Welcome to Varisia

Thaddeus the Bard of Kaer Maga by Midjourney

They call it Varisia: a frontier, a wild coast, a canvas of ruins. The maps will show you mountains, rivers, shining cities, and scattered tribes.

But I say, don’t trust the maps.

Varisia is so much more than ink and parchment. She is a living, mysterious thing. She howls with the storms that batter the coast, she broods in the shadows of her broken monuments, she tempts with gold and cut with stone.

To some she is a promise. To others a graveyard of empires. To our heroes though, Varisia was neither. She was their stage and their crucible; a bottomless pit and a sanctuary all at once. Every step they took upon her soil left a mark, and every mark she gave them cuts deeper still.

So remember this, friends: you don’t walk through Varisia unchanged.

She takes her due, always.

But sometimes - just sometimes - she gives something priceless back.

A land with a past

The Dungeon Master by Midjourney

"One must embrace the sin to reclaim the lost virtue.

The Sihedron was broken for a world to live and now fate has span your threads to the final pattern.

Choose how you weave..."

— The Dungeon Master

Aeons ago, our land - our home - was nothing like the world we came to know. Legends say it was the beating heart of a marvelous empire: Thassilon. Vast. Unyielding. And, quite frankly, terrible.

It was not ruled by kings or councils, nor guided by the will of the gods. Instead, power belonged to mighty wizards: masters of arcane arts who carved their will into the very bones of Varisia. The scholars call them great. I call them arrogant. And like all arrogant empires, theirs came crashing down.

The how and the why? Well, that depends on who you ask. Some say sin. Some say hubris. Others whisper darker truths. What matters is this: the empire cracked, and its ruins sank into the soil.

Thasselonian Ruins by Midjourney

What the seven magisters left behind still scars the land: monuments too vast to topple, dungeons sunk deep into the bones of the earth, runes carved so sharply they still whisper at night. For ages, this past lay buried, its secrets hushed beneath stone and silence.

But ruins do not stay silent forever.

Ten thousand years later, five misfits stumbled together by chance. Misfits, aye, yet bound by something greater. They did not seek to wake the dead glories of Thassilon, not at first. Yet step by step, choice by choice, they unearthed what had long been thought lost. Secrets. Powers. Shadows of a time when mortals mistook themselves for gods.

And in chasing their own fates, they reshaped Varisia forever.

Map of Varisia, by Rob Lazzaretti

Varisia is wilderness first, civilization second. Between the forests, rivers, mountains, and coasts lie scattered villages and stubborn holds, but only a handful of great cities. In their journeys, our heroes crossed them all leaving their mark on each.

And in the process, they carved their own names into legend.

Magnimar: The City of Monuments

Magnimar by Midjourney

The young city gleams like a white jewel of marble and art, born of ambition and adventurous spirit. Pressed against the sea, she lives forever in the shadow of the Irespan - the ancient, shattered bridge that soars into the sky and ends in nothing. Sitting on Avistan’s western coast, Magnimar calls out to all who seek a starting point.

It is called the City of Monuments, for the plazas and streets are crowned with towering statues and carved wonders, some raised by her proud citizens, others left behind by a people long vanished. To Magnimarians, each monument is more than stone though: it is a mark of glory, a claim to memory and a hope that their deeds will outlast their lives.

Yet make no mistake, friends: Magnimar is hungry. The streets of the city swarm with dreamers, merchants, and mercenaries; the plazas ring with politics, schemes, and coin. One hand always reaching toward the heavens, one claw sunk deep into her alleys, Magnimar is promise and peril alike: a city that can make legends, or grind them into dust.

Riddleport: The Pirate' s Haven

Far to the north, where cliffs bite into the sea, sprawls Riddleport. To walk its streets is to risk your coin, your heart, and often your throat. The city thrives on salt and smoke, on chance and steel - a haven for pirates, gamblers, and those bold (or desperate) enough to trust their luck. Ships cram the harbor, taverns spill laughter and blood in equal measure, and fortunes rise and fall with every dice roll.

Riddleport by Midjourney

Yet above the chaos looms Riddleport’s greatest mystery: the Cyphergate. A colossal arch of stone, carved in a tongue older than memory, it spans the harbor like the bones of some forgotten god. To the pirates it’s nothing but a shadow above their sails. But the Cyphermages - a brotherhood of scholars and arcanists dedicated to the gate's study - swear that the runes whisper secrets of power. And I tell you this, friends: nothing that vast and that old stands without reason.

Korvosa: The Jewel & the Tyrant

Korvosa by Midjourney

Korvosa is jewel and tyrant both. Red roofs march in neat lines up Citadel Hill, crowned by the looming royal palace built atop the Grand Mastaba - an ancient black ziggurat that broods over the city like a hawk. Born of Chelish stone and pride, Korvosa claims mastery of Varisia, and for centuries it has tried to make that claim true. Nobles posture in their halls, the Korvosan Guard keeps order with iron hands, and the city’s crown weighs heavy on every soul beneath it.

Yet behind the banners and the grandeur lie restless streets, alleys sharp with intrigue, and whispers of rebellion. Korvosa is both glorious and grim, a city that demands respect, but breeds discontent.

Kaer Maga: The City of Strangers

Kaer Maga

And then there is Kaer Maga. No marble spires, no shining plazas - only walls so ancient and vast they humble all who pass beneath them. A ring of cyclopean stone, carved by hands long vanished, wrapped around a hive of chaos. Within those walls lies every creed, every sin, every wonder and horror a soul could imagine. Kaer Maga does not judge; she accepts, swallows secrets, and spits out marvels.

To walk her streets is to see a hundred worlds crammed into one, each stranger than the last. She is chaos given form, yet somehow whole; proof that even the discarded and the lost can build something enduring. She is my home, and my haven.

Janderhoff: The Mountain's Forge

Janderhoff by Midjourney

Last, but never least, stands Janderhoff: the dwarven holdfast, one of the ancient Sky Citadels. A bastion carved into the mountains, fortress and forge alike, as unyielding as the stone itself. Its gates have never fallen, its forges have never cooled. The clang of hammer on steel echoes through its halls like a heartbeat. Tradition runs deep, but so too does pride; the dwarves of Janderhoff meet the world with steel in hand and song in their throats. To stand beneath its vaulted ceilings is to feel the weight of centuries, and the strength of a people who will not bend.

Shoanti & the Wilds: Varisia's Heart

The Cinderlands

But don’t tell me you thought we were done. I warned you from the start: Varisia is wild first, and civilized second. These cities are but islands in an endless sea of untamed land, unclaimed since the fall of Thassilon.

The true Varisia is her wilderness: forests deep as night, rivers with teeth, mountains that test every step. And in the vast Cinderlands and the high peaks of the Storval Plateau dwell the Shoanti: proud, fierce, and as much a part of Varisia as its storms and its stones. Their clans endure where few others can, carrying traditions as old as the wind.

Cities may rise and fall, crowns may glitter and crack, but the wild heart of Varisia remains eternal.

An endless stage

But I think, that's enough of stones and streets, my friends, don't you agree? After all, a land is nothing without the souls who walk it. Varisia is wide, wild, and waiting, yes, but what makes her tale worth the telling are those who crossed her roads and changed her in ways no empire ever could.

So drink deep, warm your hands by the fire, and listen close.

For now it is time to introduce you to our band of misfits.