Here comes something not mapping related, but I hope you still find it interesting..
Dragons are a fantasy icon and a staple of most settings, and they are certainly present in the World of Greyhawk. Here comes a look at dragons in my campaign and a bit of how I envision them, what makes them tick and why they haven’t taken over the whole world yet.
Dragon Birth and Reproduction
Dragons can at best produce a clutch of eggs once a century, and the number of eggs varies between dragon types but the older and more powerful the mother, the number of eggs increase. Like in big birds, female dragons are bigger and often more powerful to be able to care for the extra weight and effort with the eggs. Whether guarding the eggs and hatchlings is the solitary duty of one of the parents, a shared undertaking between the parents or a group effort varies a lot. Young dragons often need to share the responsibility in order to protect the eggs and hatchlings, while an older and more powerful single parent will take on the challenge.
For a Dragon to rare young to successful hatchlings the eggs need to rest on a bed of dragon bones for sustenance. The bones of a dragon can give sustenance to as many eggs at a time as its age category at death. The bones retain this ability for as long as the dragon, who the bones used to belong to was alive. This makes Great Wyrm dragons who are starting to feel their powers to diminish to seek out a place to die and give their bones the best possible chance of nourishing new generations.
Dragons are highly competitive and will go to almost any length to acquire parts of dead dragons or kill them if they are still alive, something especially true when it comes to dragons of other types or with a different alignment.
Treasure in the form of precious metals, gems and pearls can be used as a substitute, which have led to dragons started to hoard these items. This behavior started a long time ago by locating lairs at places where treasure occur naturally or by magical means. In more recent times with the advent of other creatures who mine and refine these resources into more (for dragons) useful treasure, the practice of hoarding them became widespread in most dragon types.
Shape Shifting
Some dragon types have an innate ability to shift to another form, usually humanoid. The type of creature they shift into is determined at a very early age, either by the parent presenting a creature of the type they want their hatching to be able to shift into, or the hatching bonding to a creature it comes in contact with by itself. The contact must be voluntary and friendly for all parties involved. Dragon parents often establish relationship with creatures of the type they want their hatchlings to be able to shift into, long before to make sure their offspring get the shifting ability desired.
Dragons with this ability always shifts into the same individual of that form. Their alternate form ages at the same rate as their true Dragon form, a hatchling dragon will shape shift into a toddler and a wyrm will shift into an elderly person. They can acquire class levels, skills, feats etc. as a normal for that type of creature.
Dragon Sleep
In order to advance an age category, the dragon needs to sleep for months or even decades, and the older it is, the longer its naps will be. Dragons are far from defenseless when they sleep, their hearing and sense of smell is often as active as it is when they are awake and active. Some dragons can also make use of other senses in the sleep, like for example tremor sense. Dragons amazing sensory usage during sleep is one of many adaptations’ dragons have gained over generations of an often-solitary existence.
Dragon Aging and Death
Old age is something dragons are looking forward to, it will make them more and more powerful as they age. Physically and mentally a dragon's capabilities increase all the way up until the dragon have reached well beyond the age of old wyrm and reach the twilight age (around 1200-1500 years).
The appearance of dragons does deteriorate as they age, becoming less colorful, less shiny and scales become more and more like a scarred set of armor. This is for the most part desirable and beneficial for dragons, giving them better defenses, better camouflage and make it more difficult for non-dragons to identify their type. Dragons are experts at judging other dragons and are very rarely fooled, or in doubt about the nature of another dragon. Smell, tracks and even the smallest trace of another dragon's current, or past, presence is enough for them to know exactly who they are dealing with.
Dragons yearn for their bones to literary nourish future generations, and ending the life knowing their bones will form a nest is very reassuring for old wyrms. This often leads to old wyrms trying to find other powerful dragons of their own type, challenge them to see if they are worthy and often slaying existing partners in the process. Dragons found to be worthy will have the honor of mating and in the process ending the life of the old wyrm. To be killed by the right partner is one of the biggest highlights of a dragon’s life, and they look forward to it for centuries.
Some types of dragons this have established special places that old dragons go to die and younger dragons guard in order to pick up the bones. For other dragons, old wyrms advertise the fact that they are ready, and younger suitors fight for the honor of being the last mate and successor of the old wyrm.
The roar of a dying wyrm making the final sacrifice can be heard, and felt, far and wide (miles), and anyone who have heard such a roar will never forget it. A Will Save is needed in order to not fear dragons for life. And any creature that are within the frightful presence radius, will automatically fail this save and only a Wish, or Miracle cast, with a material component being a bone from the roaring dragon, can cure it.
For dragons this roar is something else indeed, especially the dragon who has the honor of killing a wyrm in its last act. This lucky dragon will be able to stay active all the way into and through its next age without having to take a nap, and female wyrms often use this to make sure their last clutch of hatchlings makes it into adulthood and beyond, making it easier to raise the young ones without a partner.
This is by no means the last word on this topic, it is only a small part of the planning for my D&D in a Castle campaign I’m going to run next year and dragons will be a big part of it….
I will be on Jay Scott's Twitch channel today at 7:30 pm EDT, and we will be talking about dragons.
Here comes a look at the updated and new heraldry that have been a part of my own campaign for some years now, but with the new 576 CY map in the making the heraldry of the Great Kingdom, its provinces and dependencies needs to be looked into again.
Some of the shields have to be updated to reflect the earlier period, for example Sunndi that is now a County and shows it Iron League membership on its shield. The Aerdy simple star that is a staple on most symbols of these lands have gotten a much needed facelift as well.
I've added a number of the heraldry I developed for my own Rel Deven campaign to this preview to see where they are anywhere near the quality to be be considered for the new map. I like them but that might not be good enough, they need more scrutiny.
Here comes a first look at the Great Kingdom in 576 CY, and I must say it is very interesting to go back to the initial release of Greyhawk again. This is a look at the dying days of the biggest empire the Flanaess have ever seen.
There are a lot of considerations what doing this, for example what are the Provinces of the Great Kingdom? We have all familiar with the North and South provinces, but where they the only provinces of the empire or where they just more independent and powerful than the other provinces?
I have gone with the idea that there where more than the North and South provinces. Reading later sources, it looks like other principalities like Rel Deven, Jalpa, Nulbish etc where powerhouses long before they became the provinces of the new United Kingdom of Ahlissa after the war. The South province seems to be a leftover from the old Ahlissan Kingdom that predates the Great Kingdom, so it is kind of natural for it to be incorporated as its own entity.
In the north, things are a little bit different after the fall of the Great Kingdom, Herzog Grenell continued to rule over his province. In the south a new center of power emerged in Kalstrand that took control over all the neighboring provinces. Herzog Grenell got the leftover north of the mayhem in Rauxes.
By assuming that most of the bits that makes up the United Kingdom of Ahlissa and the North Kingdom were already established in the old Great Kingdom its is possible to make a much more detailed map with a lot of interesting features.
There are some idiosyncrasies too, Rel Astra and See of Medegia for example. The Medegia entry states Rel Astra as it capital, but the Rel Astra entry states that Rel Astra "desperately seek close ties with Medegia". This seems odd if the city already functions as the capital of Medegia.
A passage in the LG Gazetteer on p81 sheds some light to this. The passage is about the Church of Pholtus and its Holy Censor who is "granted a fief to administer from the old city of Mentrey in Medegia". I guessed that Pontylver was the capital of Medegia but this passage seems to indicate it was more centrally located Mentrey, I love to find bits like this!
So I'll fix that for the next update.
Another issue is that fact that Nyrond had invaded Knurl in 576 CY, so that part of the map needs some more work too. Lendore Isles and the Spindrifts need more research too. Di any of you know that the most of the Grandwood Forest was an Impresial Preserve? I sure didn't until I read it and it's now on the map. I added the term Imperial Lands to those areas around Rauxes directly governed by the Overking himself. The Naelax royal shield needs to be added as well.
you can download this map here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/kxc8znjjd5esr6y/Great%20Kingdom-1.jpg?dl=0
Still some work to do but this project is moving forward, and a new update will come soon!
Time for the first look at the ongoing work on the Flanaess 576CY map. In my infinite wisdom I decided do this in alphabetical order and start with the first entry from the 1983 Setting book - Almor. Almor is one of the most changed realms in the years between 576 CY and 598 CY, it practically got wiped out as a nation. It will be a good taste of how much work will be needed for this map conversion by setting a standard for how much need to be changed.
When I started to read the Almor entry I was surprised to read that the Lord Mayor of Innspa swore loyalty to Almor. I had a vague idea that Innspa was part of Nyrond at this time, and the alignment map on page 44 looks like that is the case.
This is one of the many times where text and maps differ in source materials. My instinct is to stay with the text, since I know how little the cartographer or illustrator often knows (or cares) when the maps is made, which can often be before the text is written.
So for this first draft I'm including Innspa and its surroundings in Almor. Two towns that are questionable whether they are in Almor or not are Harskern and Jennden. Haven't found any sources for them this early but they should both exist, but Jennden ought to be much smaller before the influx of refugees during the war. Since it was a destination for refugees, it seems more likely to me that it was in the Principality of Rel Deven on the Great Kingdom side of the border. Placing Jennden and the eastern shore of the Harp in the Great Kingdom also gives it a border along the Harp which I think I've read somewhere.
Harskern also seem to belong more to the Almorian side being rather distant from things in Nyrond. By including Harskern and bending the border further to the NW it matches the Alignment map better so that is my first choice for a western Almorian border. This rounds out the country well in the west and also make the road network make sense, so I like it.
When it comes to Innspa and its surroundings was my plan to include it in Nyrond, but the Almor description made me incorporate it into Almor. The post was map makes it a bit easier and I also think that the Principality of Innspa was built on an existing structure.
The western Adri is also interesting with the road between Innspa and Knurl are routed on the east side of the Harp for a bit, inside the Great Kingdom. It looks from the roads that Edgefield are trying its best to cash in on the traffic. When the Great Kingdom fell apart and the newly created United Kingdom of Ahlissa and the North Kingdom started competing for territory here the Ahlissa side was more offensive and seized the road between Innspa and Knurl. I'm not sure this is really canon but it makes for a good story!
The southern border of Almor I've extended all the way to the northern edge of Thelwood, so it included all the Marchlands from the LG campaign. All in all it makes for logical borders that matches the text sources and makes for some interesting scenarios, but the shape is a bit distorted.
The terrain map has been edited in numerous places to better reflect the pre war situation. Both the surroundings of Chathold, Almor heartlands north of the Harp and the Bonewood have now been rested back to Thelwood.
The surrounding lands on the draft map are more or less done, less the further away from Almor things are. Please tell me in the comments for details that need to be adjusted!
Now you know a bit more how I reason going about this project, and I must admit it is more fun than I thought. Lots of interesting Greyhawk knowledge that comes with it, in more ways than I imagined before I started.
Thank you again for helping me do this! 🙂
In case Patreon messes with the map here is a direct link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lnxlsntres726m8/Almor-04c.jpg?dl=0
Made a set of terrain only maps, both the standard terrain texture and a the latest parchment version. They come in both 12 mile hexed and non hexed versions.
You can get them here:
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessTerrain-JPG-2019REV1
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessTerrain-HEX-JPG-2019REV1
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessTerrain-Parchment1-JPG-2019REV1
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessTerrain-Parchment1-HEX-JPG-2019REV1
Adobe have updated Illustrator, and now for the first time you can properly export PSD files of individual layers and retain transparency. This is a huge time saver and means that I can save individual layers in 250 dpi resolution. There seems to be a 30,000 px export limit on all formats except PNG which can take forever to compile, so expect large PNG export to take a VERY LONG time. With PSD exports there are very little compression involved which mean faster exports but huge files.
For me I prefer things to go faster and invest a bit more in storage, but your preferences might vary. High on my investment list some sort of SSD based storage for my Dropbox and OneDrive, it will be expensive but save me lots of time in less wait for things to open or save. I have SSD's for system and scratch drives, 3TB all in all, but for storage I need at least 6TB more. Prices are coming down: Samsung SSD 860 EVO 2TB M.2 SATA Internal SSD for $319! Seems like I need to start to read reviews on PCIe M.2 adapter cards...
If you want to change to content of the map the easiest way is to grab the Illustrator file and edit it to your liking you can get it here:
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessFull598CY-AI-2019REV1
The PSD format (Photoshop's standard file format) only supports file sizes up to 2GB, and for my Flanaess map in layers that is far from enough, since it weighs in at 8.36GB. Thankfully Adobe has created the PSB file format (Large Document Format) that support much larger files, both in bite- and pixel size.
The 598 CY Flanaess PSB map file has over 40 layers, and I added a few masks as well to make it more useful. You can grab it here:
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessFull598CY-PSB-2019REV1
This file and the Water- and Ocean Masks are the ingredients you need to start styling the map to create a look you like!
By using Photoshops built in filters, blend modes you can create something really cool and varied results without having to do too much work. Below is a version I created in about 6 hours of playing around
You can get the full JPG map here:
http://bit.ly/GH-FlanaessFull598CY-Parchment1-JPG-2019REV1
Here is the PSB file I used to create this map version (a warning, it is 11.6GB):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/sdlwhvekgyknouk/Flanaess%20Full%20Map%20598%20CY%20-%202019%20Edition%20REV1_Handout%20Example-1.psb?dl=0
Here you can see the blend modes I used, and get the parchment layer I added. Test to play around with the filters and see what you can come up with.
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