Let’s Make a Hexcrawl Setting

[Electric Wizard]

The Dismal Mine (21.27)

The dwarves native to the Tantalus Mountains are nothing like their northern Gray Mountain cousins. They call themselves duergar. They are hairless as lizards, and their complexions share the hues and granulation of the stone in their tunnels. None have been known to have a sense of humor. This may have to do with the fact that all alcohol is poisonous to them, and that they make no music. The ring of pickaxes and hammers against stone fill their cold, unlit halls day and night.

A small colony of duergar ruby miners lives near the surface in what outsiders call the Dismal Mine. The duergar race is obsessed with rubies, and they seized the mine from Jahur during the War of the Six-Fingered Hand in order to extract them. Prior to the mine's seizure, this mine yielded the Shrouded Lands' most flawless rubies. Jahur's jewelers cut them into beautiful shapes and fitted them to the finest jewelry. Artificers and wizards used these famous gems to create potent magic items.

The duergar make no such art. They simply horde the rough rubies out of some alien impulse. Many jewelers in Jahur and elsewhere pay adventurers chests filled with gold to liberate just a few of these rough gems. Breaking into the Dismal Mine is no lark. The duergar have devious traps, efficient warriors and an alliance with a young black dragon.

Hooks
-What's behind the duergar obsession with rubies?
-What role did they play in the War of the Six-Fingered Hand?
-What magic items require the Dismal Mine's rubies?
-Tell me more about this dragon.
-Who has ventured into the Dismal Mines?

 

[Daztur]

Note: I'm imagining the that the Grey Mountains extend a good ways north of the edge of the map, perhaps containing a Tibet-like plateau or somesuch before coming out the other side.

The Sounding Snows
Hex 12.00

Here begins the easiest of the passes through the Grey Mountains to the lands that lie beyond. The way is relatively smooth through this broad valley and pack mules can be driven through it without much difficulty.

Travelers making their way through the Sounding Snows do no, however, report pleasant journeys nor safe ones. The tall mountains that rise above this valley block off the southerly winds that bring great banks of warm fog from the south to much of the rest of the Grey Mountains. Up here in the mountains it is always cold and the snows that blanket the ground seldom melt.

This valley is so sheltered, in fact, that there is no wind to disturb the silent snow so that even the crunch of a single footfall upon the snow can be heard for a long ways. Except, that is, for the footfalls of the light-footed goblins who live nearby (11.01) and who often lurk in this valley in hopes that travelers will pass through on their way through the Grey Mountains.

The only safety here is in in the shade of a great frozen oak tree that lies at the center of the valley. The goblins refuse to shed any blood in its vicinity and seem to avoid it as much as possible.

Hooks:
-What lies beyond the Grey Mountains?
-Why do goblins avoid the frozen oak tree? I thought goblins loved oak trees and tried to nourish them with blood any chance they got?
-Does the shade of the frozen oak tree offer travelers safety or does some danger lie there?

 

[Daztur]

The compilation (https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B6z-iUIH4P8aUGhvTlZKT25oTXM/edit) has been brought completely up to date now. That means that all content in this thread is now in the compilation and all of those “XX” placeholders are now gone. I recommend giving the various sub-hexes of the City of Shuttered Windows a read through. There’s so much cools stuff that was buried in the older pages of this thread that never got followed up.

So, what’s next?
-I'll have an updated map up tonight (Korean time). Edit: map done now, it's here: http://img12.imageshack.us/img12/3381/dec8map.png
-Tweaking the formatting a bit to make it look nicer and be clearer. For example I’ll be putting a listing and short descriptions of sub-hexes as part of main hexes that have sub hexes.
-In a lot of cases hexes note a connection between that hex and a foreign region but the region write-ups don’t note those connections. I’ll fix that.
-More art, I’ve found so much cool open source art.
-I’ve got ten or so hex ideas that I haven’t written up yet. I’ve also finally gotten Vornheim and will be mining that a bit as well as putting on some connections between Shuttered and the rapidly expanding Singing Wastes region.
-Eventually working on expanding Sanglorian’s index and merging it in with the compilation document (this won’t start in earnest for a while).
-January 16^th is the first anniversary of the first incarnation of this setting (the rpg.net thread). I think that the first anniversary is a good day to finally start spamming this setting around a bit to some different forums and PM all of the various old contributors (especially chutup) to take a look at what we’ve all made.

 

[Daztur]

The Seeds of the Sea
Additional Information about Hex 29.14
Connects to: 23.32 (Kraken's Beak Isles)

Pearls are not currently in fashion in the City of Shuttered Windows so they can be hard to find, especially pearls worth precisely 100 gp. However, Six Seas' Seeds, a small shop tucked away in a back alley of the Gnomish Quarter specializes in them. The proprietor is a seemly-senile human female named Olga Gruel who chats in a friendly, if eccentric, manner with her customers, especially those with the hairy bloodstained look that often goes with those looking for the material component of identify spells. Unless treated rudely she offers freebies with any purchase of at least 100 gp. You can roll a d12 to see what she is likely to offer:
1. Her granddaughter's hand in marriage.
2. A small goat. She will be insulted if it is not treated as a pet.
3. A herbal brew that she claims increases stamina.
4. Several bags of roasted peanuts. Rats love them.
5. Poorly made non-magical golden rings.
6. A pillow stuffed with cat feathers. (34.05)
7. Orc pie. Cold. (26.02)
8. Obscene Tarrasque scrimshaw.
9. A very well-made ten foot pole.
10. Especially unappetizing iron rations.
11. Soap.
12. Cologne. Very appealing to ghouls it is.

What most don't know is that Six Sea's Seeds is owned by Lady Seline, one of the twin wives of the Doge of the City. Olga reports to the Seline concerning all of her customers, which allows the canny Lady to keep tabs on adventurers operating in the City who she sends spies, tax collectors or assassins after depending on Olga's reports. Seline is able to supply the store with a steady supply of pearls due to her connections with the octopoids who live around Kraken's Beak Isles (23.32). She supplies them with aid that they hope to use to reconquer Jahur (19.31) in return for helping her dominate the pearl market.

Hooks:
-What's the reason for Olga Gruel's strange behavior? Is she really senile?
-What does Seline usually do with adventurers nosing about her city?
-How is Seline helping the octopoids? What is the form of her contact with them?
-What other pies does Lady Seline have her fingers in?
-Can anyone say Six Seas' Seeds ten times fast?

 

[Daztur]

The Death of Cows
Hex 27.03

In this stretch of the Kingswood a mournful lowing can often be heard. It comes from a strange tree whose "fruit" is a series of ghastly cow heads. These heads produce bizarre sounds that induce cows from the nearby Land of the Night Cattle to wander from their fields into the forest. When these cows approach the tree its cow heads fall upon the unfortunate cow and tear it to pieces.

When an individual head has fed its fill a sac will fill with foul smelling gases and it will float away to see another tree of the same nature.

Recently cowherds from the nearby fields have noticed their cows going missing but blame cattle rustlers from nearby keeps rather than strange trees that they know nothing of.

Hooks:
-Will these accusations of rustling lead to violence?
-Why does this bizarre tree exist?
-Do similar trees exist elsewhere?

 

[Daztur]

The Ferryman
Hex 35.06

During misty nights a strange boat can be seen plying this stretch of the Witchwater (29.07): a cloaked figure poling a boat composed of finger bones. The ferryman will take travelers across the river if they pay a finger and tell how they came by it. Freshly cut fingers and skeletal ones are both accepted, but those who lie or those who try to pay with a finger of a monkey (or other non-sentient species) will be cast into the water in the midstream.

Strangely enough, the ferryman has only ever been seen moving downriver.

Hooks:
-Who is the ferryman? What does he (she? it?) want finger bones for?
-Does the ferryman carry anything in the boat except for travelers?
-How does the ferryman always move downstream but is always seen in this same stretch of the river?

 

[Electric Wizard]

Abyss of the Prism Crabs (20.32)
Connected to (19.31)

Not all of Jahur's gems are hauled from the depths of the Tantalus Mountains. The city's rarest stones are far more dangerous to extract. Fearless divers may wrench Abyss Diamonds from the backs of crabs that dwell exclusively in a black sinkhole several miles offshore. Abyss Diamonds are cloudier and more flaw-prone than true diamonds, but their dust is nonetheless a key component in summoning many powerful outsiders. But few who challenge the abyss return. Survivors tell of water pressure that crushes bones, and of horrific predators with blazing eyes, glowing tendrils and teeth like falchions.

Recently, the city has seen an influx of Abyss Diamonds thanks to a local entrepreneur. Kwalish the Thrice-Drowned, an artificer who went deaf and half-mad during his career beneath the ocean, built a bizarre lobster-like apparatus to extract the diamonds. After an encounter with a water weird left him too feeble to operate the apparatus himself, he turned it over to his proteges. His proteges call themselves the Sons of Dagon. Anyone hoping to use the apparatus must become initiated into their band. The initiation trials always end with solemn vows to the gods of the deep and immersion in a bath of crabs for six days and six nights.

Those who refuse to swear anything to strange sea gods or use a madman's invention to plunge into sunless waters can purchase small quantities of Abyss Diamond dust from Isane the Beauty. This, too, is problematic because she is a Viceroy's concubine. By ancient law, any man speaking to her must be executed or castrated.

Hooks
-Do any predators of the abyss seek prey closer to the surface?
-What drove Kwalish mad?
-How serious are the Sons of Dagon about the gods of the deep?
-Tell me about these gods of the deep. Are they all sinister and unfathomable, or are some actually worshiped by decent folk?
-How does Isane the Beauty get her supply of Abyss Diamond dust?

 

[Daztur]

Zaal, the Sleeping City
Hex 8.27

Note: inspired by the White Ship by Lovecraft.

When the elven courts sundered (29.07) some few of the unseelie court remained behind (28.07 and 31.04) and some few of the seelie court went into exile. The Bloodied King watched them leave with a stony face and they walked away south under the night stars with the elves of the unseelie court.

But during the long miles of their exile these renegade elves fell to quarrelling with the Queen Sinister (29.14.36) and the unseelie elves abandoned them as they lay sleeping in this stretch of desert.

Now, at that very spot rise strangely pale basalt pillars that form the city walls of Zaal, the sleeping city of the white elves. It is said that within this small city rise tall terraces, bright and beautiful with green verdure unseen elsewhere in the Singing Wastes and that tree-studded avenues wind between gleaming white roofs and strange temples. They say that here lie all dreams of beauty that men forget when they awake.

However, those that approach the basalt pillars of Zaal are more likely to see ghouls than temples for the creatures lurk and howl about the city’s walls hoping to eat those who fall into magical sleep as they approach the city.

But any men with pleasing faces who are able to reach the city’s walls are welcomed warmly and a rope of elven hair is thrown down to them. No one, not even the ghouls, has seen anyone leave the white-walled city.

Hooks:
-Why did these seelie elves leave with the unseelie elves when the courts were sundered? Why did the unseelie elves leave them behind?
-How did a small handful of elves build such a city? Why are they called white elves? What’s inside the city?
-What causes (most of) those who approach this city to fall into a magical sleep? Why don’t the ghouls all fall asleep?
-Whose hair is it?
-Why do the white elves welcome (handsome male) travellers? Why have none (seemingly) ever left? Do the elves ever leave their city? The ghouls never see them go out…

 

[Daztur]

The Bone Field
Hex 41.24

The tall razorgrass (34.25) that grows here almost obscures the thousands of lizardman bones that cover this stretch of the Burning Lands. Among the bones can be found several snakes that have escaped from their libraries. If read properly, among the various snakes whose scales contain cookbooks and caravan accounts, lie more valuable books. Some of them are low level spell books and there is also a descendant of Sorlak the Gelderer’s essay on the races of the Shrouded Lands whose title is usually translated as “The Flesh Golems that Live as Easily as They Die.” It describes how men, dwarves and all the rest are fleshy automatons driven by their nature and the impulses of their environment and how lizardmen can take advantage of this. Sorlak helpfully recommends that eating the flesh of most races within the sight of other members of that race often results in adverse reactions and should be avoided. It is a classic work and Sorlak’s logic has only been sharpened by the generations that have passed since he inscribed it on a young cobra.

This bone field was created when two lizardmen caravans clashed, as they always do when two of them meet. Lizardmen are too rare this far north for these conflicts to happen often but every so often one of their caravans lumbers slowly out of the utter south with sailbeasts struggling under their heavy loads, outriders patrolling on their great fanged lizards and the great bloated forms of lizardman elders carried on the backs of the young.

Members of other races flock to lizardman caravans for their goods are exotic and, while lizardmen are even more possessive than dwarves, they are poor hagglers and offer excellent prices for slaves that they can lay their eggs in. However, the lizardmen have difficulty understanding what sort of goods would be in demand where which has resulted in their trying to sell several loads of Ungolathan orgy masks to the dour dwarves of Nororak (29.24) and other tragedies.

Connection: Isane the Beauty (20.32) maintains a large collection of lizardman literature that slithers about her garden.

Hooks:
-What other books are written on snakes? How does the whole snakes are books things work exactly?
-Tell me more about Sorlak the Gelderer! How did he get that nickname? What are his other teachings?
-What are sailbeasts? What are the fanged lizards that the lizardmen ride? What other domestic animals do they keep?
-Lizardmen are more possessive than dwarves, how does that work?
-Lizardmen lay their eggs in slaves of other races. What’s up with that?
-How did the dwarves of Nororak react to the lizardmen trying to sell them orgy masks?
-How did Isane the Beauty get so many snakes that are books?
-Are there any lizardmen about that aren’t part of these caravans? Are any lizardman caravans travelling through the Shrouded Lands at the moment?
-Why are lizardmen elders so fat? Why do the young have to carry them? Can’t they just ride something?

 

[Electric Wizard]

Sosaria, the Conjured City (48.18)

Centuries ago, the archmage Imorcar the Many chose this remote shore of the Keening Sea to found his empire. Legends tell of how he ordered an army of djinn to build the Elephant Wall, which is wide enough to host ostrich races and topped with thousands of protruding elephant tusks. He then conjured the Palace of All Time from the stone beneath the plains and proclaimed himself the Eternal King of Sosaria.

Imorcar still lives, in a way, because he perfected a cloning spell that allows him to live beyond his mortal years. Whenever his old body dies, a living, younger version of himself emerges from a vat deep beneath the Palace of All time. The clone, in theory, awakens with all the knowledge and abilities Imorcar had in his previous lives. But in truth, each clone is more physically and mentally flawed than the previous clone. In his more lucid moments, Imorcar the Many ponders if this is the gods' punishment for his hubris.

The great archmage spends his days puttering through the tunnels and chambers beneath the Palace of All Time. He wears cloak to hide his deformities and mutters decrees to a clutch of sycophants who are desperate for power and access to his spell books. The city itself survives without him. The strength of the Elephant Wall protects vast herds of dodos, ostriches and cattle from gnoll hordes. Its believed that these livestock outnumber the citizens by more than ten to one. The sheer amount of dung the animals produce provides enough fertilizer to make the surrounding plains a verdant grazing land. Imorcar the Many proclaims that soon spires, academies and temples will replace the sprawl of reeking stockyards and rickety tenements, and that Sosaria will eclipse Jahur and Shuttered. For now, it is a squalid hive of beasts and men that manages not to fall under anyone's thrall only because it is remote and unpleasant.

Hooks
-Is anyone else in the Shrouded Lands a clone?
-What other spells does Imorcar the Many guard? Does he have any apprentices?
-Who, or what, moves all of that dung out of the city?
-What kind of horrible diseases are born here?
-Who keeps watch on the Elephant Wall?