The next step in my campaign design: the world beyond the dungeon.

Alan Bradley wrote:

The next step in my campaign design: the world beyond the dungeon.

Obviously there's the "town", but beyond that?

B1 has only vague geographical descriptions, and my copy has notes about locating it in Greyhawk.

B2 has its map, and a vague description/concept of a broader world.

The Sample Dungeon has a vague description of the world beyond Portown. There's also the interesting Stone Mountain cross section..

Unfortunately the feel in B1 and B2 doesn't really match the Sample Dungeon, IMHO. Since I'd rather keep the campaign area fairly small at first, I'd probably leave them out and expand from the Portown description.

That requires at least a vague sense of what is beyond the sea. Detailed maps wouldn't be required, but a medieval style map should be available to the PCs if they look hard enough. Failing that they can rely on rumours and legends. It would be interesting to see what kind of "map" they would put together from those...

Has anyone done anything with the Sample Dungeon "world"? (Aside from mapping Portown).

I've been thinking about how to handle making potions in a Holmesian manner.

I've been thinking about how to handle making potions in a Holmesian manner. In a lot of ways, potions and scrolls are similar - one use spells in a can. On the other hand, it takes a Magic User or Elf to use a scroll, while potions can be drunk by anyone.

This suggests that making potions should be more difficult (expensive, time consuming, requiring rare ingredients, and possibly a higher level).

Has anyone done anything related to this? Any thoughts?