World books are difficult. If they provide too much information, you can’t use it during play. The best world is one you know so well you’ve created it yourself. But too little information doesn’t help either: you might as well start from scratch. Highland (hopefully) provides an interesting framework on which you can build. You can pull pieces of it and re-use them.
Highland isn’t really meant for you to use. It’s meant for me to use. I built it slowly, starting with a nice map and a couple of small towns, and a short history detailing the American west feel combined with the ruins of Europe. If I’ve tried to make this book useful, it’s because I’ve tried to make it useful to me.
This book also provides a context for standalone adventures such as The Lost Castle of the Astronomers, Illustrious Castle, and The House of Lisport. When using these adventures you can pull the locale from Highland even if you aren’t using Highland itself.
You can use one of its towns or areas as a starting point and build your own structure on that part of the framework. Or, you can start with one small town and slowly introduce more areas as the characters travel.
Highland is designed for the rural adventurer, where characters begin in small villages or remote areas and move in toward civilization as they learn more and more about their world’s past. It was designed as a version of the standard fantasy world imprinted on the American old west. The two most common starting points I’ve used are Stone Goblin and Hightown. Both places are on or near a commercial hub, but are still small enough for villagers to dream of adventure.
Stone Goblin is near the edge of the world: if you fall off, there are Elves and Celts and strange forests. Hightown is on the other edge of the world: the Leather Road, “beyond which lie dragons”. It is also situated between several of the old schismatic orders. Their castles, abandoned or not, are great sources of adventure.
