Hello,
Returning player here,
I recently bought part 1/3 of the Frozen Flame AP from a local game store for a friend (and his partner) who just started playing RPG’s and are new to Pathfinder and Golarion overall. (They have a talented DM tho from what I understand)
Yet I was surprised at just how ‘flash-in-the-pan’ the available 2e content is for the Realm of the Mammoth Lords (RotML)
I’ve also been considering an ‘east-meets-west’, dragonslaying campaign set in Icestair. But there the city lacks a statblock, gazetteer and map- and I’m unsure whether it’s a city made up of mostly Avistinian or Tian Xian architecture, and how permanent the dwellings are.
It’s a trade/expedition-base camp city right? How does its economy function with Irrisen to the West, Hold of Belkezin to the south, and a (just recently closed) Worldwound to the east? Surrounded by territorial albeit gregarious Mammoth Lord followings?
Sure, I know the city administrator has a deal with the Hold of Belkezin but most of the closest orcish cities are controlled by the more orthodox and aggressive orcish tribes. I also wonder at how the agreement between Icestairs and the Hold remains enforced and by who, because if the Hold is just letting anyone with money pass up, down, and through the hold to the Path of Aganhei, then why wouldn’t they expand on the deal to merchants passing through the Hold in general?
It just seems such a long and expensive trade route relative to the branch that leads to the more stable Land of the Linnorm Kings, and I’m curious where most of the city’s food stores come from. I imagine rice would be among the most common grains, and there’d be probably be plenty of wild game traded by the Mammoth Lords. Irissen would probably also have great demand for grain and vegetable produce given its climate of eternal winter.
I’m not expecting staff to answer all these questions but I would like more detail on Icestairs and the RotML overall. It’s a unique setting in an rpg.
It would be Lost Omens: Broken Lands, for one.
The other books in QftFF should give you all the info you need to run that AP; there’s additional articles in the other two volumes. Outside of that, the Realm of the Mammoth Lords is pretty obscure, never really getting the spotlight before that point - I assume the ‘faux-Ice Age’ theme is pretty niche. It’s very cool stuff! I like it for one lens on the culture of the Kellids, who have a lot of other canon out there via neighboring nations, but this particular region hasn’t had a ton of exploration.
As for “why not” - I think it’s telling that we’ve had two setting books in Garund and are about to go to Tian Xia for two more, while Avistan has been left to its own devices/getting smaller updates elsewhere.
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That makes sense. I am definitely happy to see Garrund and Tia Xia fleshed out more, and yeah, I definitely want a Broken Lands book in the future.
A Crown of the World book would also be beneficial for my Icestair campaign. I imagine that the peoples of the high North would also be major trading partners, through the Path of Aganhei.
So the Realm of the Mammoth Lords is part of the Saga Lands- NOT the Broken Lands.
So the Realm of the Mammoth Lords is part of the Saga Lands- NOT the Broken Lands.
My mistake! I consistently put the Mammoth Lords in the Broken Lands and Belkzen in the Saga Lands - someday I’ll get those two through my skull :p
Creative Director
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The main "why not" is we do more Adventure Paths in a year than we have opportunities to do Lost Omen books linked to them.
Another big "why not" is that when we DO link books, it makes both products more difficult to do than they otherwise would be since we have to coordinate across different lines and developers on either line have to be more in tune with more than one product.
We can't do a Lost Omens linked book for every Adventure Path or vice versa, in other words.
The main "why not" is we do more Adventure Paths in a year than we have opportunities to do Lost Omen books linked to them.
Another big "why not" is that when we DO link books, it makes both products more difficult to do than they otherwise would be since we have to coordinate across different lines and developers on either line have to be more in tune with more than one product.
We can't do a Lost Omens linked book for every Adventure Path or vice versa, in other words.
That makes sense, and I definitely don’t want fewer AP’s nor Lost Omens books.
Can I get a “maybe” on further information in the future on RotML and Icestair in particular?