Gatar Depression
Once a lowland sea, the Gatar Depression is now an arid waste of sand and salt flats cut by a small number of trails which follow gravel beds and ridge lines.
This is a deadly place to those not skilled in desert survival and able to protect themselves from predatory monsters that can be found here.
Locations of Note
Three oases are in the north-western part of the Depression:
Tuath's Rest is an unusually large oasis though in dry years the pool is sometimes dry.
Korvin's Wells is an abandoned settlement near old wells dug into the stone and can usually be relied on as a water source.
Sumaldi is a major area of greenery in the desert and contains the ruins of the once great trading city of Sumaldi, the northern terminus of the caravan routes from the Five Sisters. The ruins are generally uninhabited except for animals and Undead.
Towering over Sumaldi to the south is Argon’s Watch, once a towering pinnacle of stone from which one could observe the surrounding desert within a radius of almost 120 miles. Since it exploded in Summer 817, it is a hill of shattered stone surrounding intact pieces that still float where they have always been.
The rarely used caravan routes to the south pass beneath the shadow of the watch.
To the South of the Gatar Depression is the area of the Five Sisters.
Geographical features
This is a barren land. Life can be found in the few oases and the occasional rock spires and ridges that may once have been islands in the ancient sea.
Dust and sand blow across the vast expanses of the former sea bed, forming dunes hundreds of feet tall in some areas.
Ravines abound, sometimes exposed, sometimes dangerously concealed by the dust and sand, and others filled and buried. Some ravines seem natural others look like the ground has been fractured by mighty impacts long ago.
