A bit of a collab with Gnomish Dwelf, we were chewing the fat on this on Discord, and I think this might be an article for a future issue of Threshold. Once again taking the voice of my professor of Comparative Anthropology at the Dunadale Technical College, for the inbetween bits of this, and starting as I mean to go on - sporadically and tengentially.
Species of Shark Kin
by Cab DavidsonThe Shark Kin of Mystara
Notes from a lecture given by Professor Dane Ossify, Comparative Anthropology 104, Dunadale Technical College
Now we come to a rarely studied part of the diversity of intelligent life on Mystara, the shark kin. I know that you all believe you already know about shark kin, and you assume that you know all you need to know about them from the pulpy fiction you were brought up on. They were really just stories designed to keep children from the waters edge, I'll have you know, and mostly by Thyatian mothers who should have known better. No, the shark kin are almost as diverse in type as the monstrous goblinoids on land, and they fill many of the same roles in maritime environments. But they are far more diverse in attitudes, beliefs and activities. From the essentially pacifistic basking folk, through to the thrill seeking megamouths, to the highly intelligent and technically advanced hammerheads and the fiendishly cunning and tenacious sea dogs. As they are no more derived from one squalous stock than the reptile folk are from one form of lizard, the shark kin of the world are hugely variable.
The shark kin of the Sea of Dread are closest to bull sharks in biology and attitude, and being so well known they have rather lent a poor reputation to the others. But as the Sea of Dread has fewer shark species than other seas (due to the propensity of those waters to throw up altogether nastier creatures), they also have just a single form of shark kin, and one must go further afield to learn about the many others who make up the types.
In this lecture we will introduce each, in turn, with a short description of form and culture.