The Drowned Coast

Art in progress

Under the black water of the marsh a woman's face looks up, calm, with her eyes open and coral in her hair.

North of the flats the seabed rises into marsh, and the marsh into the coast where the Tide came in on the Night of the Tide. Saltreach, the capital of Velmarch, stands in the water here, and its king still holds court under it. He is the boss of the second act, the Drowned World; which regions sit in which act is a proposal, from the overview.

What you find

Grey fog and cold light. A salt marsh runs for miles, grey reeds and black pools and the old Salt Road sinking into it plank by plank. In the pools lie the drowned, faces turned up just under the surface, perfectly kept. Fallen who walk the marsh learn not to look down.

Beyond the marsh the grey sea runs to the horizon under endless rain. Out of it rise the spires of Saltreach, like the masts of a fleet that sank standing up. Among them stands the Tidewall, the great sea-gate of the city, and its gates stand open.

Art in progress

The palette is almost all cold: slate, verdigris, tide teal, and the pale bone of the dead. The only warm thing on the coast is your own light, and every drowned thing sees it coming.

The Sunken Reach

At low water the sea draws back from the lower city, and the Sunken Reach can be walked: the flooded streets of Saltreach, ankle-deep in black water, marble crusted with coral, driftwood jammed into doorways. Fallen name the streets by what is left in them. The Lantern Stair, a flight of steps going down into water, still lined with iron lamp-posts. The Mint, where the coin of Velmarch was struck, and loose shards still turn up in the silt. When the tide turns, the Reach fills again, and whoever is still in it stays.

Art in progress

What it tells you

That the war has fronts. The coast is where two holds meet. In the Reach the Drowned Court keeps its posts, bound and still: sentries on the walls, heralds in flooded halls waiting for messages that will never come. On the marsh the crusade from the flats wades in under its banners. Where no fallen is near, their pieces fight each other in the water, drowned against drowned, and the faces in the pools are what is left.

And that a king asked heaven for something once. Orrin begged for the fire to be drowned, and someone above answered with the sea. Nobody below knows which side.

What lives there

• Hollow Ghouls. The drowned of Velmarch, their embers washed out by the Tide. They don't hate you. They are cold, and you are warm.
• Bone Archers. The Tidewall garrison, still at their posts after the water rose. They loose at any light.
• The Drowned Court. See The world between.

At the heart of the Reach, in the throne room of Saltreach, sits Orrin, the Drowned King, crowned in coral. The floor at the centre of his throne room is dry. His court wears white, and nobody, below or above, agrees whose.

How it plays

• Three sides, not two. Packs of the Court and packs of the crusade fight each other as well as you; a fallen who waits can let them thin each other out.
• The tide is a clock. The Reach is walked at low water, and the way to the throne room closes when the tide turns.
• The act's boss is Orrin. Beating him gives back the second memory: a procession in heaven, stopping at the edge of the House's court. Past him the low road climbs out of the fog to the Vale.

On the second climb

A century on, the coast has drowned further, and the front between the two holds has moved: toward the flats if the Wardens hold more of the board, into the Reach if the Heirs do, and if you chose the Apostates, there is no front at all, only drowned things loose in the marsh. Orrin is on his throne either way. See the second climb.

Its place in history

Saltreach was the capital of Velmarch for three hundred years. On the Night of the Tide, Orrin opened the Tidewall and the sea poured through it into the city and down the mines beneath. The coast drowned in a single night. See History.

In the game

The Drowned Coast is concept. Hollow Ghouls and Bone Archers are in the current build from depth 1 of its caves, and Orrin's crown is a unique, the Crown of the Drowned King.

Rumours

• At the hour the Tidewall opened, a ship's bell rings somewhere in the Reach. Fallen have followed it. It is always one street further on.
• A warm light burns in the topmost window of the tallest spire. It has never gone out. Nobody has reached it.
• Shards from the Mint are warmer than any others. The Coalwrights pay double for them and will not say why.