The Pathfinder Society bases itself in Absalom on the Inner Sea. To the north is the continent of Avistan, seat of once-mighty empires like Cheliax and Taldor, and site of the ruins of Lost Thassilon in Varisia. South, across the wide waterway of the Inner Sea, lie the secrets of Garund, a sprawling continent of arid deserts and fecund jungles, where the mighty pharaohs of Osirion emerged from the Age of Darkness to chart a new destiny for humanity.
The crumbling remnants of countless lost civilizations abound upon Avistan and Garund, drawing explorers and adventurers from all corners of Golarion. Some of these nations fell in the cloudy days of prehistory, like the lost continent of Azlant and the mysterious terraced pyramids of the Mwangi Expanse. Others collapsed in recent memory, as occurred in the so-called Sodden Lands along the edge of the Eye of Abendego, a permanent hurricane off Garund’s western coast.
The Eye appeared a century ago, at the birth of the current era of mankind’s history, the Age of Lost Omens. Until a century ago, the destiny of humanity was guided by an ascended mortal known as Aroden, the last survivor of Old Azlant, first of the great human kingdoms of antiquity. In the early days of recorded history, Aroden walked Golarion among his people. When Azlant sunk beneath the sea, a victim of its own pride and arrogance, Aroden ventured to Avistan. There he raised the Starstone from the depths of the Inner Sea, helped to found both Taldor and Absalom, and protected his people from the depredations of horrif ic villains such as the wizard-king Tar-Baphon and the nigh-unstoppable Spawn of Rovagug. Then, thousands of years ago, Aroden departed Golarion, vowing to return on the eve of mankind’s greatest triumph.
The Last Azlanti’s powerful church in the empire of Cheliax traced this prophecy to a specific day just over a century ago. With great ceremony and circumstance, thousands of clerics of Aroden and the Chelaxian nobility who supported them gathered in a vast ceremony at the Chelish capital of Westcrown, eager to see their deific master manifest in the f lesh to usher in a new age of triumph.
Instead, terrible storms darkened Golarion’s skies, and the assembled clerics lost all connection to their god. For 3 weeks, winds and waves ravaged the world, drowning coastal nations and casting governments into ruin. In the north, Golarion shifted slightly in the direction of the infernal Abyss, granting terrible demonic forces control over a widening region of the world. The Eye of Abendego remains as the greatest physical aftershock of Aroden’s apparent death, but the psychological scars upon humanity will take centuries to fully heal.
Perhaps worse, Aroden’s disappearance shattered one of the most reliable prophecies humans had ever known, shaking their faith in the solidity of the future. Since this tragic event, no signif icant prophecy has come true in any way, leading scholars to name the current era the Age of Lost Omens.
This uncertain world serves as the backdrop for your Pathf inder Chronicles campaign. It is a world 100 years from catastrophe, a place of overwhelming danger with an unknown future.
It is a place in need of adventurers willing to make that future their own. So polish your swords and armor and ready your most potent spells.
Your new campaign world awaits!