IrdyaCanonSecretLore

WARNING: The following page contains game secrets intended for campaign designers. We cannot stop anyone from reading it, but if you are a player you should consider hitting your back button now, as you will probably enjoy learning these things more if you do it through the hints dropped at various places in the mainline campaigns.

This is a work-in-progress presenting the current state of the Irdya Canon, the revised lore that will be in Wesnoth 1.16 onwards. Things on here might not be secret, but for a work-in-progress it's easier to write first and then decide whether it should be secret or not.

Resources

Forum threads:

• The main lore starts in the A grand design for singleplayer mainline lore thread.
• Non-developer users can discuss in the Single Player campaign overhaul discussion (non-Developers Forum version) thread.

Necromancy and secrets of the undead

High-level undead are much rarer than in the Classic Canon. Liches are much rarer, as having too many dilutes the storytelling. The Wesfolks' Lich Lords are still in the Irdya Canon, but not of the Wesfolk anymore.

Some races can't use black magic at all. These are elves, woses, trolls, drakes, and dwarves. Races that are, in theory, able to use necromancy are humans, orcs, saurians, and merfolk.

Any necromancers or liches of those races are automatically non-canon, even if they were in a 1.14 mainline campaign. Even if the alternative is torture (Mal M'Brin in 1.14's TSG), they just can't use it, the black magic rots them inside first (citation needed, it was said sometime on IRC).

Relevant IRC discussions:

• https://www.wesnoth.org/irclogs/2020/02/%23wesnoth-dev.2020-02-13.log

Story of the orcs

The orcs start out as a race created by the Lich Lords to be their slaves. Over time, they free themselves from that status and develop their own culture. For a long time, they are still seen by the other races as the savage, murderous hordes of destruction they were once created as. This is reinforced by a long tradition of raiding and feuds.

Arc 1: The Rise of Wesnoth

Campaigns in this arc: TRoW, LoW, SoF, SotA

Central story elements:

• Green isles background
• Lich Lords
• Founding of Wesnoth
• Introduction of the Ruby of Fire and creation of the sceptre

Arc 2: Heir to the Throne

Campaigns in this arc: AA (Angel of Ashes), DM (Demon of Embers, builds on tidbits of Defaldors Memoirs), TSG, Liberty, HttT.

Central story elements:

• fall of king Garard II., rise of queen Asheviere
• story of Defaldor
• Asheviere as the first person to seek different relations to the orcs
• story of Konrad and Lisar

Arc 3: Northern Rebirth

Campaigns in this arc: NR, EI, DW, IoM (Isle of Mists). This arc is (comparatively speaking) more focused on epic plots.

Included in some way or another: THoT, SotBE

Central story elements:

• creation of the Northern Alliance
• (political) emancipation of the orcs
• Mal Ravanal's invasion(s)
• saurians!

Stand-alone campaigns

Only loosely connected to the three arcs will be DiD, UtBS.

Campaigns not yet accounted for: AoI (removed), AToTB (status?), WoV (currently removed).