Hex 7-9 Chagrinspire: Update and continuity check

This is a recap on some important hexes.
I might try some more big single hex maps for the setting.

These hexes were occupied by the party, and after drawing a line on a map, they found secret villages. Dog folk and barbarians were moved in by Arsh to secure territory.  The druidic one was first and friendly.

The party as a whole visited the Elemental Templars, whom players had heard of in my Bronze and Stone Age games but never dealt with. They seemed remnants of the prehistoric elementalist religion that had twice tried to take the world, but others did it better and longer and left more memories. They were a weird bunch, all in archaic armour styles with different arcane symbols. Many factions and cults of the most ancient gods were among their members. Religions that had declined after the apocalypse, leaving our bright and dark gods, civilised humans like now, a thousand years later. Early in the apocalypse gods came to destroy the chagrinspire, and it was a disaster. Gods of all kinds were killed and enslaved by their great doomsday machine, the Black Sphere. Hundreds of gods who made material avatars were destroyed, banishing them from the world for an aeon. Other gods fled and have not returned since, which didn't help their popularity. Starved of sacrifices, many gods slept or withered to just great spirits. They long to restore their power, but the black sphere still drains the world's life force. 

Anyway, these old elemental heracy templars were in fact highly diverse in their elementalism. Pilgrims came from many places here to meet others and return. Thy trade spells and lore and copy books. They are part of the great comeback.   

7 and 9 players have been in quite a bit and annexed into their Gateway Kingdom
8 players passed once 

---------------------

Hex 7
Southern Lakes
• Mercenary Outpost (damaged) with defensive force remaining after labs destroyed. Was secretly gathering secrets of improved guns to take to the warring kingdoms of the eastern lands
• Burned remains of Pickleton Bulwark (Merchant Guild + Mercenary Guild) operated by A merchant and a mercenary company seeking guns

• Blackbog village ruins, a criminal den of gambling and vice, burned by crusaders 30 years ago

• Ruins of the chapel of light and the graveyard from the failed village of Caladas, made of religious farmers
• Sagassum in the lake with giant marine plants and visible shipwrecks and violent inhabitants living in it like a wetland forest
• Canal goes under the road between the swamp and no man's land hex 10 into Allied Hill Fort

• Underland pier, a concrete pier and buried underland canal entry (+secret sub pen)

• Pact Rock, a cliff of green stone with ancient frog and fish folk carvings of a treaty

• An army of devils fighting undead fighting in the apocalypse was smothered by the great flood of holy elemental water unleashed from hex6

• Swamp Locations
-Clampville cult village occupied by barbarians and frog folk 
-Drug Lab Shack of the alchemy guild annexed by frogs, alchemists were trying to steal the frogs' continent-wide drug trade "It's an existential threat to all frog peoples everywhere!"
-Robberknight bandit base left by the party for now in a ruined mansion
-Swamp hag and troll son are friendly for now, as long as people are kind to her son

Clampville Pop 115
-Led by Druid, their wild folk guards and some frog folk allies
-Was led by Pappy, a devilswine controlling a slime chaos cult clan
-Serpent folk ruins and tunnels underneath (recently buried)
-Execution lock and severed heads in the plaza
-Tapestry tradition depicts the imprisonment of slime gods in the Apocalypse
-grow drugs, skunk cabbage, sulfur melons, skunk cabbage, flesh tubers of xor
-mix of mutants, cultists and scavengers + frogs and druids

d12 Local Clampville Encounters

1 Slime cultists gathering from algae pools
2 Frog folk occupation marines, local law
3 Wild boar
4 Giant marsh lizards
5 Giant dragonfly
6 Snake cultists (led by a snake magician hybrid)
7 Mutant fisherfolk
8 Mutant bandits
9 Giant slug
10 Giant rats ot a swarm of rats
11 Giant bugs or a swarm of insects
12 Druid and bodyguard blessing the land
10 Basilisk
11 Giant frogs or salamanders
12 Giant turtle

---------------------

8 Grassland/Wetlands/Mudlands

Crossing Grounds

• Elemental Templar Outpost for elemental cults watching the marsh and no-man's land

• Elos village of desperate survivors under the thrall of elemental cults

• Ruins from age of ancient Exilon are being explored by Templars for relics

• South road and river trade through chokepoints attracts bandits

• A canal goes from river to inside the ruined hillfort full of undead soldiers

• Includes part of hill fort line, trenches and no man’s land in between

• Several ancient elemental gods were captured by the Black Sphere in the Apocalypse, and most have forgotten their names and cults since

Elos Pop125

-Serve the Elemental templars with food
-They elementally infuse plants and livestock to produce more food in poor conditions
-Have Druids, wizard tower, earth priests and Elemental templar garison 
-Some of the population are "blessed" elemental abhumans, changelings or mutants
-An assembly of elders are in charge of diplomacy, farm planning, and other esoteric elements
-Lots of ritual activity and ceremonies in ancient times, all wear robes with elemental symbols 
-Elementalist temple has documents 5000 years of elementalist records guarded by djinn 
-Village square has an elementalist summoning circle inlaid with gems and gold
-Lots of locals have petty ancient magic items from ancient Exilon

d12 Local Elos Encounters
d4 1=fire 2=earth 3=air 4=water
1 Elemental Templar Patrol

2 Elemental Templar Wyvern riders

3 Petty 2HD elemental exploring

4 Trench Hogs from no-mans land, mutated boars who ignore mud terrain penalties

5 Elemental abhuman tribe living as barbarian nomads

6 Terror birds on the prowl and protecting territory from dogs and wolves

7 Elemental dinosaur d4 1=allosaurus 2=triceratops 3=anklosaurus 4=triceratops 

8 Giant elemental toad, often ambushes from hiding or an area with several socialising 

9 Automaton soldier d4 1=infantry 2=marine 3=sniper 4=sapper

10 Elemental keeps strangers out of the area and hunts undead
11 Deathguard flesh golem wandering on a murder rampage

12 Undead soldiers from Noman's land

---------------------

9 Hills/Ruins

Plateau Gatehouse

• Adventurers Guild Outpost held by murder hobos outside the starfort walls watching south, now allied to the Gateway Kingdom and turned on Mercenaries Guild's research operation

• Dragonhole is a scavengers colony of secretly dragon templars who would like a proper outpost and are preparing numbers and drake riders. Unknown to most, as hidden in no-man's land, surrounded by landmines. Reachable by air or tunnels 

• The Star Fort Wall, The Plateau of Peril and the Gatehouse of Chagrinspire

• The final forces of the Apocalypse war killed each other here, forgotten heroes and demigods

• Starfort wall and plateau edge
• Ruined fragments of a gigantic aqueduct destroyed by the elemental flood in hex6, some are used as lairs or forts. Ancient aqueduct line ruins. The ruined aqueduct line includes settlements

-Skyriver village, secure in a larger section of the aqueduct protected by frightening druids
-Eyebane Village of Elemental templars with wyvern riders
-Doghome Village of barbarians and dog folk

Skyriver Pop 105

-Led by 9th Lv druid chieftain Carnifax of tribal wild folk barbarians from Auldwood
-Built on and inside intact pylons of a ruined aqueduct
-Grow tubers, nuts and berries on top and mushrooms inside
-They work on the purification of pollution in soil, planting trees, and helping mutants
-Ride giant hawks to and from their allies in the Western woods

d12 Local Skyriver Encounters

1 Barbarian hunters hunting food or monsters
2 Barbarian herders with flocks
3 Druids and bodyguards purifying the land in a ritual
4 Barbarians uncovering and cleaning an ancient dolmen or standing stone
5 Hawk riders fly overhead
6 Wild elk or deer

7 Wild mutant dogs or a wolfpack
8 Auroch cattle herd, hostile and the whole herd unite to kill threats
9 Lion or panther or leopard, some may be mutants or unusual colours
10 Gorgonite bull
11 Undead ancient soldiers in rotting uniforms marching on patrol
12 Barrow wight or wraith or banshee wandering the moors

Eyebane Pop 85 + 4 adult wyverns
-Elemental templars of various factions worshipping old gods
-Built on and inside intact pylons of a ruined aqueduct
-Led by Master Ziron Nidas, breeder of wyverns
-Many temples and a magic school, a grand temple to the elementalist unitarian faith
-Hidden remnants of the pre-apocalypse gods and elemental worship
-A few dragon templars who overlap in interest are also here as advisors
-Allied with a standard outpost, secretive and wary of strangers
-Mostly, they bring in food from the nearby alchemist by wyvern or wagon

d12 Local Eyebane Encounters

1 Wyvern and templar fly high overhead
2 Mounted elemental templar patrol question strangers, dress in ornate ancient armour
3 Foot elemental templars led by a spell caster

4 Boar or goats
5 Deer or elk
6 Wolf pack
7 Lion or a bear
8 Giant toads

9 Elemental mutated animal d4 1=bats 2=rats 3=frogs or toads 4=snakes 

10 Elemental mutated monster

11 Petty 2HD elementals playing

12 Elemental wandering

Doghome Pop 95 + 85 dogs
-Founded by a dog abhuman beastman hero who came to cleanse the taint of chagrinspire
-Built on and inside intact pylons of a ruined aqueduct
-Led by Gnarg Gnorebone, a dogman 4th-level barbarian with a 4th-level druid priestess wife
-Tribe, a mix of Barbarians and Dog Folk, some of their dogs become upright humans 
-Built on and inside intact pylons of a ruined aqueduct
-Mostly barbarian huts with earth roofs and some tunnels
-Hunting in the hills and herding goats
 

d12 Local Doghome Encounters

1 Pack of dogs on patrol

2 Local tribal hunters with dogs and dog folk

3 Goat herders at work grazing

4 Wild deer herd or elk

5 Wild sheep or boars

6 Mutant chaos cultist hunting

7 Mutant scavengers

8 Druids performing purification rites and planting trees

9 Werewolves come to menace dog folk

10 Land shark
11 Chaos mutant cultists
12 Undead soldiers on the march