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The new premise for standard D&D adventures is less on world-building, and more about building fantastic, isolated locations and points of civilization so that much of the world remains undefined, unexplored, and ripe for adventure. I'm going to periodically submit ideas for new adventurous locales that could be dropped into any 4e-friendly world, and hope others do the same. Together, a thread like this could generate limitless possibilities for danger and excitement.


The Waywood: A mobile forest of semi-sentient Oaks and Redwoods that roams the plains on animated roots traveling from place to place for reasons understood by no man. The trees seem to be driven by a host of dryads that have left the Feywild, and it is rumored that there exists a cult of dark druids near the center. Sometimes the Waywood passes civilization without incident; other times there are strange deformations, and tales of men and beasts being grafted together or transformed in ways that seem to defy nature.

Steelvein: An outdoor site sacred to the Scythrian warrior-Horsemen. A tribe of militant centaur-archers that survives by raiding and tribute from settled lands. Steelvein is a circuit of roads and racetracks where ritualistic combat and races are conducted by the Scythrians during semi-annual religious festivals. Adventurers that fall into their clutches are made to undergo grueling regimes of endurance, agility, and combat along the tracks, under the watchful eye of centaurs a match for any elf in archery. Those who sruvive are taken to the glittering aurora that shines on a mound at the center of the circuit, where they may be judged by the ancestor spirits of the Scythrians; it is whispered that death along the tracks may be the better fate.

The Singing Sea: A body of water that fades in and out of the Feywild on an erratic schedule. The waters amplify the alluring powers of a host of aquatic fey with mind-controlling abilities, and when the Singing Sea appears, travelers are lured from miles around by dreams of delight planted in their minds by Fey powers. Those that reach its shores are captured and used as playthings until the Fey tire of them, a fate that is usually fatal. But if one can travel there and resist the magical lures of the amoral fey, the waters can be used to brew any sort of magical potion with no other material components needed with an enhanced level of power. But those that drink the waters suffer a great penalty to resist charm effects.

The Aboleth (and its Kua Toa follwers): This intruder form the Far Realm seeks to bring the world into phase with the mad that gave it birth. The Aboleth hates the men of Slautertown and will stop at nothing to see them destroyed.

It sounds adventure-licious, but wouldn't aboleths from the Far Realms get a warm fuzzy inside at the thought of otherwise rational humans reduced to mutant cannibal madmen?

Iceforge: The north has always been a frozen waste, but the grandfathers of the grandfathers of the Northern Dwarves remember a time before the cold got deeper and the horrors of the ice came. For genration upon generation, the Northern Dwarves kept to their mountain holds, for any attempt to travel to the Southlands meant death.

About 75 years ago, a volcanic eruption 5 days south gave the dwarves hope. A caldera was formed, and the hot springs created there gave hope of an outpost. The first dwarves to settle there built a fort they called Iceforge, and a small settlement has grown in this microclimate within the frozen waste. Today, instead of a journey that means certain death between the dwarves mountain holds and the south, potential travellers can make two perilous journeys, with a stop at Iceforge between.

Of course, Iceforge is attractive to others as well, offering the promise of warmth, and food, to the horros of the ice.

The land of Therûn has prospered for generation after generation.  It seems that the kingdom is immune to plague, drought, and famine.  Clear sparkling water runs down the foot of Mt. Kismet.  The food that the land provides has made them strong and healthy beyond measure.  Crime is unknown, and any disagreements (which are very rare) are resolved quickly and fairly.  But this prosperity comes at a price.  On the first new moon of the year, those past their 30th year and have begot children may participate in the Kalibar.  Over the course of a month, the ritual selects ten men and ten women for their strength and endurance.  On the second new moon of the year, the twenty that win have the honor of taking the Trek of Clouds.

Perpetually concealed by dark storm clouds, the summit of Mt. Kismet looms over the kingdom of Therûn.  Believing the sacred mountain to reach into heaven itself, the strongest eagerly climb on this moonless night to the top to commune with the gods and bring yet another year of prosperity.  They are assumed never to come back down from the mountain…either killed by the rigorous trek, or taking their place in heaven.  The fact that they prosper year after year, generation after generation, proves that at least some of the chosen ones have always made it to the top and have been accepted into heaven.

Deep in the heart of Mt. Kismet is the home of a community of illithid that conduct experiments in teratology for their own alien pleasure.  The abundance of the kingdom and surrounding land is an illusion, the populace nothing more than mind controlled human cattle for the mind flayers.