The Great Forest Campaign

Hello there, it's been quite a long time. I've been working on a fantasy campaign, and I want to really flesh out the setting. I'd like to post what I have here and leave it open for questions and critique. I find that I come up with the best stuff when I'm looking for answers to someone else's questions. Here we go:

Setting:
The Forest Kingdoms – A massive, country-spanning forest filled with magical creatures, magical places, and quests a-plenty. Three kingdoms; Veosha, Kuweth, and Stalux hold sway in the forest. Veosha is a human kingdom that farms in the sometimes large openings in the ever-present canopy and hunts the often dangerous animals in the Great Forest. Kuweth is a kingdom of sentient mushroom people. Their part of the Great Forest is filled with mosses and fungi. Giant spiders, some of whom are intelligent, make their home in Kuweth. The regular spiders do not see the Myconids as food, and the intelligent ones (aranea) have formed a sort of alliance with the quiet race. MUSHROOMS RIDING GIANT SPIDERS! Well, small mushroom people riding medium-sized spiders. Stalux is the kingdom of the elves and fey. The elves have been protecting the fey for centuries, and as such have gone a bit...blood-knight. Their cities are dark, deep into the older woods where no light shines through the canopy. Their society is death-obsessed, believing even their extended lifespans are meaningless compared to the eternal nature of The Great Forest. The Stalux elves have built a reputation of massive retaliation for harming a single fey. They are meat eaters, primarily wearing leathers and have intricate facial tattoos.

Con't

The three kingdoms live in relative harmony. Humans and other races residing in Veosha know better than to antagonize the (frankly insane) Stalux elves, and Kuweth has very little in the way of resources outside of the silk and mushrooms they trade. The silk is valuable, but no one wants to be killed and then have their body fed to the mushroom fields. In times of crisis the three kingdoms will band together, like they did 27 years ago when the Red Blight came to the forest. (Ifrit Invasion). Outside of the Great Forest there is the Broston Empire, which has gained almost all of the southern border to the forest. They want the huge trees and vast resources such an ancient and secret place has to offer, but are wary of the three kingdoms banding together like they did when the Red Blight happened. (Broston set up the Blight, and was genuinely surprised to see an Ifrit army be devastated by human rangers backed by elven rogues and assassins, supported by Myconid Spider Cavalry.

Con't

Trade:
Understand that trade does not happen in large numbers between the nations, as they mostly leave each other alone except in times of crisis. Veosha trades Metal and Stone to Stalux and Offal to Kuweth. Kuweth trades Silk to Veosha. Stalux trades Meat, Leather, and Medicinal Herbs to Veosha.

And that's what I have, folks.

Few questions.

What stops humans from clearing or razing larger parts of the forest into farmland or keeping openings left by forest fires from growing again?

The humans do that. When you're dealing with about forty thousand square kilometers, however, you have a lot of forest. Also, "country" may be a bit of a misnomer. The largest of these, population-wise, is Veosha, which is more of a city-state. Total population's about one hundred thousand. The country that controls the largest area, Kuweth, only has about ten thousand Myconids with another around three thousand Aranea. There are about forty thousand elves. Essentially, there's a lot of room in the forest for potential expansion.

The 'canopy' I mentioned in the Setting section is the top layer of leaves made up of vast trees, fantasy-sizes. No society has homes exactly like the pic, but I figure the trees are close to the sizes I'm thinking. There is lower forest, and that's what the humans clear.

So the main trees are akin to mountains and the bottom floor functions more like underground area when it comes to light levels, weather and so on.

Does someone mine the megatrees (living or dead)? Is there something wonky going in the canopy, like explorer lodges or skyways of different factions or is it mostly outside civilizations reach?

There's a standing agreement between the countries to not do anything to the megatrees. Any tree that's not one of them is fair game, though, as long as fey do not live in it/use it/are symbiotically connected to it.

The canopy is mostly outside of civilization's reach. Creatures such as harpies, griffions, and Branchers, woody cousins of Ropers that act in much the same way but disguise themselves as branches of the megatrees. Speaking of which, the upper canopy can be used to travel without touching the ground, and the vast boughs of the megatrees reach each other in most areas.

Can someone actually enforce the pact about not harming the trees or are there rogue (or privateer) lumberjack companies and scavengers roaming around?

There are rogue lumberjack companies and scavengers. They just have to avoid treants, fey, batshit fatalist elves, monsters, and any 'law enforcement' branch of the governments. While Veosha may just imprison you or fine you, the elves will kill you. The Myconids will feed you to the mushroom fields. Or their spider allies.

But yeah, it happens. The Megatrees have absorbed enough ambient magic over time that the wood is highly prized. It's beautiful; rot, fire, and water damage resistant, and is very durable. It's strength is compareable to Lignum Vitae, also known as ironwood.

The wood is also good for making magical items, taking enchantments easier than regular nonmagical woods.

Does the ironwoods lose its charge over time? Is it still alive after cutting and if is it actually immortal or just slowly dying?
Considering how it is probably the most important resource in the setting it matters whether the factions need to restock constantly or not. I assume that the normal magical material rules apply and you needs special skills to produce anything from it.

Are the nations centered around waterways or do they move around using roads? Can people freely travel around anywhere or does the forest become exceedingly dangerous outside official routes. Is there a underground layer to the forest and what happens if you dig down and follow roots of the big trees?

The ironwood does lose it's charge over time, but that time is counted in centuries. It is not still alive after cutting and does not self-repair after cutting. While the megatree wood is harder to work than even most hardwoods, it can be handled by regular craftsman. Regular craftsman just normally don't because of the expense in tools and time required. The factions in the forest don't make anything out of the wood, it's mostly prized outside of the forest. Fallen branches of the megatrees are fair game by the treaty, and this is where most of the megatree wood the countries use come from.

Veosha has a waterway running through it which they use for trading outside of the forest by means of pole-driven barges. The river has a slow current, making it easily navigable. There are roads going through the forest, most are new productions of Veosha running between the megatrees, but some are broad roads that predate any of the current countries in the Great Forest. Those roads are eerie to travel on, with no plant growth within 5 ft of the sides of them, and no plants within 100 ft above them. The sounds of the forest are muted as well while you're on them.

There is no real 'underground' layer a la Underdark, but there are some caves and ruins of ancient civilizations. The megatree roots sometimes break through into these areas.

myconids!

I need time to read all your theread. For now here you go a bump for the myconid pic.

>cities are dark, deep into the older woods
I presume there are a lot of pines in that wood?

Oh, why thank you. I figured that I've never used the mushroom people in a game before, so why not?

Also, if you can't tell from the first post, the thought of Myconids riding giant spiders appealed to me.

Why would you say that?

I lveo ancient roads.

How are walls and various kind of defenese buildings build?

Not very useful having a wall when you can scale a tree and get over it.

Pine forests aren't dark though.

Spruce woods, especially swampy ones on the other hand.

IRL needle type of trees (Pines) cover all sunlight and create a much darker parts of the forest where nearly no bushes and other types of trees exist. Only brown fallen needles from above.

Myconid should build along the trunk of their trees on top of giant fungi like this.
Perhaps they even use spider silk to build suspension bridges between trees in their territory?
I don't know how much you've developed the cultures of your races, but for the myconids I think it would be neat if they had a cast system based on the type of mushroom they look like.

>Myconid should build along the trunk of their trees on top of giant fungi like this.
>Perhaps they even use spider silk to build suspension bridges between trees in their territory?

Love this, taking it.

Does anyone remember the description of the Beastlands from the Manual of the Planes? The part about going towards the Positive Energy Plane. The center of the old forest is like that, with giant, vine-like branches taking over everything. The elven stronghold is among these massive trees, so pushed together that it's hard to tell where one ends and another begins.