Plains

Climate and Variety: Plains

Main Source: Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plain

Plains are areas that are mostly flat and where trees are reasonably sparse.

There are several types:

Coastal plain,
Fluvial plains;
Flood plain,
Alluvial plain,
Scroll plain,
Lacustrine plain,
Lava plain,
Glacial plains;
Till plain,
Sandur (plural sandar),

A coastal plain, like it sounds is a plain that lies on the coast and is generally seperated from the inland by some other sort of terrain like mountains or hills.

They tend to have quite an abundance of different fauna and flora, along with flat ground for Agriculture and fishing opportunites would probably be prime land for a trading/coastal settlement, while mountain/hill surrounds would possibly provide protection over land.

from a story perspective could provide a good base of operations and source of adventure, though reasonably unexciting itself (atleast I think so ;) ), a coastal port, provides oppurtunities for sea ventures and the surrounding mountains tunnels and caves.

A flood plain like a coastal plain is a plain that lies adjacent to a stream, river, lake or wetland that experiences periodic flooding.

The soil there is generally very fertile and the access to fresh water, and easy transportation via the river makes them popular choices for argicultural settlements despite the floodings. I would imagine that they would try to offset this by puting buildings on stalks?

Story wise possible sub plots of having to help out during a flood, or perhaps danger to the settlement of a severe and unexpected flood.

An Alluvial plain is a flood plain that no longer floods very often, only a few times every century, and would thus be even more desirable for a farmland settlement.

A scroll plain is a plain where a river meanders (like a snake) across a plain, sometimes forming lakes.

A Lacustrine plain is a plan that used to be the bottom of the lake where the water in the lake has disappeared due to drainage, evaporation, etc

Sometimes they are fertile, and other times will be a wetland or a desert.

A lava plain is a plain created by lava flow from a volcano, they don't seem to be particularly fertile land for agriculture, but seem to be good spots to search for semi-precious stones, such as sapphire.


Till plains are plains formed by the melting of an ice sheet that has become detached from a glacier spreading sediment across the plain.

Sandur is a plain formed from sediment deposited onto a plain from the flow of meltwater at the end of a glacier.

Lol this is going to take me ages ;) interesting though ;)