Fernfall Garrison was designed to be a former military base belonging to the Vowkeepers, who were sort of the NPC villain faction in Spellbreak. As such I wanted to make sure it felt like a large and imposing complex fit to house, train, and equip a small army. After browsing the vast folder of castle reference images we had, I settled on a layout loosely based on a historic fort in India, with a walled elevated layer creating the ground on which the whole fort was built. Those Vowkeepers were characterized as a pretty arrogant and domineering organization, so I guess it’s fitting they’d want to elevate themselves above the common people in a literal sense.

A key element of this POI is how the back wall of the main building is blown away to provide access to the adjacent obsidian biome to the south. Spellbreak was a very vertically-focused game, so being able to reliably traverse this large vertical distance using the exposed levels of the structure as stepping stones of sorts was an important thing to maintain. Additionally, the “cross-section” way the building has come apart allows players to access the interior and explore most of what’s inside without creating the sort of cramped interior spaces that were anathema to our gameplay. I used this concept quite a bit working on Spellbreak.

One last thing: our limited modular kit meant I had to get a little creative to portray key concepts in a lot of POIs. For instance, we didn’t have anything resembling an archery target for the firing range… except the wicker bottom of a clay pot prop? I honestly thought someone was going to veto that one but the team ended up liking it!