Places in my world

[Lanliss]

I really need to think of a name for my homebrew world. That aside, this is going to be a thread about specific locales in my world. I have a lot of odd places planned, with their own specific mechanics tied to them, and I have a feeling I will be asking for tips on them. For now, I will just start with a list of them, and maybe a sentence or two to describe them.

• The Circles: A chaos relic landed to the East of the plains, causing the earth to ripple like water. A series of massive concentric circles, with individual inland seas in between each one.
• Shifting Mountains: despite their name this mountain range stopped shifting a long time ago. When a Chaos Relic appeared in them they began running into the sky like a lava lamp. This also resulted in a massive gravity shift, causing different land masses to hold their own gravitational pull.
• The Mist: A strange land mass that floats throughout the Uncrossed Sea, completely shrouded in a never ending mist. There is no day or night, only a constant twilight of blurry shapes and muffled sounds.
• The Hive: A mental construction floating in the Astral Plane, a place of brilliant spires, connected by wisp-like stairways. The home of the Forumites, as they call themselves, though most others call them Hiven.

There will be more as I progress, this is just what I have off the top of my head. I will work on full posts for each of them later.

 

[Lanliss]

The Circles

A dozen rings, and 11 inland seas, each section a unique habitat, home to it's own specially evolved species. From strange and unexplainable beasts in the seas, to functioning societies on (some of) the Rings. These lands are unsafe for most creatures from outside, having different atmospheres to them. No one yet has reached the innermost rings and returned to the outside, but it is assumed that the Relic still lies there, at the bottom of the Center Sea.

My thoughts

• I am bad at distances. How wide would a ring need to be if I wanted a journey on foot to take about two weeks, going from the outside in? How thick would the Sea rings need to be if I wanted them to take a couple of months to cross?

Over time, I will work on detailing the specifics of each Ring and Sea here. For now, my only question is if anyone has a deeper understanding than me of closed ecologies sharing space without breaking each other down. Failing that, I will just BS my way through the descriptions, no harm in that.

 

[Lanliss]

The Shifting Mountains

Also called The Globular Mountains due to their distinctive shape, these mountains were changed long ago. They began flowing up into the sky, pulling off of the main mass in spherical blobs. Those blobs now hang suspended above the mountains, and have their own gravity wells. They are almost entirely ruled by a tribe of bandits that have perfected using the gravity to their advantage.

My thoughts

• Bandits are good at slingshots and probably have the various gravity wells mapped, as well as courses through them. Maybe give them advantage on Acrobatics relating to the Mountains?
• Need to construct rules for slingshot weapon attacks, like bending a bow shot around a few blobs to give it more momentum. Or just play it by ear, throw out a random number of dice or damage as a bonus.

For these it will mostly be a matter of judgement, deciding which blobs near the players have their own gravity, and how strong that gravity is.

 

[Lanliss]

The Mist

Possibly a drifting Island, possibly some massive creature. A land of darker lifestyles, and often horror. It is impossible for most to see more than a few feet away from themselves, and even magical sight is of little help. This is a land of more mysteries than can be counted, for you cannot count what you are unable to see.

My thoughts

• Maybe a similar effect to the Feywild, where spending time here gives you an indescribable urge to return for some reason? That would explain why it is not deserted.
• Madness rules would probably be a must, IMO. Need to check out CoC, since that has good ratings in that area, as far as I have seen.

Obviously, there are many questions unanswered about this place, but I think that is for the better. My own personal horror setting, with all of the built in holes to screw with my players. Has anyone done something similar, and how did it work out? I plan on cutting all sight abilities in half, as well as limiting the range on light sources, to help push the darker vibe I am aiming for here. This one will be more of a discussion on how to handle horror, and what tricks I can use to play with fears.

 

[Imaculata]

Has anyone done something similar, and how did it work out?

I have an island in my Pirate Campaign called "Damnaur", an island that is alive. It is an island that people dread, and stay clear of. It is never in the same place, and so most maps either leave it out entirely, or draw it in different locations. No one knows exactly how big the island is. But it has such a dark reputation, that merely speaking its name is considered a curse. So sometimes you'd hear someone say "By Damnaur!". The players have not visited the island though, and have mostly headed all the warnings.

The island has an awesome backstory though, which the players recently uncovered. Apparently a group of pirate-witches, called the Speakers of the Dead, tried to open a portal to the Netherworld. But the sea of the dead came pouring through the portal, and animated all the land that it touched. They managed to close the portal, but not before a large chunk of the island of Witchclaw had come alive and crawled away. This is why Witchclaw now has a crescent shape, as if a chunk has been taken out of it.

 

[Lanliss]

I have an island in my Pirate Campaign called "Damnaur", an island that is alive. It is an island that people dread, and stay clear of. It is never in the same place, and so most maps either leave it out entirely, or draw it in different locations. No one knows exactly how big the island is. But it has such a dark reputation, that merely speaking its name is considered a curse. So sometimes you'd hear someone say "By Damnaur!". The players have not visited the island though, and have mostly headed all the warnings.

The island has an awesome backstory though, which the players recently uncovered. Apparently a group of pirate-witches, called the Speakers of the Dead, tried to open a portal to the Netherworld. But the sea of the dead came pouring through the portal, and animated all the land that it touched. They managed to close the portal, but not before a large chunk of the island of Witchclaw had come alive and crawled away. This is why Witchclaw now has a crescent shape, as if a chunk has been taken out of it.

That is an awesome backstory. Do you have planned tracks for the island, or do you just have it pop up when it is convenient?

 

[Lanliss]

Giving this a quick bump. I added some actual discussion points that I am thinking on for each place.

 

[aco175]

You could call the world something simple like what Forgotten Realms did rather than calling that world Faerun or Sword Coast, or even Waterdeep. You should pick something from the first campaign and go with that so players will know what to expect.

One of the ideas I had with the ocean rings was dealing with the world turning and the water in each circling. Eventually the erosion on one of the sides would give way and spill into the next one. I would also think that to take 2 months to cross would be about what Columbus did crossing the Atlantic and would be about 600miles or 1000km. You can also make each circle different thicknesses otherwise your world would need to be several times larger than Earth.

 

[Lanliss]

You could call the world something simple like what Forgotten Realms did rather than calling that world Faerun or Sword Coast, or even Waterdeep. You should pick something from the first campaign and go with that so players will know what to expect.

One of the ideas I had with the ocean rings was dealing with the world turning and the water in each circling. Eventually the erosion on one of the sides would give way and spill into the next one. I would also think that to take 2 months to cross would be about what Columbus did crossing the Atlantic and would be about 600miles or 1000km. You can also make each circle different thicknesses otherwise your world would need to be several times larger than Earth.

It is much larger than earth. At least the size of Jupiter, just to give me space to work. I know that there is at least one known sea that could fit the Earth in it.

 

[Istbor]

The Shifting Mountains

Also called The Globular Mountains due to their distinctive shape, these mountains were changed long ago. They began flowing up into the sky, pulling off of the main mass in spherical blobs. Those blobs now hang suspended above the mountains, and have their own gravity wells. They are almost entirely ruled by a tribe of bandits that have perfected using the gravity to their advantage.

My thoughts

• Bandits are good at slingshots and probably have the various gravity wells mapped, as well as courses through them. Maybe give them advantage on Acrobatics relating to the Mountains?
• Need to construct rules for slingshot weapon attacks, like bending a bow shot around a few blobs to give it more momentum. Or just play it by ear, throw out a random number of dice or damage as a bonus.

For these it will mostly be a matter of judgement, deciding which blobs near the players have their own gravity, and how strong that gravity is.

I like this the most. I will need some time to think on it more though. It feels ripe for Airships honestly. I did something a bit similar in a campaign in the past. Mountain ranges ruled by the Dwarves. They hold a lot of sway in the world due to owning the only mine rich in a mineral referred to as Float (a Material essential to airship travel and construction). Some of the mountains were still visibly rich with the stuff causing chunks of land to float gently in the sky. Sometimes rife with bandits set to ambush unfamiliar ships sailing the skies.