KarlM wrote: The references to names, languages, political backgrounds, tectical setups and so on are all signs IMO of an excellent match between prep and play.Thank you.
KarlM wrote: I have a question about that prep: at this point in the game, how much had you prepped about 'Pegasus Mountain'?On possibility I can see is that maybe the pegasi were a rolled encounter and you knew there was a mountain nearby so you described the pegasi as flying in that direction.
Pretty much exactly that.
I have a high-level overview of the world showing major cities and kingdoms, general terrain type, and so on. I map out six-mile hexes as I need them, mostly.
I rolled pegasus, neither side surprised, spot distance was far away, and the reaction roll was indifferent. So the pegasi fled rather than risk anything.
My notes for the ancient, abandoned dwarven highway listed an ancient, failing magical effect that prevented monsters (these days, it only prevents lairs), so it made sense that pegasi might forage there; and there was a mountain two hexes south on my overview map, so …
That was pretty much all I had at that point in the game.
KarlM wrote: At what point did you decide there were additional ruins on that mountain?"Mountain" pretty much means "abandoned dwarven ruins" in this setting; dwarves owned almost all mountains, and when they disappeared, the structures were left behind. So I knew there would be at least a fortress there.
I actually mapped out the fortress between sessions 10 and 11 (and I may have thrown an extra encounter out in session 10 to buy time … heh).
When I actually sat down to map it, I made a cliff for the pegasi; the made the mountain very vertical, so I had an idea of the area being a bit more tectonically unstable, so I noted that the area was a magma bulge. I made some vague notes about fire elementals, lignemaids, salamanders, etc.
Then I started rolling up the fortress monsters and treasures. One treasure was a map; rolling that, I got an efreet bottle.
Then I had a brainstorm for a microdungeon with a fire-and-earth theme, took my earlier notes, threw in golems and a big rock trap, and had the map direct a path to the microdungeon.
Then I mapped out rest of the mountain. I gave it a vertical pillar of magma in the center. I put the dwarven fortress right next to the pillar, along with ceramic pipes and heat taps. Then I put the secondary dungeon on top of the pillar - a lake of magma at the top tip, beneath a granite dome.
Of course, that put the fortress below the secondary dungeon, which ended up having an emergent property: the Grim Fist dug a hole and flooded the fortress!