So firstly, thank you for a great stream @sdee! When i woke up and saw the title of the stream i got all warm and prepared for a “Hyggelig” morning
I made some notes during the stream and wanted to share them:
First the music:
Really awesome all three of the tracks!
The first track just gave me a sense of epicness!
The second one, provided me with a picture of a buck roaming the snowfilled landscape searching the snow with its snout, for grass, steam comming out of its nose, suddenly looking up like it heard something that could be a threat, only to dismiss it and returning to search the snow for food…
The third track gave me the picture of a hearthling in good spirits, work was no longer a choir for survival but a way to enjoy the world. Maybe even taking the time to talk with a squirrel out in the forest and forgetting the urgency of time.
Then there was alot of lore discussion about why the northen alliance would choose to live in a cold climate and not a warm one.
On that subject i will weigh in with my own experience. But first i need to clarify what the winter is (or the cold).
The Northen wind (Windr) is what brings winter and can be seen as the force of death it self. Living side by side with such a strong force, battleling it every year gives strenght, it provides you with a sense of immortality every year that you defeat it and make it through the windr, not because of luck, but because of the effort you put in to spend the whole year preparing for this battle.
The more hardship you have to overcome, the easier small problems will be to handle and might not even be categorized as problems in the end.
But why did anyone choose to live in such a place to begin with? Well what if back in the days, when the pheonix empire got aware of their path would lead them to their demise, they send out a group (that would end up as the northern alliance) to search for a solution or a source for immortality?
Where better to look for such a thing, than by deaths gates it self?
And why are they then still there?
Well they need to continuesly fight death every year, so its focus remains at its own gates and not the rest of the world?
In norse mythology it is said that Ragnarok (end of days) will come after three Fimbul winters in a row. (A fimbul winter is when summer never comes in a season).
Regarding the water and glaciers. There is a saying that first came the Wind giant Kari, then his son Froste and then Frostes son Snje (snow) Snje is a name for snake and when the ice melts the water comes down from the mountains rushing through the land creating huge rivers. Rivers are bending and twisting like a big snake.
Underneath the great tree of life Yggdrassil lives a serpernt called Nidhuggr that chews on the threes roots, so it is of course the water that the tree is drinking.
So maybe some kind of water snake could be a thing that the Northern alliance had some kind of relationship with?
This constant battle with death it self could also be a great reason, why the NA was such fearsome warriors?
Now for names:
Male:
Sten
Ulf
Kari or Kåre
Mads
Female:
Maren
Helene
Ella
Karina
Skadi
Erna
Surnames:
Ravn
Frost (My family name, and i cant really describe how “cool” it would be, if it was in the game)
Any names with Son in the end, as it is so common here that you are named after your parrents.
Same goes for Dottir (daughter)
I really look forward to see this faction evolve and finnally get to play with them!
Thank you