0. Shared assumptions & calibration
0.1. Key hard anchors
We have three calibration points:
Caer Rotham → Caer Efwron
~24 h by train.
From the station near the assassination attempt, walking to Caer Efwron would be ~3 weeks.
Yanbi (Jìnyōu loess plateau) → Yinhai (Pōlù coast) is roughly like Taiyuan → Tianjin.
Taiyuan–Tianjin rail distance ≈ 530 km.
Cangtian (eastern coast) → Yanbi (loess plateau) is like Jinan → Taiyuan, ≈ 530–565 km by high-speed rail.
A big intercity hop in both Gwyllion and the Empire is around ≈ 500–550 km.
Standardize that as a working long-stage:
One long-stage (L) ≈ 540 km
(midpoint of 530 and 550 gives nice round velocities)
0.2. Typical speeds in this setting
These are default working numbers for 1910s–interwar tech in the world:
On foot, campaign march
Mode Context: Mixed roads/trails, 3-week slog
Typical avg speed: 20–26 km/day
Notes: 3 weeks → ~420–550 km, matches the “3 weeks to Caer Efwron” implication
Horseback ride
Mode Context: Sustained courier / light cavalry
Typical avg speed: 40–50 km/day
Notes: A “fortnight’s ride” ⇒ ~560–700 km
Conventional mainline rail (Gwyllion)
Mode Context: Single-track, mountains, early diesel/steam
Typical avg speed: 20–25 km/h
Notes: 24 h ⇒ ~480–600 km (≈ 1 long-stage)
Empire express rail trunk
Mode Context: Yanbi–Yinhai / Cangtian–Yanbi in 4 h
Typical avg speed: ≈130–140 km/h
Notes: 540 km / 4 h ≈ 135 km/h
Motor carriage on decent macadam
Mode Context: 1910s–20s cars
Typical avg speed: 30–40 km/h
Notes: 6 h ⇒ ~180–240 km
These will be our conversion rules for everything else.
1. Kingdom of Gwyllion (Caer Rotham, Caer Efwron, Caer Llywelyd)
Codex-wise, Gwyllion is Wales scaled up and wired into an Aracian frontier, with Caer Lleiniog as the big coastal city to the east.
Caer Rotham is the royal capital, with Caer Efwron as a stronghold further north, and Caer Llywelyd as Prince Taliesin’s south-western princely capital.
1.1. Internal distances
Using textual timings:
Caer Rotham → Caer Efwron
Overnight train: ~24 hours.
If we assume ~22–25 km/h average (mountainous, lots of curves, WW1-ish permanent way), that gives:
24 h × 22–25 km/h ≈ 530–600 km.
That lines up if we just say:
Caer Rotham–Caer Efwron ≈ 540 km ≈ 1 long-stage.
Check against the 3-week walking note:
540 km / 21 days ≈ 25.7 km/day, entirely plausible for a desperate but road-bound march.
“Small station” (assassination attempt) → Caer Efwron on foot
From that station to Caer Efwron we’re looking at ≈ 450–550 km depending on terrain.
Easiest way to keep this consistent:
Treat that station as on or near the same line as Caer Rotham–Caer Efwron, not dramatically closer.
Working assumption: station–Caer Efwron ≈ 500 km; Caer Rotham is some tens of km east along the same axis.
Caer Rotham → Caer Llywelyd
6 h by motor carriage.
6 h × 30–40 km/h ≈ 180–240 km.
Nice round reference:
Caer Rotham–Caer Llywelyd ≈ 200 km.
1.2. Overall size of Gwyllion
You’ve explicitly said:
Caer Rotham is “roughly to the west of the kingdom’s center.”
From Caer Rotham, there are “large distances eastwards till the coast.”
To the west of the principality of Gwlgytion (Caer Llywelyd) is already the Tyskan Empire; to the south-west lies the Imperium of Aracspur.
So the kingdom is a west-border marcher wedge that continues a long way east.
A consistent, “mundane” (non-China, non-Russia) scale that fits all of this:
East–West span of the kingdom:
Caer Rotham → Caer Efwron ≈ 540 km to the far west.
Caer Rotham → main eastern seaports (e.g. Caer Lleiniog, other coastal cities) another ~600–800 km eastwards.
That puts total E–W ≈ 1,200–1,300 km.
For comparison: Spain’s max E–W span is ≈ 1,085 km, so Gwyllion is a bit wider than Spain, still far short of China.
North–South span:
Northern uplands and Tyskan marches down to southern borders with Aracspur/Lourene & coastal lowlands.
A good, consistent band: ≈ 700–800 km N–S.
Implied area:
Take ~1,250 km × 800 km ≈ 1.0 million km² (order of magnitude).
That’s “Wales scaled up ×40–50,” which matches your institutional inspiration and the codex’s “big but not continental-hegemon” feel.
EasternWorldIsland
1.3. Gwyllion reference distances (summary)
You can treat these as standard, unless you want to tweak a location for plot needs:
Caer Rotham → Caer Efwron (train): ~540 km / 24 h
Caer Rotham → Caer Efwron (march): ~21 days @ 25–26 km/day
Small frontier station → Caer Efwron (on foot): ~500 km / 3 weeks
Caer Rotham → Caer Llywelyd (motor carriage): ~200 km / 6 h
West border → east coast: 1,200–1,300 km
North mountains → southern marches/coast: ~750 km
Rule of thumb: inside Gwyllion, “long trips” are 400–600 km, “epic marches” 800+.
2. Empire of the Three Seas
The Empire’s heartland is explicitly mapped onto Henan + Shanxi + Shandong + Hebei + delta provinces, with specific analogs:
Jìnyōu = Shanxi (loess plateau),
Pōlù = Hebei (grain plains),
Lǔyáng = Shandong peninsula,
Zhēnxún ≈ Henan core, etc.
Yinhai is “Tianjin + a Hanseatic city” at the western edge of Pōlù on the Inland Sea.
The Empire of the Three Seas (三…
2.1. HSR trunk distances
Using your analogs and real-world distances:
Yanbi (Yànbì, Jìnyōu loess plateau) → Yinhai (Yǐnhǎi, Pōlù coast)
Calibrated to Taiyuan–Tianjin: ≈ 530 km.
4 h high-speed train ⇒ avg ≈ 130 km/h, consistent with “early HSR in a WW1+20 years tech pocket.”
Cangtian (eastern coast) → Yanbi (Jìnyōu)
Calibrated to Jinan–Taiyuan: ≈ 530–565 km.
4 h ⇒ avg ≈ 135–140 km/h.
Working simplification:
Treat each major HSR leg (Yanbi–Yinhai, Cangtian–Yanbi) as ≈ 540 km = 1 long-stage.
So:
Yinhai → Cangtian via Yanbi ≈ 2L ≈ 1,080 km, 8 hours by fast through-service.
2.2. Size of the Empire’s core
From the codex’s map-placement:
The Empire of the Three Seas (三…
Lǔyáng (delta/peninsula) and Lǐjiāng (lower riverlands) form the southern rim of the northern heartland.
Jìnyōu and Pōlù are plateau + grain plains to the north.
Cǎoyuán (steppe) and Sōnglǐng (Manchurian highlands analog) form the outer northern frontier.
Using the 540 km trunk as our measuring stick:
West–East through northern heartlands (Yinhai ↔ Cangtian)
Already ≈ 1,080 km.
Add some extra on both ends for coastal and inland margins → ≈ 1,300–1,500 km total E–W for the “high-infrastructure belt”.
North–South (Cǎoyuán/Sōnglǐng steppe ↑ to Great River / southern coasts ↓)
Think “Inner Mongolia down to Jiangsu/Anhui delta,” which in Earth terms is around 1,500–2,000 km.
Adopting similar scale: ≈ 1,700–2,000 km N–S for fully incorporated Imperial provinces.
So:
Heartland rectangle: ~1,400 km (W–E) × 1,800 km (N–S)
⇒ ~2.5 million km² order-of-magnitude.
The Empire probably extends beyond that with outer provinces and semi-autonomous frontiers, but for practical travel/wars, that’s your “real” core.
2.3. Travel reference inside the Empire
Using the HSR band and the codex geography:
Yanbi → Yinhai: ~540 km / 4 h HSR; ~10–12 h older express; 3–4 days by fast caravan.
Cangtian → Yanbi: same scale, slightly longer if you want (up to ~565 km).
Cangtian → Yinhai (direct HSR): ~1,000–1,100 km / 8–9 h.
Zhēnxún (mythic core) → any of Lǔyáng / Jìnyōu / Pōlù: 300–700 km depending on direction: overnight conventional train, 2–4 days’ ride.
Rule of thumb inside the Empire:
“Same province”: 50–200 km (half-day to two days’ ride).
“Next province over”: 200–600 km.
“Major cross-heartland trip”: 800–1,200 km.
3. Imperium of Aracspur and Outremer
From the Eastern World Island codex:
At its peak, the Imperium’s banners flew “from the Eastern Ocean to the Tukharian Desert north of Zar Dragul.”
The Empire of the Three Seas (三…
In the Fourth Era, for the first time, Imperium and Empire frontiers are “less than a fortnight’s ride apart,” separated only by western marches and mountain deserts.
The Empire of the Three Seas (三…
3.1. Frontiers: the “fortnight’s ride”
Using our ride metric (40–50 km/day):
Fortnight’s ride ≈ 14 days × 40–50 km/day ≈ 560–700 km.
Interpretation:
The gap between the Empire of the Three Seas and Aracspur at their closest approach – i.e. across the far western marches / Outremer-type deserts – is ~600–700 km of bad land.
This also defines the minimum possible land distance between Imperial supply heads facing each other in a late-era war.
3.2. East–West size of the Aracian world
“Eastern Ocean ↔ Tukharian Desert north of Zar Dragul” is a full trans-continental swath: eastern seaboard + core plains + interior mountain ranges + plateau/desert interface.
Reading that against your inspirations (Byzantium + Persia + Central Asia), a sensible, consistent number is:
Eastern Ocean → Tukharian Desert front:
≈ 3,500–4,200 km, i.e. ≈ 7–8 long-stages.
That gives room for:
Coastal Arcadian/Heliop cities.
Interior Elysian plains and hill provinces.
Karkeni / Orontian uplands.
The desert and hill belts that become Outremer.
The final uplift into the Haltaman/Shanab plateau.
3.3. Outremer as a belt
Outremer in your notes is the desert and highland frontier between Aracspur’s settled core and the Shanab plateau; the classic “frontier crusader strip,” but as an Aracian forward defense and logistics sink.
To keep it consistent with both the “fortnight’s ride” and the plateau-front war:
Depth (Aracian heartland → plateau scarp):
Enough that armies can chew through it for a campaign season but not cross it casually: ≈ 400–600 km.
That is 1 very bad long-stage: half desert marches, half broken uplands.
Front width (length of the Outremer front from western to easternmost fort clusters):
Needs to line up with the northern kingdoms’ steppe belt and Westmark/Volhynia’s “maneuver corridor”.
A good rule: ≈ 1,500–2,000 km of frontier arcs, broken into multiple war theaters and caravan routes.
3.4. Aracspur reference numbers
Working “atlas” scale:
Aracspur, total E–W span: ~3,800–4,000 km.
N–S, from northern Outremer/Shanab interface down to southern coasts: ~1,500–1,800 km.
Width of Outremer strip (N–S): ~400–600 km.
Narrowest gap to the Empire of the Three Seas: ~600–700 km of mountains/desert (the “fortnight’s ride” belt).
Rule of thumb:
A full Aracspur-wide campaign is 2–3 times the scale of an Empire heartland campaign. Moving major armies across the entire Imperium is a multi-year undertaking.
4. Empire of the Tyskan Crown & the Northern Bloc
From the Eastern World Island codex:
The Tyskan lands stretch:
From river-bound lowlands in the east to wolf-haunted forests in the west.
From northern merchant cities to southern vine-clad hill duchies.
Westmark is explicitly a frontier march facing Midjandr raiders and Shanab pressure across the open belt.
Volhynia is a river-and-forest commonwealth on the open “steppe highway” with no Caspian-equivalent barrier.
WestmarkVolhynia
You’ve also said the Tyskan Crown is on the scale of Charlemagne’s Empire, but with parts scaled up.
4.1. Overall Tyskan/“Northern Kingdoms” scale
Charlemagne’s realm was roughly 1,000–1,600 km wide and ~800–1,000 km tall in Earth terms. Scaling that up one notch to match your more expansive, rail-age north:
A consistent band that matches the codex:
E–W (eastern river lowlands ↔ western marches / Midjandr coast):
≈ 1,800–2,200 km.N–S (northern sea/merchant cities ↔ southern Aracian border marches):
≈ 1,000–1,300 km.
That gives a Northern Kingdoms + Tyskan realm area in the 2–2.5 million km² range—comfortably big, but still smaller than the combined Aracian+Shanab world or the entire Eastern World Island.
4.2. Westmark
Codex: Westmark = Ostmark + “Gothic Crimea, but landlocked”; its whole job is to absorb punishment along the steppe maneuver belt.
To give you usable numbers:
Frontier length (E–W)
Needs to be long enough to matter, but not an endless Eurasian wall.
Consistent with “700 km railway/trail lines” and “frontier march”:
Westmark frontier length ≈ 600–800 km.
Depth (N–S: from “secure interior Tyskan heartland” to outermost Westmark forts):
Enough for multiple defensive lines, river systems, and fort belts:
≈ 250–400 km.
So:
Westmark footprint: order-of-magnitude 200–300k km², with most of the action within ~100 km of the actual frontier rivers and canals.
4.3. Volhynia
From the Westmark/Volhynia codex: “Volhynia = East Slavic commonwealth, no Caspian, still feels Shanab’s weight.”
WestmarkVolhynia
It lives on the same open maneuver corridor as Shanab and Westmark; it’s where the grain and credit sit behind Westmark’s forts.
To keep it aligned with that:
E–W span (from Tyskan–Volhynian frontier to the furthest eastern river junctions exposed to Shanab proxies):
≈ 800–1,000 km.
N–S span (north ports & lake cities ↔ southern marches and host communes):
≈ 500–700 km.
That gives Volhynia an area roughly 0.4–0.6 million km², very close to a “big Poland/Ukraine-class” polity, which is exactly what your institutional texture implies.
4.4. Northern reference distances
Rule-of-thumb intercity/operational distances in the northern bloc:
Lwowia capital ↔ Westmark central fortress line: 400–600 km (1–2 days by express, 10–14 days by field army).
Volhynian core cities ↔ Outremer / Shanab frontier via steppe: 500–700+ km depending on which corridor is used.
Eastmost Tyskan lowlands ↔ Westmost forest duchies: ~1,500–1,800 km.
5. Cross-realm comparison cheat sheet
All of this in one place so you can eyeball “is this march plausible?” without recalculating:
Realm / RegionE–W span (approx)N–S span (approx)Order-of-mag areaNotesKingdom of Gwyllion1,200–1,300 km700–800 km~1.0 M km²“Wales scaled up to Spain+,” harsh uplands, bad rail geometry.
EasternWorldIsland
Gwyllion key routeCaer Rotham–Caer Efwron ≈ 540 km––24 h by train; 3 weeks on foot from near-line station.Empire of the Three Seas (core)1,300–1,500 km1,700–2,000 km~2–3 M km²Henan/Shanxi/Hebei/delta analog; HSR at ~135 km/h on 500+ km legs.Yinhai–Yanbi–CangtianEach leg ≈ 540 km––4 h per leg on HSR, 8 h Yinhai↔Cangtian.Imperium of Aracspur3,500–4,000 km (Eastern Ocean ↔ Tukharian Desert)1,500–1,800 km~5–6 M km²Classical trans-continental empire; heartland + Elysian plains + Outremer + plateau frontier.Outremer beltFront ~1,500–2,000 kmDepth 400–600 km–Desert/highland frontier between Aracspur and Shanab.Gap: Aracspur ↔ Empire–––~600–700 km of marches/mountain desert (the “fortnight’s ride” corridor).
The Empire of the Three Seas (三…
Empire of the Tyskan Crown + Northern Kingdoms1,800–2,200 km1,000–1,300 km~2–2.5 M km²Charlemagne-scale but larger, with dense institutional layering.WestmarkFrontier length 600–800 kmDepth 250–400 km~0.2–0.3 M km²Fort-road-signal march, main shock absorber vs Midjandr/Shanab.Volhynia800–1,000 km500–700 km~0.4–0.6 M km²East Slavic commonwealth on the open steppe highway, grain & credit behind Westmark.
WestmarkVolhynia
6. How to use this in practice
When you write “three weeks on campaign” for a marching army:
Think 400–600 km traveled, depending on weather and supply.
When you want a “big intercity rail trip”:
In Gwyllion / Northern Kingdoms:
500–600 km → 20–30 h on old rail, overnight or full day.
In the Empire of the Three Seas:
500–600 km → ~4 h on HSR, ~10–12 h on old express.
When you stage grand strategy:
Crossing a single realm (Gwyllion, Volhynia) is one campaign season.
Crossing Aracspur end to end is multi-year and politically insane without staging and pre-war buildup.
The Aracspur–Empire desert gap is big enough to be a serious logistical problem, small enough that the idea of a direct land war is terrifying but thinkable.