Adding Azjol-Nerub as a Fake/simulated Underrealm Empire in and on Northrend

[Remerod]

Describe your suggestion in full detail below:
Introduction to my Idea Suggestion
Been a lot of talk about Nerubians, whatever some stuff should be outside the map, on the map or an offmap power. And being a thinking induvidual myself i sarted to think on it to!

If it was on the map, where would it be? well here i would referance the wc3 frozen throne loading map and the pre-kalmdor sundering of there supposed land under their dominion, witch in our mod seems to be mostly around wintergrasp. Both the wc3 loading screen and the map from warcraft enclopedia thingy both seems pretty consistant.

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But how to represent something that's underground? Well this made me think of how the Eu4 Mod Anbennar represent their fallen dwarven empire that lives inside/under a big mountain chain.

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Here they have formed tunnel provinces in the mountains and some special provinces called holds. the only way inside the mountains are to go through special surface holds. and while this is not the prittiest thing in the world, it is a very beloved feature to play inside the maintain, and people have found this very immersive playing there!

I have also seen ck3 mod "something" that use the "traverse water" pathing that i think would work very well here!

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I apology, i could not find my ck3 example to show you, so i'll show this ck2 intil i'll find the ck3 to update with my suggestion with.

here an army traverse a large distance over many counties to an other part, this simulate them going underground.

they do this by useing the "crossing a river/strait" mechanic that they have modded

But how to prevent other people, witch ain't subterrainian such as tuskar from conquering the realm, well i would suggest we either give it a new terrain type witch we somehow make nerubians happy and everyone else unhappy to be in or! we could develop a new holding typ! a or several subterrainian type. I know of that elder king have pulled this of and developing a subterrainian hold typ could serve in many places around the world on azeroth, such as Black rock dephs, molten core or perhaps temple of Ahn'Qiraj!
But this might just being me trying to get a new cool feature, it would be lovely but i don't think it is a neccecary part to get the inside mountains to make it feel underground theme to be belivable, but it would add!

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Elder Kings 2 new hold that they modded in.

So with having established that you could make the empire on the map, the problem comes of how it would look and where it would be! well sadly there is not a lot of knowldge of Azjol-Nerub, i've scouted around for what ever is canon and used some, but I also found a "suggested" fan based lore, written on wowpedia about a suggestive expansion; Spider Kingdom Expansion https://wowpedia.fandom.com/wiki/User:GoldenYak/Spider_Kingdom_Expansion_Concept
Since this is a suggestion i haven't made any detailed map or anything like that, i have taken a couple of names, and if we go ahead with this idea there are a lot more places to take names from with this "fan" lore. The fan expansion have 3 maps, 2 witch fall in line what we already know exist, a Upper and a Inner Kingdom, witch have chocen to put around wintersping or under so to say. there are also a "Cave" map on the fan expansion, witch i've chosen to put beside Drak'tharion keep or under the empire of Zul'drak. it is supposed to be completly undergroud with some ruins around Grizzly Hill and Howling fjord as entrances, these would use the "traveling above water" path to give the impresion that it's underground and not connected with borders. The Nerubian ruins above ground would also represent lore material of narubian ruins around, shown on loading screens & mentioned in lore.

So here are my suggestion on how it could look like in our mod.

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Some Nerubian ruins on a lore map i based on the entrance ruins for Shadow Web caverns

Orange - Empire
Yellow - Kingdom (kinda of,)
Puke Green - Duchies
Blue - county holds / major namned places
Light Blue - county baronies
Purple - Holds that connect the underrealm to the Surface and would work as the only entrances into Azjol-Nerub.
Red dotting - serves as the pathing across the map useing the "walking above water" pathing and serve as to be tunnel paths between the underrealms. Numbers - possible namned places on the map with their description down futher
Letters - Different duches on the map with their discriptions down futher

Main Kingdoms

1. Inner Kingdom - entrance, Barony of Eku
2. Upper Kingdom - entrance, Barony City of Anubar
3. Azjol-Nerub (or Ahn'kahet), Barony of Erozi
4. Naz'anak the forgotten depths, new county
5. Naz'Amun the crawling city, new county, with Naz'amin as the center, the Cinderbog, Ahn'Dirac the silent Temple & Library of ancient weavers as baronies counted from north to south.
6. Ahn'Kahet The fallen temple (or an other name), new county with Ahn'Kahet as the center, webrecker(or something) & The City of Spiders as baronies south of it.
7. Gate/tunnel from Duchy F to E
8. Gate/tunnel from Duchy E to F
9. Gate/tunnel from Duchy D to E
10. Gate/tunnel from Duchy E to D
11. Gate/tunnel from Duchy E to H
12. Gate/tunnel from Duchy H to E

Shadow Web caverns
Azj'Aqir Worldgate
Ahn'Vekir The first City
The Shrouded Monolith

The Shadowgate - passage to Inner Kingdom

So I've written the Azjol-Nerub empire to be like possible 3 kingdoms that don't connect borderwise to each other.
The Upper Kingdom, with 4 duchies;
A the duchy that have the possible main entrance,
B Naz'Amun duchy the center of the Upper kingdom with Naz'Amun as it's capital.
C a duchy with the secound or possible main entrance based of on . Naz'anak the forgotten depths that supposodly connects closer to icecrown.
D a tunnel duchy that is suppose to lead to the Inner Kingdom.
Inner Kingdom, with 3 duchies;
E Azjol-Nerub (or Ahn'kahet) the main city & duchy of the empire witch also have the Inner Kingdom - entrance witch might be the Pit of Narjun,
F Just a duchy futher away from the capital witch you need to travel far to, my idea is to expand the mountains here and move En'kilh south, we could possible make En'kilah an entrance to the duchy form the outside.
G the furthest duchy away from the capital, my idea is that this would represent caves far away and long forgotten, and would be either here or at duchy D that the N'raqi started to attack Azjol-Nerub from.
Shadow Web caverns (name can change)
Based on the Spider Kingdom Expansion Concept & on the wc3 loading screen that show the nerubians been in control of the eastern parts of Northrend. Supposed to be either a duchy but possible a kingdom, and would be fallen, possible to faceless or something. I dunno how big it should be so it's just a duchy for now H, the capital would be Ahn'Vekir The first City with possible other settlements & terrain such as Azj'Aqir Worldgate or Shadow web forest.
There would not be a direct entrance here but rather to Nerubian "ruins" around the howling fjord and grizly hills as the loading screen shows.

Conclusion
So if i would name some drawbacks or weak point for this suggestion they would be that we need to remake the map,, change mountain ranges for the azjol-nerub to be inside of, move some provinces like En'kilah, the new counties/baronies will probably be smaller then the rest of the map and etc etc. And while i believe the underground realms simulated in mountains would be immersive they do take away some aspect of our realistic map.
But what i do belive we make from my suggestion would be; Nerubians! a lot of em, we would be able to simulate the spider wars, artas traversing and fighting nerubians, N'raqi and other faceless taking hold of parts of Azjol-Nerub threatening Azeroth. An Other Empire! A new a fun mechanic/theme of being under the ground and being able to traverse distances fast to get to the other side of the continent. I personaly think this looks fun and enjoyable to play as!

If you agree, disagree or have an opinion/idea of your own, please leave a comment. ;)

[arithon]

But how to prevent other people, witch ain't subterrainian such as tuskar from conquering the realm

Why would you disallow other cultures to conquer it? It's exactly what the LK did...

or! we could develop a new holding typ! a or several subterrainian type.

The issue with the holding type would be: Who would be the main holder of the county, if there's a subterranean holding? Either the count would rule over the underground holding's owner or there would be an independent underground baron, while the count had de-jure-claims on the land...

[Remerod]

Why would you disallow other cultures to conquer it? It's exactly what the LK did...

the Lich King was losing the war of the Spider, until he could turn the tide against the Nerubians with... the undead Nerubians. I'm not suggestion that other culture's wouldn't be allowed to conquer it, but it should be harder for other culture's that live above ground, say Humans to conquer Azjol-Nerub, while other races such as dwarves, kobold should have an easier task of being and fighting underground.

The issue with the holding type would be: Who would be the main holder of the county, if there's a subterranean holding? Either the count would rule over the underground holding's owner or there would be an independent underground baron, while the count had de-jure-claims on the land...

That would be the ideal solution actually. Say again, if a Human would be to conquer the realm, they would either have to install a Nerubian (or say dwarf) to controll the lands beneath themselves. A Human could say hold the provinces but it would be with negative maluses. Or split the realm apart into lesser "nerubian" realms.

Whatever we do a subterranean holding or a new "terrain" type i feel like an underground place should be unique and not that easy for anyone to hold. some "races" should be better doing it. but say you play as a human and really want to be underground? well with the coming cultural change they could say change their culture to have a "trait/cultural-thing-i-forgot-name-off" to allow them to flourish underground. This way every culture "could" be underground, but that shouldn't be made easy. People forget but Azjol-Nerub was like the Lich Kings main forces before the scourge of lordaeron (and the lore would have reflected on that if not for blizzard slopping that idea in wotlk). So other culture's should be allowed to fight nerubians and conquer their land yes, but it shoulden't be easy to convert culture there and so on.
To make this fair, we should perhaps make it so Nerubians would take certain negative maluses when "not in correct terrain" or if holding the wrong holding type (if we make a subterranean hold), for stuff above ground. I think this is justified in Lore with the many nerubian ruins above ground, while you could argue this is from the spider war, i wouldn't be surprised if some are from being defeated by drakari troll (just as aeons ago), vrykuls & giants.

So to say, there should be possible for a "Tuskar" to conquer Azjol-Nerub, but it shouldn't be easy, it should not be easy to convert the underground culture and it should be challenging to get a culture trait that let you be good in subterranean (or something that let you hold a special subterranean hold). And this should be for players mainly, we shoulden't see many Tuskar AI going to become Emperors of Azjol-Nerub.
I at least think that Azjol-Nerub warrent a bit of extra crisp so to say for their culture, lands and theme. Most of the other insectnoids have gotten some love and i think this is fitting.
Do that share some light on your concerns or sound agreeable @arithon ?

[arithon]

the Lich King was losing the war of the Spider, until he could turn the tide against the Nerubians with... the undead Nerubians. I'm not suggestion that other culture's wouldn't be allowed to conquer it, but it should be harder for other culture's that live above ground, say Humans to conquer Azjol-Nerub, while other races such as dwarves, kobold should have an easier task of being and fighting underground.

Ok, I can get on that side. I thought at first, that it should be near impossible like we have with the titan facilities before opening.

[Remerod]

Nono-no, of course there should be possible to fight down there, just should be a challenge. Like we know that the dwarf Baelgun Flamebeard had an expedition down there, and a player should be allowed to do something similar. So conquest by other races should definitly be possible, just not easy.
(And on the note of Baelgun Flamebeard, he should hold a county/hold in the frozen throne bookmark if anything, thus giving us a beardy dwarven run in Azjol-Nerub! )

[zumbak04]

Overall, I'm against Azjol-Nerub on the map in any form.

new counties/baronies will probably be smaller then the rest of the map

If you make them too small, it will be nearly impossible for the player to click on them or distinguish on-map models there.

[Remerod]

Yeah, to small would be bad. And i agree that this ain't the absolute best solution, but Azjol-Nerub is such an iconic and important lore location in World of Warcraft, and they are especially important for Northrend. Thus i think they warrant some kind of represenation. if anything in worst case, we could just do a lot less counties and make them stronger instead.

I really feel like adding them in this way would be fun gameplay and make the mod more enjoyable though

[zumbak04]

Thus i think they warrant some kind of representation.

Make it like China from CK2. This is an idea floating in the air.

[Remerod]

I think making it like china in ck2 works, but personally i belive in this idea, and i think this idea would be more fun to play as for people