Characters, races, and other resources for the Monster Girl setting.
This project is maintained by garbados
Minots are tall, stocky taurine mammals, generally possessing two horns and a mane of hair. They eat grasses, leaves, and certain fruits and fungi. For eons herds of them have migrated with the seasons and with the changing of things, and today many kinds of Minots inhabit most parts of the globe. From the shaggy “Yaken” Minots that occupy unforgiving taigas to the gaunt “Elken” Minots who mind thick wild groves and the “Boken” Minots who patrol shimmering savannahs, diverse herds each have deep roots to where they roam.
They are strong and sturdy people, disposed to brevity and severity. Virtually any herd in stampede could destroy a town, even a city, but such events are rare if not entirely mythological. Herds are known to have a strong sense of guestright and fairness that makes them poor merchants but good comrades. A herd camping may arrange a bazaar of goods for trade, but a stranger would find no seller asking or giving a price. Each is owed what each requires, and for each all provide.
Each herd has an ancient history with its migration territory. The diverse phenotypes of Minots are a testament to their enduring connection to the places that made them, that they over eons have made. Minots have a keen awareness of the impact of their comings and goings, and discussions about the planning and conducting of migrations can invoke data from across thousands of years.
Herds have a way of knowing each other that does not involve words, but a combination of subtle gestures, expressions, and scents. This combination is like a language, and two herds from far apart will find the other’s language quite incomprehensible, while a non-Minot attempting to speak the language will find they cannot reproduce the essential smells with any control or subtlety. Minots generally know Common but their insular language creates an insular culture. Minots who travel without a herd are rare, and leaving the herd is generally discouraged.
Minots stand between six and eight feet tall on two cloven feet, and vary considerably in body shape and size. They have two horns that grow in different patterns by region, with Yaken horns being curved forward while Elken horns branch into many points and then periodically break off and regrow. Boken horns are ribbed and grow down at a similar angle to the rest of the Minot’s face. Minot faces are angled forward, with a snout more in front of than below the eyes.
They have fur which varies in color and thickness, with a thick mane that sprouts from between their horns down to mid-back. Yaken hair is thick and shaggy, and incredibly long when combed; Elken hair is shorter and tougher, and their manes more pronounced; Boken have a very light, short fur, and some Boken herds are even known to have stripes. Most Minots have some shade of brown fur, but colors may vary across the color spectrum from white to amber to dark rose to black, and these colors may differ between the fur and the mane. They may even exhibit spots. Many Minots choose to style their manes by coloring them, braiding them, combing them, and adorning them with meaningful stones. Some Yaken braid the fur across their bodies, tying them with tassles imbued with meaning.
Herds organize through “syndicates” or volunteer collectives that carry out mandates which may be temporary or permanent. The definitive syndicate is called the Planner Syndicate, or PlanSyn, and historically they are recounted as the first syndicate. They plan, organize, and conduct migration patterns. These patterns align with seasons, but some locations or circumstances may have the herd staying many seasons. Depending on the territory, migration patterns may be so complex as to take more than one lifetime to fully traverse. Thus a generation would only ever see part of it, and each generation adjusts to their own circumstances while considering those to come, but over thousands of years the path becomes worn in the land with its regularity and the bounty that the herd seeks emerges from its own passing. Soil is turned over by countless Minot hooves as they rush over fallow land, and nutrition springs from well-tended thickets.
Not all herds have the same syndicates, as each population’s interests and intents align differently, but here are some you may find:
Individuals can participate in many syndicates, or none. Syndicates dissolve with their mandates such that many have a lifetime spanning numerous generations, while others emerge in response to specific circumstances within a lifetime and then dissolve when they have been resolved. Whenever people organize, it is called a syndicate.
Every summer solstice the herds of a region send contingents to a Gathering, to exchange news and knowledge. They affirm their bonds with gifts and rituals, dances that tell stories and dances that delight the heart and hooves. The baritone bleating and moaning of their songs, the stamping and leaping weight of their bodies, together they shake the earth. (Yaken are more careful about this, lest it cause an avalanche.) Herds generally send contingents to multiple Gatherings, as any herd has many neighbors near and far. These Gatherings help PlanSyns to ensure nobody steps on anyone else’s hooves, and enrich other syndicates with wisdom gained in parallel.
As Minots are known to come bearing gifts of sturdy crafts and elegant medicines they tend to have good relations with their neighbors and the lives with whom they share their regions. Conflicts generally have to do with possessiveness over the land, as property and borders are alien to the ways of Minots. ProtSyns have been known to act proactively against slavers, either by slaying them or by organizing escapee logistics. Minots tend to abhor violence but they hold a special place for those who would assume ownership of another.
Herds often have non-Minot members. Others may travel with them either as individuals or as groups for protection and friendship, sometimes briefly and sometimes for lifetimes. It would be half-hearted to liberate slaves only to leave them wandering the wilderness, so survivors of an encounter with slavers can sometimes be found in their ranks. Syndicates may have apprentices, bondfolk, and rarely elders of another race. As it is difficult for others to learn Minot languages, herds teach their children to speak Common as well. Gnoll tribes have been known to camp on Yaken grounds in the seasons that they are away, living on its bounty as a part of its cycle just like the herd.
Minots and Harps have a symbiotic relationship stretching into myth. The insects that are attracted to Minots and the tall grasses they eat made up a significant portion of the ancient Harp diet, but as each developed advanced societies covens and herds began to organize together on greater projects like hydraulic machinery and permanent structures. These days the insects that follow Minots are gathered and traded, often by Harps to other Harps, but sometimes as gifts from Minots. Special combs kill and collect the mites and lice from Minot fur, which can be mashed into a paste used in pastries and savory dishes. Herd and coven mythologies overlap heavily, and many stories concern the shared adventures of legendary Harps and Minots.
Minots tend toward to be true neutral, and to a lesser extent lawful good. Their measured concerns and collective ways support a strong sense of law and a deeply-held conscientiousness for others, but herd ways tend to promote adaptation and harmony over the assertion of individual will.
Minots recognize gods as beings but worship is generally reserved for the Song, the sound of the harmony of all the things in a place. The Song of a place can be harmonious or discordant, pronounced or subtle, elegant or brutal, and all of these are valid ways of being. Minots strive toward harmony, but it is not an individual’s place to dictate a place to itself. The better part of this harmony comes from living in peace with the way of a place, not by imposing peace upon its Song. It is not the way for a herd to dam a river, but to find the gifts left by its flood.
Minot myths tend to concern the events and dynamics that led to the different facets of a place’s Song, from why animals fight or collaborate to how legendary individuals approached historical phenomena. A Song is composed of not only the physical elements of a place but also the spirits that suffuse it – the spirits of rivers, lakes, mountains, groves, winds, dreams, and even sickness and death – and so they feature heavily in myth as well.
Minot clerics and other divine casters use ritually imbued trinkets from their herd as holy symbols, such as figurines and icons of mythic figures or events moulded from the finely-ground horns shed by friends and family. Gems and other stones found or traded under auspicious or significant circumstances are sometimes also used.
Although it is uncommon for Minots to leave their herds, it is not unheard of. Minots may be cast out for crimes against the herd, such as rape or murder, or they may be sent adventuring by a syndicate to gather knowledge to aid the herd. These syndicate emissaries usually act as traveling healers, mercenaries, scholars, and engineers. Minot wizards will travel to study at wizarding universities, and bards may travel to gather stories and music. Minots who have been cast out often take up with bandits or seek out violent eldritch knowledge on their own.
Minots do not name each other as they know each other by scent and sound. Instead, names are adapted from the poems given as gifts by a neighboring Harp coven’s Skald to Minots entering adulthood through a naming ceremony. These names affirm a person’s standing through their character and accomplishments. In Common, this name is shortened to a two-syllable phrase like Ib-Ba. Because names are considered gifts, a Minot may recognize many names.
Common names: Ib-Ba, El-Ki, Er-Ka, Ol-Ki, Ib-Na, Il-Si, Ol-Si, Su-Wa, Si-Ke, Lu-Kao, Ei-Ta, etc.
Adulthood: 15 years
Time to first level by class group: