It's Tuesday, and we're opening the gates to the very heart of The Overlords of Steel: the megadungeon Exesed Mordax, an enormous lost city buried beneath the wastes of a hidden mountain valley deep in southern Qa'rood. Potent magics and primordial technologies mark this ancient, mysterious place. And today, I'm sharing a selection of its incredible maps with you that were hand-drawn in painstaking detail over the last five years by my friend, the talented Mark Pileggi. As we speak, these maps are being digitally re-drawn in full-color by my little brother, Marc. We hope you like them very much!
Lost City Under the Earth
Exesed Mordax is the principal adventuring site of this mega-adventure book: a vast, interconnected underworld composed of ~30 full-color maps, originally designed by hand at 17" × 22" apiece, and containing well over 1,000 keyed areas.
The megadungeon's ruins descend beneath two surface towers, through buried districts, forgotten complexes, natural caverns, ancient works, and unfathomable regions swallowed by the earth. And the deeper the adventurers travel, the stranger the city becomes.
The diagram below shows the overall depth and structure of Exesed Mordax.
"Megadungeon Sideview," by Mark Pileggi.
The Surface
The ruins begin on the valley's rocky surface. Your stalwart heroes will discover 4 possible entrances into the megadungeon's early levels via the western tower, eastern tower, and an expanse between them containing evidence of a primordial battlefield.
Other secret avenues into Exesed Mordax exist that are not depicted on this map, however, and determined adventurers may eventually find them.
"The White Tower," by Mark Pileggi.
"Jaquays-ed" to be Explored
Exesed Mordax is an interconnected environment containing alternate routes, hidden passages, vertical connections, magical shortcuts, cunning factions, sealed vaults, and technological discoveries that can change the way adventurers navigate this dangerous place.
Within its depths, the adventurers will encounter the mysterious remains of a forgotten civilization: corridors, chambers, workshops, vaults, shrines, and bizarre machines left behind by a civilization whose mastery of arcana and pseudo-science technology far exceeded that of the present age.
As the buried city intersects with the natural world beneath Qa'rood, its passages open into immense subterranean environments: sprawling catacombs, underground waterways, alien caverns, and astonishing rifts. These places have evolved for centuries in darkness, as have their violent inhabitants...
"Level 2B - West," by Mark Pileggi.
Faction Interplay
The megadungeon is also home to multiple competing factions, each with its own goals, territories, rivalries, and ambitions. These groups are not simply enemies waiting in stasis to be fought and killed. Adventurers may negotiate with them, manipulate their fears and rivalries, trade information, strike temporary alliances, play one faction against another, or make enemies whose influence reaches far beyond the dungeon level being explored.
Relationships can shift over the course of the campaign as factions gain or lose territory, suffer setbacks, discover new routes, or react to the party’s actions. Clever players may find that diplomacy, deception, and carefully chosen alliances can be just as powerful as spells and swords.
"Level 3 - West," by Mark Pileggi.
Campaign Variety: The Spice of Life!
But importantly, the complex is not intended to be cleared from top to bottom, room by room, nor is it designed so that your band of heroes must spend the entire campaign exploring its dark halls.
Factional developments in civilization will vie for the players' attention back home, challenging them with new obstacles and compelling goals far away from Exesed Mordax, meaning they don't have to stay in the dungeon all the time. These unscripted events occur organically throughout the campaign.
This intentional design keeps the game exciting and gives players a variety of adventures to pursue and enjoy. And because of this, I think you'll enjoy the final product very much!
