Okay I have only 5 days in which I am already busy to come up with a backstory for this AP. I am going for a Catfolk Bloodrager, for the following concept. It is so far only a rough outline, and I could really use your wise GM brains to help me flesh it out into something that really ties into the world.
I chose Catfolk because of the imagery of Cats being worshipped in Egypt. I am going to be a Black Jaguar with golden armour and jewellery, and wear a red head scarf to protect myself from the dust, and the sun.
As for backstory I was thinking of some sort of tribe that believes that they are descendants from the ancient pharoahs (Campaign Trait: Blood of the Pharoahs), or served as the honour guard to them.
Then my character was born, and it is believed that their magical blood heralds the dawn of the rightful heir to the land.
My question is, is this doable? Where in the land is a good place to say the tribe resides?
What other ideas do you have?
Please just spitball ideas at me, anything helps right now
There isn't a lot of setting lore to help you out, but there is this one thing.
https://www.aonprd.com/TraitDisplay.aspx?ItemName=Adherent%20of%20Ancient%2 0Osirion
This suggests that there were catfolk who were devoted to Bastet in the ancient past. A small tribe of them living somewhere in Osirion would make sense. I would recommend a nomadic tribe, which allows your GM to use them or not use them as much as they want. There would be opportunities for your GM to tie your tribe into the setting later as you roam around Osirion, or ignore it if they want.
For my game, using a bit of 2e lore to supplement things, Osirion's catfolk are one of the many peoples who roam the Osiriani Desert, along with the Vourinoi (desert elves), the Yerbira (garundi nomads), and the Sandkin orcs and half orcs. To the south, where the desert meets the Crook river and becomes the Brazen Frontier, they neighbour the gnolls (some of whom aren't as interested in slaving as their more violent kin) and, closer to the mountains, Jaric halflings.
They're nomadic, and prefer to stick to the desert, but are far more open to trade than their neighbours, more friendly and interested in gossip and catching up on the news from the Big Cities, and are considered good luck by most Osiriani of all races, parly because they like to tag along with caravans for free just out of interest (and serve as a bit of temporary protection), and partly because they're so rare and when they do turn up, it's usually because they're on the trail of some dark creature and are about to put it down. The only people who really distrust them are the Ysoki, for undestandable instinctual reasons. Aside from adventurers who learn to deal with it, most of them rarely venture into the cities themselves, chaffing under enforced law, but will sometimes trade pelts, desert herbs, camels, and information. Life the Maftets, who they get along quite well with, they see themselves as the only ones willing to keep some of the old traditions alive, but prefer shrines and temples of the cat gods Bastet and Sekhmet which they conflate as two aspects of the same goddess, and keep the memory of more obscure cat gods like Pakhet, Mafdet, Menhit, Maahes, and so on as clan names.
They're a little more aloof from their southern kin, seeing themselves as related but separate from their kin in Amurran (and prefer to call themselves M'aiyu, the Lion People), and have some different traditions, but still keep to the catfolk ethos of thinking of themselves as created to prowl the dark places to protect the light. In this case, the Osiriani catfolk believe they were created by Sekhmet/Bastet to continue her work, to rage across the land as a punishing scourge when needed, or to be a stalker, an infiltrator, a trickster and provoker when more subtle arts are needed. They tend to produce a lot of barbarians and rogues, but also sorcerers, eschewing divine magic for an innate arcana they believe is a gift of Bastet.
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Remember - cats aren't exactly desert creatures. They are not likely to be in the abandoned utter emptiness of Osiron's deserts. They are urban creatures.
Associating your catfolk character with a temple in Wati, or with a particular pharoah would be excellent. Either option could work... your lineage has been associated with a temple of some Osiriani god... maybe like Bastet (I think using the old Orsiriani gods would be cooler than the core 20, but it's up to you) forever and ever (or not...) OR your people were brought to Wati by Pharaoh Make-One-Up and you've been there ever since.
Alternatively, they could be from another part of Osirion and are participating in the necropolis hunt for a generic reason.
A catfolk makes complete sense for the campaign, best of luck!
There's a podcast called 'Find the Path' which is running Mummy's Mask. One of the PCs is a catfolk monk who works as a temple guard for the Temple of Pharasma (I think) in Wati.
Minor point of distinction but real world cats can thrive in most terrestrial environments and were likely first domesticated in the Near and Middle East. There were and are wild cats that live in and around Egypt. Domestic cats may not be exactly desert creatures (aside from the sand cat) but neither are they particularly shy about them.
Whether these same traits extend to humanoid amurrans is another matter, but either way a catfolk certainly makes sense for this part of the world. Even more so given the aforementioned Egyptian cat veneration themes.