RealmsofAhlus Wiki

The Realm of Ahlus is a series of West Marches (Sandbox D&D) campaigns. Players will have near complete freedom in their destinations, interactions and characters themselves, and thus can drop in and out of the campaign as suits their personal schedules.

Along with single session hexcrawls, there are some overarching stories scattered throughout the world, miniature campaigns that can be completed consequentially by players or started, put on hold and returned to as per the desires of you, the players.

## The First Campaign - Into the Realms of Ahlus

The existence of Wayfinder Stones in Ahlus means that characters no longer find themselves limited to explore simply around their homebase, and instead can branch out into further points across the continent - the chilling plains of the Hoarfrost Expanse, the fetid swamps of the isle of Morass, the thirsting sands of the Shifting Dunes and the Cicatrices, the pristine lakes along the Lotus Run, and the vibrant jungles of Tourmalini’i - all can be accessed from your homebase, the spire of the Vedalken Wizard Nelenet.

You have been tasked with exploring these newfound lands, and in exchange will be granted all manner of boons - treasures first and foremost, but power too. As you discover more Waystones among the riches of the land, be they in tombs, shrines or elsewhere, decide how to use them to further your exploits.

Do you whittle away the night, pouring over their carvings to uncover the secrets of their creation? Do you strengthen the connection of the Waymarks, granting others to arrive to build civilisation anew upon this brave new world in your image? Do you utilise them to forge a connection with another part of the continent, uncovering more lands unknown and foreign? The decision falls onto you and your fellow explorers!

## The Second Campaign - The New Reigns of Ahlus

*The soil and stone stirs anew, as if bolstered into activity by nature itself. Though the mists of a forest once cursed linger still despite the passing of a century, no yew or elk or oak grows proud, for instead hills and mountains rise from the newly sundered earth. Azure waters tropical and austere oceans chill bubble and burl as masses of earth rise from the depths, and with it all manner of flora and fauna race to stake their claim.* *Just as nature rushes to claim dominion, those that first stepped forth into Realms forgotten sprawl from city to town and village, once connected settlements untethered, the magic that bound them depleted into failure. And yet they flourish, built by those inspired by echoes of the past and ideals original and novel alike.*

Picking up one-hundred and twenty-two years after the First Campaign of Into the Realms of Ahlus, the Second Campaign of the West Marches-style 5th edition Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game presents a new environment to explore on a familiar backdrop, directly influenced by the numerous story lines facilitated by Dungeon Master and player alike. The destruction of the Black Hand, the eradication of the Creed of Kaleios, the breaking of the Great Seals and the conflicts with the Harbingers, as well as the pursuit of the Legacies of Distant Reverie and the last stand against the fragmented vestige of the Darkbringer, Hadar, known also as the Hunter in the Ephialtes.

Throughout it all, characters both brash and bold and heroics and heedless alike have writ their name far and wide through word and deed, creating civilisations, societies and factions that define the cultural, political and geographic landscape of the continent. The former Realms of Ahlus have not remained static in the years between then and now, as settlements scattered across the continent have continued to grow and develop, their borders and territories as changeable and diverse as those that have come to call their contents home. With the passing of the years, those that once travelled from afar to the lands by means of the Wayfinder Stones maintained by the Vedalken Wizard Nelenet have found the houses shaped and streets paved by their own hand a truer home than any which left behind, and from them since the inception of new generations of Ahlusian natives. Throughout the major strongholds of civilisation, all manner of folk reside, most equivalent in heritage and outward appearance as those first shaped by the High-Mother Aita some one-thousand, three-hundred and sixty seven years prior to the start of our Second Campaign during the period known as Aita's Second Gift. Known to scholars as the Principal Races, these individuals are not alone within the Realms of Ahlus, and instead find themselves sharing it with those of more curious and novel origins, living lives in settlements ancient and more recent in construction.