More work on the Wild North

Working through the last of the terrain entries for the Wild North. It is a bit of a challenge to try to summarize dozens of square miles in a few sentences and make it a useful inspiration for a campaign.

One reason I added terrain entries is that during the Necromancer Games Wilderlands project I saw how useful they were to summarize an area of the map that would otherwise be a series of separate hex entries.

So after this I will have to go through the text and correct any obvious editing mistakes as well as consistency. Finally I will pick out a few locales and draw small local maps in the same way I did Castle Blackmarsh in Blackmarsh.

Finally I will able to get this edited and into the layout process. Below are some of the latest samples from the text.

The Frostgrims (Hex 0428)
Snowcapped spires reach into sky fencing ice filled valleys. Amid the shadows, Remorhaz (HD 6 to 13) tunnel beneath the ice and snow. Frost Giants (HD 10+3) dwell in castles built on the stony crags. They consider Remorhaz to be a great delicacy and hunt them alongside packs of Winter Wolves (HD 5).

Throughout the mountains are the ruined towers of Thules, Outposts established to harvest crystalline shards of viz that freeze out of the air in the early morning before dawn on the highest peaks (Hexes 0226, 0228, 0328, 0329). The Thules had to act quickly as they would melt an hour after the sun rises.

Searching for Viz
Typically 1d6 viz will appear 1d3 hours before dawn. Each viz takes 1 hour per person with arcane knowledge to find. A serious danger is the thin air, without magic characters have to make a saving throw every hour or pass out. It typically takes two hours of climbing to reach the peaks. The Thules used magic carpets or the fly spells to cut down on the travel time as well as using a lost variant of Control Winds to thicken the air in order to breath properly while searching.

The Great Glacier (Hex 0320)
Once covering nearly all of the Wild North, the Great Glacier is still slowly retreating to the northwest. It southeast face is riddled with crevasses and subglacial caves where icy cold streams emerge. Calving ice sheets are also a danger as in some areas the glacier’s edge forms a cliff 10 to 20 feet high. Travel on the glacier’s surface is also hazardous due to the numerous crevasses and moulins. A moulin is a sinkhole up to 10 feet in diameter that in a few cases reaches down to the bottom of the glacier.

Aside from the dangers of the terrain, the glacier surface is relatively free of animal life or monsters. A few small Remorhaz (HD 6 to 8) lair in the southern third. The white dragon, Rekokardek, is known to lair somewhere in northern third of the glacier (Hex 0215). The glacier’s flat surface makes surprising her almost impossible.

More common are the ruins of the Thules and the occasional Frost Giant castle (Hex 0421) found amid the nunataks jutting above the glacier surface. The ancient Thules used their towers on the glacier as a bastion from which to rule their fallen empire. They experimented with magic involving water and ice, some of which still remains undiscovered beneath the gravel and snow.

Been working on the Wild North

Been working on the updated Wild North. A small snippet of something I just wrote. The map is the same style as Blackmarsh and has been revised to adjoin it to the north.

Niveny River (Hex 1516)
This river is the traditional border between Orenberg (Hex 1313) and Suzdal (Hex 1720). The river valley has long been a debatable land between the two cities and is currently dominated by Orenburg. Regardless of which power is dominate a thousand gold pieces are given as an offering to the Vodyan (10 HD, Triton) every year. The offering is given after the first thaw to the river king is to appease him so river travelers are left unmolested during the summer season.

Wild North Progress

While priority has been getting the Wilderlands maps done, I have other projects going on. Namely my next Bat in the Attic product a revamp of the Wild North. The idea is to update the Wild North to the standards of Blackmarsh and my other hexcrawl settings. And to rework the southern edge of the map to work with Blackmarsh.

I did a preliminary version of the southern edge in the combined Blackmarsh map I made.

Then during my vacation I used my laptop to edit the original Wild North map. The laptop isn't up to the task of editing the massive Wilderlands maps so I brought the Wild North files. I was able to get the map reworked to where it match Blackmarsh both in geography and presentation. Still needs some work but it is basically done.

Now I can start working on the text.

Blackmarsh, Southland, and Wild North combined!

It took me a while but I finished up the combined map of Southland (from Points of Light), Blackmarsh, and Wild North (from Fight On #3). While the Wild North was originally designed to dovetail with Map 5 (Valon) of the Wilderlands of High Fantasy, the southern edge will be redesigned for version 2 and overlap with Blackmarsh instead.

The map shows the relationship between all three maps plus added territory. I know there no hex numbers but I decided to leave the Blackmarsh and Southland numbers untouched. The rest is left blank. If you decided to detail it yourself just give each entry a code on a copy of the map and in your notes.

Eventually I will expand the sides out to Blackmarsh letter sized maps and those maps will have proper hex numbers.

Like Blackmarsh this map is open content and dual licensed under the Open Game License and Creative Commons (Sharelike, Attribution).

Click you will see the full size map.

Some brief notes.
Province of Vasa
The province of Vasa was recently conquered by the Grand Kingdom about 50 or so years ago. It is the strip of land between the Westwall and the Grey Sea. It is the home of a Viking culture now under the heels of late medieval western european style kingdom.

The Ring Islands
Perhaps the Mountain that Fell left debris scattered around the Grey Sea. Perhaps it something else. Maybe you need to ask the denizens of the Ring Tower about it.

The Great Glacier
Once it covered the Wild North but now is in retreat. Or perhaps the malign power that sleep underneath has awaken and is beginning to stretch it's cold claws across the world once again.

The West
Blackmarsh lies on the extreme northwest edge of civilization. What lies beyond the Pendar and White Mountains? Is there an end to the orc infested Blood Forest?

Have Fun!