The Story of Nerath The Valelands & The Nerath Timeline The current year for our Valelands campaign is set during the year 103AE. Inspired By Gary Gygax

The Empire of Nerath once stood as the greatest civilization the world had ever known. Its roads stretched across continents, its armies kept the darkness at bay, and its laws united countless peoples beneath a single banner. That age is long gone. A century has passed since the empire collapsed in a cataclysmic war, leaving behind a broken realm where thriving cities became abandoned ruins, mighty fortresses crumbled into silence, and civilization retreated before the encroaching wilderness. What was once the heart of a mighty empire is now little more than a vast, untamed frontier.

The wilderness has reclaimed nearly everything Nerath built. Ancient highways disappear beneath tangled forests, forgotten watchtowers now serve as lairs for monsters, and ruined keeps shelter creatures far darker than those who once defended them.

The scattered settlements that survived stand alone, separated by miles of dangerous wildlands where travel is rare and perilous. Merchants, pilgrims, and adventurers cling to the old roads, knowing that a single wrong turn can lead to death at the hands of bandits, beasts, or horrors left behind from the empire's fall.

Without an emperor, kingdom, or great alliance to restore order, every village and town must fend for itself. A settlement threatened by raiders, cultists, or monsters cannot expect help from distant rulers because there are none. News travels slowly, and many communities disappear without anyone beyond their neighbors ever knowing their fate. Those few bastions of civilization that remain are isolated points of light, surrounded on all sides by the endless wilderness that swallowed the empire. Among these surviving enclaves lies the Nentir Vale, one of the last true frontiers of the fallen Empire of Nerath.

Here, the remnants of civilization struggle to endure while the ruins of a forgotten age beckon from every forest, mountain, and lonely hill. The heroes of this campaign are not exploring a thriving kingdom—they are walking through the bones of a dead empire, where every ruined tower, abandoned village, and crumbling fortress tells the story of Nerath's fall and offers the chance to shape what little future remains.