Have you ever arrived at the final step of a character creation screen and felt completely stumped as to what you are going to call yourself in the game? Do you wonder what kind of names would be appropriate for your vagrus based on their background? We’ve been there, and we get it.

That’s why our new random name generator has been a long time coming. Our priorities were two-fold: give options to those who would rather not worry about such matters, and also to allow players some insight into naming conventions in the Riven Realms. This feature will be available with our next build, and you can check out a preview video here.

The province of Tark was formerly a sovereign country conquered and assimilated into the Empire. It has always been a region of vast deserts and arid mountains. Its people are a hardy folk who were already adapted to a life in barren lands, which allowed them to easily adapt to the many new deserts on the continent after the Calamity. Thus, a lot of them are natural explorers and traders - but quite a lot of them are mercenaries.

Those of you who have played the game extensively surely know Deven, the great Imperial city that occupies vast caverns beneath the arid and hot Jagged Waste. It is a regular stop for many traders, wanderers, and vagri. Although the subterranean location is protected from the scorching sunlight of the surface, it is in turn enveloped in perpetual twilight only broken by the many braziers and luminous crystal clusters.

'They came at night - in the darkness that enveloped the valley, thick as ink. But then pale ghost light appeared and danced all over the carvings of the old tombs. The stink of terror was awful. And then I heard the screaming. Not that of the horrifying specters... but that of my comrades.'

'Disgusting little runts. Eaters of the dead. Pale vermin. I hereby vow to do all in my power to push them out of your neighborhoods and businesses, to bar them from decent citizens of the Empire, and in the end perhaps even rid this city of their filth altogether.'

- Tribune Septimus Votano of Deven in a speech about Wraiths during his campaign for office

'What draws them to this place, I wonder. Is it the utter sadness that permeates this forsaken expanse? Does it call to them when they begin to feel the chill breath of death? Perhaps there is a wordless language spanning all species that speaks as the realm of Ahskul starts to beckon.'

Once beautiful Madrigos, a city famous for its wealth and hospitality, is now a forsaken ruin called Scorponar, dwelling of the Scortaur, a race of savage scorpion-men who hunt all other races mercilessly and uncompromisingly on and around the Plains of Bone. Only a handful of fortunate wanderers can tell the tale of seeing the city's shattered buildings and old walls at the heart of the wasteland. Those who did see it talk about bone scaffolding and fortifications, flayed bodies hanging from battlements, and banners fashioned from human skin. Scorponar is a place of horror and despair, with the old white stone of Madrigos peeking out from under the colorless sands like broken teeth or shattered bones.

'When we arrived at the observation  post, Borgan was nowhere to be seen. The craven slaves pointed to tracks in the sand that looked like someone had been dragged away, accompanied by small, triangular stab marks – Yrg prints, I presumed correctly. These led to a dark crevice at the foot of one of the towers. We tried calling after Borgan but there was no answer. Eventually, I sent down one of the slaves with a torch. The unfortunate bloke happened upon the mutilated body of Borgan down there and fled back up in a panic. Yrg are clearly present down in the underside of the city, that much is certain. This ties in perfectly with what we know of the Elven tribes of the Second Age. The accounts of Sage Ikar record that the realm of Dor Anthelas was involved in a great war against the Yrg that lasted for  millennia. What these insect broods were like, I cannot imagine, but  they must have been a far cry from the mostly docile Yrg we know today.'

In this post dedicated to character poses and skills we are taking a look at the sleazy Dwarven smuggler and budding criminal mastermind Garrik.

Garrik is ranged support character with some very unique mechanics, so he will not be very efficient in the frontlines. In fact, he does not have any melee skills but is still fairly sturdy. All his attacks ignore Armor and even though not all of these are direct damage skills, Garrik can be extremely devastating when used correctly.

'They say that the tower was so tall that its pinnacle scraped the heavens. These days, though, only about two hundred feet of stained marble poke out from under the endless dunes of Arenas Vorax. What happened to the rest of the tower? Heh. They say that you can enter through a window and go down the steps, deeper and deeper under the sands, deeper and deeper until you reach the other side of the world. They also say that things lurk down there and skitter endlessly in the black abyss. But they say many things...'