A beautiful, peaceful bay with good fishing and easy sailing. Once a year, though, it rains poisonous snakes; there is no clear cycle to this, but the other days of the year, it's just fine! The snakes always blow in from Throne Point. Oddly, during the reign of the Goblin King, this stopped. There are a fair number of ships at the bottom of the bay from sea battles with pirates or the undead, though the Imperial Navy generally keeps things safe here. But with Drakkenhall a haven for pirates, they can only do so much.
Deep blue water and smooth sailing. The Imperial Navy patrols this area most of all and traffic between Glitterhaegen and Axis is intense. There is a lot of smuggling, but not much piracy here. And only the Prince of Shadows' presence enables any smuggling. At times, the dead invade, but the navy usually soon spots them and drives them out.
These volcanoes began as hellholes, but something strange happened and they turned into volcanoes. At times, demons emerge, and at times, lava flows out which is full of demon bones. The Crusader has cut a deal with the Three to watch over these volcanoes; it is thought he has special forges here. The Black gets periodic shipments of basalt from here; it's not clear to anyone else what he does with them.
The Bitterwood has been part of the Elf Queen's realm since the beginning of the First Age. However, it was closed to visitors except under special circumstances; the usual speculation is that it was where she conducted various experiments. A mixture of Elves and various kinds of Fae lived here. For eleven ages, it was known as the Shadowwood, because what was in it was hidden. During the ending years of the 11th age, however, some of the poisons which wiped out the Goblin Empire crossed the river into the forest. Outsiders aren't sure what happened but the forest has become a darker place and at time, angry fae explode out of the forest and have to be suppressed. The Shadowwood has become the Bitterwood.
The Cairnwood, the Hellmarsh, and the Stalking Trees were once all one big forest around Lake Hope. But the rise of the Diabolist cut the forest in half. The Cairnwood had been the center of a Serpent Folk state long before the coming of the Diabolist. There are many hidden burial grounds of the Serpent Folk; some contain great treasures, others were plundered over the ages. Some barbarians come here to bury their dead; forest spirits guard all graves from being violated.
Lake Calamity gets its name from Calamity Falls, which plunges from high lands to lowlands; it is 25 miles wide on its eastern side and five miles wide in its western branch. The falls plunge some eight hundred feet and many idiots have tried to cross it. Whether it's the giant falls or some ancient magic or evil fish people, crossing Lake Calamity is risky at best and often disastrous, especially if there is a storm.
This is an ancient swamp which is thought to have many kinds of hideous abominations, ever since it got poisoned during the 11th Age. It is most noted for its copious chuul population, a kind of murder lobster with paralytic mouth tentacles.
At first glance, Creel appears to be home to shepherds and fishermen, but the island has a long and complicated history; the ruins of three different naval bases from earlier ages, various ruined temples, a Sixth Age wizard tower, and a huge stone the shape of a potato, inside a huge block of crystal, can all be found here. The stone potato is allegedly the prison of a demonlord, according to its Second Age inscription but it radiates no magic and in eight different ages, the Diabolist made a big announcement this was a lie. But there's a ward on it, just to be sure. A very old noble family from the third age rule this island as 'Sub-Governors' and have for many ages. They preserve various third age customs, including clothing and food. The island was ruled by a Demidemon obsessed with the stone potato; he never cracked its secrets... if it has any... and was finally slain late in the Tenth Age by agents of the Crusader, who also fervently say the stone potato is not a Demon Lord's prison at all. At all. Real potatoes grow very well here, though some people find them annoyingly salty. In fact, all food here has a salty tang to it and the natives rely on pepper, mustard, and thyme instead.
Basically governed by the paladins of the Great Gold Wyrm, it is littered with ruins, especially from the age of the Demidemons. Many of them made their last stand here. Some of the land is fertile, but settlement is sparse once you go more than five miles from the coast, which is dotted with lighthouses and fishing villages. The western coast is more settled because the fish and lobster yields of the area shielded by the Spray is high.
Beneath the ruined town of Kessig, there's a huge catacomb, filled with demented horrors left behind by a demon cult. No one knows what happened to the cult, they were not destroyed by the Witch Hunters or a mob. They just vanished, leaving a twisted demon-tainted maze. Dragonwood:** Until the rise of Drakkenhall, this was the center of the Three's power. The Red and Black still maintain lairs here, but the main foci of all three are elsewhere. The forest remains overrun with chromatic dragons, especially chromatic dragons. The southeastern Dragonwood belongs to the Green and has cities of Dragonics, mostly Chromatic, living there. The Green mostly lives with the Elf Queen but comes every year for at least a month.
A land of barbarians allied to the High Druid. This land has been loosely united for many ages, ruled by a king chosen by the clan chiefs. Much of Eld is a marsh where the people build steads on small islands and use Koru Behemoth leavings to create artificial islands of swamp muck which are very fertile. They also fish and hunt and squabble with each other. At times, they have united strongly and invaded the Empire. The High Druid allows them to collect wood in the Wild Wood and they now live at a little higher living standards. They are noted for their love of crayfish, their stews, and for being a lot less interested in berserking than many Barbarians. They have tame giant frogs they claim came from the Underdark in the Fourth Age. There are rumored to be actual Frog People and an ancient temple in their marshes but if so, no proof of it exists. The Wind Novel 'I Can't Believe My Mother is a Frog-Woman' does not constitute proof!
A decent place to fish, and the winds are never too strong; storms are few. If all goes well, a ship from Glitterhaegen can run through the middle of the Sound, avoiding the Fangs and Omen, then get a good push east towards Concord or Drakkenhall. But there's a variety of risks: the floating dead, getting caught in a sargasso, sahuagin, giant sharks, accidentally being eaten by a giant whale, or stumbling into a patch of the poisons which brought down the Goblin Empire and then blew out to sea. Ninety percent of ships, nothing goes wrong. But adventurers are rarely in the 90%.
This region turned swampy after the blessing of the Midland Sea drove many monsters into it; they are said to be ruled by a river serpent known as 'The Devil of the Fangs'. It has been killed at least twenty times; no one knows how it keeps coming back or if it is a literal devil or a figurative one. The sahuagin took refuge on the coast and ruled it; they had to submit to the Goblin King in the 11th age to their intense frustration. The wards on the Midland Sea mostly keep them on the coast. Mostly.
Built with the aid of Serpent Folk Artifacts from Throne Point, this ruins stands on high ground near the mouth of the fourth of the five fangs (going west to east). Adventurers still sometimes find useful artifacts there, and every so often, some overambitious Goblin warlord proclaims himself the New Goblin King and squats there, then gets killed by adventurers for his loot. The Sahuagin avoid the city for reasons not shared with food (non-Sahuagin). From above, it looks like a badly done copy of Axis; there is a huge arena which is still largely intact and often a lair for a black dragon; indeed, a huge Black Dragon named Ancalgoraz is known to currently lurk there. A dozen adventuring parties have died at his hands. The ghost of the Goblin King is sometimes seen here. Or at least, a ghost CLAIMING that tile. There is definitely a monument to the Goblin King, in which his remains are buried, built by the last Dwarf King of the 11th Age, to honor the Goblin King's effort to slay the Duergar King. It is still in pristine shape, defying the climate.
Plants grow on this island whose spores induce euphoria. So much that you wander around happy until you starve to death; the island has been purged ten times and the plants just grow back. Records indicate it did not exist until the Fourth Age. Sailors go around it; it's known that the Prince of Shadows harvests some of the flowers and sells a nectar from them, which is rather addictive and does the same thing but with a time limit, as going to the island. It's assumed this is why the Empire hasn't destroyed the flowers yet... well, they did try a lot but finally gave up. The flowers cannot be cultivated elsewhere, thankfully, and no one knows why.
A lake port on the lake Torin's Glory, which acts as the eastern terminus of the caravan trade with Shali (Manzabwe) which has been going on since the Ninth age. It also catches a lot of fish and grows grain and vegetables. A Legion is stationed here to guard against the Hellmarsh, along with a small Naval Force whose main job is to scout the edge of the Hellmarsh and protect lake traffic.
Fullcatch Bay is a really great fishery. The rising power of the High Druid has made it even better. But you have to be careful not to take too many or something will accidentally destroy your boat and you will be accidentally consumed by sharks. The bay is also prone to sudden storms in the 13th Age; some fear the wards here are decaying.
Once this was two separate rivers which were fused together into one as part of purifying the forest ages ago. The water glows a soft gold during the day and silver at night. It is big enough for ocean going vessels south of Old Town.
This river has flowed out of Eld since before the First Emperor. It is broad and sluggish and easy to sail on; the river is fat with fish and frogs, especially in the spring. Along the last fifty miles, there are many fisheries and shove is a very popular dish. About once every hundred years, murder frogs come down the river and wreck havoc, then they have The Frogfest and eat them.
There are many places which would make good harbors here and once did, but they were sacked and destroyed in the Elven Civil War at the end of the Fourth Age. The survivors are the Grey Towers. There are also a lot of underwater ruins here that used to not be underwater. This is a more gentle area than the deep ocean, but more dangerous than it looks. Out in the bay, there is a monastery of the Order of Saint Sophia, created long ago and connected to the Empire by magical paths. A quiet place full of knowledge.
Only four remain, home to lost High Elven treasures, including records of astronomy from early ages. All are riddled with monsters and have strange curses / security measures / cursed security measures. The most famous is the Ghost Tower of Inverness.
One of the Grey Towers now vanishes during the day and reappears at night, translucent and shimmering. If you can defeat the front door locks, what lies inside is a series of floors that try to replicate the entire cosmos in miniature. Many have raided parts of it but no one has survived trying to clear it all out. It is rumored to go to another plane... maybe all of them... while it is gone from the land of the living.
This huge chunk of crystal crashed instead of making it to Starport. The Green carved it into a palace and city of green crystal. Any Green Dragon or Dragonic gains +2 to everything inside the city. The Green is gone most of the time, but some 20,000 Dragonics and slaves live here, making crafts from star fragments.
This falls sounds like many hammers striking metal; it got the name from Dwarves long ago. The ruins of Ironspire can be found near Hammer Falls, which the gnomes tapped for power in the Tenth Age. The Stone Thief ruined Ironspire but there are still old gnomish treasures to be found here, if you can survive the monsters lurking here.
At the western fringe of the Red Waste lies Hantu Cor, once a great city in a distant age. When the Red Waste was a savannah instead of a wasteland, it was home to animals brought from other lands, who roamed the savannah, providing rare materials like ivory, slatack, and coru (used to make corursteel). Hantu Cor had once been noted for its pillar saints, holy men who had retreated to dry lands to build pillars, sit on them, and meditate. But this attracted pilgrims, and shrines, and inns to hold visitors and... Over time, a city grew up around some of the pillars, and the pillar saints abandoned their posts. The city turned to a new sport to save itself -- pillar gladiators. Men who had to jump pillar to pillar to fight each other and monsters. This proved popular, and the city grew; it was at this time that hunting animals on the savannah to get rare materials became a major business. What damned the city, however, was the opening of the Abyss; the Lost River now flows into the Abyss, not the sea, making travel harder and unleashing demonic energies. The city fell into demon worship and when the Red Dragon torched the Red Waste, the city was abandoned. But its ruins remain, home now to orcs and other monsters and to those who seek the treasures it built up over the years.
Some historians believe Kroma was a response by Dragonics to the rise of Drakkenhall. A group made up of members of each of the five kinds of Dragonics who resemble Chromatic Dragons set up a city-state on the back of a Koru behemoth. They sell bits of Koru as it sheds pieces of shell and raid things along their route (and trade too). Its inhabitants call themselves the Kroma Dragonics. They are known to have some kind of deal with the High Druid, who normally moves against anyone not aligned with her who sets up a base on the back of a Koru Behemoth. Some barbarians ride them, with her blessing.
When the first hellhole opened here, it is said that an Icon sacrificed himself to bless the Lake, letting himself be forgotten. Whatever the cause, there is a strong holy aura here which neutralizes the demonic run-off from the Hellmarsh.
These islands have never been as bad as the full Iron Sea, and during the Seventh Age, they were heavily settled and a major trade terminus for trade with other lands. Now they are mostly abandoned, but a giant lamp still stands on one of them, shining its light across the islands, keeping away all but the worst sea monsters. The ruins of Lamphaven City is now infested with gnolls, strange sea-going gnolls who hunt on the other islands.
Dust blows off the Red Wastes into this land just enough to render it a region of scrub brush, yellow grass and strange flowers. Rabbits, rats, lizards, and birds are the main animals, especially owls. There is only one large predator - owlbears. It's unclear how they get enough food, though they seem to migrate to the Wild Wood during the cold part of the year. Small bands of humans, essentially extended families, live here, preying on the small animals and taming the owlbears to serve them. The Owl Folk are strong in druidic magic and are said to be what keeps the Red Waste from corrupting the Barrens entirely. Hunks of volcanic rock the size of a house or more can be found here, but there is no volcano or other sign of such. In 3919, during the rain of ash, a chunk of a building fell from the sky; it looks like volcanic rock turned into blocks and sealed with black mortar. It doesn't do anything but periodically becomes a center for evil cults until the Owl Folk kill everyone.
Shielded by the archmage, this area teams with fish; it is mostly safe from monsters, but you have to scrape your ship for barnacles more often if you run here. Most trade goes between Haven and Horizon, though some ships run up the coast to Santa Cora. It's also good for crabs and lobster, though a few lobsters turn out to be chuul.
One of the few foreign lands the Empire has regular if limited contact with. During the Ninth Age, caravans began running a route through the Moonwreck, then a cold desert, to reach the Zabwean Grasslands, where a set of city states competed with each other and studied the Classical Arts and Magics. They were the source of a popular peasant food in this age, eaten around Santa Cora, Shalashala (Shalashala is a form of processed barley, which is turned into small pellets like rice. It is used in much the same way, but you can grow barley in far more places than rice.) In this age, the city-states are all united into the Shali Empire, ruled by an Icon known as the Render of Masks. The Render seems mainly focused on some spiritual project but is allied loosely with the Crusader. Foothold is the modern terminus of the trade. It is mainly in luxuries, books, spices, and lore.
Sharktooth Bay is full of sharks and no one knows why; Sahuagin periodically try to take over the bay and have to be driven off. Since the fall of Proudfort, the sahuagin are on the move again and everyone wonders what the Emperor will do.
In theory, under the Elven Queen. In practice, Elves largely abandoned it after the Kopru Behemoth incident some ages ago, and now it's mainly home to giant spiders and spider monsters, driders, and Elves gone bad.
The Cairnwood, the Hellmarsh, and the Stalking Trees were once all one big forest around Lake Hope. But the rise of the Diabolist cut the forest in half. The Stalking Trees were enraged and began their current program of murdering everything bipedal which enters their forest. Led by angry Treants who serve the Dark Gods, the forest rejects the High Druid, who they see as a failure, in favor of the Crusader, at least in the 13th Age, though even his servants had best tread lightly.
No one is sure what made the stars or if all of them are like this, but some stars are huge glowing vehicles made of crystal which are piloted by divine spirits who cruise around the Overworld in them. These vessels come to Starport, which extends into the Overworld, for maintenance and repairs. Mortals can watch from afar but are not allowed inside. Every so often, someone steals a star, goes for a joyride, and confuses astrologers everywhere, though. The Icons never attack Starport, even when it would help them to do so. Even the Spelljack. But mortals can go there... it's just very, very dangerous. Only the most epic of heroes and villains can do it.
Threshold Island didn't exist until the Fourth Age. Sailors stumbled on it early in the Fourth Age and were confused to find a central mountain, lots of trees, and a small abandoned logging town with two churches, both to gods no one had ever heard of. The Triad and the Twelve, two pantheons of unknown gods are worshiped here through half-understood rites which seem to bring huge blessings, but fail if you go far away. The timber was mostly cut down long ago and now is carefully preserved and sheepfolds, wheat, barley, oats, and fruit trees have taken their place. There is 'Threshold', built from the ruins, and 'Threshold Port', where visitors come, though none of the island is barred to visitors. A small guild of sorcerors and wizards dwell in Threshold, trying to figure out what is going on with this place. Threshold has one other distinction. During the tenth age, six different Demidemons tried to conquer it. Each time, the clerics of the Twelve successfully slew them with a special ceremony... which didn't work off the island. The famous, yet ill-named Bard Felonious Punk believes the Triad and the Twelve are asleep under the island and until they wake, their power can't go very far.
The Money Pit Southeast of Threshold, but not very far from it, is a small rocky island used to raise sheep called The Money Pit. It is so called because it has a large, mostly flooded shaft in the middle, allegedly used by the Captain of Corsairs to hide a great treasure. A vast amount of money has been wasted trying to get through the monsters, traps, poisonous fluids, dark flooded areas, to get to it. Plus, everyone suspects maybe someone already took it. Still, every so often, people take a shot at it.
The southern Stalking Trees rises into hills and small mountains, a range parallel to the Giant's Walk. The Sun River runs through those hills and mountains, but here it cascades down a thousand feet into a canyon which it runs down to Lake Hope. If you stand here on the Summer Solstice, the Sun lines up with the falls as it rises and eventually passes over the top of the falls. It is said that the First Emperor met here with the Elf Queen and the Dwarf King to plot the fall of the Wizard King, back before the forest turned dark and became The Stalking Trees.
This hilly area was once known as Imperial Point, where Emperors hunted, a wild land reserved for the Imperial Family. During the 11th age, a Demidemon took over the area; his name was Fourth Son and he built his own city, Fourth City. When the Empire finally moved against him, he brought down a rain of swords before being squashed flat by the Golden Carapace. The swords are still here, thrust into the ground, and the area is now used for arcane experiments and Emperors hunt in the Dire Wood.
An ancient lake which goes back to the time of the Serpent Folk. The giant hero Torin, a Storm Giant, wanted to liberate Giantkind from Serpent Folk oppression. So he lured them to what was once just a vale, while he ascended into the Overworld using one of the legendary Eyes of the Overworld. Then he found a wandering star and rode it down, crashing it into the army and destroying it; the Eye and his remains are at the very bottom of the very deep lake. Whether this is true or not, the lake is extremely deep and full of fish. The Imperial Town of Foothold is located on the northern shore. ]