Finder’s Archives – Clearwater Pathway

July 1, 2022 Kim Frandsen Finder's Archive 1

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Finder’s Archives.

In this column, we take some of the lands from Magic: The Gathering and turn them into something you can use for your fantasy games.

The stats given in each entry assumes that you’re using Pathfinder or 5e for your games, but they can easily be converted over into any fantasy system. Today we take a (mostly) gentle swim down the Clearwater Pathway.

Clearwater Pathway

The Clearwater Pathway is something of a misnomer, as it is a rather large river that winds its way through several countries, regions, and different types of terrain, from tall and rugged mountains to flat and peaceful plains. For the most part, it is a gentle river, easily traversed, and used by hundreds of craft each day, moving cargo to and from various cities. The river itself feeds thousands with the fish that live in it, and many of the communities that have grown up along its banks would be unable to subsist if it wasn’t for the life-giving waters.

As a result of this dependence, all of the nations that border the river have a strong naval presence on the waters, and while smuggling definitely occurs, it is a lot less than what is experienced on similar waters in the rest of the world. For the most part, even when at war, the various nations leave the river alone as well, to avoid angering the rest of the nations that have a territorial claim upon its waters. No single nation would be able to resist the might of the others if they banded together, and a peace that has lasted over a century among the various nations still holds strong today.

Lay of the Land

The gentler parts of the river tend to be where the communities are, but a number of waterfalls and natural weirs makes traversing the full length of the river somewhat dangerous to those who are unfamiliar with the waters. The borders of various nations often end or begin at these natural barriers, with mills, blacksmiths, and other industries often placed here to take advantage of the power of the water passing through, driving great wheels. All of them take great care to avoid contaminating the river, knowing that their livelihoods, and those of their families and friends, depend upon the fresh waters of the Clearwater Pathway.

All told, the inhabitants here consider themselves lucky to be living near such a place of plenty and refuge, and many are willing to lay down their lives in order to protect it.

Dangers

For the most part, the Clearwater Pathway is safe and is patrolled by the river navies of the various nations that border it, but no single nation claims the Pathway for itself. This is due to the presence of a Sea Dragon (which goes by the name of Qingshui — 5e / PF2) that claims the river as its domain, and which reveals itself to the ruler of each country upon them taking power. There they are given an ultimatum: “Accept the river as a neutral ground, under the protection of all, as well as Quinshui itself, or face the wrath of the dragon immediately. If accepted your nation will grow and be prosperous, if declined maybe your successor will be smarter.” – So far, the wise rulers have accepted, and been proven right. The bounty of the river has been plentiful. Those who have declined… None are alive.

Enjoy a safe swim, and see you back next week. 😊

The following two tabs change content below.
My Facebook profile

Kim Frandsen

40 years old, and a gamer since I was 13. These days I freelance as a writer for various companies (currently Fat Goblin Games, Flaming Crab Games, Outland Entertainment, Paizo, Raging Swan Games, Rusted Iron Games, and Zenith Games), I've dipped my hands into all sorts of games, but my current "go-to" games are Pathfinder 2, Dungeon Crawl Classics and SLA Industries. Unfortunately, while wargaming used to be a big hobby, with wife, dog and daughter came less time.
My Facebook profile

Latest posts by Kim Frandsen (see all)

Comments are closed.