My players are currently going through the Catacombs and I suspect next session they'll finish it off and head to Thistletop and.. for the life of me, I can't seem to find any descriptions for what the OUTSIDE of the top level looks like.
Is it a wooden fortress like building on top of the rock? Is it a door into a series of rooms built into the stone? I honestly have no idea and can't seem to find it in my AE ROTRL book... Is it not there, or am I missing it somewhere?
I know this doesn't seem like a very big thing, but I would like to be able to describe it to my players even though there's a chance they probably won't linger for very long on the outside of the compound heh.
Thanks.
SPOILERS
The description is kinda dispersed throughout the Thistletop chapter.
The building on top is a ramshackle stockade built out of junk and old ship parts. There are two 30' high towers on either side of the stockade. If you get up into the towers, you would see that the fortress is mostly covered in a roof, but there is a courtyard as well.
I imagine that it would be difficult to tell that the island was once a head, after years of erosion and plant coverage. But I would point out that the position of the island seems unnatural - it's like a massive boulder has fallen into the ocean. Some of the ledges on the boulder seem to have been carved a long time ago...
Perhaps one of the openings in the cave used to be the mouth of Karzoug? Maybe that's apparent from the inside?
The first level is above ground, a wooden fortress with walls and two guard towers. The structure is build using wood from shipwrecks.
The second level is underground and has been excavated by cultists of Lamashtu 200 years ago.
The third level, also underground, is Thassilonian and part of the original construction - a colossal statue of which only the head remains now, forming the island of Thistletop. The statue and others like it were part of Karzoug's defenses against Bakrakhan.
I personally like this rendition of it, although the features of the statue should be more weathered and less recognizable.
The cover art for the Inner Sea Primer is a view of Thistletop as the iconic characters Ezren and Merisiel fighting goblins near the rope bridge.
The only issues I see are:
1) the head is rotated too much.. the interior level 2 is "slightly" slanted, not rotated on its side as this image suggests
and
2) the fact that it is a head/face should be less clear. The features of the face are supposed to be more weathers, so you only get the impression that they are there when the lighting is "just so".
From the AE, p.45: "The stockade is made of thick wood. Closer inspection reveals that most of the wood seems to have been scavenged from ships—a few nameplates remain affixed to some of the beams, while other timbers look like they might have once been masts."
Something like this, but not as well-built, of course: Wooden fort.
How high is the bridge over the water?
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The cliffs on both sides are described as 80 feet high.
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My players are currently going through the Catacombs and I suspect next session they'll finish it off and head to Thistletop and.. for the life of me, I can't seem to find any descriptions for what the OUTSIDE of the top level looks like.
Is it a wooden fortress like building on top of the rock? Is it a door into a series of rooms built into the stone? I honestly have no idea and can't seem to find it in my AE ROTRL book... Is it not there, or am I missing it somewhere?
I know this doesn't seem like a very big thing, but I would like to be able to describe it to my players even though there's a chance they probably won't linger for very long on the outside of the compound heh.
Thanks.
This should help - I found this for our campaign and am using it for our wiki (which, I'm sorry to say, has fallen behind our actual play)...