Truly 'Homebrew' - Using Local Area IRL to create Fantasy Settings
- Thread starter takasi
- Start date
Mystaros
First Post
I've played around with this a couple of times, in a couple of different ways. Currently, my "doodle work" (i.e., the writing I do to get away from doing my work-a-day writing) is exactly such a campaign. I use the basic premise that it the setting takes place after the Change, where magic returned and technology failed. The elves and dwarves and such have returned, monsters roam the land, and so forth. I stole this basic idea from Steven Boyett (Ariel, http://www.amazon.com/Ariel-Steven-...4/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-4459848-9850363?ie=UTF8) and S.M. Stirling (Dies the Fire, http://www.amazon.com/Dies-Fire-Roc.../ref=pd_bbs_sr_2/104-4459848-9850363?ie=UTF8). I'm toying with two eras, one about thre years after the Change, when young adventurers go forth into the Changed world to discover what happened to the rest of the country, and another about 1,000 years later, which is really more of a latter-day Horseclans (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horseclans) style adventure.
The best maps for this kind of game are from DeLorme (www.delorme.com), you can find them at any Barnes & Noble and most other bookstores. For a campaign set right after the Change, they are perfect; anything urban is essentially wasteland, filled with the bones of the dead, and perhaps undead, and PC's will be based out of small farming villages way off the beaten path. For a campaign taking place later down the road, you can match up bits of forest and such to create new wilderness lands, and use classic medieval demographics to determine the current population and such (www.io.com/~sjohn/demog.htm).
You can d a lot of interesting things culturally in a post-Change world, which is essentially a magical post-apocalypse setting. For example, in the 1,000 year+ version that I'm working on now, the lands in the triangle between Chicago/Detroit/Indianapolis are known as "Mooristahn," a black pseudo-islamic region lifted almost directly from the Horseclans setting's "Zahrtogah," though as it has the "old gods returned" the religion is a mix of Egyptian, Babylonian/Sumerian, and Phoenician (actually, I use the gods and pantheons as outlined by Gary Gygax in his Lejendary Pantheons). Arabian Knights meets weird fantasy in the Midwest, and I can use the maps straight out of the modern atlas, with a few additional bits of wilderness. Counties are beyliks, and several counties make up an emirate, malikate, or even sultanate. The same is done elsewere with other cultures and regions, i.e., each county is a county or shire, and several together are a duchy or kingdom or republic or what have you.
For macro-politial divisions I used the maps from here: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/produc..._DIVS/states_counties_climate-divisions.shtml
They aren't always based on geography, but they make things easy. Each region is a kingdom or sultanate or duchy or whatever. There are tons of cool resources like this out there...
The best maps for this kind of game are from DeLorme (www.delorme.com), you can find them at any Barnes & Noble and most other bookstores. For a campaign set right after the Change, they are perfect; anything urban is essentially wasteland, filled with the bones of the dead, and perhaps undead, and PC's will be based out of small farming villages way off the beaten path. For a campaign taking place later down the road, you can match up bits of forest and such to create new wilderness lands, and use classic medieval demographics to determine the current population and such (www.io.com/~sjohn/demog.htm).
You can d a lot of interesting things culturally in a post-Change world, which is essentially a magical post-apocalypse setting. For example, in the 1,000 year+ version that I'm working on now, the lands in the triangle between Chicago/Detroit/Indianapolis are known as "Mooristahn," a black pseudo-islamic region lifted almost directly from the Horseclans setting's "Zahrtogah," though as it has the "old gods returned" the religion is a mix of Egyptian, Babylonian/Sumerian, and Phoenician (actually, I use the gods and pantheons as outlined by Gary Gygax in his Lejendary Pantheons). Arabian Knights meets weird fantasy in the Midwest, and I can use the maps straight out of the modern atlas, with a few additional bits of wilderness. Counties are beyliks, and several counties make up an emirate, malikate, or even sultanate. The same is done elsewere with other cultures and regions, i.e., each county is a county or shire, and several together are a duchy or kingdom or republic or what have you.
For macro-politial divisions I used the maps from here: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/produc..._DIVS/states_counties_climate-divisions.shtml
They aren't always based on geography, but they make things easy. Each region is a kingdom or sultanate or duchy or whatever. There are tons of cool resources like this out there...
Ed_Laprade
Adventurer
Valley Elves, fer sur! As others have said, sure, go for it! I was going to do a Gamma World campaign using the East Coast long after nukes made big holes were cities had been and the sea level had risen. Never did get to play it though.
painandgreed
First Post
Would work for where I live now in Seattle, but not so good for my old home state of OK.
PC1: What's around my village?
DM: Endless miles of featureless plains.
PC2: Are there any landmarks?
DM: What part of "featureless" did you not understand?
PC1: Are there any rivers?
DM: Somtimes, but it's the wrong season for them currently. <rolls dice> You do spot a monster coming across the plains towards you about three miles away.
PC2: Can I hide?
DM: What part of "featureless" did you not understand?
PC1: What's around my village?
DM: Endless miles of featureless plains.
PC2: Are there any landmarks?
DM: What part of "featureless" did you not understand?
PC1: Are there any rivers?
DM: Somtimes, but it's the wrong season for them currently. <rolls dice> You do spot a monster coming across the plains towards you about three miles away.
PC2: Can I hide?
DM: What part of "featureless" did you not understand?
Templetroll
Explorer
IIRC, the area around Greyhawk and Dyvers was based on the area of Wisconsin around Lake Geneva. I don't recall the exact map correlation, however.
There was a book, "Always Coming Home" by Ursula K. LeQuin, that was based on a futuristic San Francisco bay area after a massive cataclysm that left it as a peninsula. The bay was called the Inland Sea. The map is on page 223 of the book I had. It came with a tape of songs of the people in the stories. There were also some local maps that would be of use to anyone with a campaign wanting a small area to run in.
Another option, the Cadfael mysteries by Ellis Peters had very cool maps of the town of Shrewsbury and the county of Shropshire. It also had some of the area of England and Wales nearby. It would be very easy to build a campaign around the maps in those books.
There was a book, "Always Coming Home" by Ursula K. LeQuin, that was based on a futuristic San Francisco bay area after a massive cataclysm that left it as a peninsula. The bay was called the Inland Sea. The map is on page 223 of the book I had. It came with a tape of songs of the people in the stories. There were also some local maps that would be of use to anyone with a campaign wanting a small area to run in.
Another option, the Cadfael mysteries by Ellis Peters had very cool maps of the town of Shrewsbury and the county of Shropshire. It also had some of the area of England and Wales nearby. It would be very easy to build a campaign around the maps in those books.
jim pinto
First Post
Brilliant
Being from Northern Cal (at one time), I can say there's no better place for a D&D campaign.
We once had a campaign using a map of alaska, the yukon, washington, oregon, california, colorado and the rockies.
We even used real city names.
No point in changing those.
And it gave us a great sense of just how far things were... Seattle to Eugune? Cripes. That'll take 4 weeks.
Ha.
Btw, Garberville sounds like a great name for a small barony, Redlands is where orcs live, Yuma City could be a fading Byzantine-style city, Willits and Ukiah are great places for "trading post" kind of towns, and Eureka would be the new seaport where illicit trade takes place.
Enjoy
Being from Northern Cal (at one time), I can say there's no better place for a D&D campaign.
We once had a campaign using a map of alaska, the yukon, washington, oregon, california, colorado and the rockies.
We even used real city names.
No point in changing those.
And it gave us a great sense of just how far things were... Seattle to Eugune? Cripes. That'll take 4 weeks.
Ha.
Btw, Garberville sounds like a great name for a small barony, Redlands is where orcs live, Yuma City could be a fading Byzantine-style city, Willits and Ukiah are great places for "trading post" kind of towns, and Eureka would be the new seaport where illicit trade takes place.
Enjoy
Jesus_marley
First Post
Bob Salvatore ( in his Corona novels) used Eastern Canada as the baseline for the known world map...
I believe Northern California and Nevada were used as the settings in the Fallout and Fallout II video games... maybe you could get some ideas there....
I believe Northern California and Nevada were used as the settings in the Fallout and Fallout II video games... maybe you could get some ideas there....
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