June Patreon Reward: All Quiet in Canniel!

Canniel District and Environs

Well, it's been three months since I put up my first backer reward on Patreon, so here it is released into the wild. The map was generated using The Welsh Piper's hex-based campaign posts.

All Quiet in Canniel

What You Need to Know

• Temperate, rainy climate.
• The city-states in Canniel district collapsed well over fifty years ago under war and plague.
• The inhabitants of those old city-states dispersed into scattered villages and homesteads throughout the region. These are the “hillfolk” named so by both fort dwellers and themselves.
• The parent state (whatever it might be) has been reclaiming the region for some years now. They are not putting many resources into the effort.

000.003 - Ruins of Ekt

• Terraced layers of stone homes with colorful roofs, slowly reclaimed by nature. The streets are filled with the desiccated corpses of those stricken by plague.
• Haunted by the spawn of Leprosa, the plague spirit. Where the Rotmother went after she arrived in the city during the war is unknown, but her flea-men have remained.
• Contaminant-of-Blood, a flea-man, has been accepting human sacrifice from the hillfolk on behalf of the Rotmother.

000.008 - Fort Nail

• Commander: Sullivan Gant - Battered, bad-legged veteran. Memory is fading. Believer in an old, left-behind religion. His men treat him with a mix of respect and great pity. Thinks Tonsure is a useful fool for his magery and Lox a dull, blunt instrument. Fort is properly run by the Castellan Drury.
• Anarchists are among the camp followers here, using the quiet as a cover while plotting to remove the other two commanders and blackmail Castellan Drury into merging the fort with Din (002.007), then deposing the other two commanders.

001.003 - The Oracle

• Accessible only through the banshee-haunted Valley of Signs (002.003)
• The Oracle - species uncertain beneath moth-eaten green veils. Cave is filled with insects.
• Those wishing to see the Terrible Secret must be stung by her holy wasps, an excruciatingly painful three-day process that will leave the disciple near death for days but capable of walking into and out of dreams.

002.007 - Town of Din

• Home of the Stewpot Anarchists - most of the town is a member in some way. Very good at turning military oversight to their side.
• Flea-men in the swamp have been attempting to subvert the movement, sending disguised manipulators in to meetings. Their disguises are getting better.

003.004 - Town of Nod

• Grim and claustrophobic. Immensely wealthy.
• Treasures from Ekt (000.003) can be found in nearly every home.
• Dark secret: people the town doesn’t want around (vagrants, sinners, anarchists) are traded to Contaminant-of-Blood for treasure. Fort Dredge (005.005) has sent prisoners through the town.

004.007 - Old Battlefield

• Remnant of the old war. Nothing left but rusted scraps and overgrowth.
• Jona Setter, a traveler, has come here to find some trace of their grandfather, who died in the battle. They are an anarchist, but not a very good one, and will presume anyone meeting them at such a lonely spot is one as well and start talking about their allies and plans in Fort Nail (000.008).

004.009 - Treasure!

• Deep in the toad-filled festering swamp there is rumored to be an idol of the god interred at the burial grounds (006.010) - a thing of meteoric gold, light as a feather despite size worthy of a king’s ransom.
• The shrine is empty, save strands of sticky, numbing webbing. The idol was taken by the Cutter-Weaver (009.001)

005.000 - The Old Moot

• A pre-war meeting place. The Fort commanders believe it abandoned and ignore it.
• Representatives of several major parties live here, waiting for news by crow:
• Eriphen Ao Bule - Follower of the Jubilant Sword. Willing to work with the forts, to handle the ghouls.
• Snaggle Crackmolar - The ghoul. Wants claims on all the ruined cities, battlefields, and forts. Allied with flea-men.
• Thursday - The anarchist. Wants to subvert the forts through ideology.
• Tobah Longar - Hillfolk. Wants the forts driven out by force.
• ???? - A figure in a hooded red robe. Says nothing at meetings.

005.002 - Fort Rust

• Commander: Elba Tonsure - Arcanist and theosophist. Prone to fits of conspiratorial fancy. Hates Lox for his dull fanaticism, tolerates Gant for his experience.
• Built directly into the mountainside. Single entrance.
• Every few nights, a column of hooded, red-robed figures walks up the path and is accepted into Tonsure’s chambers without question. No one is ever seen to leave come morning.

005.005 - Fort Dredge

• Commander: Burtran Lox - Paranoid nationalist. Hates everyone. Sees knife-wielding anarchists behind every corner (and has been right twice).
• Walls on the verge of collapse due to shoddy construction. Lox’s paranoia has spread: the soldiers are tense, bottled emotions boil over violently. Clamping down on vices with puritanical ferocity.

006.004 - Dead Man’s Mine

• Uranium mine, once thought to be iron and now thought to be cursed.
• Commander Elba Tonsure of Fort Rust (005.002) has sent a few trusted men in lead-lined suits to mine for small amounts. He intends to enrich it through magical means.
• The mine has expanded far beyond its original confines without human touch, winding down into the earth like intestines. Faint grinding noises can be heard from deep below.
• The miners are growing restless. Several are murmuring about arresting Tonsure for abuses against his men and electing a new commander.

006.010 - Burial Grounds

• Not of the human inhabitants, but a being claimed to be an ancient god descended from the stars. It is in truth the mate of the Cutter-Weaver (009.001).
• The body has not decomposed, and thus has proven a lure to hordes of ghosts looking for a potential possession.
• Drumg, a ghoul, is burrowing away at the mound in secret, attempting to retrieve some god-flesh for his faction back in Jale Attera (009.007).

007.009 - Monastery of the Jubilant Sword

• Goddess of plenty and warfare. Two dozen adherents plus nearby villagers.
• Originally built to service the Burial Grounds (006.010), repurposed to current denomination.
• On-and-off conflict with the ghouls, have been paying protection money to the Grockodile (009.009).

008.007 - Hunting Camp

• A band of men from Fort Dredge (005.005) sent to the ruins of Jale Attera (009.007) to hunt for Mellifluous Kobbo Birds. Secret mission: assassinate Zin Snap-Crack, the ghoul carrionchief.
• Yan Kallo, head of the party, has been beset by a succubus in his dreams. He has resisted so far but the intensity of the attacks is increasing, spilling over into the waking world. He has been trying to cover this up.

009.000 - Ruins of Gon Shor

• At the bottom of the valley between two hills. Abandoned during the war after a landslide buried most of the southern district.
• The Donnager Party out of Fort Rust (005.002) has been tracking the Cutter-Weaver (009.001), hoping to carve it up for magical reagents. The real plan is to be “attacked” on the way home and hand them over to the hillfolk chiefs at the moot (005.000).

009.001 - Lair of the Cutter-Weaver

• Described as something like a gigantic arachnid or crustacean with a mossy, pink-blue shell.
• Heralded by and surrounded by a cloud of toxic, freezing mist.
• Webbing numbs flesh instantly upon contact.
• Was drawn here via the Stones of Stars (011.003) and would like to go home. It does not care for you.
• The idol from (004.009) is here. The Cutter-Weaver has laid eggs within it.
• Moths and wasps of the Oracle (001.003) are found here, and fly back and forth between the cave and her mountain.

009.007 - Ruins of Jale Attera

• Shattered spires of brilliant, voluptuous jale.
• Home to a great number of ghouls, who came to the city after the war destroyed it.
• The ghoul carrionchief, Zin Snap-Crack, is barely maintaining control over the families of the warren - he is considered a pretender by all and keeps his rule only through the spirits of fire he has bound as his servants.

009.009 - Ruins of Tillan Holding

• Crumbling fortress on the southern lake edge. The north wall has collapsed into the water.
• Inhabited by The Grockodile, a crocodile-headed, chaos-tainted ogre. He has trapped a warren of ghouls in the keep’s great hall for a feast that will never emerge and insufferable comedy-of-manners small-talk. The Grockodile will demand that he be brought the Cutter-Weaver as a meal. The ghouls want freedom from their chains, but mostly to attack the hunters at 008.007 for their trespass.

011.003 - Stones of Stars

• Concentric rings of standing stones, arranged just so to provide accurate mapping and measurement of the heavens. At the center is a crater of smoky glass and a hooded red robe.
• Individuals who put on the robe fall asleep instantly and, with through terrifying dreams, will learn a spell of their level +2. It will be cast from HP. Upon waking, they will feel alienated from their own body for several days.

Want this stuff early? Hit up my patreon!