Alright, I'm just gonna dump info!

Orcs:

Orc civilization was once the widest, greatest, strongest nation on the planet, at one point holding all of the Eastern Lands. They were known for their great feats with Psionic ability, thier craftsmanship, and their literature, great poems of heroic bravery, and other such things. Thier cities were well-run, evenly taxed and employed. They even managed to create plumbing and a crude version of running water. They were run by individual govenors, and these were each in turn ruled by a great king. Every fifty years, this king was retired, and his son or daughter would take his place. Such issues as occur in such arrangements were decided by battle in a nuetral area.
But after four hundred prosperous years the whole civilization fell, and the intellect and grace of Orks fell with it. They lost thier great psionic ability, reducing it to what is left in the minds of the leaders, and they are scattered in an area only one twelth the size of their old kingdom.
Most of the ruins and dungeons adventurers sneak through are of orcish design.

>>312789
Kobolds:
Kobold society, trade skill, and general life has a sort of patina of rushed incompetence about it. Their houses are barely hammered together wooden huts, their crops fail half the time, and they generally make a living by trading what they can make for what they cannot. They are innocent to the thought of large scale war, ignorant of tactics and other such concepts.
There's only really one thing Kobolds excel at naturally, and that, is trapmaking. Many kobolds never discover this talent, since most no longer are able to live in the caves that thier ancestors did, due to Dwarven expansion. But it's still a well-known fact that if you give a kobolkd a hammer, nails, wood, and a thin tunnel, they can make one person's life a horrible, horrible nightmare for all of ten seconds.

Kobold history is a badly kept and disjointed affair. It's agreed that they are somehow related distantly to dragons. Dragon lore mentions them once as the 'little folk who watch', alluding perhaps to their ancient duty of making traps for areas too small for Dragons to enter. Or they were warriors, watching over the dragon as he slept.

Either way, a kobold who discovers the secrets of his or her lineage and works to unlock thier potential would be a scary thing indeed, had they the initiative to do so.

>>312813
Gnolls:
Gnolls are a strange mix of humanoid and canine features, leaning towards humanoid. Well-known for their deceptive manner and preference for ambush tactics, one thing no man ever wants is to sleep alone in a place where a clan of Gnolls lives nearby. Most Gnolls trade lossely with all races, exporting rather well-made swords and armor and importing dried meat and livestock. For some strange reason, as easily as Gnolls destroy, they create. Thier huts and homes are generally well-made, their blacksmiths fall distantly second to Dwarves, and their ability to compose music is only bested by elves. The only reason they retain the tribal system of life is to root out their weak and so they may spread their people as loosely as possible, allowing for insane military campaigns that end within the first ten minutes due to surrounding the foe's camp almost the instant war is declared. They birth in litters of an average of five or six, and children are raised in a commune of the elderly.
Recently, some Gnolls have been leaving their clans early to set out to the large cities and cultivate their crafting skills with races that are better at them.