery of the Seven Forms. The mountains of the Southern Range continue south into Qadira, where they’re called the Zho Mountains.

The Great White Wyrm, an ancient white dragon, is rumored to make his home on Mount Kaltafarr. Though he hasn’t been seen in more than a century, he once ruled the Headwater Gap and terrorized the small settlements in this region. When Qadira controlled the region, they sent adventuring parties up the slopes to deal with the Great White Wyrm, and none were ever heard from again. The last, a group calling itself the Shining Blades of Katheer, purported to have an artifact that would end the wyrm for good – and though they also never returned, the Great White Wyrm’s pillaging ceased.

Other dangers throughout both ranges of the Wolrd’s Edge Mountains include rocs, ice trolls, a few small clans of frost giants, and the dreaded koscimo – blue-shelled ice scorpions that can grow to be 10 feet long.

The Canals of Taldor

Taldor has very few natural waterways to connect the interior with the coast. Once you leave the large rivers behind, it’s a long overland trek to the rest of the empire. Early in Taldor’s history its citizens excavated canals – wide ditches connected by occasional locks – that gave Taldor’s citizens easy routes of travel across the empire’s heartland. The canals created an entire class of water-borne trade and became the arteries of Taldor’s economy. Since the Grand Campaign, the canals have slowly slipped into disrepair. Only a few key lines near the capital city of Oppara are maintained, and the rest have dried up, turned into marshland, or fallen under the control of brigands.

Natural Resources and Hazards

The towering blackwood trees of the Verduran Forest are among the strongest and most flexible hardwoods on Golarion, making them, without a doubt, the choicest lumber for shipbuilders. Blackwoods once covered the entirety of Avistan in a thick, primeval forest, but after thousands of years of humanity, the only remaining blackwoods are now found in the Verduran Forest. With such a huge timber and sawed-lumber industry powering its shipbuilding, Taldor is also known for its blackwood-derived tar, a substance most often used to waterproof ships and wood roofs. The blackwood tar is sweet smelling with a pleasant odor, and the tar factories of the Imperial Shipyards in Cassomir often smell eerily like candy.

With some of Avistan’s tallest mountain peaks, the World’s Edge Mountains are home to countless iron mines, a fact not lost on the countless dwarf clans who live and work in Maheto in exchange for mining rights in dozens of those mines. The southern coast of Taldor, from the River Porthmos down to the Jalrune River, has the perfect climate for olives and grapes and as such produces some of the finest olives and wine in all of the Inner Sea. Vast, heavily protected wineries and vineyards dot the Zimar Scrublands. Lastly, with Old Taldor founded by the descendants of Old Azlant and the empire covered in ruins, Taldor does a brisk trade in exported Azlanti artifacts – both authentic and manufactured.

Without a doubt, the greatest risk to travelers inside Taldor’s borders comes from humans. River pirates stalk the Verduran Fork, brigands control most of the canals and unpatrolled roads, vagabonds (most of them ex-military) crawl through the foothills and rolling plains of the Tandak, and the more remote prefectures are ruled almost entirely by gangs so powerful as to make the Taldan governors but weak figureheads. Even worse, when the royalty and senatorial classes decide to go to war and send the soldiers of the Taldan Phalanx against one another, the poor of Taldor are usually caught in between and suffer greatly. Taldor’s history is full of battles between rival houses, rival governors, and even between rival military commanders. Because of 6,000 years of civilization, most of Taldor is free of monstrous dangers, though the foothills, mountains, rivers, and Verduran Forest are all filled with the ancient dangers that held sway over Taldor before the descendants of Old Azlant settled here.

Foreign Relations

Taldor is an ancient country, and its relationships with its neighbors and rivals are usually based on long-standing grudges and slights.

Absalom: While Absalom views Taldor as a doddering old empire to be carefully avoided, Taldor sees Absalom as the key to reinvigorating the empire. Taldor has long kept plans for the invasion of Absalom and the Isle of Kortos. Knowing that no siege of Absalom ever succeeds, the emperor instead directs Taldan agents to infiltrate every aspect of Absalom society, intent on one day quietly merging Absalom with the empire and using it as a base of operations to reclaim the glory of Old Taldor.

Andoran: Andoran and Taldor share a peace right now caused both by each nation’s enormous, defensive navies and the fact that the druids of the Wildwood Lodge control their mutual border, the Verduran Forest. Though Taldans still consider Andoran part of the empire, they see the nation of freedom lovers as autonomous children stretching their legs for the first time. Someday, when the time is right, the Taldan Empire will call its children home – forcefully if necessary.

Cheliax: Only Qadira is more hated by Taldans than Cheliax. The Taldan Empire would like nothing more than to see Cheliax – the source of the Even-Tongued Conquest that robbed Taldor of many of its ancient holdings – wiped from Golarion. Add to that the recent takeover by devil-worshiping House Thrune and most of Taldor sees Cheliax as an abomination. Once Absalom falls to the crown-and-lion, the Taldan Phalanx will burn the Chelish countryside clean and once again rule the region as Old Taldor did for thousands of years.

Galt: Taldor keeps a wary eye on its northern neighbor lest the seeds of revolution blow south and take hold. Though Taldor’s military is largely focused south and east, Taldor keeps several encampments active along its border with Galt. Travelers from Galt are subject to search when they cross into Taldor, and recently the Taldan Phalanx and River Guard have captured ships and caravans filled with handbills demanding the people of Taldor rise up and shake off their oppressive rulers. Oppara fears such a revolution and makes sure those caught advocating such reform inside Taldor’s borders are never heard from again. Many of the senatorial class are pressing Grand Prince Stavian III to end his feud with Qadira so that the Horse and Phalanx might march north and crush the petulant revolution for good.

Lastwall: Though angered by Lastwall’s decision to remain neutral during the Even-Tongued Conquest, Taldor today sees Lastwall for what it is: a symbol of Old Taldor’s glory on Golarion. Lastwall represents Taldor’s greatest victory, the defeat of the Whispering Tyrant and his imprisonment at Gallowspire. The empire’s most glorious officer, General Arnisant, gave his life to protect Golarion – a fact Taldor doesn’t let the rest of the world forget. Taldor still sends money to Lastwall to keep up its defenses, and young blades of the empire, taken by the stories of the Shining Crusade, still travel to Lastwall to join forces with the watchful border kingdom.

Osirion: Many Taldans still believe Osirion to be a satrap state of the Padishah Empire of Kelesh and, as such, hold a great deal of mistrust for the ancient nation. Despite this lack of trust, Taldor has a healthy merchant relationship with Osirion, buying up massive quantities of the desert kingdom’s ancient artifacts to display in Taldan museums and households. Few Taldan noble houses lack a mummy or other ostentatious representation of the land of the pharaohs.

Qadira and the Padishah Empire of Kelesh: The Grand Campaign saw the Padishah Empire of Kelesh and its satrap state, Qadira, occupy southern Taldor off and on for 500 years. The city of Zimar was enslaved, nearly every settlement across the Zimar Scrublands was burned, and Taldor was broken into pieces by the Even-Tongued Conquest, a war that would never have succeeded had Qadira stayed inside its own borders. Needless to say, most of Taldor’s people hate Qadira. Taldor sponsors privateers, known as the Zimar corsairs, who plague all Qadiran shipping from Katheer to Sedeq. Both nations still raid across their common border, especially in the foothills east of the confluence of the Jalrune River and the River of Qadira. Qadira positively strains at its leash, held tightly by the Padishah Emperor, eager to invade Taldor again and reclaim lands it sees as its own. Taldor’s military is ready to defend against a new Qadiran threat, but Taldor’s last grasp on imperialism would crumble if it dared invade Qadira. Today both nations stand ready to defend against the other, and for now the cold war along their border is the extent of their mutual diplomacy.

Government

Taldor’s government is convoluted, ensuring the need for legal scholars for generations to come.

Grand Prince: Taldor is ruled by a Grand Prince, the hereditary title of the emperor of Taldor. The Grand Prince wears the Primogen Crown and holds absolute authority, his power base solidified by a loyal military. Taldor’s line of succession follows the rule of primogeniture, with the eldest living son granted the title of Grand Prince upon the father’s death. This line has reset more than a dozen times in Taldor’s history, with another powerful house of Taldor claiming the Primogen Crown when no heirs of the Grand Prince existed. As Grand Prince Stavian III has only a daughter, when he dies it is likely there will be some infighting among the royals (including the princess herself) as they press various claims to the throne, which may devolve into civil war.

Royalty: Taldor’s upper class – comprised of dynasty-inheriting houses, most of which trace their lineages back to one emperor or another – is both the Grand Prince’s boon and his bane. Throughout the empire’s history, the royalty of Taldor have shared as much responsibility for the greatness of their emperors as they have for their emperors’ downfalls. The Grand Prince can raise a citizen or senator of the empire up to this class by bestowing title and wealth upon the individual. Annually, the Grand Prince holds a huge celebration at the Imperial Palace where he does just that – though the current Grand Prince wisely limits his title-bestowing to those who ally with him and support his hold on the Primogen Crown.

Taldor’s royalty class is full of byzantine titles – patrician, magister, proconsul, mandator, exarch, viceroy, duke, and so on – and it takes several scholars at the Primogen Library to keep it all straight, as each title has a subtle place in the hierarchy of the empire. The royalty of Taldor are eternally obsessed with the arcane arts and the acquisition of newer and greater magical knowledge – an obsession they share with the current Grand Prince.

Senatorial Class: The senatorial class represents the hereditary members of Taldor’s senate, the governors of Taldor’s prefectures, and various heads of the bureaucracy. While it is quite rare for citizens to rise to the royalty, they can easily work hard for the government and achieve a title in the senatorial class.

The Bearded: Taldor’s royalty and senatorial classes are known as “the bearded”, a term reflective of their protected legal status as the only males in Taldor who can legally grow beards (though this becomes less of an issue the further you travel from Oppara). Wearing a beard is a symbol of status, and the level of extravagance poured into a man’s beard is representative of his personal wealth and power. It’s not uncommon for Taldans to portray Abadar, Aroden, or Cayden Cailean with beards, as it is hard for them to imagine male gods not possessing enough power to earn the right to wear one.

This is not to say that any man with a day’s worth of scruff is thrown in jail or onto a slave galley – intent is the key, and long cheek whiskers and a scraggly beard are clearly not attempts to rise above one’s station. It is only when a man of lower class starts to groom and oil his beard (particularly a goatee or chin-beard) in the manner of nobles that others start to take notice and guards are inclined to take action. Furthermore, foreign dignitaries, dwarves, and gnomes are all but exempt from this scrutiny, as Taldor is a human nation and the intent of the law is to keep the Taldan peasant class from putting on airs, not to alienate beard-wearing merchants and diplomats from other races or countries.

The Unbearded: Taldor’s massive underclass, called the unbearded, make up 99% of Taldor’s population. They are merchants, craftsmen, day laborers, dock workers, vagabonds, soldiers, sailors, and so on. Taldor’s crushing tax rate and import tariffs ensure that the poor of Taldor remain poor – as do the policies of the ruling class regarding the rights of citizens (the unbearded have none). Amazingly, the heart of the empire has never rebelled against this stratified and oppressive establishment. The Grand Princes have been careful to raise key citizens from the ranks of the unbearded in order to keep their compatriots ever hopeful that after hard work and long loyalty to the empire they might one day join the ranks of the bearded. Taldor’s military offers such an avenue to advancement, and because of that the Taldan Horse, Taldan Phalanx, and Imperial Navy are loyal and strong, and fight hard for the empire – if only to gain the notice of their commanders and receive a promotion to the ranks of the bearded.

Military

Taldor’s extensive military allows it to guard against threats from all sides, despite the great drain on the country’s finances.

Taldan Horse: Taldor’s cavalry is comprised of both horse and elephant units. Huge horse farms in southern Taldor raise fierce destriers that are trained their entire lives to work and fight in the midst of chaos and carnage. Taldan elephants are descendants of breeding stock brought back from the Garundi interior thousands of years ago during one of the expeditions of the Armies of Exploration, and they are among the largest breeds of elephants on Golarion. The Taldan military uses its horse legions to break the lines of enemy advancement and to outflank their foes while they use the elephant legions to move supplies and, rarely, to crush the heart of the enemy’s lines. The horse legions are comprised entirely of heavily armed and armored knights, led by a knight-captain. While the elephant legions are led by knights, they are largely populated with citizen soldiers.

Taldan Imperial Navy and the River Guard: Based in the mighty shipyards of Cassomir, the Taldan Imperial Navy is all that stands between Taldor and the end of the empire. Andoran’s fleets are strong, and the ships of Cheliax and the mighty merchant fleets of Qadira could easily be converted for use as a massive invasion force. With these threats on all sides, it falls to the sailors and officers of the Taldan Navy to keep the shores of Taldor safe. A small wing of the navy is called the River Guard, an honorable (but small) fleet of ships that protects the many rivers inside Taldor’s borders from piracy.

Taldan Phalanx: The majority of the military is comprised of the Taldan Phalanx. For thousands of years they’ve used the same potent strategic combination of archer and spearmen to conquer their enemies. The spearmen wield long pikes, wear light armor, and carry a short sword at their sides. They march as one unit and are trained to quickly form either lines of battle or defensive formations to protect against cavalry charges. Each spear unit is led by a knight-captain who sits atop his charger in heavy armor and directs his men into battle. Archers wield fine longbows, wear light or no armor, and carry a variety of weapons (usually axes) for hand-to-hand combat. One unit of archers is assigned to each unit of spearmen, and they follow closely behind their pike-wielding brothers and sisters. On command, the two units function together as the spears form a protective square around the archers, who fire hails of arrows from inside their living fortification. This strategy broke hundreds of Qadiran horse and camel charges, and the Phalanx proudly believes it’s because of their perseverance that Taldor eventually won the Grand Campaign.

Ulfen Guard: After the assassination of Emperor Jalrune, the next Grand Prince built a personal bodyguard to protect him from any threat. He sent emissaries to the Ulfen Jarls in the north and promised vast wealth for any who came to serve the empire. Thus the Ulfen Guard was born. Heavily-armed barbarian warriors all, they protect the bearer of the Primogen Crown from any threats, real or imagined. At any one time, more than a dozen Ulfen warriors can be found guarding the Grand Prince, and they each serve for at least a year, though some stay on their entire lives, entranced by Oppara’s wealth and enamored with the number of would-be assassins they get to slaughter every year. Once an Ulfen’s service is up, he can take as much loot from the imperial treasure vaults as he can carry.

Zimar Corsairs: The pirates of the Jalrune River serve Taldor as a quasi-legal part of the Imperial Navy. Each captain of a corsair galley is given a Letter of Mark that both identifies him as a full captain of the navy and grants him some legal protections should his ship be taken by the enemy. The Zimar Corsairs patrol the Jalrune River and the southeastern Inner Sea region, seeking to sink Qadiran merchant traffic, though they’re also known for enslaving merchant ships and adding both ship and crew to their numbers.