Of Kender...

Kender are the children of the Krynn. They are an adventure-loving, curious, spontaneous race that embodies the youthfulness and lust for life many adventurers share.

Their closest relation on other worlds would be halflings, but even halflings cannot compare to a kender’s curiosity, fearlessness, or knack for finding trouble. Almost every kender encountered is in the thrall of wanderlust, an affliction striking kender hard during their late teen and early adult years. Wanderlust causes kender to pick-up and travel the world far and wide in search of one exciting adventure after another. They roam aimlessly and are not known for following orders, unless they believe they came up with the idea themselves or are interested enough in what might happen if they followed that order.

Every race on Krynn has encountered the kender. A kender’s curiosity and fearlessness take them to places no sane being would think to go. This includes pockets, private homes, and locked chests. However, the majority of kender are appalled at the thought of stealing. Most true
kender do not steal; they handle. Handling is simply the act of picking up an item and examining it out of curiosity. They are often so involved with examining the item that they wander away and forget to return it. To a kender, this makes perfect sense, but to other races, it’s just another
word for stealing.

Physical Appearance

Kender typically stand no more than 3 to 4 feet tall, with the males usually being taller than the females. They weigh between 80 and 100 pounds. Adult kender are well muscled, despite being thin and light of build. Kender are sometimes mistaken for young humans, but closer inspection reveals the pointed ears, face wrinkles, and many pouches indicative of kender. Kender find their face wrinkles, also called crow’s feet or laugh-lines, highly attractive.

Kender hair color ranges from light blond to deep brown to black with a few sporting red-orange hues. Most kender wear their hair long. The most common hairstyle is the topknot. It’s also common among kender nobility to braid their sideburns as a sign of their status.

Kender typically favor bright colors and gaudy apparel that is at the same time rugged and rustic. Most kender add accents to their clothing and weapons by tagging them with ribbons, feathers, beads, or colorful scarves. All kender-made clothing, regardless of what it is, has pockets and lots of them. The staple of all kender outfits, however, is the many pouches. It is rare to see a kender with less than two pouches, though they usually have many more than that.

Psychology

An old kender proverb goes: “If you find an open door, go inside, and if you find a locked door, open it.” Kender are born with the heart of an explorer and an intense curiosity that can not be denied. This leads them to explore every nook and cranny, check behind every door, and snoop in
every pocket. Over time, a kender can learn to understand the need for caution in some situations, such as when their friends may be hurt as a direct result of their actions.

ender are attracted to magic and gadgets like dwarves to ale. Kender are in awe of anything magical; items, spells, and creatures pique a kender’s interest, and they can often be found wandering around places rumored to be magical.

Gnomes are very fond of kender, because they are fond of anyone who shares an interest in their creations; however, a kender will rarely hang around for the full explanation of an invention’s specifications.

Kender do not feel fear, magical or otherwise. In the face of the most intense fear, most kender have stated that they have felt an odd fluttering in their stomach, similar to getting a bad case of indigestion. This is usually enough to let the kender know they are in a perilous situation. They
are unaffected by dragon fear, the fear of the undead, and any fear created through magical means. This does not mean that kender are entirely reckless and without a sense of self-preservation, however. The only thing a kender usually fears is the loss of a close friend.
Kender are fiercely independent. This independence, coupled with their fearlessness and irrepressibility, often gets the kender and his companions into trouble.

“I know you told me not to open the door with the magical writing on it, but it had such an interesting lock, much like the one my Uncle Lefty had the accident with, and it was much closer than that other ordinary looking door. Sorry about the whole banshee thing, but I think it’ll be morning soon and we’ll be able to crawl out any time now.”

The most feared statement any fellow traveler can hear from a kender companion is “Oops!”
Kender have a unique concept of personal property. If they see something not being used, they will pick it up and take it with every intention of giving it back to the owner when they are done using it or looking at it. It’s really not their fault they forget to give it back. Naturally, most others term this as thieving, but kender see it as simple handling and are simply curious about the world around them. This absentminded approach to others’ personal property can make the owner view a kender as a liar when he is caught in the act. In most situations, the kender will automatically have an excuse ready:

• "You left it, so I didn’t think you wanted it anymore."
• "I was just holding it for you."
• "I was gonna give it back, but you wandered off somewhere."
• "It must be magical, because it just appeared in mypouch!"
• "Someone was going to steal it, so I'm holding it for safekeeping."
• "Just because I have it, and you didn't know that I took it, doesn't mean I stole it."

Even more frustrating for the owner, the kender is totally sincere and truly believes what they have just said. Kender do not always realize what they are doing might be wrong.

Social Structure

A minor collection of kender elders presides over most kender communities. In smaller communities, one or two older, more experienced kender are often looked up to and consulted for their wisdom. They are unofficially given the authority to act as arbiters of local disputes. In larger
communities, this usually manifests as a Council of Elders. In addition to the every day problems of the community, the Council of Elders usually makes laws (that are rarely followed) and makes important decisions (like what color every one must wear on the third day of every month).

Ruling over most councils is one individual who has somehow found himself in the esteemed position of ruler. Kender often follow anyone who has a high enough Charisma. Kender tales tell of communities ruled by all manner of beings: a kindly barbarian ogre, a traveling minotaur bard, an insane wizard, a ghost, a sphinx, and even a mysterious wooden totem pole that the kender swore spoke to them when the wind blew. Although some of these may simply be kender tales, they are not far from the truth.


The majority of the kender nation is located primarily in the region of Hylo in Northern Ergoth. Sometimes referred to as Kenderhome, the inhabitants of Hylo are a content group of people. They are well protected on all sides from outside threats, and due to the fact that there is very little there others would want, the citizens of Kenderhome have lived in relative ease for thousands of
years.

Since the majority of the inhabitants are kender, most other races steer well clear of this region of Northern Ergoth. The kender here are typical kender. They are interested in other races, open, friendly, and willing help outsiders. The region is populated with kender tree villages, ancient ruins, and small hamlets. To most people, the homes in these areas look unfinished. The motley collection of domiciles are mismatched and run together. Ladders run straight from some homes up into
tree dwellings and rope bridges connect others. People from other races just shake their heads and wonder how the kender survive and know where they’re going. Kender are also known to reside in small villages and cities on the outskirts of the Desolation in the east.

A Brief History...

Shortly after their creation by the Graygem in 3951 PC, the kender race, looking for a place to call their own, began to follow Balif, an elven general of Silvanesti and honorable rival of Silvanos, the leader of the Silvanesti elves.

During their journey, Balif befriended the kender, and offered them a place in the lands east of Silvanesti that were given to him by Silvanos. Balifor was slated to be the next great elven nation; elven households had been making plans to settle the region and establish a second great elven
city for years. Balif granted the kender the rights to settle in the forests of Balifor.

Balif ’s relationship with the kender made him something of an outcast among his people. The animosity of some elves towards Balif, and those jealous of the protection Silvanos afforded him, came to an end in 2750 PC when Balif was murdered. The Silvanesti blamed the kender and closed their borders. Kagonesti loyal to Balif assisted the kender in preventing the Silvanesti from retaking the lands the elven general had given to them.

For the next thousand years, the kender civilization spread throughout the region of Balifor. Many small villages popped up in the far corners of the forests and even the sparse grasslands on the edge of the desert wastes. Those kender on the borders of the wastelands dealt with goblins and sligs that raided their villages from time to time. Fierce kender fighters were born in these parts, and
eventually, some of these kender took up the nomadiclifestyle of the human tribes that survived off the desert lands.

Around 2600 PC, a clan of kender discovered a floating citadel. The accounts of its discovery are still unclear, as records pertaining to the creation of the first flying citadels are a closely guarded secret. Some stories say it was found abandoned; others claim the kender were slaves or servants
to a group of wizards who were constructing it. However it occurred, these kender boarded the citadel and caused it to take off. It flew across the continent and crashed in the foothills of the Sentinel Mountains of Ergoth. The surviving kender settled this lush forestland and named it Hylo, because the citadel that brought them there was first high and then low. They lived among the forest for almost two hundred years without the intrusion of other races.

They spread out around a giant bay they named the Bay of Monsters. It was called this because they wished it were full of monsters, not because it was. Over the years, many rulers looked to the lush forests of Hylo, intent on conquest, but none prevailed. In 2200 PC, Emperor Ackal VII annexed Hylo, renaming it Kenderhome. This meant they were now subject to taxes and forced conscription, but the kender never minded sharing and were happy to visit new places with the armies of Ergoth. However, by 1886 PC, the kender of Hylo had enough of Ergoth. The tax collections had steadily increased, and the honor of traveling with the army had
lost its novelty as kender were usually given thankless jobs. A group of kender complained to the imperial governor, and he had them killed, their bodies hung from his palace walls. This act caused all of Hylo to rise up and wage a fierce guerrilla war against the Ergothian occupation force. The battle lasted until 1810, when the emperor at the time decided Kenderhome was not worth the trouble it cost to occupy and withdrew his troops.

In 1801 PC, Hylo officially declared their independence from Ergoth after hearing of Vinas Solamnus’s rebellion. The Statement of Rebellion confused Ergoth, as it had considered Hylo
independent for almost ten years. In the following years, to better control international
trade, Istar aggressively imposed and enforced trade and fair-price standards on neighboring nations, including the kender of Balifor. Kender, enjoying the barter and haggling system, refused to obey the strict trade tariffs.

Years of Istaran military action, failed lawsuits, and kender manipulation of supplies resulted in Istar’s near economic crash. In 727 PC, with a special tariff exception known as the Kender Tax, kender ceased their market manipulations, resulting in the Kendermeld.

In the centuries leading up to the Cataclysm, missionaries from Istar repeatedly visited Balifor and
Hylo in an attempt to convert the heathen kender and teach them the ways of the true gods. Unfortunately, these new methods were very tedious and required complex rules and meditation, something with which the kender quickly grew bored. They also failed to understand the
concept of tithing and were reprimanded when trinkets and baubles started replacing coins in the collections for Istar. Eventually, in both kender nations, all Istaran clerics were driven out. In turn, the Kingpriest of Istar eventually established in the Proclamation of Manifest Virtue, that all kender were inherently evil. Bounty hunters captured kender for a fee and some even took their tongues to keep them from talking.

The Cataclysm was particularly devastating to the kender of Balifor. More than half of the region was
submerged. The flooding was instant, and thousands of kender were lost to the violent waters. Some of the surviving kender of Balifor and Kenderhome were scarred emotionally. They couldn’t understand why the gods had punished them along with Istar. Many of these kender seemed very subdued, scared, and meek. They became paranoid and were prone to fits of violence. However,
within three generations, most of these kender’s offspring had returned to being their normal, happy-go-lucky selves.