Scenario

A scenario is a pre-made map along with the cultures, nations, events, and all other things needed to play a game of That Which Sleeps. The game's three main scenarios are The North Burns (the showcase), From the Depths, and Empire of Twilight. Each has two supplementary scenarios that can be attached to the main scenario or played on their own (but mixing and matching is not allowed).

As originally Kickstarted, the game would only support ready-made scenarios, but one of the stretch goals met was Procedural Generation: the semi-automated ability to have the game make new ones.

Scenarios can add their own victory conditions.

Scenario setup
A playthrough can be customized with a series of multiple-choice questions at setup about the events leading up to the present (What laid you low? How did you take your revenge?). The player's answers may strengthen the Elves but make the humans resent them, dot the landscape with further ruins, modify the map, etc. This customization is in addition to game modes (different rates of resource income, etc.)

The questions can vary from scenario to scenario and Old One to Old One - especially Sisyphus. In the video dev logs, the questions don't give the mechanical effects of the choices - flavor text is their only description. The question mechanic is shamelessly copied from the opening of King of Dragon Pass, a 1999 game known for its approach to storytelling, though there the effects were more straightforward.