Anvar - Adventures in the Nine Cities

I am currently running a Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign and I wanted a setting/milieu in which to place my weird fantasy adventures. At first I dabbled with some random generators, then I remembered I had written up a some notes on a few settings a few settings several years ago. So I took out one of them, dusted it off, and removed any aspect of the setting that didn't fit into the Weird Fantasy genre.

Campaign Overview

Six years ago, Anvar was invaded by the Scourge, an invading force of evil humanoids from beyond the mountains and deserts to the east. The Scourge was defeated by a miracle when the archmage Velho used the Crown of the Immortals. Their forces routed. They fled into hiding amongst the ruins of the Husk Barrens.

It is six years later. The Nine Cities have been re-built and have added a series of defensive walls and outposts to stand watch in case of future Scourge attacks.

The Scourge have been reduced to squabbling warlord cantonments and roving packs of marauder scavengers. Rangers from the Nine Cities scour the countryside in search of Scourge encampments and bases. When a camp or canton is found, a strike team is sent in to eliminate the threat.

The wilderness beyond Anvar is forbidding and dangerous yet filled with lost treasures and the wealth of the Age of Legends. Expeditions of brave adventurers risk everything in their search for knowledge, relics, and gold.

 

The Setting

Gharan

Gharan is a barren plateau northeast of Anvar populated by tribes of barbarians who follow the herds of mammoths. The region is known for its lions, bears, and wolves of prodigious size and ill temperament.

 

The League of Nine Cities

The city-state of Anvar is the capital of the League of Nine Cities, an alliance of city-states in a fertile region around the Middle Sea. The League of Nine Cities exists at a primarily early medieval level of technology.

The League of Nine Cities includes:

• Anvar
• Torin
• Ucia
• Daradar
• Cleft
• Mallocha
• Attar
• Trondar
• Amondar

Anvar

Anvar is the largest and oldest of the League of Nine Cities. It is a walled city surrounded by eight leagues of farmland and pasture. An outer wall protects the city at a distance of eight leagues. Bastions line the outer wall every league.

Anvar straddles the Anvar Cataracts, a series of waterfalls on the Rallentz River. Dozens of stone bridges cross the Rallentz river and connect the city to numerous islands in the cataracts.

Anvar and the other eight cities of the League were founded in ancient times by survivors of the War of the Gods that nearly wiped out all of humanity. Today, Anvar is a cosmopolitan crossroads of culture and trade with a population of roughly one million inhabitants and visitors from regions across the world of Yrd.

 

Torin

Torin is a port city on the eastern shore of the Sea of Garlach. Much of the grain from the plains of Kza are taken to Torin to be shipped throughout Nine Cities.

Ucia

Much of Ucia is built upon pylons in Gravena Lake. The fishermen of Ucia catch and preserve the salted eels of Gravena for export throughout the Nine Cities.

Daradar

Daradar is situated near the Laughing Shallows,a series of river rapids where the Lake of Birds drains into the Amzot River.

Cleft

Cleft is a trading town located within a narrow canyon connecting the Anvar valley and the Mazzan Rift. It is surrounded on all sides by the Husk Barrens. Cleft is a city of catwalks and balconies built into the side of steep cliffs.

 

Mallocha

Mallocha is known for its logging and its trading post where one can purchase furs and skins from the b’alam and therian hunters from the plains of Batos.

Attar

Attar is a city of thieves and pirates. The best mercenary bands and assassin guilds can be found in Attar.

Trondar

Trondar is a port city known for its shipbuilding. Trondarian sailors are renowned for their seamanship and Trondarian warriors are famous for their fierce fighting spirit.

 

Amondar

The city of Amondar is located at the base of the Forbidden Falls that separates the nine cities from the swamps of Aranos.

Rallentz Gorge

The Rallentz river cuts a deep gorge that separates the mountainous highlands of Lacha and Khabak. The Rallentz river begins in the lakes of Garlach, flows through the gorge in a series of cataracts and waterfalls, meanders through fetid swamp of Aranos, crosses the salt desert of Dhren, and ultimately meets the sea of Tarakka hundreds of miles to the west. The Rallentz river is not navigable by boat.

The walls of the gorge loom hundreds of feet on either side of the river. The cliff walls are riddled with caves and are inhabited by primitive humanoid okor.
The Husk Barrens

Surrounding Garlach to the south and east is a plain of scattered ruins that stretches towards the horizon known as the Husk Barrens. The Husk Barrens is a desolate wasteland of thousands of ruined cities, the remains of the great Empire of Yrd from before the War of the Gods. Within the Husk Barrens one will find a few sparsely populated enclaves of therians, mutant scavengers, and the human descendants of criminal exiles. Scourge slavers and raiders also haunt the abandoned buildings.

Lacha

South of Garlach is an area of rolling hills and mountainous badlands known as Lacha. Lacha is a strange wilderness filled with mutants and chimera formed from the storms of chaos magic that blow from the west. Twisted foreboding forests grow in the twisting canyons and mountain valleys. Ancient structures and entire cities dot the landscape. Thousands of abandoned cities lie in ruins along the western slope of Lacha, a region known as Necros, the Kingdom of the Undying.

 

Necros

Necros is a nexus for the plane known as the Thanatos (the Shadowfell). Energy from Thanatos suffuses Necros. Regions of dimensional instability have been known to spontaneously develop there allowing entities from that dimension to cross over into our world. These spirits can animate the mummified bodies of the long dead like puppets or take on the form of ghosts which mimic the appearance and mannerisms of the deceased.

Humans who spend too much time on Necros lose their natural skin coloring, becoming pallid and gaunt. Their personality changes too, causing them to become dour and morbid.

The Kingdom of the Undying is composed of ghosts, spectres, banshees, wights, ghouls, mummies, vampires, and other spontaneously occurring undead . The Undying Kings are powerful members of each type - the Vampire King, the Ghoul King, the Spirit King,

The dark energy that pervades Necros tends to animate formerly living matter skeletons,zombies, animated body parts, bone whirlwinds, blood-flies and animated effigies, will-o-wisps, shades, and shadows.

The Swamps of Aranos

North of Lacha, at the bottom of Rallentz canyon, lie the swamps of Aranos, The swamps of Aranos are inhabited by giant amphibians, reptiles, and snakes, as well as insects and arachnids of prodigious size and various oozes and jellies. Elemental energy spontaneously animates plant matter. Such intelligent and motile plants are indistinguishable from the other flora. Swamp trolls and hags can also be found throughout the swamps.

Aranos is ruled by two rival city-states - the arachni city Makadi-Shahar rules the region north of the river and the drakkan city Batalklik rules the region south of the river.

Makadi-Shahar is a fortified city created from hard sticky webs. The webbing has the tensile strength of steel cable held together by biological secretions with the hardness of cement. Makadi-Shahar is ruled by the Spider Queen and is populated by thousands of intelligent humanoid spiders known as arachni.

The drakkan city of Batalklik is home to the warlike black drakkans and their ruler, King Siyah the black-scaled swamp dragon and his kin.

The wild swamps of Aranos are home to three primitive humanoid races - the humanoid reptiles known as guzi ; the amphibian humanoid frog-creatures known as burhi; and the beast-like humanoids known as therians. All three live a primitive existence as hunter-gatherers dwelling in dismal mud and stick villages. A traveller might find a friendly ally or a fierce enemy depending on the tribe and time of day.

The Mazzan Rift

South of Garlach, over the Lacha pass, is a wide canyon known as the Mazzan rift. The rift separates the plateau of Nram from the plateau of Lacha. The walls of the rift drop hundreds and thousands of feet. The rift itself is, in some places, hundreds of miles wide. The floor of the rift is covered in untameable jungles and swamps. west of the rift lies the rolling hills and granite mountains of Lacha. East of the rift is the vast plains of Kza.

The Jungles of Opir

The floor of the Mazzan Rift is covered by the Jungles of Opir. The jungles are populated by giant saurians. The humanoid cat-folk known as the b'alam and primitive therians dwell in treetop villages while the decadent ophidians called yilan hide away in their ancient vine-choked temples.

The Mazzan River flows down the center of the rift. The Mazzan river is a wide slow river filled with dangerous life. The river forms several lakes where the rift narrows. Such lakes form breathtaking waterfalls as the water cascades over sheer cliff faces to the next lower level of the rift.

 

Nram

The massive land mass known as Nram lies hundreds of miles to the east across the great rift canyon of Mazzan. A thin ridge known as the Lacha pass connects the plateau of Nram with the plateau of Lacha.

 

The Plains of Kza

Most of Nram is covered by the great Plains of Kza, a vast expanse of semi-arid savanna and giant lichen scrub inhabited by tribes of barbarians from various races, most notably therians, baxa , tirikiin, and some humans. The Scourge has managed to establish a handful of fortified cantonments on the Plains of Kza where captured slaves are consolidated and prepared for shipment over the Vrocha mountains to the Scourge Citadel in Lagala. Scourge warbands also roam the ancient highways in order to raid trade caravans and enslave hapless travelers.

The steppes are home to herds of buffalo-sized giant beetles that feed on the short tough lichens that grow there. Tribes of the humanoid insect nomads known as tarikiin follow these herds. The tarikiin often come into conflict as the herds pass within range of the tribes of bestial therians that dwell in low hills.

There are two small cities on the plains of Kza, the trading outpost of Tsolin, the drakkan city of Tarafsiz-Sehir, and the holy city of Malinas at the base of Ayampas, the holy mountian.

 

Tsolin

Tsolin is a walled trading outpost housed within the confines of an ancient caravan watering hole on plains of Kza. Tsolin is a way point for pilgrims on their way to the ancient holy mountain of Ayampa in the Vrocha mountains.

Tsolin is a walled fortress with little in the way of architecture. The fort is surrounded by a stout defensive wall. Within can be found watering holes, hostels, stables, machine shops, mercantile shops, and offices for merchant companies and guides.

Tsolin lies at the crossroads of two of the ancient highways that connect the hundreds of ruined decaying pyramid cities across Nram and the plains of Kza. Tsolin conducts trade with the tarikiin as well as with representatives from the rival desert drakkan kingdoms of Mavi-Sehir, Kali-Sehir, and Tarafsiz-Sehir. A few exiles from the nomadic tribes of bestial therians sometimes find their way to Tsolin but the tribes themselves prefer to maintain their isolation.

 

The Realm of the Lich Queen

A large region south of the plains of Kza are ruled by Ungluab the Lich Queen.

Unglaub was a former wizard exiled from the Nine Cities for practicing the forbidden magic of necromancy. She used her profane powers to cheat death and emerged from her tomb as a lich. She leads armies of zombies and skeletons and other reanimated undead in her quest to destroy the Nine Cities.

The Vrocha Mountains.

The eastern edge of Nram rises to form the Vrocha mountains. The mountain valleys are inhabited by tribes of tall humanoid demi-colossi called golyat and bestial therians. Grey-skinned okors dwell in the caves of the mountains.

Stone colossi occupy beautifully carved subterranean complexes deep under the roots of the mountains. Such complexes feature soaring vaulted ceilings and tall columns and are illuminated by glowing crystals.

Many mountains are ruled by tyrannical flame dragons and their drakkan armies and servants. Chief among them is Kirmizi which is ruled by the flame dragon named King Kehennem.

The mountain peaks are also inhabited by all manner of flying beasts such as griffons, pegasi, and stone gargoyles. The mountain slopes and valleys are inhabited by four-armed mountain gorillas, giant lizards and giant spiders, and mountain trolls.

The Vrocha Mountains are riddled with the innumerable tunnels of abandoned mines. Mineral companies from the League of Nine Cities employ humanoid basanite miners from the subterranean land of Mokor and often make use of local golyats and therians as guides and guards.

 

The Oasis of Lagala

At the base of the eastern slope of the Vrocha mountains are several small oases. The largest oasis was the ancient city-state of Lagala. Six years ago Lagal was bombed into submission and subsequently conquered by the Scourge. Lagala is now home to a Scourge Citadel- a combination military base, manufacturing center, and slave city.
Khabak

To the north of Lacha is a region known as Khabak, an area of rugged badlands and wind-swept wastes where dwell bandits and exiles. Khabak is separated from Lacha via Rallentz Canyon, an area of deep gorges, canyons, and ravines populated by barbarians known as Lowlanders.

The northwestern edge of Khaback is a strange place where the land breaks away and floats magically in the air. These sky-islands are home to a plethora of flying beasts and air elementals and is the domain of the aarocka.

Hurator

Hurator is a strange magical region north of Khabak. Hurator is infused by the magical winds blowing over the Inland Sea from the south. This magic causes the land itself to detach from the bedrock and float in the sky. 

Ancient cities of marble, glass, and crystal can be found on many of the sky-islands. These cities are inhabited by the humanoid avianoids known as aarokan as well as the solitary cloud colossi. The cloud colossi respond quickly and harshly to any perceived intrusion into their realms. Great Nabatosian tempest colossi have been known to construct powerful fortresses in the skies of Hurator. It is unknown how these powerful beings traveled to Hurator.

Hurator is a nexus for the elemental plane known as Aeros. Elemental energy from Aeros suffuses Hurator. Regions of dimensional instability have been known to spontaneously develop there allowing entities from that dimension to cross over into our world. Zinj from Aeros have established strongholds across Hurator. These strongholds are defended by air elementals, aarokan slaves, and various intelligent Huratorean beasts.

The wild skies of Hurator are inhabited by every manner of flying creatures. Many are aerial versions of aquatic creatures such as sky-sharks, whales, giant octopi, and others. The sky-islands are home to every type of flying creature including rocs, and giant eagles along with strange hybrid beasts created by magical chaos such as harpies, pegasi, peryton, and many more.

Wakar-Nasar

Wakar-Nasar is a magnificent marble capital of the aerial kingdom of the aarokan built atop a floating island in the endless sky of Hurator.

Wakar-Nasar is a city of domes, spires, and elevated walkways made of white Mokorian marble and clear Thomonian crystal. The city serves as a port for airships and flying mounts that connect the cities of Garlach to remote sky-island villages.

Expeditions from Wakar-Nasar seek out uninhabited sky-islands to be mined for magic-infused minerals and crystals. Newly constructed alchemical hover-factories built and operated by robotic matons from Makina extract useful gases from the atmosphere for use in various manufacturing and alchemical processes.

Malos

West of the Lacha lies the lowlands of Malos. Malos is a desert of inhospitable salt and sand surrounding the Inland Sea. Great dunes of salt and sand comprise the bulk of the terrain. Occasional isolated peaks rise from the featureless plain. The Mitaat mountain range rises to the west. Beyond lies more salt desert for as far as anyone has ever travelled.

Insects and reptiles form the dominant forms of life in the desert, many growing to prodigious size due to the influence of magic. Magical chaos storms blow from the southwest giving rise to creatures composed of animated sand, dust, or pebbles including dust devils, sand stalkers, dust weirds, and others.

Malos is home to three kingdoms, each ruled by a group of blue drakkan rivals : Mavi-Sehir, Kali-Sehir, and Vadi-Sehir. Each kingdom is ruled by a powerful blue-scaled desert dragon from an impregnable mountain fortress. Of the three, Vadi-Sehir is the only one that is tolerant of human outsiders.

Vadi-Sehir

Vadi-Sehir is a drakkan trading city-state located where the Rallentz River meets the Inland Sea
The Inland Sea

The Inland Sea is a shallow body of water in the center of the desert land of Malos.
The Citadel of Daqhal

The citadel of Daqhal rests atop a tall mesa just northwest of the plateau of Khabak. Daqhal overlooks the salt desert of Malos. The city is unknowably ancient and is built upon untold layers from previous epochs. The undercity of Daqhal is a labyrinthine warren of passages and chambers occupied by scavenging ratkin. Daqhal is surrounded by ancient crumbling ruins of once-vast cities similar to those in the Husk Barrens.

Due to its location atop a mesa in a deep chasm, strong winds from the west keep the city clear of the polluted air that plagues much of Yrd.

 

The Forests of Arba

Far to the north of Khabak, near the northern pole of Yrd, lie the ancient forests of Arba. The entire region is a nexus for the plane known as Aeon. Life energy from the Aeon suffuses Arba. Regions of dimensional instability have been known to spontaneously develop there allowing entities from that dimension to cross over into our world.

Tribes of bestial therians live in isolated villages, some constructed among the boughs of the massive trees, deep within the forests of Arba.

The deep forests of Arba are sacred places protected by the green-skinned demi-colossi known as maor. The maor are solitary creatures and lack an organized society or government.

The forests are also home to cave-dwelling green-skinned okor as well as various beings from or influenced by Aeon. Such beings include nymphs, faeries, brownies, leprechauns, unicorns, and dryads.

The temperate forests of Arba are inhabited primarily by mammals such as wolves, deer, elk, lions, bears, etc. The fey magic that permeates Arba gives rise to spontaneously animated plant creatures such as treants, shambling mounds, twig blights, etc. The fey magic also causes many natural fauna to grow to prodigious size or unusual intelligence.

During times of crisis the maor will call upon and organize all the inhabitants of the forests to come to the defense of the arboreal realm.

The mountain kingdom of Orman located within the forest is ruled by a powerful forest dragon king Celadon and his hairs.

 

The Scourge

The Scourge is a force of invaders that hail from a land across the eastern ocean. The Scourge consists of at least four races: warlords, marauders, crushers, and dregs.

Warlords are tall muscular blue-skinned demi-giants with long bovine horns, pointed ears, and demonic faces. They are inherently magical and are able to change their appearance, become invisible, and control the minds of others. They are fierce fighters but prefer to compel others to fight on their behalf. Warlords occupy positions of leadership within the Scourge hierarchy.

Marauders are red-skinned humanoids with pointed ears and demonic faces. They are the rank-and-file soldiers within the Scourge hierarchy. They fill the ranks of the Scourge infantry, pilot Scourge warmachines, and crew the Scourge airships.

Crushers are tall muscular humanoids with yellow skin, pointed ears, and demonic faces. They possess great strength and stamina. Crushers are used as assault troops and heavy weapons fighters.

Dregs are diminutive humanoids with pointed ears, yellow or green skin, and demonic faces. They are the most common type of Scourge soldier and usually occupy menial or support positions, serve as reconnaissance, or are used as cannon fodder, diversions, or targets.

The Scourge are aggressive and warlike. They prefer invasion and conquest over trade and negotiation. They possess an industrial society that requires the continual acquisition of slave labor and new fuel and mineral resources. The Scourge uses a mechanized army of airships, land crawlers, and other armored vehicles, and infantry to invade a new land. Once conquered, the scourge demolishes much of the existing architecture, leaving only a few structures standing for their own purposes. They enslave the populace, collecting them into concentration camps. The slave laborers are then forced to extract metal and build new cities and factories. The factories, in turn, manufacture new weapons and war machines for the next invasion.

Using this strategy, the Scourge has conquered much of the continent of Xaya. Having depleted the mineral and fuel resources of Xaya, the Scourge sent an expedition west in search of new lands. The expedition crossed barren salt deserts and shallow seas for several days until they encountered the eastern edge of the plateau of Nram and the small nations they found there. The Scourge did not tarry. The expedition force left behind a small garrison to enslave the local kingdoms but continued west, a ten day journey over the Vrocha mountains and across the great plains of Kza in search of the rumored land of Garlach.

The Scourge Invasion

Six years ago invaders came to Nram from across the eastern salt desert of Malos. The invaders were an expeditionary armada of strange humanoids called the Scourge. They came in their armored flying ships and razed the cities of the eastern coast. They enslaved the survivors and set about rebuilding the cities into colonies of the Scourge.

The Scourge pushed west, enlisting the aid of the barbarian nomads that dwelled in the foothills of the Vrocha mountains. The Scourge soon encountered the allied armies of the League of Nine Cities. The Scourge armada included mechanized airships with bombs and artillery. The Scourge armies were led by magical demi-giants called Warlords and included well-trained soldiers called Marauders and muscle-bound shock troopers called Crushers. The comparatively less technologically developed allies defended their medieval cities with horses, swords, spears, bows, and primitive bombards.

The defenders of the Nine Cities were overwhelmed and the Scourge armada continued west and levelled the cities of Lacha and Cleft while their barbarian mercenaries rounded up the survivors as slaves. The allied forces of the Nine Cities made their final stand at the city of Anvar.

The outcome looked grim for the alliance until, with the invading armada prepared to launch their final attack against Anvar, the enigmatic archmage named Velho appeared and destroyed the Scourge using a powerful artifact called the Crown of the Immortals.

The day was saved. The Scourge armada was destroyed and the ground forces were routed and fled, scattering into the Husk Barrens. The Crown of the Immortals was placed within the vaults of Anvar where it could be used again in times of great need.

In the ensuing six years, the strategy at the Scourge Citadel in Lagala has shifted towards the acquisition of slaves and the consolidation of their power along the east and building the infrastructure necessary to reconstruct their devastated fleet of mechanized airships. The Scourge possess only a few airships with which to cross the impenetrable Vrocha mountains. They have established a few small cantonments which are used to consolidate slaves prior to shipment over the mountains. Groups of marauders in armored mechanized vehicles also harry trade caravans traversing the ancient roads that cross Lacha and Nram.

Meanwhile, the League of Nine Cities built a series of defensive walls and modernized their allied armies with new weapons and vehicles designed by Magister Ayan.

The Vrocha mountains and the Mazzan rift create natural impediments that discourage land invasion from the east. A series of defensive fortifications have been built around Garlach with special attention paid to the Lacha pass. Convoys of armed mechanized transports cross the ancient roads that connect the Nine Cities to the remote mines of central and southern Lacha and the east slope of the Vrocha mountains.

Rangers patrol the regions around Garlach, the Husk Barrens, the jungles of the Mazzan rift, searching for Scourge cantonments and encampments. Once located, the sites are reported to the Ministry of Defense and a strike team is sent to eliminate the threat.