Wilderness Dressing: Ruins
The leavings of many civilisations dot the land. Such places are often a magnet for minions of evil. Bandits, marauding humanoids or other—more terrible and ferocious—monsters can be found lairing in such locales.
Small Ruins
Smaller ruins—abandoned homes, old chapels and the like—litter the land. Such places can serve as a temporary campsite or the locale for a short mini-adventure.
A neglected, roofless shrine sits by the road. Weeds choke the interior. A three-foot-tall statue, its features too weathered to identify, rests in an alcove in the far end.
A series of short, crumbling stone walls stretch east to west. They are evenly spaced as if denoting property or field lines. Rocks and bits of rotted wood fill a hole between the walls in what was once the entrance to small farmhouse’s cellar.
A mud hut, its mouldy thatch roof caved in, sags forlornly near a collapsed cow barn. Dense cobwebs stretch between the hut and barn.
The charred beam and pillar framework of a former inn stand like a blackened skeleton. Soot and ash cover the ground and not even weeds find purchase in the barren soil.
Cracked stone steps ascend to a small circular platform beneath a series of worn, broken pillars. Broken mosaic tiles on the platform depict a demonic face.
An octagonal wooden fence, missing most of its planks, encloses ground empty except for a small stone plinth. A deep furrow runs from the plinth to a broken down section of fence as if something large and heavy was dragged away.
Debris surrounds a tumbled brick chimney set in the jagged remains of a stone wall. Burnt table legs and a decayed blanket fill the hearth.
The shattered upside-down remains of a farmhouse lie in a small hole.
A dry stream bed runs passed an ancient, but still sturdy-looking, wood and stone mill. Only cobwebs and ivy call the empty interior home.
Wind whistles through gaping holes in a wooden barn leaning haphazardly to one side. A rickety wooden ladder leads up to a rotten upper floor.
Large Ruins
Large ruins—shattered castles, abandoned towns and the like, are likely well known in the locality. Many fell tales are told of such places.
Massive stone archways lean haphazardly over weed-choked stone boulevards and plazas. Only a few crumbling walls denote former houses.
A crumbling moat tower, overgrown with ivy, protects a castle, half sunk into the ground, its interior exposed to the elements. Broken towers lean against the castle’s keep.
Three massive stone pyramids sit in a line, steep steps leading to large fire pits carved into their flat tops. A single door at the base of each structure leads into a labyrinthine interior.
The burned out husks of wood and thatch longhouses cluster around a stone well filled with debris. The smell of death lingers in the air.
Four great towers, their tops shattered, rise 50 ft. into the air. Thin, cracked stone bridges criss-cross between the towers. Broken staircases spiral the inside of the hollow towers; jutting bits of stone are evidence of former rooms and floors.
Broken statues line a stone pathway up to a large marble-pillared building. Water floods the interior from an exposed underground spring that has broken through the floor at the building’s centre.
Ivy and moss cover nearly every surface of a stout stone keep. Mould and mildew coat the keep which is home to rats, bats and huge spiders.
Rotting ships, some as large as galleys, lie upturned next to large slabs of stone set in the ground. This now almost totally buried ruin seems to be the remains of a wharf.
Scattered blocks of obsidian, inscribed with the iconography of an evil deity, surround the foundations of a once proud temple. A few outlying buildings remain relatively intact. At night, a mist arises bringing with it a foul presence.
Wind- and rain-eroded archways frame the ruins of a once grand building; most of its roof has caved in. A few rooms, crowded with fungus and a strange, silver glowing moss, remain mostly intact.
This is an extract from Wilderness Dressing: Ruins (Remastered) by John Bennett. This tremendously useful GM’s Resource is available in 5e, OSR and Pathfinder 1 editions.
Words John Bennett Art Matt Morrow