#0248 Close Up With Early Epochs

This is the second close up of terrain in #0248 Archerland. The previous post looking at the 1st and 2nd Ages is here.

The complete Archerland Map Pack can be downloaded for free from DriveThruRPG. I’d recommend doing so as looking at the maps is far nicer than the little pictures on this blog. Take look at the guide pdf booklet that accompanies them, its got some tips in it.

Primordial & Deadlands

These two epochs have similar topography but tell a very different story.

Deadlands & Primordial epochs from the Archerland map.

The primordial is about somewhere inhospitable in the process of becoming nicer, violently.

Deadlands, on the other hand, is an environment trapped in a perpetually barren hostile state.

The first thing you’ll notice about both of them is a lack of grass, forest or anything that might make you think they’d be a nice place to live. If you’re looking for lower planes or brooding alien worlds these are candidates.

The shape of the land itself is extremely rugged, especially Deadlands. There are alcoves like walls made from high hill and mountains. If you’d like your early races to get a foothold in isolation, these will serve as good incubators.

The folds and crinkles of the land make travel routes double back on themselves. Finding land routes between two places will challenge players especially as the lack of forest means rope bridges, ladders and the like will not exist.

Volcanos & Fissures

Deadlands volcans are huge and come in groups to make for lava filled hellscapes.

Volcanos are a major feature in these epochs. Dozens of huge cones spitting lava and Archerland is well endowed with volcanos.

The Primordial has a lot but Deadlands fills its geological faults to capacity.

The ground regularly shakes as these groups of volcanos darken the sky with soot and debris for miles around. If players on the ground can see a volcano then it can probably shake them off their feet and rain lava on their heads.

From this view you can see that these hellscapes of volcanos are a mix of cones, lava fields and bubbling lava pits. Cooled lava is a ruddy colour to distinguish it from other dark features.

Rivers of running lava leak continuously across the landscape, sometimes quite a way from their source. Lava also builds up on top of water where it cools to form islands and bridges.

Deadlands has deep fissures as the mantle pulls a pushes the land around.

The Deadlands also has bonus volcanic fissures. They are a bit harder to spot, but when you do, you can see them criss-cross the landscape like scabbed up cuts. These cracks can be bubbling with lava or just a crack to leap across. The lines are quite broken so routes across them are not hard to find. But is that route solid land or just an eroding bridge over the fissure?

Primordial Water

Raging rivers and sticky swamps.

During the Primordial the sea is a little dingy but the rivers look cleaner.

There are lots of really big rivers, some don’t even reach the sea. This is new water spilling across land that is mostly rock, ground water isn’t really a thing yet so it all sits on the surface and runs wherever it can. The Primordial is meant to be hazardous and this includes rivers that are seething wide death traps of white water.

Where Deadlands has well defined pools, Primordial has swamps. Greenery collects near waterlogged sand and blends into grey water. In this image a ridge has created a causeway across the swamp on the right. Swamp colours go from pale grey to black and get tinted with green. You can use these variations for depth or changes from murly water to sludge to thick tar.

Deadlands Water

What horrors lurk in these murky lakes?

Where the Primordial is all about rushing water, Deadlands is about stagnant water.

Rivers are few and small and the water is not a healthy colour. The water level is also quite low with lots of small flat islands.

Unlike later ages where erosion has sunk small islands into the sea, here looming peak are surrounded by sharp underwater rocks.

Rock & Desert

Primordial above, Deadlands below. Both are barren and inhospitable in their own way.

Both maps are largely desert and rock. Primordial is sulphurous with swirls and patches of, well, even more sulphurous looking stuff. Deadlands is all bare rock and puddles of thin sand.

However there are a lot of patterns, textures and colours in and around these dominant features that you can use. What you use them for is dependent on how you envisage the land. It can be odd colour grasses, gooey algae or surface deposits of precious minerals. Because these landscapes are less recognisable it gives you more licence to be creative.

Next post is all about the Dry Mesa epoch.

I hope you’ve enjoyed this little tour. Reach out to @Leapin_guy on Twitter or Leap Interactive on Facebook and let me know what you think.