This is a part of a worldbuilding exercise where I tried to make a group that could fit into an established universe, but was also a different take than what was already seen there. I chose the Fallout universe.
The Wraith tribe are majority ghoul, and most of the members others interact with are by that very fact going to be ghouls. But unlike many wasteland ghouls, Wraiths rarely wear more clothes than they need to, frequently only a loincloth and shoes, with a backpack for carrying things, and maybe a short cape like thing they can throw on in rainier climates.
A Wraith warrior will always be wearing a necklace made of scrap metal and bones, etched with patterns. While it isn’t immideatly obvious to outsiders, and no two warrior necklaces are the same, the aesthetics of the necklace is secondary. Primarily, this is an easy way to carry a tool set, without needing to stop and take things out of a bag, and each piece of the necklace has a function such as bottle opener, screw driver, thing for popping the shell off a radroach etc.
They will also typically be seen with a spear, usually a length if pipe cut into a point on one end, and a machete. Most of them also do have a firearm of some kind, but those are not kept as obviously as the rest.
The tribal look and lifestyle they employ makes many outsiders assume that the Wraiths are primitive. In actuality, they are just practical, and retrieving a spear you throw at a radstag is easier than unshooting a bullet. In that the tribe regularly picks up members as they travel, the tribe has a very diverse skillset, and the same warrior who just snuck up on a raider and pounced like an animal before hacking off his head with a machete, might be the guy the others call over to hack a terminal to get into somewhere.
Wraith warriors, in that they are ghouls, are generally very experienced hunters, trackers and fighters. This, along with the natural advantages ghouls have in an irradiated wasteland, makes them very effective at procuring food. Since ghouls also need to eat much less than smoothskins, the Wraith tribe is usually very well supplied with food.
The Wraiths are, despite their name, often quicker to trade than fight. They believe in a basic set of engagement rules everyone should adhere to and be protected by, mainly that you do not enslave, torture, rape etc.
Breaking this ruleset effectively means in the eyes of the Wraiths that they do not have to engage you like a person anymore. This does not mean they are willing to enslave etc. those people, but it does mean that those people are fair game to hunt and eat. This is another reason the Wraith tribe generally has plenty of food.
An obvious example here would be that if there is a conflict with a random group of scavengers who wants to go through a ruin the Wraiths believe they have the right to, the Wraiths will be somewhat reluctant to actually start a fight, warning the scavengers first, letting them flee if they lose the fight, generally play fair when fighting and not booby trap food or medication. There might be a conflict, but those are people who should be respected.
In contrast, encountering a group like Caesars legion, the Wraiths would be very quick to determine that those are fair game, and stop engaging them as people. This is not something they would tell the legion either, they would just start stalking and hunting them the same way they would with any group of animals, killing entire patrols and butchering the corpses on the spot to make it easier to carry home the meat. They would likely escort any slaves they managed to free along the way to settlements too.
This cannibalism is usually the source of conflict with more even tempered settlements, and the Wraiths are fully aware not everyone shares their world view. They are likely to offer jerky to others casually, and are not offended if the other person rejects it when learning some of it may be raider.
In general, the Wraith tribe can be a bit disconcerting to some, leaving piles of clearly butchered human bones in the wild, openly using the same noises ferals communicate with as shorthand and just showing up and settling down somewhere after massacring a group of raiders to take the building they were holed up in, but overall they’re not really dangerous unless you go out of your way to be an asshole.
The Wraith tribe are majority ghoul, and most of the members others interact with are by that very fact going to be ghouls. But unlike many wasteland ghouls, Wraiths rarely wear more clothes than they need to, frequently only a loincloth and shoes, with a backpack for carrying things, and maybe a short cape like thing they can throw on in rainier climates.
A Wraith warrior will always be wearing a necklace made of scrap metal and bones, etched with patterns. While it isn’t immideatly obvious to outsiders, and no two warrior necklaces are the same, the aesthetics of the necklace is secondary. Primarily, this is an easy way to carry a tool set, without needing to stop and take things out of a bag, and each piece of the necklace has a function such as bottle opener, screw driver, thing for popping the shell off a radroach etc.
They will also typically be seen with a spear, usually a length if pipe cut into a point on one end, and a machete. Most of them also do have a firearm of some kind, but those are not kept as obviously as the rest.
The tribal look and lifestyle they employ makes many outsiders assume that the Wraiths are primitive. In actuality, they are just practical, and retrieving a spear you throw at a radstag is easier than unshooting a bullet. In that the tribe regularly picks up members as they travel, the tribe has a very diverse skillset, and the same warrior who just snuck up on a raider and pounced like an animal before hacking off his head with a machete, might be the guy the others call over to hack a terminal to get into somewhere.
Wraith warriors, in that they are ghouls, are generally very experienced hunters, trackers and fighters. This, along with the natural advantages ghouls have in an irradiated wasteland, makes them very effective at procuring food. Since ghouls also need to eat much less than smoothskins, the Wraith tribe is usually very well supplied with food.
The Wraiths are, despite their name, often quicker to trade than fight. They believe in a basic set of engagement rules everyone should adhere to and be protected by, mainly that you do not enslave, torture, rape etc.
Breaking this ruleset effectively means in the eyes of the Wraiths that they do not have to engage you like a person anymore. This does not mean they are willing to enslave etc. those people, but it does mean that those people are fair game to hunt and eat. This is another reason the Wraith tribe generally has plenty of food.
An obvious example here would be that if there is a conflict with a random group of scavengers who wants to go through a ruin the Wraiths believe they have the right to, the Wraiths will be somewhat reluctant to actually start a fight, warning the scavengers first, letting them flee if they lose the fight, generally play fair when fighting and not booby trap food or medication. There might be a conflict, but those are people who should be respected.
In contrast, encountering a group like Caesars legion, the Wraiths would be very quick to determine that those are fair game, and stop engaging them as people. This is not something they would tell the legion either, they would just start stalking and hunting them the same way they would with any group of animals, killing entire patrols and butchering the corpses on the spot to make it easier to carry home the meat. They would likely escort any slaves they managed to free along the way to settlements too.
This cannibalism is usually the source of conflict with more even tempered settlements, and the Wraiths are fully aware not everyone shares their world view. They are likely to offer jerky to others casually, and are not offended if the other person rejects it when learning some of it may be raider.
In general, the Wraith tribe can be a bit disconcerting to some, leaving piles of clearly butchered human bones in the wild, openly using the same noises ferals communicate with as shorthand and just showing up and settling down somewhere after massacring a group of raiders to take the building they were holed up in, but overall they’re not really dangerous unless you go out of your way to be an asshole.
Category All / Fanart
Species Humanoid
Size 649 x 1000px
File Size 312.2 kB
FA+

Comments