Heortland landscape

[Jeff]

Some impressions of the river valleys of Heortland. They are often called fjords, but aren't actually the results of glaciation.

Here's the entrance to the Horting Fjord - the mouth of the Bullflood River.

I suspect further upriver near Durengard it is more like:

As you can see, above the river valley cuts through a plateau with gentle hills.

As we go upriver, we get back into rugged hill country into we get into the Storm Mountains. This is in the Jab Hills south of the Print:

[creativehum]

@Jeff I love this. Could you give examples of images from other real-world analogues for areas of Glorantha? (Specifically of  Dragon Pass for my own interests!)

And if not images, then perhaps names of parts of the world that I could Google Image on my own.

Thanks!

[Joerg]

4 hours ago, Jeff said:

Some impressions of the river valleys of Heortland. They are often called fjords, but aren't actually the results of glaciation.

Here's the entrance to the Horting Fjord - the mouth of the Bullflood River.

Completely different from my expectation, to be honest.

There is no plateau above the cliff, instead what we have here are coastal ridges. And too few coastal flats.

At least the rock type is somewhat correct - sedimentary chalk and limestone.

 

The only cliffside I have visited that comes close to the relief of Heortland is the cliffs of Mohare, although the elevation is too low and the rock type is wrong.

The cliffs of Arkona (Rügen) or Bornholm might be a small scale version of what I expect from Heortland - a 1000 ' near vertical rise, with occasional overhangs. Below that, rubble foothills, tapering off to coastal marsh and pasture.

This is how the edge of the Mirrorsea could look like (if you add some impressive cliffs where the distant clouds are):

 

(Tümlauer Bucht, Eiderstedt, Germany)

(North coast of Cyprus, near Kyrenia)

(also northwestern Cyprus, a rather broad coastal flatland with only occasional rock outcrops below a plateau)

(possibly some of the Leftarm Isles, where the plateau portions are significantly lower than at Vizel)

 

[jajagappa]

Here's some of what I'd picture for the coastal flats. And perhaps the inlet heading towards Jansholm.

 

[Joerg]

59 minutes ago, jajagappa said:

Here's some of what I'd picture for the coastal flats. And perhaps the inlet heading towards Jansholm.

I like how your second image shows coastal flats, a cliff, a plateau, and a mountain range in the background, althouh this needs to be scaled up a lot to become a view to the south-east from the edge of Shadow Plateau. The vegetation should be a lot lusher, though - at least to the level of the British Channel coast.

[jajagappa]

14 minutes ago, Joerg said:

The vegetation should be a lot lusher, though - at least to the level of the British Channel coast.

Definitely! This is the rainiest area around the Mirrorsea.

[AndreJarosch]

A long time ago Greg wrote this article (and i hunted down a copy of that book on eBay): 

https://www.glorantha.com/docs/postcards-from-glorantha/

[Sir_Godspeed]

What are the trees we would expect to find in the highlands of Heortland? I must admit I defaulted to lots of pine and spruce with beech, ash, elm, etc., but with this kind of climate perhaps cypress trees are more likely? Not that there can't be overlap.

[Sir_Godspeed]

5 hours ago, creativehum said:

@Jeff I love this. Could you give examples of images from other real-world analogues for areas of Glorantha? (Specifically of  Dragon Pass for my own interests!)

And if not images, then perhaps names of parts of the world that I could Google Image on my own.

Thanks!

Here's a list on temperatures and rainfall/humidity, with some added RW comparisons:

Here another specifically on what winter in Dragon Pass might be like, with added image references: (Spoiler: it's a bit like the Alps and parts of the Rockies.)

 

[Sir_Godspeed]

5 hours ago, creativehum said:

@Jeff I love this. Could you give examples of images from other real-world analogues for areas of Glorantha? (Specifically of  Dragon Pass for my own interests!)

And if not images, then perhaps names of parts of the world that I could Google Image on my own.

Thanks!

Oh yeah, and lots of areas in Kethaela and Prax are inspired by the American West/Southwest, perhaps most notably California and adjacent areas, if I recall correctly. This might have changed a bit over the years, but I think the gist still stands true.

[creativehum]

1 hour ago, AndreJarosch said:

A long time ago Greg wrote this article (and i hunted down a copy of that book on eBay): 

https://www.glorantha.com/docs/postcards-from-glorantha/

This is GREAT! Thanks so much for pointing this out!

And even without the book Greg referenced, Google Image will pull up tons of pictures to fill the need of the book.

Also, the Bateke Plateau is as gorgeous as I would want Sartar to be! I think this sort of illustration matters. It shows why the Orlanthi would be so defiant against anyone would want to unravel reality... no matter how seductive the clever words of Lunar Priests might be!

 

 

Edited September 28, 2019 by creativehum

[Joerg]

42 minutes ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

What are the trees we would expect to find in the highlands of Heortland? I must admit I defaulted to lots of pine and spruce with beech, ash, elm, etc., but with this kind of climate perhaps cypress trees are more likely? Not that there can't be overlap.

The highlands of Heortland? Do you mean the tree-line of the Storm Mountains, or the foothills north and south of the Footprint?

Cypress is definitely a candidate (Redwood is a close relative), but so is pine. Overall, I might be willing to go for a vegetation beween Danube Valley in Bavaria and Austria on the cold extreme and Cyprus on the warm extreme. Probably only winter hard trees in most places, so no olives or oranges - at least not after the lack of summer 1622.

Spruce is a candidate for Dekko Crevice and the Troll Woods.

[Sir_Godspeed]

1 hour ago, Joerg said:

The highlands of Heortland? Do you mean the tree-line of the Storm Mountains, or the foothills north and south of the Footprint?

 

Well, basically everything above the coastal flats:
(I know the map is a bit outdated, being second age, but it was the first and best elevation map I found, and most of the terrain beyond the River being redirected hasn't changed too much).

[Jeff]

That's not a terribly good map I fear - one of our early ones. I'm working on a map of Kethaela at the same level detail as the Dragon Pass master map. 

8 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

What are the trees we would expect to find in the highlands of Heortland? I must admit I defaulted to lots of pine and spruce with beech, ash, elm, etc., but with this kind of climate perhaps cypress trees are more likely? Not that there can't be overlap.

In the foothills of the Storm Mountains, you'll find lots of pine, oak, maples, laurels, and possibly even the occasional redwood grove. Once you get above 750 meters, it ends up being a lot like Sartar, including higher snowfall.

The plateau is mostly grasslands with scattered stands of oak and pine.

[Joerg]

5 hours ago, Sir_Godspeed said:

Well, basically everything above the coastal flats:
(I know the map is a bit outdated, being second age, but it was the first and best elevation map I found, and most of the terrain beyond the River being redirected hasn't changed too much).

Other than being tumbled thoroughly by Veskarthan's fury in 1050, you're probably right. A ten foot wave going through the land may have left ripples which matter a lot at sea or river-bed level but may be invisible on the vertical scale of a map like that.

The coastal flats in all likelihood aren't. I am pretty convinced that Kostern Island has a cliff of an average of four to five meters rising up above a beach line that may be just a few meters wide at highest tide and maybe thrice as much at lowest tide, similar to where the flint mines on Bornholm were found. At or near the tidal flats, a meter elevation means half a world of difference.

 

Just above the flood line, willow, birch, black alder, blackberry vines, hawthorn, dwarf pine, gorse (the prickly kind), and out of the wind bushes like fuchsia or rhododendron would cover land not cleared for pasture and material to secure shore lines in the process of being washed away.

Southern Genertela is probably not suited for mangroves, and extensive reed areas will probably be found only where the tidal outflow is compensated by river water.

On top of the plateau, almost everything used to be forested - in my opinion a fairly open forest of predominantly deciduous hardwood trees in flat (but elevated) areas out of the wind. IMO soil coverage on the plateau is nothing to scoff at, and due to the massive Ice Age Glorantha has undergone, quite a lot of the top soil may be loess (fertile ground earth carried away from the glacier front and deposited here by Storm). Like Orlanth carried Ernalda out of the Evil Emperor's lands to the north... so let's assume a loose sediment layer of several meters above the limestone and karst bedrock in most places, with clays and possibly podsol from pre-Ice Age forestation providing water-retention layers making the plateau well provided with surface ground water.

Where I live, we have some picturesque (but at best 15 meters high) cliffs of glacial marl clay topped by a beech-dominated deciduous forest slowly gnawed away by storm floods, with parts of that cliff and the trees above falling down every few winters. The cliffs of Dover have similar degredation (but no forest on top), the cliffs of Rügen have such forest on top of chalk cliffs.

For the Heortland plateau near the cliffs, the vegetation of the Channel Isles like Jersey might be a good guideline (from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jersey):

Quote

Trees generally considered native are the alder (Alnus glutinosa), silver birch (Betula pendula), sweet chestnut (Castanea sativa), hazel (Corylus avellana), hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna), beech (Fagus sylvatica), ash (Fraxinus excelsior), aspen (Populus tremula), wild cherry (Prunus avium), blackthorn (Prunus spinosa), holm oak (Quercus ilex), oak (Quercus robur), sallow (Salix cinerea), elder (Sambucus nigra), elm (Ulmus spp.) and medlar (Mespilus germanica). Among notable introduced species, the cabbage palm (Cordyline australis) has been planted in coastal areas and may be seen in many gardens.^[120]

For the southern part of the plateau (Esvular) closer to the Storm Hill foothills, the rising landscape might get closer to Istria, with occasional karst coming to the surface:

The edges of the Footprint might look similar, too, although covered in forest. Possibly with quite a bit of cedar and spruce.

But the Heortland foothills south of the Print also feature quite lush and well watered valleys:

(I chose Istria for comparison as it used to be the forest region providing the timber for the Venetian fleet, now somewhat denuded.)

Higher up in the Storm Mountains, the western Pyrenees or the mountainous regions of Greece, coastal southern Anatolia, or Cyprus might be a good guidance.

The rather extreme vertical upfolding of the northern cyprus range (just south of Kyrenia) might actually be a good geological parallel for the upfolding caused by Larnste stamping down into the footprint, pushing up the general ridge of the Storm Hills through which Veskarthan's sons then rose to form the higher peaks, their trapped earth-fire finding a way up between the cracks left by that mighty stomp.

[Jeff]

Here's a little snippet from south Heortland just to give a view.

[Joerg]

2 minutes ago, Jeff said:

Here's a little snippet from south Heortland just to give a view.

Is that a fortification across the peninsula between the Bullflood and Malthin estuaries?

[Jeff]

Just now, Joerg said:

Is that a fortification across the peninsula between the Bullflood and Malthin estuaries?

Yes.

[10baseT]

This is a great thread, thanks! My campaign centers around Salt Point, the marsh south of it and the Vulari peninsula area. This really helps get an idea of how the coastal plain looks like from the cliffs to the Mirrorsea or marsh.

[Ian Absentia]

12 hours ago, Jeff said:

I'm working on a map of Kethaela at the same level detail as the Dragon Pass master map.

For those of us fortunate enough to own copies of the excellent Thieves' World boxed set, what's the current "canon" position on the correlation between Sanctuary and Refuge in Esvular?  Or, for that matter, Midkemia's Carse to Glorantha's Karse?  Understanding, of course, that we're free to do what we want with non-Gloranthan source materials.

In my Glorantha, I've added canals to Sanctuary instead of sewers and paired it to Corflu, which has become a masterwork of Lunar military naval construction c.1614-15.  Instead of being rundown with age, it's boomtown ramshackle.  Think of early-era Venice mashed with contemporary PRC island-building.

!i!

Edited September 29, 2019 by Ian Absentia
I forgot the Moon!

[Joerg]

11 minutes ago, Ian Absentia said:

For those of us fortunate enough to own copies of the excellent Thieves' World boxed set, what's the current "canon" position on the correlation between Sanctuary and Refuge in Esvular?  Or, for that matter, Midkemia's Carse to Glorantha's Karse?  Understanding, of course, that we're free to do what we want with non-Gloranthan source materials.

In my Glorantha, I've added canals to Sanctuary instead of sewers and paired it to Corflu, which has become a masterwork of Lunar military naval construction c.1614-15.  Instead of being rundown with age, it's boomtown ramshackle.  Think of early-era Venice mashed with contemporary PRC island-building.

!i!

Thieves World is the easier of the two supplements to adapt to a less mediaeval layout than the Longshanks fortifications of Caernarfon.

However, at least in my head canon, these supplements still fit with only slight surface jobs.

For Refuge, I'll probably keep the map alterations drawn by Guillaume Fournier and adapt population to the recent canonical revelations about the Brithini, and I ignore the suggestion about a child of Eurmal as wyter.

The road pattern and house assignments of Carse aren't a big problem. The citadel might take some re-furbishing on the inside.

I've been to Caernarfon a few times, with the Carse booklet in mind, and the one thing that struck me as mos different from the aerial view impression in the Carse supplement is that it has been painted as a quite flat area when just marching from the strait through the walled city to the mill pond leads you several meters up, down again towards the walled city's moat, and then quite a bit up towards the area of the pond (where you are almost level with the crown of the city wall).

The discussion on Orlanthi housing provides a number of possible layouts and building styles for Karse. I would go for saddle roofs, not quite sure how much thatching and how much shingle there would be. (And I am of two minds whether slate is available near the Marzeel mouth - the general geology of the region with chalk and limestone sedimental rock makes slate quarries like in the hinterland of Caenarfon quite unlikely before you enter the Storm Mountains.)

[Ian Absentia]

29 minutes ago, Joerg said:

Thieves World is the easier of the two supplements to adapt to a less mediaeval layout than the Longshanks fortifications of Caernarfon.

However, at least in my head canon, these supplements still fit with only slight surface jobs.

Ah, ha.  I just found this brief thread on this very topic.

I suppose what it really boils down to is, Karse and Refuge are really just names in the current canon that owe their origin to the freewheeling campaigning of the '80s.  They are what they are now, and don't track at all to the old publications in any official capacity.

Interestingly, my notes for a boomtown Sanctuary/Corflu track very closely to your notes for a Santuary/Refuge (though I linked the S'Danzo to political refugees from Fonrit).  I hadn't made the connection between the Beysibs and the Waertagi -- nice; consider it borrowed.  Don't like that Fournier map at all, though.  Too many right angles -- ugh.

!i!

Edited September 29, 2019 by Ian Absentia

[Jeff]

13 hours ago, Ian Absentia said:

For those of us fortunate enough to own copies of the excellent Thieves' World boxed set, what's the current "canon" position on the correlation between Sanctuary and Refuge in Esvular?  Or, for that matter, Midkemia's Carse to Glorantha's Karse?  Understanding, of course, that we're free to do what we want with non-Gloranthan source materials.

In my Glorantha, I've added canals to Sanctuary instead of sewers and paired it to Corflu, which has become a masterwork of Lunar military naval construction c.1614-15.  Instead of being rundown with age, it's boomtown ramshackle.  Think of early-era Venice mashed with contemporary PRC island-building.

!i!

Midkemia's Carse is not Glorantha's Karse. Glorantha's Karse is an ancient settlement, although the original settlement was on the opposite bank. Its fortunes have been linked to that of Sartar - the city is the terminus of the land route through Dragon Pass. It is an important trading centre, where ships merchant meet caravans and vice versa. The city was conquered by the Lunars in 1619, and lost to them in 1625. Since then it has functioned as a semi-autonomous city state that pays tribute (or protection money) to both Nochet and the Wolf Pirates.

Architecturally I don't think it bears much resemblance at all to the Midkemia product.

[PhilHibbs]

And remember that "Midkemia" isn't just a company name, it's the name of Raymond E. Feist's fantasy world which is very different from Glorantha.

[Joerg]

11 minutes ago, PhilHibbs said:

And remember that "Midkemia" isn't just a company name, it's the name of Raymond E. Feist's fantasy world which is very different from Glorantha.

Actually, Raymond Feist is only a co-creator of Midkemia, but when he parted ways with Midkemia Press as his Magician novel became a trilogy with follow-ups, he received the rights to the literary use (and subsequently computer rpg use, although I claim ignorance of those licensing deals, which may have been a joint venture) while Steven Abrams and his company kept the rights to the rpg use.

Midkemia is very much a role-playing world with the typical late 70ies/early 80ies tropes done right. It was one of several sources of inspiration for my first (initially Viking-themed) RQ3 fantasy setting which had a few hundred pages of world background and maps, alongside Glorantha.

5 hours ago, Jeff said:

Architecturally I don't think it bears much resemblance at all to the Midkemia product.

I don't see much of a problem with the street layout or most of the NPC outlines, but I think I would twist the architecture, too. If Pavis remains canonical, the layout of Carse is possible, and only the individual houses (which don't have any descriptions of the interior except for a few text passages) need some attention. So IMO the aerial view map of the supplement as published by Chaosium in the eighties isn't usable as is.

The Menai Strait at Caernarfon does resemble a river estuary if you don't look past Bangor. Other local details vary greatly from Caernarfon.

 

From the handling in roleplaying sessions, the City of Carse supplement is way over-defined for running a scenario or two, and the paper format isn't that helpful, but for creating integrated characters and plot hooks it is a treasure-trove. Much of the data is nice-to-have rather than essential, but the same goes for parts of Pavis as well.

I made first contact with this supplement in its German adaptation to the setting of the Midgard rpg, the first game for which I developed a campaign setting/game world (using shards of the official setting to integrate the official scenarios I started with), and that may have made me more aware of the possibilities and occasionally necessities for adaptation.