Hârn HârnWorld Introduction

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Introduction

What Is Hârnworld

HârnWorld is a detailed, realistic, flexible, and system-neutral setting for fantasy role-playing games. Since 1983, HârnWorld has been used by thousands of people across the world to run a wide array of medieval fantasy adventures. HârnWorld can accommodate whatever style of campaign you are looking for, whether your player characters are knights, mages, barbarians, clerics, noble lords, mercenaries, gladiators, craftsmen, merchants, thieves, or even simple peasants yearning for adventure.

This basic HârnWorld module has two components:

Hârn Overview

The 58-page Hârn article is a general overview of Hârnic cultures, governments, economics, history, and more. It also includes campaign aids for such tasks as generating weather conditions and character backgrounds.

Hârn Regional Map

The map of Hârn provides a vast amount of information with a unique cartographic system developed specifically for fantasy gaming. The area detailed measures 620×930 miles (1000×1500 km). The colors and textures show vegetation and terrain as noted on the map key.

Encyclopedia Hârnica

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Beyond this master module, HârnWorld is described in a series of articles covering a variety of topics. At the highest level is Hârndex, a master index that includes entries for kingdoms, cities, castles, and major settlements; historical and present-day monarchs and other important people; gods and religions; mountains, lakes, and other geographic features; and a number of strange, dangerous creatures unique to HârnWorld. Hârndex also includes definitions of terms related to medieval economics, warfare, and society.

Hârndex is expanded upon by a series of stand-alone articles collectively referred to as the Encyclopedia Hârnica. These supplements cover a wide range of topics in much greater detail. Articles for the major kingdoms describe their people, histories, and political intrigues, while those covering individual castles and keeps provide details of the settlement’s residents, fortifications, and resources. Various religious orders are covered, giving GMs and players a rich panoply of realistic faiths from which to choose. Material about the various guilds brings greater depth to the world’s economics and articles on wilderness areas and barbarian tribes provide fertile ground for adventuring. Throughout, GMs are provided with plentiful adventure hooks and story seeds to introduce the players to the setting. With more than 200 supplements published to date, GMs won’t lack for choices in how to tailor their campaigns.

Modules are presented in an expandable format: they are loose-leaf and hole-punched, allowing you to insert them into binders to create your own Encyclopedia Hârnica to fit the needs of your campaign.

Where to Start

With all this detail, HârnWorld can seem overwhelming to newcomers. But don’t worry, you don’t need everything we’ve published to get started. The descriptions of the Hârnic kingdoms in this module will give you a taste for each and should spark ideas of the kinds of adventures they are best suited for. Just pick one and then dive into the related supplements. Use what fits your game, change what doesn’t. Above all, enjoy exploring Hârn!

SideBar

Why Use HârnWorld?

The following was written by N. Robin Crossby, creator of Hârn, in the second edition of HârnWorld, published in 1990.

Fantasy role playing is a trinity of three vital elements: gamemastering, rules, and environment. The first needs little explanation; even the best environment and rules will not survive the misjudgments of a bad GM, but they can make a talented rookie shine. Rules are no more than a mechanical set of guidelines, an attempt to formulate common sense into some pretty weird stuff.

HârnWorld belongs to the third element of FRP. A good environmental framework is a painstaking endeavor that takes many, many years of blood and sweat to create. Something like 30 man-years has gone into HârnWorld products.

All works of fantasy should be woven of familiar threads. Because it is impossible to entirely describe an alien world, readers must be able to fill in the gaps with their own knowledge and experience. Although more than one million words have gone into describing HârnWorld and its expansion modules, lots more can be said and will be said. In the meantime, the reader can take comfort from knowing that this world operates under the same physical laws and social dynamics as medieval Terra.

Of course, in any fantasy the viewer/player must suspend his disbelief. In fantasy role playing, most are willing to accept that magic works and that fell beasties roam the wilderness. Outlandish beasts with strange powers and strange esoteric phenomena exist in HârnWorld, but they are carefully blended with medieval reality.

With roleplaying, there is a vital element of mood, and this elusive principle lies at the heart of HârnWorld. While it is true that magic-strong, hack-

and-slash environs can keep players busy for a time, only an environment that is fundamentally rational can give the feeling that one is involved in an epic.

HârnWorld was specifically created for roleplaying as opposed to dragon-bashing. Those who have so far limited their FRP activity to random forays into disjointed chaos have missed at least half the fun of this exciting hobby. HârnWorld is, I believe, an epic product, with all the fantasy you want, and all the realism you need.

N. Robin Crossby

1954–2008

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