Desert Adventuring

We do not go there, too many Sandworms and Blue-Eyed savages. Everyone knows there's nothing of worth in the desert other than spice

To the south, there's a human kingdom situated along several rivers, I guess you might consider this an Egypt rip off if you had really low standards for defining 'Egypt'. To the north, the desert itself is inhabited by the sun elves, these are various nomadic groups which have been travelling the desert for longer than humans have existed, elven physiology allows them to survive on much less food and water. The sun elves mostly acted as traders, allowing goods and communication to go between the human river kingdom and the elven citadels north of the desert. However as humans started to build towns and villages away from their usual heartlands, around wells and oases, some of the sun elves decided there was more to be gained in raiding these villages (since they know the human kingdoms would have a hard time counterattacking). This was a minority of sun elves, but still enough to be a persistent problem for the human villagers.

A thousand years ago, a meteor came. It carved a path through the middle of the super-continent, almost bisecting it in half (for reasons yet to be discovered or searched for, the impact didn't do more, like end all life).

What remains connecting the two halves of the continent is a small strip of land to the north; mostly glassy-desert, with not much hope for plant growth in the coming centuries. Seeing the potential for setting up tolls, the dragons (and dragonborn) moved to the strip, charging a toll for passage. It came to be known as the Dragon Strip.

Over time, however, it was discovered that the impact point of the meteor, to the south of the strip, caused a sort of rift between planes/dimensions/realities, allowing monsters of all kinds to enter through. The dragons vacated the strip, and established a walled city on either end.

The cities are connected to each other by a magi-tech adamantite train with a crystal powered forcefield. Anything short of that wouldn't last against hordes of death dogs, and ravenous purple worms. The cost was more than made up for by the extra toll for using the train and the revenue that came from markets set up in either city.

Several generations ago, the dragons exiled their white siblings to the desert. The cause isn't known, even by some dragonborn.

The whites, already primal by nature, thrived(in a sense) in the desert. They established several settlements around the desert. Their settlements don't get attacked by purple worms for some reason.

Some people don't wish to pay for the exorbitant train tickets. Others (very rare) don't have a pleasant train ride, either by malfunction, determined monster attack, or mysterious circumstances, and fall of the train. Both kinds find themselves helpless in the desert, surrounded by monsters, or nearly starving/dying of thirst.
Some very lucky ones are found by wandering white dragonborn, and are taken to their settlements.
Do you guys want more?

Does anyone have cute fennec foxgirls in their deserts?

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>In the desert, all water is precious. Any sort of pollution can mean death for an entire clan. Intentional poisoning is tantamount to mass murder, and the punishment must be severe. In the olden days, the punishment was "simply" exterminating the offending party and their family. This backfired when some perpetrators' families turned out to be too powerful or well-connected to wipe out without risk of war.
>Eventually a new punishment was developed: the offending clan would be condemned to live permanently at the source they had polluted. Sacred hospitality would be denied them, and their names and location would be wiped off all maps and records. The assumption was that the offenders would eventually die to their own poison, inbreed themselves to unviability, or just kill themselves. This assumption proved naive.
>The outlawed clans, formally known as the Banished (also called the Damned, the Polluted, and other ominous and unflattering titles) secretly held onto the personal maps and records that still bore their names and locations, as well as those of other banished clans. Over time they banded together, fortified their homes with whatever they could gather, and became a shadow society dedicated to their own survival and comfort, all at the expense of the nomads that condemned them.

Pic unrelated.

>It carved a path through the middle of the super-continent, almost bisecting it in half (for reasons yet to be discovered or searched for, the impact didn't do more, like end all life).

nigger do you have any fucking clue how plate tectonics work

I like this, tell me more user.

>(for reasons yet to be discovered or searched for, the impact didn't do more, like end all life)

The actual reason is: long story short, a war was going on, someone summoned a giant meteor, everyone joined forces to try and stop it, it only slowed down, skimming the surface until it reached the ocean. The skimmed surface soon filled with water, creating a (relatively) shallow sea dubbed the carved sea.

That's my explanation. If you know about plate tectonics, and see that my explanation doesn't make sense, then please help me make it make sense

How did they survive the polluted water long enough to band together?

Different user, different complaint: you should have some explanation as to why the massive amount of ejected material didn't get kicked up into the atmosphere and block out the Sun and kill everything. Maybe some mages worked together to remove/contain the dust? Maybe your planet gave birth to some new asteroids / small moons to revolve around it?

I actually ruled that the carved out material (along with the remains of the meteor) made a new island to the south. I really didn't think it through.

900 or so years later, humans sailed from that island to the super-continent in an attempt to conquer it (not Darwin, just other visitors through the rift)

So, asteroids you say? How about floating islands?

Sounds cool

Most don't survive. The ones that do either find a way to purify the water, have contacts that are willing to share in secret, or turn to banditry.

The deserts are inhabited by weird tribes, one tribe that uses armour made out of fantasy cactus's, one tribe that seals their entire body with leather and membrane shaved off giant bugs so they can actually live inside sandstorms, etc...

...seriously?

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Dark Sun

Not all poisons are fatal. It could sicken them but survivably so.

So your saying a setting based around scrappy scavengers and their tech journeying through lands of savage tribals in their quest to follow ancient icons to a hidden paradise city?

Well NOW I'm saying that.

Can't go wrong with sand worms

WE

ATE

AT

JERUSALEM

'S MCDONALDS

ON OUR WAY TO

Reminder that walking in sand sorta sucks. Just saying.

>posting more than one word
Let's pack it up guys, it's ruined.

How do locals traditionally traverse sand? Horse? Camel?

Horses for short distance fast rides, or long distance very long rides. They don't usually have the stamina to carry baggage and you at the same time.

Camels are primarily used, due to their ability to walk much longer (days) than most other desert denizens while carrying a lot of baggage.

Walking is mostly discouraged unless you know of some friendly people on your path that would willingly resupply you, or are desperate. You can't carry all the supplies you'd need in the desert on your back.

Some people that don't have enough camels, walk with the camel(s) carrying their baggage. The camels carry the supplies they need. The camels also function as an emergency water supply, by cutting them open and drinking the water they store in them.
Rich enough people can ride a horse, while the camel carries the baggage (camels can cause sea sickness to beginners due to the weird way they walk).

Pic related, as camels can, in fact, run

>The camels also function as an emergency water supply, by cutting them open and drinking the water they store in them.
Really? That's neat as fuck.

Your face ruined it

>Who lives there? How do they live? What do they do to eke out a living in an endless sea of worthless sand?

My favorite is a race of cactus people that go dormant for long stretches at a time, but when the rains do hit the desert, they wake up en-masse and act as guides and traders, helping adventurers and caravans, because no one else can navigate the vast desert expanse.

Whatever you say, Harkonnen.

What do people pay them? Do they act out of the goodness in their "hearts"?

But how would you fuck it without ending up like this?
youtube.com/watch?v=PHSJCMkUa9Y

Perhaps it's something that can prolong their wakefulness? Maybe it's just more water. Mostly, I just like the thought of a caravan circling up and battening down for a storm near a large patch of cactus. Then the next morning, they wake to find cactus people ready to barter.

The eastern frontier is a vast wastland in the west of New Order and Central Repubblic, and before the war it was used as trade rutes for trading to the Other Land. Now is mostly abbandoned, most of the human settlement are left to root and ancient city of elder civilizations are hiding under the sands dunes.
In the past century it was home of the First Civilization, but it's history is long been lost
There are many minor city that helps the travelers, but in recent years is become more and more dangerous due to the conflict.
It's rocky, old and dangerous, but something under the surface of it is awakening.

We care about the fantasy Arabian Nights not the real world shithole. The same way we like fantasy Western Europe but don't usually play in actual Western Europe.

At the moment? Technically no one living. The only resident that lives there would be Arswyder, a rather odd lich. In truth, the Dead Expanse was completely devoid of all life. Arswyder was an ancient scholar about eight thousand years ago that believed the Expanse once contained life, and could possibly do so again, with proper conditions. About eighty years into his research, he discovered that certain plants and animals could, in fact, adapt to the climate and lack of resources if organic matter that had decomposed was at least minimally present. Naturally the idea dawned on him "what if I covered parts of the Expanse with corpses? Would I be able to make it hospitable once again?" To be able to see if it would work, he turned himself into a lich, and started down the rabbit hole. He started with massive amounts of plants, animals, and eventually humans from nearby settlements. He found the flesh and organic gubbins were the most suitable, with bone being depleted of usefulness in about a century, so he set about reanimating skeletons as his laborers to set about altering certain key geographic distinctions. A mountain range, for example, blocked certain air currents from bringing rainfall, so naturally he wanted to slightly modify it so the rain would dispense evenly on both sides. Turns out the residents of the mountains didn't appreciate a then two-thousand year old naked skeleton in a sunhat doing geological surveys and attempting to destroy their beloved home. Also turned out they proved to be extremely useful undead laborers. After six thousand more years of this, the Expanse became known as the Flayed Lands, but Arswyder didn't give a shit. Now there are small creatures, some variations of shrubs, and an amazing quarter of an inch of rainfall every year, so his plan seems to be working. My adventurers, however, are going to choose if this land will eventually become habitable or stay as is.

to continue, there are certain gods that have taken interest in the project, including a minor river god that takes the form of a turtle dragon, and has taken a liking to the lich and has a few tortoises and snapping turtles as his entourage, one that even serves as Arswyder's phylactery. The condition for the river god's support is that all of his kin will be honored wherever his river feeds into the lands. He of course agreed, and the river god's kid serves as an emissary/student for the twosome, keeping the lich company and the god informed. Of course, this will take thousands more years to come to fruition, and none except a few gods will know of it.
>TL:DR my desert is a crazy lich's terrarium project that prefers corpses as fertilizer and cheap labor with a flare for turtles

The desert I have reaches to the far north, so it is far colder than what it would appear to be.

Deltora Quest!
I'd like to play a game in that setting sometime.

BEATING