I've been giving some thought about how to create some geographical difficulties traveling from eastern Flaness (Greyhawk/Keoland/Furondy) to western Flaness (Nyrond/Pale/Great Kingdom). Essentially I want to squeeze trade routes to a few points passing through powerful city-states, and giving the Bright Desert population a trading identity as well as nomadic herders.
One thing I want to do is eliminate the Duchy of Urnst and run the Bright Desert all the way north to the Nyr Dyv. But that still leaves the sea lanes. My thought was to make the Gearnat Straight and the three mountain ranges directing weather patterns into it become a very dangerous place for sailing. Hurricanes/severe winds become a major worry, especially between the Abbor Alz and the Headlands. I'd make the major ways to trade from east to west up through the County of Urnst and over they Nyr Dyv to Greyhawk one route, overland across the Bright Desert another, hugging the shore along the southern coast of the Bright Desert a third, and then I'd create a portage way across the neck of the Headlands (involving a river valley up, a tunnel through the mountain, and down to Irongate, giving the dwarves a powerful trading position). And that's basically it, three main routes with different dangers, and one that's relatively safe but tightly controlled and inconvenient.
Anyone else ever done anything like this? I know lots of folks want easy travel, but I like it to be more difficult and an adventure in and of itself.
I believe your general idea has some interesting possibilities.
First, I believe you switched east/west in your comment above. ;)
"Greyhawk/Keoland/Furondy" would be in the western Flanaess, while "Nyrond/Pale/Great Kingdom" would be eastern Flanaess.
Second, canon has the prevailing winds moving from the east to the west across the Flanaess - opposite the prevailing winds across most of the USA and Europe. Having the Abbor Alz and the Headlands, in Onwal, funnel the prevailing winds into the Sea of Gearnat works, if you make them higher mountains - especially the Headlands. As is, they aren't tall enough to greatly affect the prevailing wind patterns.
I am uncertain of why the trade route across the neck of the Headlands would be a useful route if the Sea of Gearnat is extremely dangerous to navigate. There would, presumably, be only a small bay north of Irongate that could be safely sailed. That doesn't seem much of a trade route.
Alternatively, you could use a combination of some of your geological changes in combination with adding geo-political and monstrous dangers to the various routes that already exist.
Perhaps The Urnst states know that they are the only reasonable trade route, so they extort extremely high tolls on merchants. Perhaps this has led to a war, or undeclared hostilities, between the two Urnst nations, so anyone traveling through them is at risk of being robbed by patrols or having their goods confiscated for the war effort.
Other routes may have dangerous weather, or be overrun with monsters.
I did get east and west reversed. I always do that, for some reason. The terrible part is that I double checked myself and thought I'd have them wrong so reversed them. I had them right the first time! Ah, well.
I'm curious what the source for the winds is.
Regarding the Headlands portage, it's the Straight (not the Sea) of Gearnat that I'm talking about. That is, the area between the Pomarj and the Headlands, though in this instance I'd extend it up to the eastern Abbor-Alz. The idea is to isolate Kelmor Bay and (to a lesser extent) the Gearnat Sea from the Azure Sea and from each other.
So far as geopolitical barriers, I'm relying on this for the northern Flaness, with Iuz, the Horned Society, and the Bandit Kingdoms forming a trade barrier between east and west. Also the pirates from the Pomarj and Scant prevent effective seaborne trade routes hugging the coast through the Straight of Gearnat.
Thanks for your input, I hope this clarifies my thoughts a bit more.
Trade is already squeezed into a few routes. And those routes are dangerous.
There is no need to eliminate the Duchy of Urnst. The Cairn Hills between Greyhawk and the Duch of Urnst is unsafe and requires significant patrols to make it functional. Also, going by the maps in CoGH and FtA, there is only one viable road, through rough hills, again making the passage difficult. Further, once trade gets to Greyhawk, the overland route to Dyvers goes under the eaves of the Gnarley Forest, again with nastiness lurking within.
As for Woolly Bay, Relmor Bay, and Sea of Gearnat, they are all noted as being very stormy and dangerous. They also have pirates who may be slavers.
Nyr Dyv has monsters.
The passage through the Shield Lands is subject to raids from the Bandit Kingdoms, if not outright closed post-Wars. And, since Dragon 68, the last stretch is part of the Bandit Kingdoms, with raiders and pirates.
That leaves the Azure Sea, which, guess what, has monsters and pirates. Oh, and has to pass the Pomarj and the Gearnat storms anyway, unless you want to run galleys out of sight of land (50% success rate) or have lots of Renaissance era ships (long digression there). Even then, monsters and pirates.
You do not have to change anything. By canon, there are only four routes, and none of them are safe.
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