Great Desert
This is the great desert that stretches across the southern and eastern part of the continent. It is bounded to the south by the Southern Ocean, to the north by the Ashy River, the Little Dragon Hills, and the highlands near Dragon Lake, to the east by the Dragon Mountains and the Xi River, and to the west, by the Iron Mountains. The desert is a great vast wasteland, an empty spot on the maps - though like most deserts, containing far more life than is expected. There is civilization all around the desert, and quite a lot of traffic through it, caravans, nomadic herdsmen moving from oasis to oasis, well traveled trade routes and so on. There are resources in the desert - salt and other minerals, as well as places where there is enough water for agriculture and animal husbandry - which give it a fairly thriving, though widely dispersed, economy. The edges of the desert, as well, are fairly fertile and well watered - a coastal climate int he south, a hilly climate in the north.
All around the desert, are several significant cities and states, which are themselves defined by the desert itself. In the north is the great city of Grayhawk, old and large, with a distinct feeling of being on the edge of two cultures. It is a major trade center, connecting the desert caravan routes to rivers flowing west, the Makeesa, which flows to the Greatflood, which flows to the sea. West of the desert are the Iron, or Fire Mountains, a great chain running down the eastern border of the Kingdom. The foothills are dominated by the ancient city of Phoenix, right on the edge of the driest part of the desert. In the south, the Althas mountains run parallel to the coast, and between the mountains and ocean are several major cities. Al Aben, Arcabar, Xandria and Thebes are the most important, each the center of fairly substantial and well populated hinterlands, with good farmland, pastureland, and decent weather. These cities are very ancient, 1000s and 1000s of years old. This is where human civilization began. There have been many kingdoms and empires through the millenia, rising and falling - first, the Black Empire, which originated in fact in Phoenix, spread back to the east, run by religious fanatics using monstrous armies and magic to conquer all. Its collapse led to centuries of smaller empires rising and falling, expanding and contracting, bringing peace and prosperity, and ages of war and destruction. In the present, the southern civilizations are fragmented politically, but united culturally, and all prosper mainly through trade with one another and across the seas and deserts.
Geography
The Great Desert is, in fact, a huge location, and contains quite a variety of geographical features. It is not at all an undifferentiated sea of sand, but rather a mix of hills and ridges, mountains, high flatlands, depressions and plateaux, and, indeed, more than one large sea of sand. It is all hot and dry, relatively barren, though there is water to be found, a number of oases and other ares where life is easier. For all that, it is a vast place, dry and dangerous, and requires careful planning to move through, even along well marked caravan routes. There are a lot of ways to die.
There are a number of relatively distinct regions within the desert.
First - the southern coast, which is not a desert at all. The Althas mountains run parallel to the coast, some hundreds of miles inland, and they create a fertile coastal zone between the mountains and the sea. This is where most of the people live, especially clustered around the large cities. The hills around Al Aben are quite lush - cedars, olives, figs, dates, even grapes grow here. It is part of what makes Al Aben the power of the region - the agriculture provides much of the food and wood used in this part of the world. The area around Arcabar is similar, though not as lush, and is a major grain growing area in the south. Eastward, the land grows harsher, though still not quite desert, until you reach the very fertile delta of the Xi river.
Second - the Xandrian Delta. The Xi is a massive river flowing down from the mountains in the east, past the city of Xandria. All along this river is extremely fertile, and the coastal plain, and river itself, support several large cities, and many powerful kingdoms in history. The cities - Xandria, Trebes, etc, are very large and populous, though being on flat, undifferentiated ground they tend to be more vulnerable to attack.
Third - the western edge. The foothills of the Fire (Iron) mountains is a fairly pleasant land, watered by rivers and lakes, though it is not, itself, wet. The city of Phoenix dominates this area. It is a fairly narrow strip, though - the rivers flowing from the mountains tend to disappear in the desert east of Phoenix. But the area near the city is quite prosperous.
Fourth - the one truly uninhabitable part of the desert is south of Phoenix, a huge, empty, bone dry peninsular known as the Dead Lands. This peninsular consists of high, steep coastal mountains surrounding a high, flat, dry plateau. Many believe it is not naturally dry - that an ancient curse afflicts it, and creates its inhospitable climate. That's for mystics to answer. We can say that almost no one lives there - except Gith. There are known enclaves of both Githyanki and Githzerai in the Dead Lands. How they all live exactly remains something of a mystery.
And finally, the Desert itself, which is also very mixed. The two main types of land are:
High desert, plateaus, hills - this is particularly true around the edges, near the Little Dragons and the Althas mountains. But there are highlands in the center of the desert as well. Some of these get some rain - not a lot - but this allows them to support small groves of trees, and some other plants, and sometimes small settlements.
Depressions - there are a variety of these. Major depressions, vast spaces of low, dry land; there are sinks; there are vast sand seas. These may be the remnants of ancient, dried up seas - it is possible. They tend to be low, sandy, very dry, though with scattered oases throughout.
There are a number of significant landmarks and locations in the desert.
• The Trade routes. There is a major road running from Grayhawk to Al Aben; there are roads from this road to Phoenix, as well as routes running north from Phoenix, along the Ashy River. The Grayhawk/Al Aben route is probabloy the most used, though there are several opther routes of note. A major road runs east-west across the whole desert, crossing this road, and meeting another major road running north from Xandria. There are several smaller routes, connecting the cities, the largest oases and settlements in the desert, routing around contested areas and so on.
• Al Aben Sink - a major depression north of the Althas mountains; this is a nasty, hot land, though it is also a place where you could find water. Much of the water, though, flows into the desert, and comes out at oases - the trade routes tend to run among these smallish oases, just west of the sink.
• The Great Sands - this is a huge low area in the middle of the desert, consisting of sand dunes. Bordered on the east by a range of hills, on the west by higher ground, where the trade routes run. This is very inhospitable, hot and windy, though there are oases, since this is very low. Somewhat notorious as a bandit haven as well - they know the tracks and can find the small oases again, and so use it to ride out and murder people.
• Eastern sands - similar place to the east, smaller, but with a similar reputation.
Natural Resources
Salt, minerals, grazing around the edges, etc.
Type
Desert
Location under
Included Locations
Remove these ads. Join the Worldbuilders Guild
Comments