chaogomu

The Endless Sands are a spacially expanded area located 1-E-15N-4.

From the outside, the sands only stretch a few dozen kilometers, but once entered, the extent of the Sands are truly endless.

There are a few cities scattered amongst the Sands, most of them are simply called Oasis, This can become confusing, yet a simple answer presents itself. Most of these cities, are in fact the same city. The cities are mirrored reflections of each other, sometimes literally, sometimes figuratively, and sometimes it's a future or past version of the city. Rarely is actual time travel possible, but rumors persist.

(as a note, don't do true time travel unless you really want the headache)

Traveling the Sands is only possible at night, and then only with the correct skills in astronomy, with an astrolabe. If the navigation rolls succeeds, it only takes 1d6 nights travel to reach any destination in the Sands, even the exit.

Maps of the Sands are always in the form of star charts. These charts make no god-damn sense outside the Sands.

Dangers of the Sands;

The Day-Time Heat. This can be deadly without shelter and water.

Sandstorms. These roll through, day or night, and basically ruin your day. Characters will want to be bunkered down in tents before one of these hits them. (weather/survival/ sense skills should be able to give 1d6 hours advance warning)

Sandstorms can move a camped caravan, and there are some planned routes through the sands that require such a sandstorm. Tales persist of ancient tombs, and great treasures to be found on such routes. The reality is that great treasure comes with great danger.

Sandstorms can also drop off monsters or such at GM discretion.

Jinn, Genies, and spirits of the sands, or whatever name you give them. They're everything from small helper/prankster spirits to beings of almost Godlike power, limited only to the Sands. Some will cut deals, some will grant wishes, and none of them can be trusted. They cannot leave the Sands.

Culture. I'm borrowing heavily from the ideas of Arabian Nights here, There would be a distrust for sunlight, because navigation is only possible by starlight, so idioms like "only starlight tells the truth" would show up. or possibly a "Are you telling me by daylight?" for "are you lying to me?". If you distrust a person, you might even say something like "Tell me that on the rock" because "the rock" is the ground outside the Sands. and Jinn cannot leave the Sands, no matter their power level.

While the caves are non-Euclidean and infinite, any given path once traversed, is stable for 1d6 days, with modifiers based on the number of people traveling said path, and any markings they leave.

This means that if something nasty crawls out of a monster nest deep in the caves, there's a good chance that its friends can follow. Conversely, an adventuring party can delve the deeps, follow the spore trails, and clear out the danger before more makes its way to the surface.

This stability, coupled with the fact that any cave diver is likely to return to their home canyon (if they survive the depths) means that a secondary form of adventure is available. Trailblazing new trade routes.

The normal method is to simply enter a cave, take the first turn available, and then make your way back to the surface, then use the sun and stars to see how where you are North to South. Then repeat until you have a useful trade route.

Most useful trade routes have 3d6 stops above ground. Finding a faster, more direct route, can lead to riches.

The simple answer to the question of weather is, that it's whatever the story requires.

The long answer is that water vapor rises from the center of the Low Sea, but it only reliably fills the lower terraces.

This means that the Low Sea and Green Hell are both inundated with water, but the Emerald Hills and upward are not.

For the Emerald Hills, the Arid Steppe, and the Frozen Wastes, the prevailing winds alternate between day and night. Daytime winds blow from the Low Sea outward, while nighttime winds blow from the Frozen Wastes inward.

Summer and winter have the effect of lengthening the day/night cycle, and thus the giving more variation to the temperatures.

Another factor is the North/South winds, the Northern and Southern latitudes can see wet air traveling to the poles, and then back toward the equator, but much colder and following the upper terraces. This can lead to some intense winter storms.

And also some intense summer storms as well.

The only area spared is the equator, which gets monsoons in the spring and fall. Pouring rain, but little in the way of severe weather systems.

The Frozen Wastes are less frozen at the equator, and the Green Hell actually extends into the Emerald Hills.

The City of Whitefall takes its name from the WhiteFall river, whose headwaters are found in the Frozen Wastes, 1-W-41N-5.

A somewhat unique magic infuses the lands around the Whitefall, allowing a hardy species of cottonwood tree to grow along the river's flood plane.

The average fully grown Whitefall Cottonwood tree produces close to 250kg of cotton each Autumn. This sets off a yearly race to harvest the white gold before it can begin to decompose.

The spinning and weaving factories of the City use the flow of the Whitefall river to produce finished cloth, most of which is transported down the cliff face to the lower city (1-W-40N-3), where it is then loaded into caravans to be sold across the world.

The City boasts a pair of great elevators, each having dozens of platforms in near constant movement. The near constant is accomplished with a cleaver use of clockwork. This allows the passenger elevator to have a one-minute stop at each platform, and the freight elevator a ten-minute stop.

The elevators run day and night, with the infrastructure responsible for their operation taking up several kilometers of the cliff both at the top and base.

There are also maintenance stairways bolted to the cliff face, making the 4km climb.

The city of Whitefall is ruled by a coalition of merchant houses, Their true names have been lost to time, and are now just named for their colors. Members of each house and their employees all wear tunics and capes dyed in the color of their house.

The Main players are the Families Black, Red, and Green. These houses exist in a perpetual state of competition, which can at times turn violent, even as the heads of the houses themselves are friendly with each other.

There are several lesser houses, and the unofficial house of the poor workers, the White.

The current lord of the Upper City is a man named Erik Black.

Erik is a deadly duelist, and one of the most competent administrators to ever rule the city. He also has infamously bad luck at any game of chance. He has been tested repeatedly for supernatural influences, including by three separate gods, and yet the bad luck persists with no known source.

Erik Black is often found at his favorite Tavern, a gambling den run by House Green. If you meet him in a game of chance, you may be slightly disappointed to learn that he only bets pocket change. The exception is when he wagers the title of city lord, this is the one time of bet that Erik Black has never lost, despite the number of times he's attempted it.

The Houses' main responsibilities are as such.

House Black mostly provides security, policing, and caravan guards.

House Green, based primarily in the Lower City (with several Upper City establishments) handles foodstuffs. They have farms, groceries, and taverns.

House Red maintains the machinery that is the lifeblood of Whitefall. They built the Great Elevators, and own most of the spinning and weaving factories of the Upper City.

Notable lesser houses.

House Blue tends to handle messenger and scribe services, and they maintain a large library in the Lower City.

House Saffron tends to the gods.

The unofficial "Houses" are the Whtie, which is most of the everyday workers, who are expected to keep their clothing a pristine white, and the final unofficial House, the Gray.

The Gray are those too poor to regularly wash their clothes, which then pick up filth and muck which then "dyes" their once pristine clothing various shades of gray.

The Gray are the poor, the beggars and the sometimes thieves, with constant rumors of a more organized structure hidden within the sorry masses. This is generally false, the Thieves' guild operates in the White.