The North Burns
The North Burns has undergone some significant changes over the last year, and you may have seen some of that in the video. I was hesitant to discuss the scenario at length during the video as I have done that prior but I wanted to discuss some of the changes here.
The Barrens suffered a severe reduction in overall POIs and had a lot of their adventure and ruin focused POIs moved elsewhere. We did this to not only make late game marches more immediately threatening but also to prevent a common strategy where players would have 3-4 agents all in the barrens searching for artifacts and ancient ruins. While a few were moved to distant areas most of the unique elements were moved to the large island in the north of the map, which now also holds the Sentinel. In addition to this requiring more investment on the player's part to get to and make use of these POIs it also lures heroes into dangerous expeditions that aren't necessarily at your doorstep.
The Golden Republic of Toln has had its entire off-map kingdom brought onto the map, a militant/pirate neighbor added to the south, and pathways up to more badlands and tundra to the north. We did this to create much more potential for both chaos and order in that area, and we also moved the Mercenary modifier from Tolnspire to a new city off the coast. With the new surrounding territories Tolnspire as well as the massive presence of slaves the city already has enough powderkegs without treacherous mercenary insurrection. We moved The Court of Bone from the west up north, centering The Cult of Mirth's city-based itinerary around the sea and making its appearances in critical moments more frequent. This also serves to make the Court's military threat more unique instead of pinning it in an area already brimming with potential allies.
Minotaurs were added in the western wilds, just one of the four tribes but we also added the ability for a second tribe to migrate in from one of the off-map connections. The Elves were moved slightly to support more aggressive movements by the barbarian tribes and also to make threatening them with corrupted barbarians or the Iron Mountain easier.
Dwarf Holds have been added to Arden and also to the volcano near Hereldus bringing the total of Abandoned Holds up to four. While the North Burns still starts with no established dwarf kingdoms (just some Clay Dwarf modifiers) you can expect this doubling of Holds to almost guarantee at least dwarf attempt to reclaim one of the holds.
Omm now straddles the mountains that once served as its southern border, we did this to create alternate paths for Omm to move against either the Shadowmere rising to the east or the possible undead hordes that can come from the Offmap plains to the west.
The Serpentlands of the Brood were brought closer to the coast, cutting down on the extra POIs needed to get there. This was done mostly because the Brood rarely managed any meaningful contribution to the campaign and by at least allowing them a short transit to the coast they will be a stronger lure both for adventurers and for agents.
