Characters

This page lists the people and kingdoms of the Story campaign of Dawn of Embers. Each entry starts with what the opening missions show. Anything later is hidden in a spoiler box.

The game is in development. Names can change before release. In Skirmish and Multiplayer, kingdoms are given random names; the names below belong to the Story campaign.

Kingdoms

Ashmere

The player's kingdom: a forest kingdom on the old iron roads, of grey stone and timber halls, the colour of ash and ember. At the start of the campaign Ashmere holds only a foothold in a contested valley: one hall and a few villagers. Ashmere declares a Calling at the start of the campaign, the thing it means to be better at than anyone.

Story spoilers: Ashmere, Missions 1 to 10

This box is closed until you open it.

• The foothold grows into a walled village (Missions 1 to 3) and survives Corvane's great assault on the Day of Ruin, saved by a Pillar rather than by its own army (Mission 5).
• After the Day of Ruin, the embers find people in Ashmere, and its first mages join the army (Mission 7).
• The King's army attacks the town (Mission 9). Commander Hale dies of his wounds, and the town and its people pass into the Captain's care.
• Months later a Pillar rises in the centre of the town (Mission 10).

Corvane

Ashmere's enemy in the early campaign: the larger neighbour across the valley, with more soldiers and older walls. Corvane holds to the tried and true, and has made it a creed. Its camp in the valley is older and bigger than Ashmere's foothold.

Story spoilers: Corvane, Missions 1 to 7

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• Corvane tests Ashmere with a single soldier (Mission 2), a border patrol (Mission 3) and finally a full army (Mission 5). Ashmere destroys its camp in Mission 3.
• On the Day of Ruin, Corvane's army is caught by the storm when the Pillar wakes, and breaks. Ashmere's knights take its camp.
• Corvane fights Ashmere again when Ashmere has its first mages (Mission 7), and loses its hall again.

The kingdom and its capital

Story spoilers: the King's realm, Missions 5 to 10

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Ashmere's commander reports to a king who rules from a great capital, ringed with armies, siege engines, walls and towers. The capital is first seen in Mission 8. The game does not name the capital or the King's realm.

People

The Captain

The player. The opening film calls them a recruit; from Mission 1 on, Commander Hale addresses them as Captain. The player picks a male or female Captain, and the Captain's portrait follows that pick. Through every mission written so far the Captain serves under orders: the commander gives them, and the Captain carries them out.

Story spoilers: the Captain, Missions 9 and 10

This box is closed until you open it.

• At Hale's deathbed (Mission 9), the Captain is given the town and its people to look after. Hale is clear that he is handing over the people, not his rank.
• The Captain promises not to let the day be forgotten, and to avenge Hale.
• From then on the Captain speaks in their own voice. In Mission 10 they resolve to learn to harness a Pillar and bring down the King.

Commander Aldric Hale

The commander of Ashmere's army, and the voice of almost every order in the campaign. A veteran, plain-spoken, he distrusts anything he cannot count, and he addresses the player as Captain.

Story spoilers: Hale, Missions 1 to 9

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• Hale finds the Pillar in the valley in Mission 3 and dismisses it. After the Day of Ruin he is the first to say that something other than Ashmere won the battle.
• He does not trust the first mages, and puts them in the line anyway (Mission 7).
• He leads the escort to the capital, his distaste for the rulers plain in his voice but kept cordial (Mission 8).
• In Mission 9 he is mortally wounded in the battle against the King's army. That night, by a campfire, he cheers the Captain up rather than the other way round, gives the Captain the town and its people, asks that the day not be forgotten, and dies.

The scholars

Ashmere's scholars study the stone pillars that have risen across the land. They copy the carvings and argue about them, and no two of them agree. The scholars do not fight.

Story spoilers: the scholars, Missions 3 to 10

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• In Mission 4 the Captain escorts four of them to a Pillar to study it. They come home knowing nothing new.
• After the Day of Ruin (Mission 6), three of them argue whether the stone was a weapon, a wound in the world, or a door. They cannot agree. The game does not say which of them, if any, is right.
• Five of them go to the capital in Mission 8. The King keeps three of them to teach his own scholars; two come home.
• In the current text of Mission 10, a lead scholar studies the Pillar that rises in the town.

The King

Story spoilers: the King, Missions 5 to 10

This box is closed until you open it.

• The ruler Hale reports to. Hale writes to him after the Day of Ruin, without saying what saved the town (Mission 5), and later holds an unopened letter from him (Mission 6). The King then summons Hale and the Captain to the capital to explain what happened on the field (Mission 8).
• At his court the King shows his greed. He covets the Pillars' power, and he keeps three of the scholars to teach his own (Mission 8). He speaks in his own voice, and two guards stand by him in his courtyard.
• His army, in his colours, attacks the town in Mission 9. Hale dies of the wounds he takes in that battle.
• In Mission 10 the town wonders whether the King has taken the stones for himself, and the Captain resolves to bring him down.
• The campaign so far does not decide the King's fate.

Ashmere's first mages

Story spoilers: the mages, Mission 7

This box is closed until you open it.

After the Day of Ruin, the embers found people, and some of them could suddenly do what no one could before. Three Fire Mages stand in the Captain's camp in Mission 7. Hale does not trust them and uses them anyway. They ask for a place to teach others, and the Wizards Training Grounds is built for them. See Magic.

The narrator

The voice of the opening film of Mission 1, who welcomes the recruit to Ardenmoor.

Story spoilers: Mission 9

This box is closed until you open it.

The narrator returns to set the scene at the camp on the night of Hale's death.

See also

• Campaign
• Ardenmoor
• The world
• Units#Story-only units: the scholars, the King and his guards, and the King's soldiers as units