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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Yaarel" data-source="post: 9509919" data-attributes="member: 58172">With regard to the north of the Greyhawk map, the Region of Arn is a sparsely populated, "frontier" environment. One can expect Indigenous Flan to be flourishing across here. The Flan communities likely relate to the Hunting Lands to the east and the Burneal Forest to the west. Plus there is a presence of Wegwiur and Indigenous from Black Ice.The boundaries of the region of Arn are uncertain. It includes at least part of the Burneal Forest, and possibly part of the Black Ice. Perhaps Arn is a geographical name for the entire land mass from the Burneal Forest up to the northern coasts of the Black Ice.The village of Blackmoor was founded as a trading outpost of the "Thonian Empire",  where "Thon" appears to be a dialectic variant name, deriving from the name "Aerdian", namely the Aerdi ethnicity of the Great Kingdom. Blackmoor served as an exclave "archbarony" for the Great Kingdom. But today, the entire region is autonomous, and the Great Kingdom has little or no idea what is going on there and has no way to enforce any territorial claims.The Blackmoor setting is alive and well, and persists across the editions of D&D, even with a 4e version. The Mystara setting has a timey-wimey version of it. But Blackmoor also exists in the 1980 Greyhawk map itself. In 2024 Greyhawk, the name "Arn" is a tribute to Arneson, one of the two inventors of D&D. Arneson created the Blackmoor regional setting during the formative days of the Castles & Crusades Society. Blackmoor is the first D&D setting ever. The attitude of Arneson is, players should have fun and can do whatever they want with the Blackmoor setting. My interest here is what he did with his own campaigns, plus judicious updates to situate seemlessly within 2024 Greyhawk.Blackmoor itself is a fishing village. Its small population is mainly Thonian humans who originate from the "Thonian Empire", namely the Aerdi Great Kingdom, which is farther south. North from Blackmoor are the "vikings" of Skandahar (who relate to the Zeai of 2000 Greyhawk). Skandahar is specifically the coastland on the north side of the Black Ice.Previously, all of Arn was claimed as an "Archbarony" of the Great Kingdom. Blackmoor served as its administrative center, but the seat of the government has since relocated to Dantredun. What remains of Blackmoor is the isolated fishing village. It is a small fort with wooden defensive walls around it. Most of the citizens of Blackmoor scatter across the remote farms and hamlets of the hinterland. Blackmoor itself is modest. Even if the village was entirely destroyed to the ground, it can easily rebuild within a few months. The fishing areas bubble annually with spawning fish across the horizon, when fishers and birds and monsters of every kind come to feast.Here is the original map by Arneson of the village of Blackmoor from Castle & Crusades Society. See how remote, small, and modest it is. There are roughly forty homes, a few civic buildings, and a notorious pub, the Comeback Inn.[ATTACH=full]386121[/ATTACH]Here is a later map of the village of Blackmoor, that helpfully colorizes and reorients for due north. One can see the fishing village is part of a safe harbor. There is a forest to the northwest. Some distance away in that forest is an elven civilization of mages, whose majestic capital city is Ringo.[ATTACH=full]386122[/ATTACH]Notice Castle Blackmoor on a small isle in the southwest corner of the village. Here is what the castle looks like as one sails into the harbor. The image comes from Original D&D.[ATTACH=full]386125[/ATTACH]This castle was the seat of the Arn government before it transferred to Dantredun. The mountain jutting upward from the water is riddled with caves and underground complexes, forming a dungeon crawl of many levels. It is now teaming with monsters. Understandably this is a main reason the government decided relocate elsewhere. Currently, there is a community of orcs who inhabit the upper levels of the underground complex. (In the 1970s, these were monsters who ruled other orcs in the surrounding areas.) In 2024 Greyhawk the orcs are Humanoids who are fellow citizens of the Blackmoor fishing village, participating in civic life alongside human, elf, and halfling citizens. The orc community intentionally keep their homes there under the castle to shield the rest of the village from the monsters below.The castle above finds itself in different circumstances at different times. In some eras, it is a functional administrative center for a dutchy of the area around the southwest part of the Blackmoor Peninsula, but not the entire archbarony of Arn. At one point, the duke is a vampire who has the decency to not kill his own citizens. At an other point, the duke is an orc. Sometimes the castle is a mayor office for the village only. Sometimes the castle gets overrun by the monsters below, thus abandoned and derelict − and at this point a military unit of elves guards its perimeter to protect the village. The DM can decide which circumstance is happening during the Common Year 576, whichever seems most fun.Also note, in the campaign of Arneson, there is a town some distance away to the northwest, where an "Egg" seems some kind of Farrealms Aberration, that has taken control of the minds of the towns citizens. Arneson utilizes the Egg as an entity to send encounters rather than be an encounter itself. (Heh, I cant help but wonder if the "Egg" is a playful reference to "Ernest Gary Gygax".)Here is Arn in the 2024 Greyhawk map. I added the exact location of Blackmoor village, at the southwest corner of the peninsula. The distances and directions from it pinpoint the locations of Maus at the northern tip of the peninsula, and Bramwald at the southeast of the peninsula. The Egg is in the northwest. Note, the Ruins are roughly 30 miles away, east from Blackmoor village.[ATTACH=full]386127[/ATTACH]Here is a closeup of the map with more detail. Each hex is 30 miles across, and this is a very large area.[ATTACH=full]386128[/ATTACH]I recommend using the 2024 Greyhawk map as-is for the entire Blackmoor setting, now the "Arn" regional setting. It works excellently.The Blackmoor Peninsula derives its name from the fishing village. Blackmoor Bay is sometimes called the Black Sea. Placenames depend on which community one is asking. The east coast of the peninsula is intercoastals coursing sea waters deep within long barriers of land. Across the eastern coast are shallow areas that this map counts as "land", but other maps might count as "sea" depending on the cartographer. Much of the land is near or at sea level. Note the two locations of Archus, where it is mainly at an intercoastal but with an outpost for the sea itself. Maus at the north point is developing into a significant city of commerce.In the central of the peninsula, Ringo is the majestic capital city of an elven magocracy. Their Cumasti culture relates to the 2024 High elves, and features great libraries of magic. (A 2024 Fey Crossing locates within the city itself, with extensive Eladrin relationships.) Cumasti cities blending living nature with elven architecture populate the forest that covers most of the peninsula.Note, the "Ruins" are the regional name for the ruins of a fallen city in the Stormkiller Mountains, near modern Bramwald. (The 2024 Stormkiller Mountains are home to goliaths of Storm, Stone, and Hill lineages. Their giant kin likewise inhabit here.)One cant tell from aboveground, but the foot of the "Crystal" Peaks Mountains have entrances to what might be one of the largest dwarven civilizations in the north, said to be a sprawling subterranean empire. Regent of the Mines is the name of the entrance city.Nearby Bramwald is a prosperous Thonian city. It is the main consumer of the steady flow of metals coming from the dwarven empire, and the trading center for it. Bramwald maintains an effective active army whose thousand-plus soldiers are well equipped and well trained. Ideologically, Bramwald leadership is loyal to the Great Kingdom, but in reality there is little or no meaningful contact with that empire. Bramwald maintains constructive treaties with the other governments of the "archbarony" who want nothing to do with the Great Kingdom. Most of the governments in Arn, especially Bramwald, depend on the Regent metals, and make efforts to maintain good relationships with Regent who typically insist on stability.On the mainland the "marshes" are mostly a maze of dry land and long lakes, albeit there are indeed many wetlands. The Temple of the Frog is on one of the islands rising from the marsh.At dense forests near Lake Gloomy, there is an other culture of elves, Westryn, relating to Wood culture. They celebrate contests of strength, including spectacular races, running and leaping from tree to tree, across the canopies of the forests. Many of the astounding Westryn athletes are celebrities.The waters of the Firefrost Channel flow all the way thru the Black Ice − tunneling under the black ice − to the northern coast of the Black Ice, the misty realm where the Zeai of Skandahar inhabit.According to a local legend that has attracted explorers from afar: somewhere in the Valley of the Ancients is the site of an ancient alien technological civilization.Sul Peshwan is a trading outpost for the Indigenous Peshwan. Most Peshwan are nomadic, but some communities have settled areas forming towns. For 2024 Greyhawk, they are understood to be a tribe relating to the Flan who inhabit the Arboreal Forest, either belonging to the Uirtag grouping or neighboring them. From the Wegwiur, some of the Peshwan communities have adopted horse culture, in the plains of Hak, but not in the marshes or forests.There are two unrelated halfling cultures. The "Hob" (originally Hobbit) are aboriginal to the region of Arn. Many areas are known for their cozy homes, arts and politics. Their communities often integrate other Humanoid communities, and they have a longstanding alliance with the Thonian humans. The "Docrae" are a warrior culture feared for their skirmishers and guerrilla tactics. These derive from refugees from an earlier war with a certain Chakyik tribe called Afridhi. The Docrae settled the land of Booh, between Blackmoor and Vestfold.The Afridhi tribe is known for a distinctive veneration of fire. They resemble other Chakyik but tend to have higher frequencies of red hair, which they attribute to a certain ancestor, a fire creature named Zugzul. Some Afridhi have settled near Starmorgan, the capital of the Dutchy of Ten (not to be confused with the Dutchy of Tenh).Dragonborn communities cluster around Dragonia, mainly Gold, Red, and Topaz. Much farther west, the dragons flourish across the Barren Wastelands. The Dutchy of Dragonia is home to the Order of Dragon Knights, warriors who revere dragons, and who invited the Dragonborn to immigrate there.Starport the capital of the Duchy of the Peaks sits on the slope of the remote Superstitious Mountains. It is a city of pleasure, reputed to have "destroyed" many armies by absorbing them into the Starport citizenry by means of welcoming them with all manner of hedonism. Mages of illusion and bardship are said to pass down thru the noble families.The above are a smorgasbord for what is going on in Arn.</blockquote>

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