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| NOD Companion cover by Jon Kaufman |
Below, you shall find a world map of the Land of Nod. Previous hex crawls are indicated by the yellow boxes, the numbers corresponding to the issues in which the hex crawl appeared. The red boxes with the letters are the possibilities for the next hex crawl. These boxes correspond to the following locations in Nod ...
A - Sea of Divils - A little slice of Hell on Nod - a shallow sea controlled by devils and their followers and flanked by the cities of the strange people of the Pearl Coast.
B - Azsor - When a dwarven messenger stumbled into the camp of a hill chief called Mogg, little did he know he was helping to found the kingdom of Azsor, a kingdom where dwarves and human live together and a kingdom threatened by giants, trolls and the wild men of the steppe.
C - Klarkash Mountains - The Klarkash Mountain are not only home to the kingdoms of the hobgoblins and the human city-state of Guelph, but also to an underworld where the drow are the least of one's worries.
D - Amazonia - A fetid jungle basin inhabited by the former slaves of the ancient elves, human and otherwise. In its midst is the secret city of Tara-Tilal, the last stronghold of the ancient elves.
E - Ende - The dusty plateau of Ende holds four warring city-states, each ruled by a monster in search of the ultimate power that lies at the center of the plateau.
So, one and all, if you have a preference, vote below. Whatever gets the most votes determines the next stop I'll be taking in the Land of Nod.
Oh, and if you want to see the map sans boxes, here it is.
First off, that is a really cool map! Thanks for sharing that with us. I had been wondering how everything fit together....
ReplyDeleteI vote for Ende. They all sound cool, but there's something about that one that resonates with me.
B.
ReplyDeleteThe oceanic and jungle settings don't do much for me. E would be OK too.
Ends sounds pretty wicked,but so does sea of devils. Gotta vote for Ende though.
ReplyDeleteTerrific map!
ReplyDeleteMy vote for Amazonia.
I want to see the Klarkash mts! I'm still running my S&W campaign set in Venatia and a Klarkash mountain hexcrawl would be perfect for me.
ReplyDeleteI haven't had a chance to look into the last few issues; nevertheless, option E would be my first choice, and A the second.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I believe issue #10 also details Mu-Pan.
Wow! I've been wondering how the previous maps connected on a larger scale. Now I know :) My vote goes to Kharklash or Ende.
ReplyDeleteAlso, a question while I remember: In what issue of NOD did you switch from S&W stats to B&T?
If I may answer this, I think issue #16 was the first one to have B&T stats.
DeleteThey all sound interesting. I'll Ende, with Amazonia as a second choice
ReplyDeleteI would recommend either the Black Gulph or the Valley of Monsters, they should be good spots for something really dangerous.
ReplyDeleteKlarkash or Ende for me. I'm all up for linking the hex crawls up.
ReplyDeleteOh! I see know, you wanted choices from the list you provided. I vote for C - Klarkash Mountains. Although I still think you should consider some of the other cool places on your map for next time.
ReplyDeleteThe entire globe will eventually be covered, even though it will take me a couple decades or more to do it.
DeleteI will totally go for Ende. The potential here is staggering.
ReplyDeletePlus I love the illustration for the NOD Companion. I assume this is the major supplement for B&T collecting the stuff from the NOD issues and updating them? And I assume the umber hulk-like guy is playable race?
The NOD Companion will get its own post soon (I hope for it to go live tomorrow, if I can get my shit together today), but it will contain the following:
DeleteA history of NOD, plus the map above and a quick discussion of the different continents and what they hold
Three races first published in NOD - the notac-ichat (i.e. the umber hulk looking guy), the macabre and the utu (i.e. utu dwarves) - essentially the three characters on the cover
A few new racial class variants for the standard races in the game (i.e. the elven gallant, the dwarf prospector, the half-orc thug, etc.)
Almost all the classes that have appeared in NOD, updated for B&T (plus a couple that never appeared in NOD, but we're going to eventually)
New weapons and armor (totally unnecessary, but always fun), plus the rules for used armor that appeared in NOD, as well as new henchmen/0-level folks to be hired
New spells relating to the new classes in the book - primarily the Charlatan (the old S&W illusionist I wrote re-skinned since B&T already technically has an illusionist) and the Elementalist
An optional proficiency system that covers weapons, tasks and spells
An optional psionics system inspired by the one in AD&D
A system for starting characters as 0-level nobodies trying to achieve 1st level greatness
And anything else that pops into my head over the next 24 hours that I can fit into the volume
Should come in at around 100 pages.
It would be nice if it did because I was going to buy a bundle of stuff from LULU using their awesome coupon valid until the 31st.
DeleteEnde gets my vote.
ReplyDeleteAmazonia. And I can't wait for the NOD Companion...purchased in hardcover and PDF, as soon as it's available. :)
ReplyDeleteMy vote is for area C, I am all of expanding the sandbox area for the players instead of having scattered detailed area's around the map. For Virgin Woode or Mu-Pan it is not that bad since an easy explanation is a sea voyage, but for some of the other new area's proposed I would have a harder time explaining the players ending up there!
ReplyDeleteI'm partial to the Klarkash Mountains and Amazonia. I like hidden cities and underground civilizations. Also Aszor where Dakk can finally be among his people...
ReplyDeleteDakk's story must someday be told!
DeleteOf those listed, I choose Amazonia. I'd actually prefer something in Antilia, as next to nothing is published regarding amerindian cultures for D&D.
ReplyDeleteI'm quite excited to eventually write the areas north of the Virgin Woode to tackle a pseudo-American Indian area of NOD. Saguinay is intended to be an city-state of American Indians who possess Renaissance European technology - their main trading partners are a neanderthal kingdom in the mountains of, for lack of a better term, Alaska (look at the map and you can probably figure out what I'm talking about) and a samurai-matriarchy on the far west coast of NOD called Re-Si (a holdover from a much older campaign world I designed). The areas surrounding Saguinay are inhabited by tribesmen who will certainly resemble the American Indians in some respects, but with a heavy dose of fantasy and weirdness added to make them more than just a pale copy of real people. Should be fun - maybe one of those regions will get the nod (no pun intended) in 2015.
DeleteNice to hear.
DeleteAlso, puns are fun :P
I'd like to see Azsor because it will be on a new continent. I'd also love to see a mini-gazeteer of all of NOD. Nothing like the scale of some settings like Forgotten Realms or the Inner Sea, but a sentence or two about each "land" would be great and could be an awesome default setting for B&T
ReplyDeleteI would like to do such a Gazateer as well. My only problem is that so much of these hex crawls is invented as I write them. In other words - there are city-states and peoples populating NOD that I don't know about. Still, a couple lines might work, maybe a quick description and small map of each "region" of the world would work for folks. I'll put it on my list of things to do!
DeleteI vote for Ende.
ReplyDeleteEnde sounds very cool!
ReplyDeleteI'm really interested to hear more about the Sea of Divils...
ReplyDeleteWhat a wonderful number of responses. Quick tally of votes (and for those who voted for multiple settings, I'll be counting your votes as half votes or third votes for each of the settings in which you showed interest) ...
ReplyDeleteEnde - 7 votes
Klarkash Mountains - 5.3 votes
Amazonia - 3.8 votes
Azsor - 2.3 votes
Sea of Divils - 1.5 votes
So, it looks like the first half of 2014 will be devoted to the Plateau of Ende and its India-inspired dangers and wonders. The second half of 2014 will be devoted to the Klarkash Mountains, a gonzo-dungeon writ large (which means one map for the surface of the mountains, and the other for the underworld - and no, I don't know precisely how I'm going to pull that off and have it make sense.)
At the end of 2015, I'll do another vote for what parts of NOD we explore during that year.
And yes, I still intend to write the entire setting up in hex crawls. And yes, I realize that will likely take me the next 20+ years. We'll see if I actually manage to make it that far!
Your work gave meaning to the word "megarambitious" (I justify the R by virtue of being pronounced in the variety I speak; for those without inserted Rs it would be the lame-looking "mega-ambitious").
DeleteI vote D.
ReplyDeleteArgh. I vote B. And B. And B.
ReplyDeleteE
ReplyDelete