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Q: What are the closest known nearby settlements?
A: Well, there are canonical and non-canonical answers to this. The non-canonical answers are towns that are currently being conceived to flesh out more of the wilderness
Non-canonically, for the purposes of our game. You can find more information on them here, you can find out more about nearby settlements on our wiki.
Canonically, you have the ruined city of Dale close to the Lonely Mountain, destroyed long ago by Smaug. You also have the land of Dorwinion down the river to the southeast by the Sea of Rhun, which frequently traded its famous wine with Laketown and the elves; interesting to note in relation to Dorwinion is a long-termdebate between Tolkien experts about whether or not Dorwinion was a realm of Men, or of Elves. Additionally, you have the dwarves of the Iron Hills, which were a very noble line of dwarves known to trade with the Lakemen. Laketown existed very near to The Woodland Realm of Sindarin Elves; these elves were their strongest allies at this time. It's also possible that Laketown traded withwith Easterlings in time of peace, though it's just as likely that Laketown (and especially non-canonical outposts outside of Laketown) had to be wary of Easterling raids. Often over-looked, the history and influence of the Easterlings should definitely be considered.
Because the Lakemen were in close contact to so many different cultures (and likely saw refugees from some of those cultures), and there is no canonical evidence of them not trusting the nearby dwarves and elves (prior to the events that take place in 'The Hobbit'), it seems unlikely that the Men of the Dale were xenophobic.
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When Was the Kingdom of Dale Founded? Who Were its People?
A: Much like Angost in SOI2, it seems likely that Laketown is a melting pot of different sub-races of Man. The Dalish survivors, the Rohirrim, Hill-Men, Easterlings, and even the Rangers of the North. All of these sub-races could feasibly have moved and lived in Laketown as refugees, and would have had hundreds of years to cross-replicate and muddy their gene-pool. This questions seems like it would have a simple answer, but Tolkien doesn't make it very easy for us to discern. While a unique and barbaric line of Northmen lived in the area for quite some time, the best research suggets that the actual city of Dale was founded between the years 2590 and 2600 in the Third Age. The Northmen who settled this area hailed from the far north, beyond the Grey Mountains. In the Second Age, Sauron had destroyed their culture prior to the War of the Elves and Sauron. In the Third Age, these nomadic people, unrelated directly to the Woodmen of Greenwood Forest (not yet called Mirkwood) or the Rhovanion peoples, began to settle south along the northern and eastern edges of the Greenwood Forest. They would suffer through several wars against the Easterling Wainriders and Balchoth, but would ultimately survive to eventually found the Kingdom of Dale.
But by the time that Dale was founded, their blood heritage would not likely have remained very pure at all. After all, they had lived in the Grey Mountains, in close proximity other tribes of Hill-Men, and come south near to the northron Woodmen of Greenwood Forest. They had found themselves in constant contact with several tribes of Easterlings (sometimes, in war), and would have cross-bred with the above races for thousands of years. Kingdom-less and locked into an isolated location geographically, they would also have been likely to have had refugees of the Rohirrim and even the Rangers of the North enter into their gene-pool over the course of the Second and Third Ages. Each of these early Dalish tribes settling along the Forest and Rivers' edges would have its own unique genetic code, and by the time they were unified as the Kingdom of Dale, their heritage would have been a veritable melting pot of other sub-species of Man.
There is narrative in The Hobbit that suggests that even the Laketown that exists during that story is built upon the ruins of another town on the Lake. We do not know anything about that more specifically, though it does suggest that the area has been inhabited for quite a long time. Tolkien has given us clues, but few direct answers.
It seems likely that, based on geography and what we can infer about the Lakemen's culture, they would not care as much about their lineage as other regions of Men were wont to. They would simply be the Dalish (Men of the Dale) to the educated, or Lakemen to the masses. The Easterlings would seem starkly different to them, and it's likely that the Lakemen would think of them as nomadic savages with a very strange culture. These Lakemen had evolved culturally from their savage background, whereas the Easterling tribes had not.
Q: What Do We Know About the Lakemen?
A: Not a ton, but we can extrapolate. Positioned between more settled areas, with Mirkwood Forest on one side, and vast swathes of wilderness and mountains on the other sides, we don't know how the city-state of Dale came to be in much detail; most likely, it started as a melting pot for refugees of different races tribes of men, including the Rohirrim, Dunedain and Easterlings. local Northmen, Hill-men of the Grey Mountains and refugee Easterlings, unified by a Girion, a Northern Lord.
We do know that Laketown is the Laketown of 'The Hobbit' was unique in that its people spoke a specific, archaic form of the Common Tongue related to Atliduk (the ancestral language of the Rohirrim). It was also unique in that it was a Democracy, with no monarch; the town thrived on trade with its neighbors and was steeped in local politics. Their method of trade was interesting and strange; they floated barrels of goods down the river as the hub between the elvish kingdom and the realm of Dorwinion. Surrounded by water and mountains, Laketown was extremely defensible; however, they could do little to manage the threat of Smaug. It was not uncommon for Smaug to attack Laketown, burn down a house or two, and carry off a maiden; this was a threat that all Lakemen would have been very aware of.
Most importantly, I think that Laketown's being a form of simple Democracy is key. To me, this suggests that the town was likely founded by refugees who had come to be opposed to monarchy. This, in turnsturn, suggests to me that the Lakemen were likely fiercely independently-minded, culturally.
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A: Wargs are known to actually be quite intelligent, and even sentient. You can read some basic canonical information about them, though Wolfsong and Krelm have written in-depth non-canonical documentation to further describe their society for the purposes of our game. In short, the Wargs of this region are independent allies of the orcs and the Necromancer, and they are a feared threat to the Dalish settlers.
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