Page 9 - Critical Role: Tal’Dorei Campaign Setting

tal’dorei campaign guide

guidance from beyond the Divine Gate, bestowing their humans braved the angry Ozmit Sea and sailed to what is
knowledge and power to their most devout worshippers, but now western Tal’Dorei from distant Issylra.
the path of mortals is now their own to make. New cities, These people had the sea in their blood, and sailed from
kingdoms, and cultures have retaken the world, built over island to island for generations, but something called
the ashes of the old. New songs fill the air, and the hope of them to Tal’Dorei. The ruins of their first settlement still
a brighter future drives people day after day, while buried stands today: the port city of O’Noa. From O’Noa the
ruins and forgotten relics remind all people of a darker time seafarers expanded outward, until all the western shores
of mistakes that should never be repeated. fell under their banner. In the North, they found fertile
fields unsalted by the nearby sea against an inlet unmarred
the history by looming rocks and dangerous reefs, and they began
to build. They did not know their city would become the
of tal’dorei heart of a great empire. They did not know the glory and
sorrow that would surround their city of Emon.
Following the creation, and subsequent razing, of Exan- the iron rule of drassig
dria, a post-Divergence world was now left to rise from
the ashes and begin a new era. While every region has The rise of human colonies vexed the elves of Syngorn.
had their own rebirth since the terrible destruction of Forests that had stood for centuries fell under the axes of
the Calamity, the continent that now bears the name of creatures who lived only a scant few decades. These ten-
this setting shall remain the focus. Let it begin with the sions did not rise to war, but the humans gnawed at peace
founding of Gwessar. like termites.
As the first human civilization on this part of the world
gwessar after the Calamity, a handful of self-entitled noble houses
arose in Emon and established law and structure, but
Not more than 800 years ago, what is now known as the
those who designed the game stacked the deck in their
continent of Tal’Dorei housed the germinating seeds
favor. Corruption spread through the upper echelons of
of restored civilization. It was the hardy, dependable
Emon, and power-hungry politicians seized each new and
dwarves who best weathered the war between gods and
valuable resource that was discovered in their bountiful
mortals, and within the Cliffkeep Mountains, the dwar-
new kingdom. They turned their citizens against each
ven clans built the subterranean city of Kraghammer.
other, forcing them to fight for scraps while they hoarded
The proud clans were the first to reclaim the riches of
the lion’s share.
the earth, and nestled in its safe embrace they founded
Emon was a political war zone, and the greatest warrior
expansive mines of rich metals and minerals, ensuring a
of them all was a loudmouthed braggart and cunning
prosperous foothold under the banner of the ruling Clan
oligarch named Warren Drassig. The chaos and mistrust
Jaggenstrike.
in Emon allowed Drassig and his agents to seize power
Far to the south of Kraghammer lived the elves. In
and transform the realm into the Kingdom of Drassig,
the wake of the Calamity, the surviving found shelter
with Warren himself as its supreme monarch. Drassig was
in the otherworldly peace of the Feywild, returning a
quick to sever any remaining connections with the elves
generation later, united under the guidance of an elven
of Syngorn and make new alliances with the dwarves of
sorceress named Yenlara. The elves rallied to her both
Kraghammer, marrying Drassig’s autocratic power with
for her defiant strength and her compassion in the face
the dwarves’ immense material wealth.
of adversity. It was under Yenlara’s wise rule that elven
The elves were furious, but the ambassador from Syn-
society once again began to reform. She led her people
gorn to Emon, an idealisitic grandson of the still-living
westward to the Verdant Expanse, an untamed forest
Yenlara, hoped to resolve this diplomatically. Upon
born from the surging, post-Calamity energies left
arrival, he was apprehended, tortured, and slain. This final
untouched by the Betrayers’ evil. Calling themselves
act of treachery sent Syngorn into arms, and the continent
wood elves, Yenlara’s people began to construct a new
erupted into a long and terrible war between Yenlara’s kin
home for elven culture in these lands. This reborn home
and Drassig’s bloodline known as the Scattered War.
was given the name Syngorn.
The new elven society came to call this land Gwessar— the scattered war
in their tongue, the Fields of Joy—and they refer to the
continent of Tal’Dorei by that name to this day. The Scattered War lasted for thirty-two years and is
The dwarves and elves are long-lived people, and when colloquially known as the “Time of Shrouds:. The war
they struggled to rebuild their civilizations, there were spanned throughout the Cliffkeep Mountains and into
those among them who still remembered the world that parts of the Verdant Expanse, with the human colonies
was. The humans were not so fortunate. Their histories, spread throughout the soon-to-be-warring territories. The
written by warmongers in fading ink on waterlogged settlements, towns, and cities had no means of long-range
parchment and vellum, did not survive the years. Yet communication, and could not warn each other; Dras-
humanity endured. Several centuries after the Jaggen- sig was able to attack each one with little resistance. He
strike dwarves began this period of renewal, a clan of taught his soldiers to infiltrate their enemy, listening from
8 chapter 1: campaigns in tal'dorei