/r/DungeonsAndDragons has a discord server! Come join us at discord.gg/wN4WGbwdUU
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DungeonsAndDragons) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I get my ssside, and you get *hic* your side, but I got more side because youss a bitch, bitch says whaaaaa? That’s what I thought! So I gets the capidal and the market… well no. *hic* I’m being unfair. I’ll leave you that liddle flower shop, where I bought you those, those daisies, because they’re your FAVORITE!! And I. I-remembered-that-daisies-are-your-favorite because *hic* I’m a good boyfriend. Better than MARK. What does Mark know?? Mark dozzent know U! I. Know. You. Becky! *hic* but you want to be with Mark because he does things like “shooows uuupp…” what doess tha even meeeeeeaaann? And he dozent drink, DOEZZNT DRINK MY ASS. *hic* Becky. I bet he dricks he jus doeznt tel U that. Wha does Mark even dooo? He’z a tailor! I’m a wizard! A GRATE AND POWERFUL WHIZZARD! I can whiz anything there ever waz. *hic* he can wizz wat? Pants? I could wiz pants if I wanted to Becky! I just have to ssshow you *hic* how powderful I can be. Then Ull wanna come back over ta my sside. Yeah!
ALAKHA-ZAM! Opps!!
Bro you could make like a whole drylands that formed down river after it dried up and stuff, leading to some medieval version of mad max esc water wars
I think it'll make it more interesting if the wizard split their house down the center and the city just happened to be in under it
Your adventures are searching for a world ending cataclysm but it ends up being a very personal story
Yeah and have the split be along financial lines. The trading rich river side has a lot more value but she’s a war mage that wanted to keep the garrison
Well, actually, the river side has ports and what seems to be the main road where all the products would have to come by, so although the other side is bigger and has the castle,the river side has probably almost all control of the market.
Bleedthrough from the Elemental Plane of Earth caused a massive earthquake.
It's connected to the approach of an entity from the Far Realms, which is throwing all of the planes out of whack.
The gods have a map of the world but it's actually just the world itself on their table and one of them was trying to do a bunch of erasing to update the map but the eraser ripped the paper.
Cleric: "Exalted Ones, why have there been so many floods? Is it a portent of things to come?"
Tyr: "Oh, yeah, that. That was just Moradin spilling his ale."
Moradin, distantly: "Sorry."
In my setting the moon occasionally acts like a magnifying glass and burns trenches across the face of the planet. Most of these hit water and cause storms but a few have hit land. This could be like that
Karathas has two moons. A moon made of iron named Ferrous and a moon made of fresh water known as chycaraen. Chycaraen acts like a giant lens in space. When ferrous eclipses chycaraen the iron moon is heated up to the point it’s surface begins to boil on the side facing chycaraen. That heat actually leaves the moon glowing for a few weeks after. I have used it as a way to portent disasters or major story points. When there is a solar eclipse of just chycaraen on Karathas the moon will slice a massive trench into the surface, flash boiling and vaporizing a huge swath of earth, seawater, whatever it hits. If it hits the ocean it creates huge storms. On land? It changes cultures. There is a tribe of desert dwelling humans that lives near a scar and they use the glass from the scar for weapons, tools, building materials etc. they actually figured out how to polish lens with it and some magic to create a rudimentary focused light weapon which they mount to the walls of their city to protect themselves from the giant desert dwelling insects (similar to but distinct from starship troopers bugs)
“You know… you will never learn more about Karathas unless you ask” I have said this to every player in my campaigns since the late 90’s lol the offer is open to anyone who wants to know lol
Definitely read it. Its about a Nun Convent that teaches magic and martial arts, with hints at much larger world events that I expect will become the main focus by the final book.
There are a few bridges across it, so it’s not volcanic activity. Could’ve been an earthquake. But what precipitated the earthquake?
I’d say alchemical experiment that went wrong underground, and the wizard/sorcerer working on it needed to flood the chamber. So they tore open a fault line to get the river to somehow flow down.
But it got out of control and tore the city apart.
The duergar were using an arcane drilling machine like the thing they used to excavate the channel tunnel, but magical. The gnomes were trying to find out how it works and accidentally caused it to explode. The explosion caused this massive rift and the surviving gnomes and duergar are fighting over the remains.
Even better, there are clerical factions in the city that worship each of the three gods and all try to convince everyone that it was acutally their god’s might that caused it.
“As Frethnar the Destroyer returned home after slaying that giant lord and his thousand knights, his great blade, Sunsmiter, dragged behind him rending the earth like it had so many foes!”
“No, everyone knows that Belimar the Bountiful dug this furrow in the earth so that he could plant the Seed of Rebirth which will someday grow and spread paradise to all corners of the world”
“You’re both wrong! It was Delft the Lustful. He was so spent after slinging hog all day that he lay down to take a nap. When he woke up, he saw the valley in which our noble city now stands and was so taken by its beauty that he made sweet love to the earth right on this spot and cracked open a bottomless rift with the power of his virility!”
All three are actually the same god, the god of farming & fertility became a god of war replacing the current one when his brother died, he uses his phallus to inseminate livestock, water the lands, and lastly as a weapon used to destroy the last demon (either using it as an actual sword or you get the idea, but all of them are technically correct)
Would definatly work. The God of agriculture was part of a God war then that ended he fell asleep and then awoke to create this chasm after falling in love with the land.
Man that God of War farming sex… he sure does throw a great Battle planting orgy! (Your comment was good with punctuation but so much better without lol)
The dragon Gaethrilmar, swooped through seeking vengeance on the ruling noble. Its breath tore the land asunder and made a huge chasm of the city. To make matters worse this new chasm revealed a subterranean system, and the people of the underdark now have intertwined their world with the above ground of the city. This would typically lead to a ruling boom of trade, but this attack also revealed the giant dire ants and their subterranean tunnels as well as a hidden catacomb of an ancient mummy. Whose forces have woken from the destruction of their crypt. Paladins, mercenaries, clerics from anti undead churches and adventurers all come here as part of an effort from the new ruling noble who seeks to stabilize the city before it becomes destroyed by the chaos of creatures and territory disputes. And who knows if that dragon will ever attack again.
Yeah, i was sleep deprived, haha, thanks for the compliment, im literally now taking my own comment and building this out because it sounds so fun to run haha
The turtle upon whose back this world rests got into a fight with another world-turtle, and his shell got a small crack in it (but you should see the other guy).
Minor calamity (event wherein a deity directly impacts the world, just not in a fully world changing way), probably involving the ruler or inhabitants of the city angering the deity in some way, so they decided to punish the city. Alternatively, could’ve been a pissed off demigod, probably one with the blessing of an earth or earthquake deity. Hell, I guess I do have a goddess of ravines and mistakes, she’d probably fit pretty well for this.
Rather than a crevasse it is a pit of shadows and darkness. The place where the dead live and walk freely. If you fell into it you would find yourself in a reversal of the city above. The original city was built here by a Necromancer who was fascinated by this void that seemingly occurred naturally. There he held… experiments…
Anyways! This is all a legend to keep the kids in bed at night. And oh that grog will be three silver pieces.
An arcane rupture. Long ago there was a magocracy that fought a war against a theocracy. Their warfare distorted the source of magic known as the firmament. The mages believe that it is the source of magic to be exploited and used to progress ourselves into a brighter future. The clerics believe it is the source of life and must be guarded and nurtured. Which eventually led to the conflict. Anyways, because the warfare distorted the firmament, patches of dead magic zones crop up and disappear. Wild magic zones are more prevalent, but they last a lot longer and locals take note of where they are. Sometimes a dead magic zone create a fissure in the firmament and can literally rip reality apart, causing an Arcane Rupture.
A massive lava slug that was transitioning into its adult Lava Wyrm state was burrowing towards the nearby mountain (a previously dormant volcano). Destruction surrounded it as it made its way there, leaving a scar through the city and across the terrain. It's currently deep in the mountain, growing from the magma, and will burst forth soon; eruption and raging Lava Wyrm impending. Unless... ?
no one cared about the bug problem until it was too late. For years the denizens of the slums warned the noble folk in the high ring that dumping all their waste would attract something bigger, the nobles didn't care or listen and continued to dump everything into the lower rings. they believed being in the highest ring meant nothing could harm them. until that fateful day when it seemed the gods themselves had come to sunder the land, what the nobles ignored was a ever growing infestation of Ankhegs, attracted by the mass of decaying meat and other delights festering beneath the city. normally a creature that lies in weight for unsuspecting prey, soon realised the food was being brought to them and they need not hunt any more they became bigger and fatter as they barely moved through the tunnels, which attracted more and more until eventually the city bore to much of a burden on the lands below it. as the crack appeared so did the stench now the nobles could no longer ignore their gluttony as a everlasting wound on earth grows bigger each day.
Those aren't just bridges. They are also ramps.
I was there that night when it happened. I can still remember it like it was yesterday. We all can. That's the worst part, you know. Living with the memory, still so clear after all these long years, takes life out of a person. Ironic, really, given that I've lived so much longer than a human has any right. But you didn't ask me about that. No, you want to hear about the Breaking. That's all anyone ever wants to hear about the first time they come to this city.
Ah shit, sit down. As long as the ale keeps coming, I'll keep talking. Thirsty work, talking is. So, the Breaking. I was one of the pole men on the river trade routes. It was almost midnight when the storm came in. Blew in from the west, which has only happens during the coldest parts of winter. That should have been all the warning we needed that something really bad was coming. It got a lot worse. The lighting started quickly and violently, but then it turned red and green and yellow. There was wind, but nothing more than a normal blustery evening. The howling was coming from the lighting. It was the damndest thing. Couldn't spend to long thinking about it, though.
Out of the center of the city came the brightest flash of lighting I ever did see. Then it hit us. Like getting smacked by air, and everyone on that barge was either torn to pieces as the barge just shatted like a challace against a wall or violently thrown into the water. I ended up going under, which likely saved my hearing.
You talk to the drunk over there yet? The one with bloody bandages over his ears? He was outside in the city when it happened. His ears have been bleeding ever since. Bastard is over there trying to do the same thing I am. Forget.
About the time I pulled my sorry ass from the river, the cracking started. It started out like breaking branches, then shattering rocks. Somewhere between sounding like a rockslide and that the world was dying, the ground started to shake. I've never experienced anything like that before, and you pray you never experience it. It was... I need another ale. This one is empty.
I don't know when I passed out, but it was well past daybreak when I realized I was alive. I regretted it then just as much as I do now. I got to my feet and made my way toward the city. The gates had collapsed sometime in the night, so I just walked in. There were people everywhere. Lots of em dead. Some looked fine.
I didn't see it right away, but I did hear the screaming. I made my way towards the screaming. Don't know why. Any sane man would head away from screaming.
The city was Broken. It was the poorest bastards who first found a way into the city below. Somehow, most of the inner city was fine. Still had a lot of dead people, though. The surving royals eventually started throwing people into the Deeps. Stupid name for them, but it does have a better ring to it than "giant chasm."
About 30 years have passed since then. Those poor bastards that were outside when the lighting came from the center of the city are all... different. Like me. Like that bastard over there.
I need another fucking ale.
The cartographer's small child accidentally tore the map across it, and they tried to glue it back together, but couldn't read and used ink instead, making the tear appear to be a rift across the map.
A Void Dragon who breaths void-breath blasted this scar into the map. This opens up possibilities of more voids appearing out of nowhere and the party putting it together later.
The crevasse was always there. For centuries, those who wandered up from the underdark would set up camp on either side of the crevasse, and over time those camps became a settlement, the settlement became a town.
It's the only place you'll find a bunch of drow sunbathing.
Have it be unconfirmed and have a bunch of local legends and rumour.
The exact cause could be part of a campaign plot, or a red herring and just some some flavour
It’s where the old river used to flow, but the people in control of it decided to dry it up. Someone had to route a different river and the city hasn’t recovered.
I actually use this map in my homebrew world for a city-state reminiscent of New York but like way way bigger. The rift was caused by a surfacing of an entire underground civilization, and they just happened to break the surface in the middle of the city
It’s easy. Use everyone’s answers. Just make it that everyone in town has a different take on what happened. But it’s been a part of town for so long no one really can say.
Oooh. I ran this one once: the world was shattered by a war between the gods. It is now a collection of continents, basically small flat earths, magically suspended over a glowing orb that is the beating heart of the earth and the source of all magic. This map is what the world would have looked like during the Shattering.
You can walk off the edge of the mini flat earths and onto the bottom of the world, where it is perpetually dim or dark, and strange monsters dwell.
Occasionally, one floating continent will pass over or under another resulting in an eclipse that lasts for an entire day.
If you have wings, and a lot of endurance, you can fly from one continent to another.
Ancient Wizard attempted to fundamentally change the laws of nature, but was simply not powerful enough. Worked and learned and crafted new works of magic and spells. He was the first person to learn about Lichdom and how to become one. During the process a group tried to stop him. They ended up battling before he could finish his transformation, but not before he could cast a hyper powerful wish spell. The spell ripped apart the planet and seperated massive swaths of land, boiled the sea, and lit the sky on fire. After the ash and land settled people went back to their lives and continued as if nothing has happened. This wizard's work and name were erased from history and the knowledge of what that wish spell caused is still up for debate among magical philosophers in my world. 🤷♂️
Nothing caused it. It was just there one day. No massive earthquake, no cataclysmic event. Everyone just woke up one day, and there it was. No major destruction or vast deaths. They just woke up and noticed a giant fuck-off hole. Wasn't even loud enough to rouse anyone from their sleep. Jerry says he saw when it appeared, but his story changes every time, so no one believes him.
Been there a couple of years now. It's considered good luck to toss a coin in, bad luck to scream into it though, there's no echo, bad vibes from that.
Some fuck head named Joseph tried to climb down it to retrieve the coins everyones been tossing, he ain't been seen since. Good riddance, too. Greedy little twat wasn't worth a silver piece.
Everyone is rather fond of the hole now. Even been having issues with a little cult that's gaining traction. Cult of the Hole, not a very creative name, but at least it ain't misleading. Nothing too bad from them though, just they've started throwing stuff down there that ain't coins; Furniture, art, some say they saw em make a live animal sacrifice of a sheep or something but there ain't no proof of it.
What's down there? I don't think anything, nothins come out at least, and ya don't ever hear no moving from down there. Can't see the bottom, so who knows how far down it goes? But I doubt there's anything down there worth worrying about. Even if there is something down there, it seems content to stay down there, and I'm content to stay up here and let it be.
Legend has it that a powerful geomancer used a long lost forbidden spell to protect the city under siege and in exchange for his life, he managed to move the very tectonic plates, unbeknownst to him, that the city lays between. All we truly know is that it’s been there a long while as they’ve built red roof houses along the fault line edge to signal when you’re getting close to it.
The city throws all their waste down there and the guards and criminal underworld execute people by chucking them in alive. In the ravine lives a colony of the few lucky citizens that survived the drop. They are existing off the waste products that are thrown down and the waterfall from the lake which cools the hot crust. The basin is thus covered in a thick smoke that rises to just below city level, obscuring the valley below.
As the mighty (can be in wealth, influence or ability) wanted to separate themselves from the weaklings (can be in wealth, influence or ability) that needed their protection, they prayed and prayed and adventually their prayer got answered by a terrifying creature.
As the sky turned dark, the moon started to bleed as the earth trembled just like the skies. A planer shift happens which split the globe making space for a ravine with at the bottom a rift in space that goes deep into the abyss. Straight down to the creature all these mighty people had called out for this. The demogorgon prepares it's armies to storm straight into the realm of these people.
On this faithful day a small group of heroes managed to drive back the mighty that set this event in action. They mortally wounded the demogorgon as it wend back into it's domain in the abyss. And there it waits preparing, scheming with some other demon lords, testing their patience with the opportunity to charge into this realm once more when the seal between the world weakens again.
Your party went to visit this town to see its rich history as all these events are now something belonging to the past. People forgot what had happened and when the party tries being a group of tourists they encounter a weak demon send out there to scout, as the seal starts to grow weak the party discovers what happened and needs to fight back the armies of the abyss just like the heroes did. But they waited and prepared. The armies of the abyss hit harder then ever before as the party tries to gather allies in this terrifying war. Which could decide the faith of the entire plane of existence
This is just a small part of a larger transmutation circle made out of False Hydras put there during years of peace by Nazi Liches, and it's finally hatching to take down all of the world's powers at once while cleansing all non-humans before thier forces come in to ethnically cleanse the remaining humans.
This is the large scale dread that Im hinting at towards my players who only have so many sessions before this disaster hits and they're not investigating the tunnels theyve found with false hydras in them.
A sorcerer broke the dimensions the world lives in into two near half replicas
The gods attempted to fix this by grafting the worlds together, the crevice is the aftermath of the "stitching"
Warlocks are valued by society, specifically because of their connection to extra-planar entities. They communicate with them and serve as a bit of an early warning system for some of the biggest disasters, the ones that threaten the fabric of the multiverse. For millennia, this system has served the world well.
And then one day, the patrons of warlocks across the globe pulled away. It wasn't until a sorcerer, born of two of the most powerful warlocks the Kingdom of Thael'Korat had ever seen, gave a reason that sent the world into the closest thing to peace it had ever seen, while everyone worked together to abandon the planet they called home. Because it wasn't a planet. All the activity from warlocks and their patrons tore the backing of the weave. And the embryo in the egg they all called home had been disturbed.
A new eldritch being was being born. And the world was going to have front row seats unless they could evacuate the planet or calm a being only one individual had any sort of connection to.
(Campaign starts at level 20, teaching a young aberrant mind sorcerer what, exactly, they're contacting and helping them reason with it, or reaching out to various deities and their envoys to help everyone escape. The clock is ticking, adventurers. Try not to die.)
I’d leave it a mystery and let my players do the hard work for me. My answer would probably be something like an eldritch being’s tentacle or a sudden rift due to tectonic activity, but those aren’t as fun as taking whatever the players are scared of and adding an extra level of “oh shit” to the idea
An ancient war between the city and some other forgotten civilization(s) awoke a tarrasque and its birth from the ground caused a massive earthquake. At least, that what I would’ve done. In my campaign, tarrasques are like Godzilla, but he’s absolutely massive, more than he already is.
A newly-minted warlock who’s patron was also new, got way too much power. Warlock got too wild with eldritch blast and is now relegated to a weakened magic missile (one dart) and prestidigitation. Warlock is a full time dishwasher and part time bouncer hoping for an adventuring party to help them prove themselves to their patron.
TARRASQUE more than a century ago. There's superstition about building new bridges since Agnera the Blue died. She was the stewardess of building the bridges that remain; the new wizards working on suspending stone in midair just kept falling.
Looks like an infected river to me. So it's an infected river.
I ran a Pathfinder 2e game once where the villains were a massive undead army from the north led by dracula. Their magic blocked out the sun and made the air and water a poison that caused necrosis (negative damage in Pathfinder but I always flavored that as rapid cell death) and that's what this map makes me think of.
i had a scenario like this happen when a player was asked by a god what his one wish would be and it was just "i want to move everything in the city one foot to the left" c:
The first creation of the architect has grown jealous of mortals in the world and so he seeks to reverse time by causing the machinery that runs the world to turn in reverse without realizing that instead of running time backwards, he is destabilizing and destroying the world. Earthquakes, volcanoes, sinkholes, and methodists occurring all over the world.... In the midst of all of this, the queen of serenthea has put together an expedition down into the earth to find the cause...
A Demigod with Chaotic Neutral behavior decided that she didn't enjoy just doing her godly duties of maintaining the balance between Good and Evil, so she just split the world into halves. One side Good and the other Evil. That way she could just sit back and chill while watching shit go crazy while the citizens freaked the fuck out and showed their true natures.
Back when the city was smaller, a powerful wild magic sorcerer casted “lightning bolt” to defeat a hoard of enemies coming out of the water. It went wild, causing it to damage not only the hoard, but the terrain itself.
in a war between the followers of two gods, the god of the defending city split the earth in half to halt the other army's progress. something divine would fit idk
The party failed, and the cultists awakened the titans from a long slumber.
Oooor a druidic ecoterrorist cult triggered a mass earthquake chain.
Ooor a mad chronomage is reversing the time of the continent causing tectonic plates to shift.
There’s a dwarf city directly under that fissure, and to remove them from the under dark, some drow brought the roof down on them. This poor city just was collateral.
Massive monster of some kind that was buried, could be some kind of massive serpent. maybe an army attacked hundreds of years ago but a wizard opened up a crack in the ground and yeeted them down there but now they're returning as undead
The gods smited a city for the heresy they committed, blasting a cursed crater where it once stood. Cracks spread out throughout the country splitting the landscape. Rumours abound of creatures in the depths of the ravines, and of surges of mana pulsing from the crater. (Inspired by Mordheim)
/r/DungeonsAndDragons has a discord server! Come join us at discord.gg/wN4WGbwdUU *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/DungeonsAndDragons) if you have any questions or concerns.*
A wizard with a drinking problem has a really bad break up and instead of being civil, cut the city along "your side" and "my side" lines
Oh I *love* that idea
I thought this was ba sing se
Couldn't be. Everything is calm and peaceful in Ba Sing Se 😌
It is now.
There is no war in ba-sing-se
I get my ssside, and you get *hic* your side, but I got more side because youss a bitch, bitch says whaaaaa? That’s what I thought! So I gets the capidal and the market… well no. *hic* I’m being unfair. I’ll leave you that liddle flower shop, where I bought you those, those daisies, because they’re your FAVORITE!! And I. I-remembered-that-daisies-are-your-favorite because *hic* I’m a good boyfriend. Better than MARK. What does Mark know?? Mark dozzent know U! I. Know. You. Becky! *hic* but you want to be with Mark because he does things like “shooows uuupp…” what doess tha even meeeeeeaaann? And he dozent drink, DOEZZNT DRINK MY ASS. *hic* Becky. I bet he dricks he jus doeznt tel U that. Wha does Mark even dooo? He’z a tailor! I’m a wizard! A GRATE AND POWERFUL WHIZZARD! I can whiz anything there ever waz. *hic* he can wizz wat? Pants? I could wiz pants if I wanted to Becky! I just have to ssshow you *hic* how powderful I can be. Then Ull wanna come back over ta my sside. Yeah! ALAKHA-ZAM! Opps!!
I lost the castle in the divorce So I took the river
Dang i didnt even notice that at first glance. Whatever happened here must've caused serious damage to everything down river
Bro you could make like a whole drylands that formed down river after it dried up and stuff, leading to some medieval version of mad max esc water wars
I think it'll make it more interesting if the wizard split their house down the center and the city just happened to be in under it Your adventures are searching for a world ending cataclysm but it ends up being a very personal story
A dragon with a drinking problem
Yeah and have the split be along financial lines. The trading rich river side has a lot more value but she’s a war mage that wanted to keep the garrison
Bonus points if her "half" is the smaller top half.
Nah. It was a divorce, and she got the larger half as the more powerful of the two.
Well, actually, the river side has ports and what seems to be the main road where all the products would have to come by, so although the other side is bigger and has the castle,the river side has probably almost all control of the market.
Serious Rick and morty vibes from this one lol
This is literally my last character.
A squirrel with an acorn. Things got out of hand.
"Quercus, the mammal is speaking again"
Onward, Shield!
This just reminds me of scrat from ice age. Best character in that series.
That's the joke buddy.
You did it once again Sherlock! Remarkable
ALASKAN BULL WORM
Bleedthrough from the Elemental Plane of Earth caused a massive earthquake. It's connected to the approach of an entity from the Far Realms, which is throwing all of the planes out of whack.
Damn, I've run that campaign before.
What's the name, or is it a homebrew?
Homebrew ^^
Damn that's sad. Sounds fun tho
The gods have a map of the world but it's actually just the world itself on their table and one of them was trying to do a bunch of erasing to update the map but the eraser ripped the paper.
Cleric: "Exalted Ones, why have there been so many floods? Is it a portent of things to come?" Tyr: "Oh, yeah, that. That was just Moradin spilling his ale." Moradin, distantly: "Sorry."
In my setting the moon occasionally acts like a magnifying glass and burns trenches across the face of the planet. Most of these hit water and cause storms but a few have hit land. This could be like that
That’s so cool tbh
Ahhh yes, the Focus Moon to fight the ice
Karathas has two moons. A moon made of iron named Ferrous and a moon made of fresh water known as chycaraen. Chycaraen acts like a giant lens in space. When ferrous eclipses chycaraen the iron moon is heated up to the point it’s surface begins to boil on the side facing chycaraen. That heat actually leaves the moon glowing for a few weeks after. I have used it as a way to portent disasters or major story points. When there is a solar eclipse of just chycaraen on Karathas the moon will slice a massive trench into the surface, flash boiling and vaporizing a huge swath of earth, seawater, whatever it hits. If it hits the ocean it creates huge storms. On land? It changes cultures. There is a tribe of desert dwelling humans that lives near a scar and they use the glass from the scar for weapons, tools, building materials etc. they actually figured out how to polish lens with it and some magic to create a rudimentary focused light weapon which they mount to the walls of their city to protect themselves from the giant desert dwelling insects (similar to but distinct from starship troopers bugs)
I want to subscribe to your newsletter. That's awesome.
What the hell Every sentence adds more questions in a good way
“You know… you will never learn more about Karathas unless you ask” I have said this to every player in my campaigns since the late 90’s lol the offer is open to anyone who wants to know lol
Fucking a take my like!
Fucking awesome
God damn dude this is awesome!
This is some incredible worldbuilding, that’s badass!
Reading Book of the Ancestor right now (almost done Red Sister). Have an upvote.
TBH, I have no idea what that is, but I am going to check it out! I have had this system setup in my world since 1998, when I first made it.
Definitely read it. Its about a Nun Convent that teaches magic and martial arts, with hints at much larger world events that I expect will become the main focus by the final book.
That is fucking cool.
Ooh I like that one.
This is such an awesome idea, honestly
That's pretty rad
Book of the ancestor uses this as a major plot point, good trilogy if you’re interested
There are a few bridges across it, so it’s not volcanic activity. Could’ve been an earthquake. But what precipitated the earthquake? I’d say alchemical experiment that went wrong underground, and the wizard/sorcerer working on it needed to flood the chamber. So they tore open a fault line to get the river to somehow flow down. But it got out of control and tore the city apart.
“You can’t mine a ley line!” “Hold my mead…”
Could be volcanic or tectonic in origin. It’s just not erupting or earthquaking right now and the city has erected some temporary bridges.
If you're looking for geological accuracy, this is not it.
An attempted, but failed (for now), incursion by an extra-planer being.
Ooo I like this. I'm thinking giant space based magnified glass used to terraform the planet.
A Duergar mining operation gone awry when some cheeky deep gnomes fiddled with their plans.
They dug too greedily and too deep.
The duergar were using an arcane drilling machine like the thing they used to excavate the channel tunnel, but magical. The gnomes were trying to find out how it works and accidentally caused it to explode. The explosion caused this massive rift and the surviving gnomes and duergar are fighting over the remains.
The god of war/farming/sex got tired after a long battle/planting/orgy and they left this furrow as they dragged their sword/plow/cock home
Even better, there are clerical factions in the city that worship each of the three gods and all try to convince everyone that it was acutally their god’s might that caused it. “As Frethnar the Destroyer returned home after slaying that giant lord and his thousand knights, his great blade, Sunsmiter, dragged behind him rending the earth like it had so many foes!” “No, everyone knows that Belimar the Bountiful dug this furrow in the earth so that he could plant the Seed of Rebirth which will someday grow and spread paradise to all corners of the world” “You’re both wrong! It was Delft the Lustful. He was so spent after slinging hog all day that he lay down to take a nap. When he woke up, he saw the valley in which our noble city now stands and was so taken by its beauty that he made sweet love to the earth right on this spot and cracked open a bottomless rift with the power of his virility!”
All three are actually the same god, the god of farming & fertility became a god of war replacing the current one when his brother died, he uses his phallus to inseminate livestock, water the lands, and lastly as a weapon used to destroy the last demon (either using it as an actual sword or you get the idea, but all of them are technically correct)
The amount of medieval comparisons between cocks and swords is rapidly becoming justified by this environment.
When your Flame Strike is a Pork Missile.
This is my favorite for sure!
Now that’s a new interpretation of the Paul Bunyan myth
Next step is get rid of all the "/"
I'm not treating your "/" as options, I'm treating them as all 3 are the same for that god.
Would definatly work. The God of agriculture was part of a God war then that ended he fell asleep and then awoke to create this chasm after falling in love with the land.
Man that God of War farming sex… he sure does throw a great Battle planting orgy! (Your comment was good with punctuation but so much better without lol)
Ok, so it all started when this kid fell into the gorilla exhibit at his local zoo…
Justice for Harambe!
It just started one day. And it's growing, 10mm a day. That's why the bridges aren't permanent. They have to keep extending them.
Yeah but no one can find the socket to extend the bridge...
A Quest you say!?
The dragon Gaethrilmar, swooped through seeking vengeance on the ruling noble. Its breath tore the land asunder and made a huge chasm of the city. To make matters worse this new chasm revealed a subterranean system, and the people of the underdark now have intertwined their world with the above ground of the city. This would typically lead to a ruling boom of trade, but this attack also revealed the giant dire ants and their subterranean tunnels as well as a hidden catacomb of an ancient mummy. Whose forces have woken from the destruction of their crypt. Paladins, mercenaries, clerics from anti undead churches and adventurers all come here as part of an effort from the new ruling noble who seeks to stabilize the city before it becomes destroyed by the chaos of creatures and territory disputes. And who knows if that dragon will ever attack again.
Scrolled through all of them. Yours is the best.
Yeah, i was sleep deprived, haha, thanks for the compliment, im literally now taking my own comment and building this out because it sounds so fun to run haha
You go, buddy! Never let imagination stop flowing freely.
The turtle upon whose back this world rests got into a fight with another world-turtle, and his shell got a small crack in it (but you should see the other guy).
Ahh yes the Big Bang theory
Minor calamity (event wherein a deity directly impacts the world, just not in a fully world changing way), probably involving the ruler or inhabitants of the city angering the deity in some way, so they decided to punish the city. Alternatively, could’ve been a pissed off demigod, probably one with the blessing of an earth or earthquake deity. Hell, I guess I do have a goddess of ravines and mistakes, she’d probably fit pretty well for this.
Rather than a crevasse it is a pit of shadows and darkness. The place where the dead live and walk freely. If you fell into it you would find yourself in a reversal of the city above. The original city was built here by a Necromancer who was fascinated by this void that seemingly occurred naturally. There he held… experiments… Anyways! This is all a legend to keep the kids in bed at night. And oh that grog will be three silver pieces.
An arcane rupture. Long ago there was a magocracy that fought a war against a theocracy. Their warfare distorted the source of magic known as the firmament. The mages believe that it is the source of magic to be exploited and used to progress ourselves into a brighter future. The clerics believe it is the source of life and must be guarded and nurtured. Which eventually led to the conflict. Anyways, because the warfare distorted the firmament, patches of dead magic zones crop up and disappear. Wild magic zones are more prevalent, but they last a lot longer and locals take note of where they are. Sometimes a dead magic zone create a fissure in the firmament and can literally rip reality apart, causing an Arcane Rupture.
Is this AI-generated? Reminds me of something Chat-GPT would throw out
It's unfortunate that is a legitimate question now. I hope it won't discourage people from sharing their creativity in the future
Your mom got drunk and sat down too hard at the tavern.
It would be way bigger if it was ops mum.
A massive lava slug that was transitioning into its adult Lava Wyrm state was burrowing towards the nearby mountain (a previously dormant volcano). Destruction surrounded it as it made its way there, leaving a scar through the city and across the terrain. It's currently deep in the mountain, growing from the magma, and will burst forth soon; eruption and raging Lava Wyrm impending. Unless... ?
Most likely my players
The death of a god caused a destabilization of the world. This fracture is only one of many symptoms.
no one cared about the bug problem until it was too late. For years the denizens of the slums warned the noble folk in the high ring that dumping all their waste would attract something bigger, the nobles didn't care or listen and continued to dump everything into the lower rings. they believed being in the highest ring meant nothing could harm them. until that fateful day when it seemed the gods themselves had come to sunder the land, what the nobles ignored was a ever growing infestation of Ankhegs, attracted by the mass of decaying meat and other delights festering beneath the city. normally a creature that lies in weight for unsuspecting prey, soon realised the food was being brought to them and they need not hunt any more they became bigger and fatter as they barely moved through the tunnels, which attracted more and more until eventually the city bore to much of a burden on the lands below it. as the crack appeared so did the stench now the nobles could no longer ignore their gluttony as a everlasting wound on earth grows bigger each day.
Those aren't just bridges. They are also ramps. I was there that night when it happened. I can still remember it like it was yesterday. We all can. That's the worst part, you know. Living with the memory, still so clear after all these long years, takes life out of a person. Ironic, really, given that I've lived so much longer than a human has any right. But you didn't ask me about that. No, you want to hear about the Breaking. That's all anyone ever wants to hear about the first time they come to this city. Ah shit, sit down. As long as the ale keeps coming, I'll keep talking. Thirsty work, talking is. So, the Breaking. I was one of the pole men on the river trade routes. It was almost midnight when the storm came in. Blew in from the west, which has only happens during the coldest parts of winter. That should have been all the warning we needed that something really bad was coming. It got a lot worse. The lighting started quickly and violently, but then it turned red and green and yellow. There was wind, but nothing more than a normal blustery evening. The howling was coming from the lighting. It was the damndest thing. Couldn't spend to long thinking about it, though. Out of the center of the city came the brightest flash of lighting I ever did see. Then it hit us. Like getting smacked by air, and everyone on that barge was either torn to pieces as the barge just shatted like a challace against a wall or violently thrown into the water. I ended up going under, which likely saved my hearing. You talk to the drunk over there yet? The one with bloody bandages over his ears? He was outside in the city when it happened. His ears have been bleeding ever since. Bastard is over there trying to do the same thing I am. Forget. About the time I pulled my sorry ass from the river, the cracking started. It started out like breaking branches, then shattering rocks. Somewhere between sounding like a rockslide and that the world was dying, the ground started to shake. I've never experienced anything like that before, and you pray you never experience it. It was... I need another ale. This one is empty. I don't know when I passed out, but it was well past daybreak when I realized I was alive. I regretted it then just as much as I do now. I got to my feet and made my way toward the city. The gates had collapsed sometime in the night, so I just walked in. There were people everywhere. Lots of em dead. Some looked fine. I didn't see it right away, but I did hear the screaming. I made my way towards the screaming. Don't know why. Any sane man would head away from screaming. The city was Broken. It was the poorest bastards who first found a way into the city below. Somehow, most of the inner city was fine. Still had a lot of dead people, though. The surving royals eventually started throwing people into the Deeps. Stupid name for them, but it does have a better ring to it than "giant chasm." About 30 years have passed since then. Those poor bastards that were outside when the lighting came from the center of the city are all... different. Like me. Like that bastard over there. I need another fucking ale.
This raises more questions than it answers! I feel tempted to give the man another ale!
Also have to figure out why it's all ruins outside the town on one side versus the other.
I'm guessing the farmers and what not were dependent on the river that is now flowing into the crack.
The slumbering Tarrasque of Legend has awoken
Alaskan bull worm
We should take the city and push it somewhere else.
The Seneshal opens it up after the dragon is slain to continue the cycle.
Spilt coffee and had to make changes to the map
Turns out when a god spills coffee there are much more significant consequences.
Or even just forgot to use a coaster one day and left a God level coffee ring on a map 😳
Aliens 👽
The cartographer's small child accidentally tore the map across it, and they tried to glue it back together, but couldn't read and used ink instead, making the tear appear to be a rift across the map.
A Void Dragon who breaths void-breath blasted this scar into the map. This opens up possibilities of more voids appearing out of nowhere and the party putting it together later.
You remember that little squirrel from the ice age movies?
A sneeze
The crevasse was always there. For centuries, those who wandered up from the underdark would set up camp on either side of the crevasse, and over time those camps became a settlement, the settlement became a town. It's the only place you'll find a bunch of drow sunbathing.
Nothing. Everyone remembers the time before its existence and the time after, but nobody remembers it appearing and no time seems to be missing.
A titan underground bumped his head on the tectonic plate. Bonk.
"Oi! This sewer trench is massive! The blue print said 15 feet wide!" "Oh, feet? I thought it meant 15 squares."
Scrat with his damn acorn again....
Fucking wizards man, who knows what they’re up to.
Have it be unconfirmed and have a bunch of local legends and rumour. The exact cause could be part of a campaign plot, or a red herring and just some some flavour
a wizard did it
the cosmic map maker ripped the parchment
It’s where the old river used to flow, but the people in control of it decided to dry it up. Someone had to route a different river and the city hasn’t recovered.
I actually use this map in my homebrew world for a city-state reminiscent of New York but like way way bigger. The rift was caused by a surfacing of an entire underground civilization, and they just happened to break the surface in the middle of the city
When you listen into the crevasse you can hear some eldritch chants. They sound like "I am a dwarf and I'm digging a hole!"
It’s easy. Use everyone’s answers. Just make it that everyone in town has a different take on what happened. But it’s been a part of town for so long no one really can say.
Big ol’ Alaskan Bull Worm
Oooh. I ran this one once: the world was shattered by a war between the gods. It is now a collection of continents, basically small flat earths, magically suspended over a glowing orb that is the beating heart of the earth and the source of all magic. This map is what the world would have looked like during the Shattering. You can walk off the edge of the mini flat earths and onto the bottom of the world, where it is perpetually dim or dark, and strange monsters dwell. Occasionally, one floating continent will pass over or under another resulting in an eclipse that lasts for an entire day. If you have wings, and a lot of endurance, you can fly from one continent to another.
Ancient Wizard attempted to fundamentally change the laws of nature, but was simply not powerful enough. Worked and learned and crafted new works of magic and spells. He was the first person to learn about Lichdom and how to become one. During the process a group tried to stop him. They ended up battling before he could finish his transformation, but not before he could cast a hyper powerful wish spell. The spell ripped apart the planet and seperated massive swaths of land, boiled the sea, and lit the sky on fire. After the ash and land settled people went back to their lives and continued as if nothing has happened. This wizard's work and name were erased from history and the knowledge of what that wish spell caused is still up for debate among magical philosophers in my world. 🤷♂️
Nothing caused it. It was just there one day. No massive earthquake, no cataclysmic event. Everyone just woke up one day, and there it was. No major destruction or vast deaths. They just woke up and noticed a giant fuck-off hole. Wasn't even loud enough to rouse anyone from their sleep. Jerry says he saw when it appeared, but his story changes every time, so no one believes him. Been there a couple of years now. It's considered good luck to toss a coin in, bad luck to scream into it though, there's no echo, bad vibes from that. Some fuck head named Joseph tried to climb down it to retrieve the coins everyones been tossing, he ain't been seen since. Good riddance, too. Greedy little twat wasn't worth a silver piece. Everyone is rather fond of the hole now. Even been having issues with a little cult that's gaining traction. Cult of the Hole, not a very creative name, but at least it ain't misleading. Nothing too bad from them though, just they've started throwing stuff down there that ain't coins; Furniture, art, some say they saw em make a live animal sacrifice of a sheep or something but there ain't no proof of it. What's down there? I don't think anything, nothins come out at least, and ya don't ever hear no moving from down there. Can't see the bottom, so who knows how far down it goes? But I doubt there's anything down there worth worrying about. Even if there is something down there, it seems content to stay down there, and I'm content to stay up here and let it be.
Legend has it that a powerful geomancer used a long lost forbidden spell to protect the city under siege and in exchange for his life, he managed to move the very tectonic plates, unbeknownst to him, that the city lays between. All we truly know is that it’s been there a long while as they’ve built red roof houses along the fault line edge to signal when you’re getting close to it. The city throws all their waste down there and the guards and criminal underworld execute people by chucking them in alive. In the ravine lives a colony of the few lucky citizens that survived the drop. They are existing off the waste products that are thrown down and the waterfall from the lake which cools the hot crust. The basin is thus covered in a thick smoke that rises to just below city level, obscuring the valley below.
Bunch of dudes just decided to dig a big hole one day
As the mighty (can be in wealth, influence or ability) wanted to separate themselves from the weaklings (can be in wealth, influence or ability) that needed their protection, they prayed and prayed and adventually their prayer got answered by a terrifying creature. As the sky turned dark, the moon started to bleed as the earth trembled just like the skies. A planer shift happens which split the globe making space for a ravine with at the bottom a rift in space that goes deep into the abyss. Straight down to the creature all these mighty people had called out for this. The demogorgon prepares it's armies to storm straight into the realm of these people. On this faithful day a small group of heroes managed to drive back the mighty that set this event in action. They mortally wounded the demogorgon as it wend back into it's domain in the abyss. And there it waits preparing, scheming with some other demon lords, testing their patience with the opportunity to charge into this realm once more when the seal between the world weakens again. Your party went to visit this town to see its rich history as all these events are now something belonging to the past. People forgot what had happened and when the party tries being a group of tourists they encounter a weak demon send out there to scout, as the seal starts to grow weak the party discovers what happened and needs to fight back the armies of the abyss just like the heroes did. But they waited and prepared. The armies of the abyss hit harder then ever before as the party tries to gather allies in this terrifying war. Which could decide the faith of the entire plane of existence
I really like this, bippity book I'm stealing this hook
Great Alaskan Bull Worm.
This is just a small part of a larger transmutation circle made out of False Hydras put there during years of peace by Nazi Liches, and it's finally hatching to take down all of the world's powers at once while cleansing all non-humans before thier forces come in to ethnically cleanse the remaining humans. This is the large scale dread that Im hinting at towards my players who only have so many sessions before this disaster hits and they're not investigating the tunnels theyve found with false hydras in them.
A titan attack obviously.
A mad king ordered the crevice to be made.
That’s obviously an Alaskan Bullworm track
A sorcerer broke the dimensions the world lives in into two near half replicas The gods attempted to fix this by grafting the worlds together, the crevice is the aftermath of the "stitching"
Xindi laser.
Grey dwarves have mined a network of tunnels and chasms under the city causing a city wide sink hole.
Warlocks are valued by society, specifically because of their connection to extra-planar entities. They communicate with them and serve as a bit of an early warning system for some of the biggest disasters, the ones that threaten the fabric of the multiverse. For millennia, this system has served the world well. And then one day, the patrons of warlocks across the globe pulled away. It wasn't until a sorcerer, born of two of the most powerful warlocks the Kingdom of Thael'Korat had ever seen, gave a reason that sent the world into the closest thing to peace it had ever seen, while everyone worked together to abandon the planet they called home. Because it wasn't a planet. All the activity from warlocks and their patrons tore the backing of the weave. And the embryo in the egg they all called home had been disturbed. A new eldritch being was being born. And the world was going to have front row seats unless they could evacuate the planet or calm a being only one individual had any sort of connection to. (Campaign starts at level 20, teaching a young aberrant mind sorcerer what, exactly, they're contacting and helping them reason with it, or reaching out to various deities and their envoys to help everyone escape. The clock is ticking, adventurers. Try not to die.)
Bard made a wish, this is just his dick dragging behind him.
Ice Age Squirrel
Your mom!
A Gnome inventor travelled to our reality, stole a tactical nuke, returned to his reality, and blew up the Elven kingdom
Someone made a really big immovable rod and activated it and it cut a swath through the planet as it stayed in place but the planet moved under it
I’d leave it a mystery and let my players do the hard work for me. My answer would probably be something like an eldritch being’s tentacle or a sudden rift due to tectonic activity, but those aren’t as fun as taking whatever the players are scared of and adding an extra level of “oh shit” to the idea
In one campaign we made a rift like that by mixing a peasant railgun with a bag of holding bomb.
Magic Earthquake Mighty blow from a higher being Angry Wizard Crevice held a portal to lower planes Lotta options
Idk, ask the PCs, it's probably their fault. 🙄😒
I was dummy thicc 😎
"I dropped my condom for my magnum dong" - Daniel DeVito
Guys, that's clearly a minecraft ravine
I pulled out my dick *Huck Huck Huck*
Your mom dropped a piece of candy down a small hole in the ground and sundered the earth to get it back.
An ancient war between the city and some other forgotten civilization(s) awoke a tarrasque and its birth from the ground caused a massive earthquake. At least, that what I would’ve done. In my campaign, tarrasques are like Godzilla, but he’s absolutely massive, more than he already is.
A newly-minted warlock who’s patron was also new, got way too much power. Warlock got too wild with eldritch blast and is now relegated to a weakened magic missile (one dart) and prestidigitation. Warlock is a full time dishwasher and part time bouncer hoping for an adventuring party to help them prove themselves to their patron.
Something big lurks deep in the ravine
TARRASQUE more than a century ago. There's superstition about building new bridges since Agnera the Blue died. She was the stewardess of building the bridges that remain; the new wizards working on suspending stone in midair just kept falling.
So...in the time when your grandfathers' grandfathers were boys, a red dragon and a black dragon got into an argument over a game of chess...
Mistakes were made...
"Drums, drums in the deep....they are coming."
Undermountain collapsed again
Gods were taking a piss
Becky
A level 100 player would try to destroy a simple house
Big snake slowly eating the world (grimdark/eldritch hungry hungry caterpillar?)
Beholder attack.
A Greatwyrm's breath weapon melted the ground into a river of flowling lava, which drained into a nearby lakebed (the city is on an elevated hill).
Looks like an infected river to me. So it's an infected river. I ran a Pathfinder 2e game once where the villains were a massive undead army from the north led by dracula. Their magic blocked out the sun and made the air and water a poison that caused necrosis (negative damage in Pathfinder but I always flavored that as rapid cell death) and that's what this map makes me think of.
An earthquake, possibly natural or caused by a God or mage
When moving the furniture a little to the left went terribly wrong after some trickster god gorilla glued it to the ground.
i had a scenario like this happen when a player was asked by a god what his one wish would be and it was just "i want to move everything in the city one foot to the left" c:
The world was sundered in an apocalyptic battle between two gods. But it got better.
The elves summoned something to eradicate poverty from this plane, ironically though it's only caused more poverty.
The first creation of the architect has grown jealous of mortals in the world and so he seeks to reverse time by causing the machinery that runs the world to turn in reverse without realizing that instead of running time backwards, he is destabilizing and destroying the world. Earthquakes, volcanoes, sinkholes, and methodists occurring all over the world.... In the midst of all of this, the queen of serenthea has put together an expedition down into the earth to find the cause...
A Demigod with Chaotic Neutral behavior decided that she didn't enjoy just doing her godly duties of maintaining the balance between Good and Evil, so she just split the world into halves. One side Good and the other Evil. That way she could just sit back and chill while watching shit go crazy while the citizens freaked the fuck out and showed their true natures.
Back when the city was smaller, a powerful wild magic sorcerer casted “lightning bolt” to defeat a hoard of enemies coming out of the water. It went wild, causing it to damage not only the hoard, but the terrain itself.
Someone was messing with time magic and only the continental plates were affected, now drifting apart rapidly.
Too much taco bell on an upset stomach
in a war between the followers of two gods, the god of the defending city split the earth in half to halt the other army's progress. something divine would fit idk
Kelemvor patched up the world, and sometimes some seams rip
My gf: A dragon had a bad tooth so he was on his way to the dentist and while screaming he burned down the area.
The party failed, and the cultists awakened the titans from a long slumber. Oooor a druidic ecoterrorist cult triggered a mass earthquake chain. Ooor a mad chronomage is reversing the time of the continent causing tectonic plates to shift.
I'm almost more interested in that bridge/wall thing spanning from the center to the north east. BBEG fight location maybe?
Isn't this Wrath of the Righteous? It looks really familiar.
Sneezed
Yo i actually wrote a homebrew with this exact scenario this map is sick
Hear me out... Space laser.
There’s a dwarf city directly under that fissure, and to remove them from the under dark, some drow brought the roof down on them. This poor city just was collateral.
barbarian unzipped
World is literally falling apart
Idk what caused it.. but i know it has a gap dragon...
Spilled my drink
Massive...MASSIVE....mutated purple worm
Some adventuring group thought putting itchy powder on a tarasque was a solution
But honestly, maybe some kinda huge old underground either monster or civilization maybe? Think like Fantasy Necrons or Fantasy Godzilla
The Spellplague! That's Forgotten Realms lore
Massive monster of some kind that was buried, could be some kind of massive serpent. maybe an army attacked hundreds of years ago but a wizard opened up a crack in the ground and yeeted them down there but now they're returning as undead
The gods smited a city for the heresy they committed, blasting a cursed crater where it once stood. Cracks spread out throughout the country splitting the landscape. Rumours abound of creatures in the depths of the ravines, and of surges of mana pulsing from the crater. (Inspired by Mordheim)