Western Heartlands Overview

[DM Leverage]

Western Heartlands
- Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting -

Capital: None
Population: 1,641,600 (humans 78%, elves 7%, half-elves 4%, halflings 4%, half-ores 3%, gnomes 2%, dwarves 1%)
Government: City-states, each with a different government
Religions: All
Imports: Ale, fish, herbs, iron, rugs
Exports: Gold, pottery, silver, wool
Alignment: All

The Western Heartlands cover a vast area between the Storm Horns of Cormyr and the Sword Coast south of Waterdeep, from the Lizard Marsh in the northwest to the Lonely Moor on the fringes of Anauroch in the northeast, down to Beregost and Green Fields in the southwest and Easting on the border of the Dragon Coast in the southeast.

To the caravan drivers of Amn and Sembia, the Western Heartlands are known as "miles and miles of miles and miles"— windswept, grassy flats skirting impassable bogs, badlands, rolling hills, high moors, and lonely forests, all of which are filled with monsters. The farmers, frontier folk, walled-city dwellers, and other hardy souls who live here are strong and independent enough to carve successful lives out on the frontier where skill and intelligence count for more than one's bloodline. The Western Heartlands are home to dozens of separate walled cities, racial enclaves, farm towns, monasteries, fortified strongholds, and armed domains.

The Western Heartlands welcome ambitious adventurers. A dozen crumbled empires have sought to conquer or dominate the region, leaving behind fortifications built upon by waves of subsequent would-be monarchs. Others left behind treasure troves, high and perilous magic, or both. Unlike the densely packed regions in the Heartlands and the North, the Western Heartlands require long stretches of overland travel between destinations—but at least no one freezes en route.


Life and Society

Inhabitants of the Western Heartlands live in scattered wilderness settlements. The people of the west tend to be stubborn, independent, and proud of their ability to thrive in a challenging environment. Their frontier spirit is complemented by a trader's willingness to greet strangers as potential friends rather than potential enemies. Unlike some civilized people of the eastern nations, the folk of the west look upon adventurers favorably, viewing them as potential customers, good allies in a fight, and possibly even as neighbors.

- Areas of interest: Battle of Bones. Durlag's Tower. Far Hills. Fields of the Dead. Forest of Wyrms Forgotten Forest. Hill of Lost Souls. Lizard Marsh. Marsh of Chelimber. Reaching Wood. Serpent Hills. Skull Gorge. Snakewood. Troll Claw Ford. Troll Claws. Troll Hills. Trollbark Forest. Winding Water. Woods of Sharp Teeth.

- Regions - Highmoor (Highstar Lake). Greenfields. Sunset Mountains.



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[DM Leverage]

Green Fields
- Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting -

Over the centuries, innumerable petty warlords and ambitious merchants have established fiefdoms on the northern fringes of the grasslands north of the Snakewood and southeast of the Wood of Sharp Teeth. The current halfling-who-would-be-queen is Dharva Scatterheart. Dharva likes the space, the running water, the lack of taxation (from anyone other than her), and the constant stream of caravans attempting the shortcut from the route through the Cloud Peaks over to Berdusk.

With the aid of a silent partner who has turned out to be a Shadow Thief of Amn, Dharva has erected a palisade town named Greenest along the trail to Berdusk. She's not entirely happy that the Shadow Thieves are her partners, but so far they've behaved themselves and confined themselves to business. That could change, of course. It wouldn't be the first time that a Green Fields enterprise failed because of incompatible partners.

[DM Leverage]

High Moor
- Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting -

Largest of the open moorlands in western Faerun, the High Moor is infamous as the haunt of monsters who loom out of the cold mists to consume wayfarers. The High Moor is a rocky wilderness, vast and uninhabited aside from its fearsome monsters — notably trolls, though travelers who've actually crossed the moor talk more of orcs and hobgoblins.

The High Moor is bounded on the west by the Misty Forest, whose dim blue glades and deep groves have always carried a fey and deadly reputation, and on the east by the Serpent Hills, where snakes and yuanti lurk. These crag-studded, rolling lands are said to ide the ruins of long-fallen kingdoms—but just which kingdoms is a topic over which sages argue furiously. Minstrels sing colorful but contradictory ballads of these lost realms. ("The bones and thrones of lost lands" is a favorite phrase, all that's left of a long-forgotten song.) What is certain is that the moor holds its share of ruined castles, stone tombs, and caverns, almost all of which have yielded treasure to the bold and fortunate. Wolves and leucrottas are scarce on the moor, since trolls, bugbears, and hobgoblins have slain the other large beasts of prey. The relative scarcity of natural predators allows hoofed grazing animals of all sorts to flourish, from small rock ponies to shaggy sheep. Large, well armed bands of coastal farmers and down-on-their-luck merchants venture onto the moor in warm months, seeking horses to round up for training and sale elsewhere, or livestock that can be taken away.

The greedy are warned that hobgoblins and worse always find and ambush large-scale intrusions, and small human bands pay for these raids with their lives. Like the Evermoors north of the Dessarin, the High Moor is studded with moss- and lichen-festooned rocky outcrops, breakneck gullies, and rivulets of clear water that spring from rocks, wind across the moor for a time, then sink into the soil. The moor is also shrouded by frequent mists, since the prevailing winds are gentler than the chill, mist-clearing winds of the North.


Dungeon of the Hark
- Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting -

Somewhere in the rocky ridges on the norther edge of the High Moor is a set of ruins and a subterranean stronghold used by brigands. The most recent are were rats and a mysterious bandit leader know as the Hark.


- Forgotten Realms : The Savage North -

The Hark is the name of the leader of a were-rat bandit gang operating out of these ruins. They attack travelers on the Delimbiyr River, then retreat to the dungeon. If attacked in their stronghold, the rat men retreat father into the subterranean complex below the ruins, where more fearsome things are said to lie in wait.

The Hark, a were-rat thief, leads a band of were-rats, mostly thieves and fighters. Above-ground, they live in reconstructed houses that were once quite fine. Below ground, they can retreat through territory controlled by Xuchallit, a roper, and about a dozen ogres. The roper is an agent of the illithid Beast Lord on a long-term assignment.


Highstar Lake
- Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting -

High in the broken land of the northern High Moors, this eerily beautiful lake attracts human, dwarven, and elven pilgrims who come just to stare at the lake's legendary crystalline perfection. Adventurers can't believe that something so beautiful isn't loaded with strange magical powers, so they tell stories about drowned temples, sunken Netherese airships, and lost civilizations beneath the lake's waters.


- Volo's Guide to the Sword Coast -

Highstar is an eerily beautiful lake of clear water that the dwarves believe has magical properties. The lake has many other names, and so often appears without a name on many maps of the area. It is the large lake in the northern reaches of the High Moor and is usually the only lake shown anywhere near that locale. Called Dauerimlakh by the dwarves and Evendim by the elves, this body of crystal water has several names among humans, and some folk travel days just to see it, risking monster attacks.

One human legend of the lake speaks of it holding in its depths a drowned temple to an unknown or lost goddess, but the most popular tavern tale of the Coast lands says the lake holds magical treasure in its depths—a sunken Netherese airship crammed with gems and magic. The wreck is guarded by undead wizards, the tale goes, who seek to steal the bodies of the living for their own use. They jealously and persistently stalk adventurers who take something from the ship and then escape. They walk by night and leave trails of slimy water, following their prey clear across the known Realms to get their belongings back. Supposedly, if they kill a thief, they steal his or her body for their own twisted uses.

[DM Leverage]

Sunset Mountains
- Lore from Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance -

The Sunset Mountains are a pair of mountain ranges separated by the Far Hills, which are literally part of their chain. They form a high, almost impenetrable barrier between the Eastern and Western Heartlands as well as the eastern edge of Sunset Vale. The main road to get to the is the Winds Walk Sunset Mountains. It usually a clear windy, dry, hot mountainous road. It usually clear from monsters.


Ice Caves

The Ice Caves are where the Yetis, Ogres and Gnolls normally live. Only through the occasion of the Dark Alliance did they spread to hound the Winds Walk and Mount Burning Eye. In the Ice Caves, there are the Displacer Beast species and their masters, Ice Giants. The white dragon Ciraxis had its lair in the Ice Caves and was the ruler of all trouble in Easting.


Mount Burning Eye

The highest mountain in the Sunset Mountains. Once Yetis, Ogres and Gnolls hounded the mountain and prevented the Dwarves of Easting to call for help. The Dwarves that did make it to the top were killed by a White Dragon. Will'o'Wisps and wolves occasionally stray onto the paths of the mountain.

[DM Leverage]

Hills, Forests and Areas of Interest
Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting & Volo's Guide to the Sword Coast

Battle of Bones

As travelers approach the region known as the Battle of Bones, the rolling grassland of the west gives way to chalky white soil dotted by stunted trees. Bones and other signs of an ancient battle begin to outnumber rocks, until the explorer stumbles through a wasteland of bleached bones that has resisted nature's cleansing elements for nearly three hundred years.

In 1090 DR, a horde of goblins and orcs out of the Stonelands met an army of humans, elves, and dwarves north of the Sunset Mountains. The warriors of Tyr, Corellon, and Moradin triumphed, killing uncounted thousands of the invading orcs in a six-day battle. Even the elves' healing magic and the clerics' powers of resurrection could not prevent thousands of the defenders from joining the orcs in death. Three hundred years later, the site of the great battle is still a cursed and haunted land, covered with bones and remnants of the battle that are nearly a foot deep and sometimes pile into great drifts. The sixty square miles covered by the battle are horrid hunting grounds for undead: zombies, skeletons, ghouls, wights, wraiths, spectres, and even liches. Young clerics of militant faiths frequently journey to the Battle of Bones to prove themselves in battle against the undead. Their efforts are countered by clerics of Velsharoon and other deities who view the battlefield as a site for their own unholy pilgrimages.


Boareskyr Bridge

This massive stone structure spans the Winding Water along the Trade Way from Scornubel to Waterdeep. The current bridge is the most recent in a long series of bridges at the site. The bridge is in fairly good shape, though the two statues of dark gods that originally guarded its ends were shattered by spells cast by worshipers of Mystra and Kelemvor.

No permanent settlement lies at Boareskyr Bridge, but the collection of merchant tents and caravan shelters that accumulate at both ends of the bridge never entirely disappears. At any given time, the tents are home to forty to nearly three hundred merchants, travelers, and hangers-on. At one time, two adventurers took the tent city under their protection and enforced a rough sort of law and order, but they moved on to retire in Waterdeep, and the estates to the north were occupied by a series of chieftains and rich merchants' entourages.

Thanks to the battle between Cyric and Bhaal that ended in Bhaal's death, the water downstream of the bridge is black, foulsmelling, and unlucky to drink. "Go drink from the west side of the bridge!" is a common curse in these parts.


Cloak Wood

South of Baldur's Gate and north of Candlekeep, the Cloak Wood is a thickly overgrown ancient forest that looms along the shore south of the Sword Coast. Unlike the cliffs to the north, the Cloak Wood's shoreline theoretically allows a ship to moor and send a small boat to shore for water and supplies. In practice, only desperate mariners dare the wood's nasty population of beasts, monsters, and vicious fey.

The sages of Candlekeep assert that Cloak Wood contains portals to several other parts of Faerun.


Far Hills

If they were not dwarfed by the peaks of the north and south branches of the Sunset Mountains, the Far Hills might be considered mountains themselves. It's not the region's rocky ridges, hidden valleys, and thick stands of twisted trees that keep travelers away — it's the forbidding spires of Zhentil Keep's western fortress, Darkhold. Until recently, Darkhold's control on the region was absolute, but the mage Sememmon's departure has led to confusion, conflict, and laxness among Darkhold's defenders.


Fields of the Dead

Like the Battle of Bones, the Fields of the Dead is the site of an ancient battle. Unlike the orc remains that litter the Battle of Bones, the deaths on the Fields of the Dead resulted from fights between human empires, kingdoms of the Sword Coast, and Amn, who all sparred for control of the area's rich farmland. The rolling farms of the area have had five centuries to recover from the last major war, but old armor, skeletons, unused scrolls, weapons, and magical bric-a-brac resulting from the intersection of bizarre spells still turn up under the plow.


Forest of Wyrms

The great redwoods and thick pines of this wood shelter a multitude of green dragons, who think of themselves as masters of the forest. The wyrms correctly estimate their control of their territory. Dragon slayers come here to hunt, becoming heroes or dying in the attempt.

Harpers and other heroes used to journey to the forest to battle a lich who lived in a castle named Lyran's Hold, but two adventurers finally killed the lich and occupied the hold in its place. New reports indicate that the adventurers who displaced the lich have inherited its evil ways. Lyran's Hold has returned to the list of potential adventuring sites shared over firelight or mugs of ale by seasoned heroes. If new adventurers manage to kill the hold's present occupants, the newcomers would be well advised to keep moving there's no need to stay for over a tenday in the hold, unless they wish to risk suffering the same fate as the previous occupants.


Forgotten Forest

A single mighty forest once covered the center of Faerun. The Forgotten Forest is a fragment of that ancient wood, a living cathedral of oak, walnut, and shadowtop populated by a large treant community. The treants mourn each mile that the forest has lost to the spread of the Great Desert, Anauroch. Another magical disaster to the south, the Marsh of Chelimber, has encroached upon the forest from that direction.

Druids and rangers are among the few who pass safely through the groves of treants. One of the great druids of Faerun, Pheszeltan (N male human Drd17/Dis4 of Silvanus), lives in the thickest part of the forest. He speaks to those who have the skill to reach him, but his home is less accessible than the highest mountaintop of the Graypeaks west of the forest.


Lizard Marsh

Instead of flowing freely into the Sea of Swords, the River Delimbiyr dissolves into a morass of waterways threading beneath cold-weather cypress trees festooned with hanging moss. Humans avoid the five hundred-plus square miles of the marsh, unless they intend to tangle with the lizardfolk, dinosaurs, and black dragons that lurk in its shallow waters. Few of the dinosaurs grow to great size, since they are fiercely hunted by the lizardfolk who give the marsh its name.


Marsh of Chelimber

Some of the ruins dotting this misty lowland swamp belonged to the land's original ruler, Prince Chelimber. Chelimber feuded with a mighty wizard known as the Wizard of the Crag back in the early days of Waterdeep. The prince hired magical assassins to kill the wizard, who fought back with awful magic. The battle spiraled out of control, killing the prince and destroying his lands. A few of the old ruins are too magical or intimidating for the marsh inhabitants to tamper with, such as Dunkapple Castle.

Lizardfolk and bullywugs skulk through the thousands of square miles of the swamp that still bear Chelimber's name, occasionally striking against the Zhent caravans that pass nearby. The interior of the swamp and the oldest ruins are dominated by sivs. The sivs prefer to practice their enigmatic monastic disciplines in privacy, but adventurers are sometimes welcome as a change in diet from marsh bird and bullywug.

- Volo's Guide to the Sword Coast -

The tale of this vast wetland’s creation is known to every youngling in western Faerûn.6 The elementals who ran amok, spreading the Winding Water to flood all the lands of Prince Chelimber, and the warring wizards whose spell battle released them are all long gone, but there are fresh tales about just where Chelimber’s flooded halls lie every spring, as a new lot of hopeful adventurers brave the bogs and lakes of the waiting, mistshrouded Marsh. Most of the tales say Chelimber and his courtiers are now aquatic undead who guard the prince’s huge hoard of gold and silver, dragging intruders who get too close to their flooded hall down to a watery grave. The existence of this hoard is said to be proven by the silver goblet brought to Waterdeep in triumph by the adventuress Andlazara 70 winters ago. Its handle is the snarling boar of Chelimber.

Sensible travelers don’t need fearsome tales of undead to keep well clear of the marsh. It’s a long trek off the trade roads, and it offers stinking mud, quicksand, and clouds of stinging flies, to say nothing of catoblepas, water spiders, water snakes, lizard men, gulguthra, and similar dangers to the traveler. No known trails safely cross the vast, mist-shrouded, dank maze of water and little islets. There’s little to go there for, either, unless one is a merchant trying to capture a marsh monster for a wealthy collector or kill one for the yield of its carcass in magical components.

Some people enter the marsh in search of plants, as some marsh plants have medicinal uses, though few bring high prices. One can also live on marsh fish, though they tend to taste unpleasant at best. A few hunters make a living by throwing weighted nets over groups of marsh fowl from the relative safety of the marsh verges or use poles, safety ropes, and shoe pads’ to gather marsh bird eggs for food or sale. Some eggs are the size of a large human’s head!

Yet there’s a lot of marsh to yield such things. It’s as large as nearby Evereska and the Greycloak Hills combined, and of a size with the Serpent Hills. Its spreading waters flooded a large realm and may hold many riches, plus treasure known to have been hidden in the bog in recent years by brigands and by desperate dwarves fleeing orcs.

Several travelers who blundered into the heart of the marsh have reported a wondrous sight: a castle floating in the air, hidden by the mists until one is near. Obviously damaged in the spell battle that created the marsh, it hangs upside down, close to the ground —but is now home to a huge swarm of stirges that pours forth to overwhelm creatures who come too close.

Misty Forest

Wood elves, hybsils, druids, and rangers move comfortably through the fogs of this evergreen forest. Others have the uncomfortable sense that they don't truly belong on its wooded slopes, particularly not the savage orcs and other barbarians that occasionally sneak through the forest from the High Moor to strike at the neighboring Trade Way. Though the Misty Forest's wood elves are loath to admit it, they perform a valuable service for caravans and other travelers headed to Daggerford, Secomber, or Boareskyr Bridge, providing temporary respite from the constant vigilance required to survive the attention of the creatures that infest the High Moor.


Serpent Hills

The Serpent Hills are a great expanse of rocky hills rolling and broadening to the west until they become the High Moor. The Serpent Hills see more rainfall than the moor, providing scrub cover for the region's innumerable snakes and groves of hardy trees to provide ambush shelter for the land's roving yuan-ti. Copper and red dragons fight for possession of the choicest ridgelines not already occupied by ancient silver dragons.


Snakewood

This place's name comes from the black and green snakes that live here. Clerics of Eldath inhabit the central woods despite isolated pockets of monstrous spiders, giant snakes, beholders, and lycanthropes. An ambitious green dragon named Ringreemeralxoth lairs in the northeastern portion.


The Cloud Peaks

These mountains mark the northern border of Amn. Despite being home to white dragons and remorhazes, they are mined for iron, precious metal, and even sonic gems. A pair of steep crags known as the Fangs guards the Trade Way leading to the Sword Coast lands.


Trollbark Forest

There's scarcely a corner of Faerun that does not have a forest, mountain range, or moor named for. the trolls. Like the rest, the Trollbark Forest is thick with these monsters. The forest's dense underbrush, thick twisted stands of ash, and many bogs make it a perfect hunting ground for monsters that can crash through thorny barriers and nests of poisonous snakes without taking permanent damage.


Trollclaw Ford

The trade route known as the Coast Way does not actually run along the Sword Coast. It turns inland at Baldur's Gate to stay away from the Troll Hills and to cross the Winding Water at Trollclaw Ford at the edge of the Trollclaws. The ford is shallow and functional, but the water is black and foul, still poisoned by the death of the deity Bhaal to the north at Boareskyr Bridge. The crossing is fraught with danger, since trolls haunt the region, especially in hours of darkness.


Trollclaws

Caravans from the Coast Way that miscalculate their water rations send expeditions into the broken hills and boulder fields of the Trollclaws to find the natural springs above the tainted Winding Water, More often than not, the springs serve as watering holes and ambush spots for trolls, tall mouthers, and other murderous monsters.


Troll Hills

The Troll Hills are overrun by the same screaming, festering horde of trolls that lurks in the Trollbark Forest to the north. Some say that the trolls that live in the caverns beneath the hills have a kingdom of their own. The truth is that these trolls belong to a number of different competing realms that would be happy to eradicate each other, if not for the miracle of troll regeneration that lets them survive damage they do to each other with teeth and claws.


Winding Water

The Winding Water dips and hums across the center of the Western Heartlands, growing from a small stream flowing south out of the Marsh of Chelimber into a mid-sized river where it joins with the Serpent's Tail Stream beside the Forest of Wyrms. The Winding Water descends to the sea in a series of cataracts that can be heard from the base of the Troll Hills. Below Boareskyr Bridge, the site of the death of Bhaal (a dark god of murder), the river's waters are foul and loathsome, flowing black until many miles west of Trollclaw Ford, when they clear slightly and turn muddy brown but are otherwise normal. The inhabitants of the Western Heartlands speak of the black water as "Bhaal water" and refuse to drink it, saying that it brings bad luck. While Bhaal water is not poisonous and can support life, intelligent beings who drink the stuff suffer unpleasant magical side effects, equivalent to enduring a curse spell for a day.


Wood of Sharp Teeth

This wood's reputation as a hunting ground for dire beasts, hydras, and dragons has preserved it from woodcutters and settlers from Baldur's Gate—or anywhere else, for that matter.