The Canopy

CLASSES

There are overlap between all classes and it’s quite possible that many apply to your Canopian. Please just select whichever is closest or feels the most correct.

 

FARMER

Any Canopian involved in any kind of agricultural work, whether it’s growing plants, tending insect farms, raising silksquirrels, breeding songbirds of Statta, or any other pursuit involving the production of food or raw materials. 

 

TRADER

Any Canopian involved in selling or trading goods at market. This can include middlemen for farmers to transport items to the Great Tree (where the biggest markets are found), bankers, and other generic merchant or merchant-adjacent roles.

 

CRAFTSMAN

Any Canopian involved in the manufacture of goods--weaving, woodcarving, dyers, and homebuilders all fall under this category. Please remember that clay is scarce (although you can definitely have a potter, they are likely to mostly work in wood and only sometimes in clay), fire is tightly regulated, and stone is very nearly non-existent outside of high nobility jewelry. This category also may include artists who do not fall under the entertainer or Ritualist umbrella.

 

HUNTER

Hunters are increasingly scarce in Canopian society as agriculture displaces gathering, but they are still valuable members of the community. They primarily hunt birds and the wild ancestors of Statta and silksquirrels, and some may also be entrusted with guarding their community from the encroaching of large birds of prey and act more as bodyguards.

 

ENTERTAINER

Canopians prize art and entertainment--jugglers, singers, dancers, storytellers, street wrestlers, and more fall under this branch. Most scrape by on the charity of their community but some are gifted with the patronage of nobility, especially those whose arts are elegant, beautiful, or exceptional in some way.

 

NOMAD

Wandering and jobless, nomads do what they must to get by. Some view them as vagrants and a nuisance; others as a pity; others still as a romantic aspirational goal. Some are criminals, some are scavengers, and some are outcasts. 

 

NOBILITY

The wealthy upper classes of the Canopy, most hail from old families who long since carved out a niche in societies and often literally in the trees themselves. Sprawling family trees are common, and most live off of ancestral wealth or a strange system of branch rental wherein tenants and farmers provide a portion of their production to the noble who ostensibly “owns” their branches. Others are simply extraordinarily wealthy merchants, powerful Ritualists, or especially beloved entertainers. There are two types--Low Nobility are still upper class, but it’s the High Nobility who are truly the creme de la creme of Canopian high society, with many of them being celebrities in their own right or household names. They are often the trendsetters of Canopian society, and are harassed by gossip and scrutiny in exchange for their indolent lives of luxury.

 

RITUALIST

All religious figures fall under this branch. There is no God in Canopian society, but the trees themselves are worshipped as a sort of all-providing entity, and Ritualists, in addition to being charged with the care of the dead and ushering souls to their next cycle of life, are responsible for interpreting signs and portents brought by the Forest and for blessing dangerous expeditions. Not everyone believes in their power and they are less universally fashionable than before, but they are generally respected and admired and are expected to exercise their influence and power to help disadvantaged Canopians, tend to the ill, and even to act as scholars and historians. Some are in the process of developing a system of written language, and others are pursuing knowledge of the stars. Scientists of all kinds who are not agriculturally inclined are also considered Ritualists. 

 

DESCENDER

The rarest of all Canopians, Descenders are the only Canopians who are trained in the difficult and often deadly art of reaching the forest floor, which most Canopians have not even glimpsed from between the branches. Their training takes years, and their first few expeditions are only a few yards away from the trunk of their tree. Being on the unmoving ground often makes Descenders ill at first--Groundsickness, it is called--as they are used to being tossed by the wind at nearly all times or swinging from branch to branch, and some would-be Descenders never make it past the Groundsickness. Those that do have the important tasks of expanding Canopians’ knowledge of the world below--often commissioned in their trips by wealth Nobility or Ritualists--and of bringing back the incredibly prized trophies of clay and stone. Some also bring back stories of horrible monsters--stories we might identify as describing deer, bear, foxes, and other terrestrial forest creatures. Descenders tend to die young, but they are extremely revered in society and treated as living heroes--albeit also sometimes with superstitious fear.

 

JUVENILE

If your Canopian is not yet an adult, they can skip a class entirely. They can also be an apprentice to another class, if you desire, but apprentices to nobility, Descenders, and Ritualists must purchase the appropriate classes.

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