One of the more interesting things about Ravenland is the combination of a generation(s)-spanning cataclysm that has kept everybody inside, and the resulting really low population levels that resulted.
This is (a) unusual and (b) not really driven home by the rules, so it’s easy to miss. The posts in this section try to point out the consequences of having a land about a third of the size of England with at best a tenth of its population level in Roman times.
What should magic items be like in the Forbidden Lands?
Rare, individual, and always with drawbacks
In a world with plentiful magic, magic items are no longer surprising, but just part of ordinary life, which means the rich will have the best magic. It’s a bad idea to say that you can make magic books of knowledge, or make magic items if you don’t fear magic mishap because you’re already dying: that would mean the Ravenlands would be full of them, and we know that they’re not.
Talking of stuff from D&D that doesn’t belong in this game, having monsters that can only be hurt by magic weapons makes magic weapons uninterestingly mundane. Spells that make traveling easier and more luxurious introduce entrenched privilege that doesn’t belong in a post-post-apocalyptic game where nearly everyone is starting from scratch.
If we look at what the game suggests should happen instead, we should make sure creating a grimoire is really hard so they stay rare and impressive; following the pattern of the magic items created by/for the ancient elves, it should take a lot of time to create a magic item and/or they should always have limitations, by necessity or design. Maybe some magic items were created by / born from events, fairy-tale-style?
Once we’ve done that, we can lean into what makes Forbidden Lands magic items special. They never let you become superhuman; they always have drawbacks, which if not unfortunately rubbish can be a great source of roleplaying; there’s always a story about them, which makes them feel special rather than randomly-generated; and because they have a personality, they’re now an extra NPC you get to play with.
So if your players get loot which isn’t quite what they wanted, that’s the best of experiences. “It just works” is boring. “It works but…” is amazing.
Gracenotes:
If some monsters can only be hurt by certain magic items, you’ve invented combat golf; it’s actually refreshing that Zertorme knows how to adventure; grimoires should feel weird; did the ancient elves make their artifacts or were they given them?; limitations of evil artifacts maybe weren’t considered limitations by their creators; there are so few magic items that a scholar somewhere is trying to become an expert on them all; “I’m sorry, the weird sword wants to say something”; disadvantages that are qualitative rather than rules-based.
Why even is there a rift in the Ravenlands?
Is Zygofer unwittingly the embodiment of the Ravenlands-Churmog rift now?
Most worlds don’t have rifts open to a demonic world, but once you have one, you’ve got a struggle that’s going to last for a while. Leaders matter, whether it’s sacrificing one in a shocking manner or a leader bringing their people behind them, and in the Ravenlands this means Zygofer. It looks like Zygofer is both the sacrifice and the leader, by his indecision between order and chaos embodying the problems besetting the Ravenlands.
Gracenotes: someone like Zygofer was inevitable, an incursion of excess order would be equally weird, order-vs-chaos metaphysics could mean the Forbidden Lands get even swingier, how likely is it that your players are going to be peacemakers?, even if you disagree with me, Zygofer should try to sacrifice / marry Kalman Rodenfell
What does happen in a land with low population density and centuries of isolation?
Nothing is settled; everything is up for grabs
There isn’t necessarily one obvious person in charge; everyone’s gone their way, not necessarily well, and all villages should be really, really weird. The world is so empty and wild that encountering a herd of bison could be a significant challenge, but the PC group might be basically the only one. If everyone else is busy, a focused PC group might be able to do serious damage.
What doesn’t happen in Ravenland given the low population density?
Specialists and parasites need towns and frequent, anonymous travel
Your neighbours have the same stuff as you, so ancient trade ports are now ghost towns. Probably only dwarves trade regularly; other kins’ trade is probably limited to small, valuable foodstuffs, or one-off deals for PCs building strongholds to impress people.
Of course there’s alcohol, but it’s for local people, not travellers. The smith doesn’t have a pile of ready-made swords. If you want horses you might need to find someone who’s got a gryphon problem.
Anonymous thievery or, worse, slavery, are out for lack of people; similarly, if you manage to conquer another settlement you can’t keep it. If you find anything like this going on, it’s out of desperation or because of individual preference.
You need to remember how few people there are in Ravenland
Your neighbours are probably bison, and they don’t carry coins
Either game balance, the map or the armies in the Alder wars let us estimate the population of Ravenland before the Blood Mist, and things probably got worse since then. There’s not many people left.
Zytera+Kartorda have coins, but that’s very much an exception. Most villages have more informal arrangements.
What new technologies do we get from the Blood Mist?
Is there an Elvenspring village full of water-wheels somewhere?
Salient points:
How and where are the Forbidden Lands?
Which hemisphere? Which climate?
Counter-intuitively, it’s probably in the Southern hemisphere.
Noteworthy issues: what do the mountains do to rain, and what does that mean for the climate?