Niflheimr
CharlesWayneRobinson
Traveler
Niflheimr,
Far to the North West of the Vagothian realms is said to be the mythical lands of Niflheimr. These lands are named after a similar place from their old world. To find it, you must travel over 1,250 leagues heading North West from the Skjaldborg Eylands. A little over half way, you will come across the uninhabited island of Thule where your ship will have safe harbor. The waters between Thule and Niflheimr are known for the giant creatures of the deep that travel in great schools. It is said that Jormungandr, the Midgard Serpent, loves to hunt these beasts and causes great storms.
Niflheimr is a realm of primordial ice and cold and has born to the world many terrible things. There are 12 rivers, much like the place of legend from Vagoth's mythology, but a single spring is not the source of these, nor is there a great tree. These rivers are known as: Elivagar, Svol, Gunnthra, Fjorm, Fimbulthul, Slidr, Hrid, Sylgr, Ylgr, Vid, Leiptr, and Gjoll. This is a barren place, with no forests and little vegetation. The animals that do live here mostly dwell along the coast or within the sea. It is also believed that after the end of the Faith Wars, many powerful creatures and lesser gods, that naturally felt at home in the cold regions, may have fled to the mountains of Niflheimr.
A black dragon stalks these lands and is known as Nithhoggr, the Malice Striker! He lives in the mountain named Nithofjoll and guards the halls of Nastrond. Nastrond means the Corpse Coast, and it is believed that those who were murders, adulterers, and all who have had died of old age dwell here and serve the Goddess Hel. These are the shores of the undead. They do not feel the cold, they never tire, and one day, they will march against Odin.
From Vagothian Lore:
"From below the dragon dark comes forth, Nithhoggr flying from Nithofjoll. The bodies of men on his wings he bears, the serpent bright. But now must I sink."
"A hall I saw, far from the sun. On Nastrond it stands, and the doors face north. Venom drops through the smoke-vent down, for around the walls do serpents wind. I there saw wading through rivers wild treacherous men and murderers too, and workers of ill with the wives of men. There Nithhoggr sucked the blood of the slain and the wolf tore men; would you know yet more?"
The Vagothians can tell me many things about Niflheimr, they know the stories well, but I have yet to meet anyone that has actually been there or who were willing to go there. Even though it is on many maps, I am not sure that it truly exists. Someday, I will have to find the truth of Niflheimr.
The Father, Council of the White Elves, Lord of Destiny, and the Patron Saint of Orphans.
Far to the North West of the Vagothian realms is said to be the mythical lands of Niflheimr. These lands are named after a similar place from their old world. To find it, you must travel over 1,250 leagues heading North West from the Skjaldborg Eylands. A little over half way, you will come across the uninhabited island of Thule where your ship will have safe harbor. The waters between Thule and Niflheimr are known for the giant creatures of the deep that travel in great schools. It is said that Jormungandr, the Midgard Serpent, loves to hunt these beasts and causes great storms.
Niflheimr is a realm of primordial ice and cold and has born to the world many terrible things. There are 12 rivers, much like the place of legend from Vagoth's mythology, but a single spring is not the source of these, nor is there a great tree. These rivers are known as: Elivagar, Svol, Gunnthra, Fjorm, Fimbulthul, Slidr, Hrid, Sylgr, Ylgr, Vid, Leiptr, and Gjoll. This is a barren place, with no forests and little vegetation. The animals that do live here mostly dwell along the coast or within the sea. It is also believed that after the end of the Faith Wars, many powerful creatures and lesser gods, that naturally felt at home in the cold regions, may have fled to the mountains of Niflheimr.
A black dragon stalks these lands and is known as Nithhoggr, the Malice Striker! He lives in the mountain named Nithofjoll and guards the halls of Nastrond. Nastrond means the Corpse Coast, and it is believed that those who were murders, adulterers, and all who have had died of old age dwell here and serve the Goddess Hel. These are the shores of the undead. They do not feel the cold, they never tire, and one day, they will march against Odin.
From Vagothian Lore:
"From below the dragon dark comes forth, Nithhoggr flying from Nithofjoll. The bodies of men on his wings he bears, the serpent bright. But now must I sink."
"A hall I saw, far from the sun. On Nastrond it stands, and the doors face north. Venom drops through the smoke-vent down, for around the walls do serpents wind. I there saw wading through rivers wild treacherous men and murderers too, and workers of ill with the wives of men. There Nithhoggr sucked the blood of the slain and the wolf tore men; would you know yet more?"
The Vagothians can tell me many things about Niflheimr, they know the stories well, but I have yet to meet anyone that has actually been there or who were willing to go there. Even though it is on many maps, I am not sure that it truly exists. Someday, I will have to find the truth of Niflheimr.
The Father, Council of the White Elves, Lord of Destiny, and the Patron Saint of Orphans.
Comments
I like your hills and mountain
Imo only the icebergs are too many.
Excuse my bad english.
Vastin
I was wondering about that. Not sure how many there should be though. :-)
Semitransparent white color sheet where the icy sea regions are.
Vastin
I like how you've used the symbols from There be Monster's annual.
I agree with the others about the ice. In my opinion, it isn't that there is too much ice. It is actually two different issues. The first is that there isn't enough ice. I picture it like what you would see with a coast guard cutter trying to move through the ice in the Antarctic or north pole trying to rescue a stranded ship. Second is that all of the pieces of ice that you do have are uniform size. You definitely need to vary the size of the icebergs.
Love the school of sea monsters though. That is hilarious to me because I had never thought of sea monsters travelling in schools. To be honest it is a terrifying thought too!
:-)
;-)
PS: I actually got the idea from the suggestions for decorating the open areas of my ocean. I was thinking about the suggestion for a battle between ships and when I started building Niflheimr and decided to use one of the sea monster symbols for the Midgard Serpent, it came to me, what does a sea serpent that is big enough to wrap all around the work eat? Smaller sea monsters of course - the battle is on as the predators become the hunted! LoL!
;-)
I did not like the coast for my Niflheimr map.
The beach tan and green from the base Land sheet did not go with the artic feel.
I made an Artic Land sheet and changed the settings to give it a more barren "cold" feel.
I have deleted all the ice flows and the icebergs.
How does the coast look now?
I am still experimenting on ice flows.
Thanks,
Charles W. Robinson
This is just an experiment - so it only covers the southern most coastal area of Niflheimr for now.
What do you think?
I Like this ice flow
Edit:
Some ice pieces brealking apart will look great too
:-)
Charles, the ice flows look much better now... Makes the coastline appear much more treacherous!
Oh, and BTW... It's now your turn in the tutorial hotseat! Have you written up a tutorial for how you make your rivers flow I to your seas, and how you break up the coastline to show where they flow into the sea? I mean an actual PDF tutorial? If you have, can you provide a link for downloading such a tutorial?
If not....you really need to make one for those of us that want to know how do you do it?!?
LadieStorm, I have a tutorial in the forum from where a person asked me how I do my rivers, but not a clean PDF version. I will look into making a PDF version since I have been asked about them twice since. I just provided the link to the forum version again yesterday. So far, I have done three tutorials on the forum. Thanks for the idea LadieStorm. I never thought of putting it in a PDF format before.
http://forum.profantasy.com/comments.php?DiscussionID=5552&page=1#Item_28
Of course...that's one of the points I used to convince hubby to let me order the tome! Next project... Convince him to let me get the annual subscription! That one's more difficult, because our bank is fickle with out of country purchases.
I put my update into a new thread: Niflheimr2
*raises mine*
http://forum.profantasy.com/comments.php?DiscussionID=5552&page=1#Item_28
The people here are fantastic, and exceedingly kind, most of them try to accommodate me, and others like me that have sporadic access to Internet.
It is the one class that I am struggling in.
Right now I am just messing around with CC3+ as a study break, most of my time is spent studying here in my home office.
Monsen placed my thread: Robinson Tutorials into the Sticky: Interesting, Important and Helpful topics - Resources, Tutorials & More.
I can update the thread whenever I want and it will be easy for you all to find instead of having to wonder throughout the posts.