While I’m working my way through painting another 36 dwarves, I’ve completed my Campaign Map
The island of Middelland:
With a bit of fluff:
My Middle Earth games aren’t set in the land described by Tolkien. Rather, they occur on an adjacent island - one that Tolkien didn’t get round to describing in his stories
- where many of Tolkien’s races are co-located.
The east of the island is controlled by Gondor, whose people fish the sea, raise livestock, and grow cereals. Nortown is the base of food production, with its produce being transported to the deep water port at Londor for shipping to Gondorian settlements elsewhere. Fartower - a bleak and lonely posting for any soldier - guards the fields and roads. The plains of The Great Grazing - an area rich with luxuriant grasslands - is less well guarded, and the drovers and shepherds who herd the animals that are fattened there, fear the malevolence of Uruk Hai and the rumour of dragons.
Though within their domain, the Gondorians avoid the Fated Forest, as it is populated by cut-throats and bandits, while pirates are reputed to operate from its eastern shore. Further south, The Wild is literally that, largely inaccessible to humans, it is the domain of woodland spirits.
The west of Middelland is untamed, with stories of dragons in the mountains and kraken in the sea. There is an Uruk Hai settlement - as if such a civilised word can be used to describe such a dark place - in the mountains at Uruk Mal Votar (Which translates from the Black Speech as ‘Orc Mountain Home’). The Uruk Hai descend from the mountains, raiding the grazing lands for livestock and the farming lands for human meat and slaves.
The orcs fear the dwarves who have made Khaz A Zan-Drakk (the Dwarvish of ‘the Hall of the Red Dragon’) their home. Though not particularly deep underground, the dwarven hold - the karak - is fronted by a fortified gatehouse. What was once just a simple cave is now a Great Hall in which much beer is drunk and great stories are told. The cave had been the nest of the Red Dragon, famously killed by Hekkuth Greataxe, the fearsome Lord of the clan.
The Red Dragon was killed for many reasons, for the cave that could provide comfort and security, for the rich treasure that was the dragon’s nest, for the veins rich with ore that it gave access to, but mostly for revenge. The Red Dragon had preyed on the clan as it moved deeper into the mountains, escaping pursuit by the Uruk Hai. The Dragon had caught the clan in the open, burning and feasting on many until Hekkuth had entered the cave alone to put an end to its reign of terror. With his reputation as a dragon killer, the Uruk Hai now fear Hekkuth and all that follow him. Like all dwarves, the clan holds fast to its grudges. And if they had not been escaping the Uruk onslaught, they would not have been in the open, and the clan would not have been easy prey for the Red Dragon. The dwarven losses to the Red Dragon were the fault of the Uruk, and so Uruks will pay forever.
The dwarves of Khaz A Zan-Drakk do not live under the sky - do not live topside - but their shield markings do represent the sun-drenched sky above the mountains. It is their statement that they do not fear being above the earth, as they have defeated the great evil - the Red Dragon - and are now feared by the Uruk Hai, both of whom had caught them in the open.
Within the Shorewide Forest are isolated settlements of Rangers - men and women of the Dúnedain - who though seeking a simple life, see it as their solemn duty to keep the evils of Middelland in check.
The Wash of the Dead is a malevolent place. An army of humans is reputed to have come ashore there, but while crossing its miles of sand it was caught by the fast tide, their armour and weapons pinning them beneath the waves so that they all drowned. Their spirits are reputed to roam the sands, especially when the sea mist crawls ashore.
Likewise Skeleton Bay, from where few ships have returned, but whose surviving crews tell tales of walking dead.
Welcome, Guest. Please 
April 28, 2024, 07:46:02 PM
May 24, 2013, 11:20:26 PM
