The Campaign Builder's Guild

Lands of Karelan

Erileine

Lands of Karelan

Laharn

Lands of Karelan

Republic of Leotine

The Phoros Rim

The Phoros Rim

The idea of a Republic of the Dead is really intriguing.  I'm kind of fascinated by Col d'Val and the Rim in general... you say that the presence of a cursed Alentia forced ships to cross further south along the Poison Sea - so is the Republic innately hostile, then?  Is the curse (and the volcanic eruption) a consequence of Venus' wrath?

I would'nt say the Dead Republic is innately hostile.  

The Phoros Rim

The Phoros Rim

The Phoros Rim

The coexistance of the very alien Elder Darks etc and more antrhopomorphic deities is interesting - I very much like that Eda has an incongruous series of mythologies/religions, much like the real world, rather than a unified set of agreed-upon deities (Greyhawk, the Realms, and other fantasy settings tend to suffer from this...).

So Nal-Toth...  uninhabited but suffused with evil energies?

The Phoros Rim is probably my favorite area you've developed so far, probably because of my taste for the macabre.  There's a real sense of living history here (as in the rest of the setting).  Seafaring adventure on the Rim would be pretty awesome.

Thanks for your comments, Steerpike.  I'm quite fond of the Phoros Rim too.  Your right in that I tried to create a 'real' history for Karelan encompassing economic and social movements, as well as the usual wars, catastrophes and political machinations.  I'm planning to write something about the direct consequences of the fall of Alentia in the 114-15th centuries (ie. the break-up of Ascuria and the origins of the Peninsula Wars).

A bit more background info on Nal-Toth and the Poisoned Sea.  Nal-Toth was drowned during a titanic struggle between the dragon emperor Ghyl and a usurper known to history by the rune 'Awakened Dragon'.  In an instant 'Awakened Dragon' slew the emperor and every dragon on the planet in an attempt to create a demi-omniverse which it could inhabit.  However it failed and was torn to pieces by the forces it had unleashed.  However 'Awakened Dragon' was able to subsume a failing time line to create Edar, a parallel world to Eda.  This became the basis of my Hollowrought setting.  For more information check out:

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=581043&page=3

http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=581043&page=4

All the enteries marked 'Hollowrought' relate to Edar, and its a far more darker, more macabre world than Eda, so it may be more to your taste.  :)

I've never fully developed Edar, and only used it in one campaign.  Therefore I've only developed the liberocracy of Gilendi and the Menean Kingdoms of Dusk

QuoteGilendi is surrounded on all sides by wilderness and waste. The alternative Carolan of Hollowrought is dotted with isolated cities or clusters of cities surrounded by the overgrown ruins of what was the mighty Grand Republic of Orthere. The technology level of Gilendi is roughly 18th-19th century, with flintlock rifles and steam carriages. Fortified positions keep the Nemeans and their dog-orc and dog-goblin slaves at bay. The Gilendians have little idea of what goes on beyond their borders - occasionally they hear of other cities and lands which survived Orthere's collapse, but generally the wilderness is too dangerous to attempt to cross. No Gilendian would dare enter the Slough Trough - the black platforms is a place of the First, who are said to have enslaved the Eldar Darks to their will. The Gilendians leave such evil to sleep. A great forest grows all along the edge of the Slough Trough which the Gilendians rarely enter.

This caught my eye just because of the similarities between it and the two settings I have on the board, both with tech levels round the 18th-19th century (though the Cadaverous Earth really has more of a pastiche tech level borrowing from many eras) - cities surrounded by waste, a malevolent stretch that few enter (Slough Trough/Slaughter-lands) and/or a malignant forest (in my setting, the Tangle).

I like the idea of the alternative Carolan, it reminds me of my favorite Buffy episode where Sunnydale temporarily turns into a vampire-run town in the absence of the Slayer heh.  I'll definitely keep reading.

"This caught my eye just because of the similarities between it and the two settings I have on the board, both with tech levels round the 18th-19th century (though the Cadaverous Earth really has more of a pastiche tech level borrowing from many eras) - cities surrounded by waste, a malevolent stretch that few enter (Slough Trough/Slaughter-lands) and/or a malignant forest (in my setting, the Tangle).

I like the idea of the alternative Carolan, it reminds me of my favorite Buffy episode where Sunnydale temporarily turns into a vampire-run town in the absence of the Slayer heh. I'll definitely keep reading."

Re-reading it, there are a lot of similarites between the Cadaverous World and Hollowrought.  I basically came up with Hollowrought as a substitute for Ravenloft and therefore used the same approx. tech levels as that classic setting.  I used Hollowrought for one campaign which saw a temporal convergence between Eda and Edar.  However I've never developed the setting since.  I think the major difference between the Cadaverous World and Hollowrought is that the former is about physical decay, while the latter is about madness and mental disintegration.  Hollowrought exists in the mind of a mad god, and that god is going slowly senile.  As its mental capacities diminish, reality breaks down.  This links in to what we talked about earlier - the Vancian 'slow winding down of time' as Edar gradually falls apart.  It is the rationalists (a philosophical position which in real life I have little time for) who are keeping things together.  The Cadaverous World is far more visceral, more 'meaty'.  It is the roleplaying equivalent of the Grand Guignol.  Two different approaches, two distinct settings but a lot of similarities.  However yours is a lot better fleshed out than mine (no pun intended).

The Phoros Rim