The Goreth - literally translated as "the place of exile" - plains are a vast area, stretching thousands of kilometers in every direction, mostly made up of rolling hills, empty grassy plains, chill tundra and rocky wastes with low groves of gnarled and thorny trees. Icy streams and small rivers babble through the windy wilderness, filling small turloughs and passing by ancient standing stones, piled rock tombs and strange, crude monuments.

Hundreds of fierce tribes roam these plains, the Goreth'ai, hunting blue-horned oxen whose gore brings with it the kiss of poison and whose barbed back bristles can pierce even stout leather, savage predators like wyverns perched on obsidian stacks, and roaming plainswalkers, flightless razorbeaked birds three times the height of a man who can run faster than a horse and leap a wall in one bound.

Each of these tribes has made a pact with a totem-daemon and are sworn to its service, in exchange for which they gain certain unnatural powers. Some of these spirits are bodiless and are carried in ornate receptacles like cauldrons or polished bronze mirrors, others hold court in dark caverns or high, lonely peaks surrounded by glistening alien jewels and heavy golden treasures, while yet others have no tangible presence at all in this plane, haunting instead dreams and nightmares.

Although there are too many to easily enumerate, the usual pattern of the Goreth tribes is that most ritually-accepted members of the tribes gain minor advantages, and higher or more favoured followers who have completed a variety of dangerous tasks gain more powers. Each of the dark spirits have three shamans, either male or female, regardless of how many people are in the tribe, and should a shaman perish, another rises to take their place.

Raguthai the Dominator's tribe can easily charm and persuade others, Kriquill of the Flexing Scales' people can leap over any body of water, the clan of A'Sshiar Rawtouch have long and sharp nails, as damaging as any iron dagger, Kikionat's Wind Breathers can press the wind behind their arrows, allowing them to strike targets from great distances, and these are but a few examples of the diverse skills and powers of the Goreth tribes. They supplement their supernatural abilities with distinctive martial arts or "warfeats" which take full advantage of their mystic powers.

Shamanic spells can be bound into "windings" or twisted lengths of hide and sinew to give added options to roaming battlemasters, whose own physical appearance may become stranger and stranger as their favour increases with their pact-spirits. Shamans can also create "ghost children" of the spirits which can be summoned by lesser acolytes as an avatar, and join in the battle. These are normally reserved for serious conflicts however as their destruction weakens the pact-spirit itself. Artifacts containing ghost children are seen as the most precious of all Goreth relics, and although blasphemous may be used by those not of the tribe, if they know the means of release.

Open warfare between the tribes is relatively rare, with smaller skirmishes of a few dozen or a few hundred tribesmen and women being more usual. Slave-taking and ritual mutilation are common, and slaves are sold between tribes and to neighbouring principalities and empires, where they are highly favoured for the spectacles they can perform in gladiatorial combat. In exchange the tribes gain weapons, armour and luxuries beyond their ability to manufacture. Ritual human sacrifice is also quite normal, with the manner depending on the whims of their daemon.

Outside trade with the tribes is fraught with risk as they are notoriously unpredictable, and lengthy trade routes through tribal areas are usually impractical as each tribe will demand a steep toll, if they allow passage at all.

The markings each tribe uses to identify itself are as varied as the tribes themselves - some embed quartz crystals in their fists, others have elaborate posion tattoos meant for protection, while others can be known only by their raiment or standards. While the weapons of individual heroes can take almost any shape or size, usually spears, bone whips, longbows firing tooth-tipped arrows and heavy bronze axes are the preferred implements of combat. Ponies, warhorses and chariots are also commonly used.

Treaties between the tribes are written on the skulls of enemies slain in feuds and hung on treaty trees for any to read. The destruction of a treaty tree is considered a great sacrilege and will usually bring the wrath of all nearby tribes.

Once every six years the Goreth tribes gather at a place called Abul-Goreth, or the end of exile. This begins with an enormous feast and exchanging of gifts and brides, the hallucinogenic herbal smoke of which blocks out the sky above, and then, under the gloom, begins a gigantic ritualised battle. At the height of the combat the pact-spirits themselves come forth beneath violet lightning amid strange phantasms and strive mightily with one another, shedding ichoric blood which is gathered at great risk by the shamans and mingled into peculiar potions, some of which are said to grant immortality of one form or another.

After the month-long orgy of destruction and feasting ends, the tribes return to their normal grounds, reduced in number but sharpened and honed by the fires of Abul-Goreth.