Being as Conan Exiles takes place between Xuthal of the Dusk (Slithering Shadow) and A Witch Shall be Born. We have a good idea of a region where physical access to the Exiled Lands can be found:
Somewhere between Xuthal and Khauran as indicated by the circle in the image. From that information and from what Conan says himself, he kinda just wandered in. That’s pretty consistent with how he shows up pretty much everywhere.
No frozen wasteland in that region (equatorial, just for starters). Works ok with the positioning of Sepermeru and the Lemurian swamps (except that this would place the swamps in a desert, and fails to account for the coastline). But then the sun travels south to north. Isle of Siptah is easy enough to position, since it exists already within the broader Conan canon (pretty sure it’s DeCamp, so not for the purists, but nonetheless it’s clearly identified), but there is no position on earth that can accurately match the location of the Exiled Lands - because there is nowhere on earth that has a frozen tundra located within a couple of miles (max) of a sweltering desert and a coastal swamp zone.
Tephra
43
The Exiled Lands or the entrance Conan used to access it is either in or near Stygia.
The snow in the Exiled Lands is artificial. The Witch Queen actually makes this so clear in her description of seeing the Exiled Lands for the first time, that it kind of feels like a forced insert by the writers specifically to prove the tundra is artificial: “In the north were mountains, but not the snow-covered mountains that we had seen on our journey, just jagged rocky peaks.”
Others have probably already said what I’m about to say, or at least in close enough terms, but I’m a sucker for a lore thread so I thought I’d throw my two pennies in.
Q1:
I’ve not seen a solid lore reason why we respawn, though I am personally quite interested to read theories about it. There are plenty of them, from the magic of the bracelets to TEL being a purgatory, but I think it’s deliberately left vague (and will never be answered definitively) because it’s a game mechanic. It’s just one of those things the devs had to bite the bullet on, as it’s incredibly meta, and respawning is just such a natural part of games.
Q2:
Outside of age ratings and PR, my personal theory would be the harsh conditions. Even in the “nicer” areas of TEL, life is far from pleasant with the sandstorm, beasts, beating sun and vicious purges. Children could exist for sure, there’s no evidence that I’ve seen to indicate the slave bracelets prevent reproduction, but the deck is stacked incredibly high against the prospect of new and delicate life. There’s also the potential that children who do survive would want to leave TEL and find help for their relatives, a journey that most likely would not survive. I also don’t doubt that sorcerers would have some dark use for the blood of children.
On that note, it is worth noting that some sorcerer camps have interesting cauldrons, the one that jumps to mind is at Spinebreaker’s Flank. The cauldron is full of blood and tiny limbs, far too small to be an adult. Much like Q1, we’ll never get a solid answer because it would be “we don’t want to depict children alongside the game’s themes”, but the child-like limbs in the cauldron are perhaps a small hint at the fate of children in The Exiled Lands.
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The reason for the frozen area is found in the Frost Temple.
The map shown is an artist rendition and may not be entirely canonical (though there is no canonical map outside of what is in Age of Conan), however it gives a pretty good indication of where everything is in relation even if not quite to scale. So the coastline may not actually be an ocean or even large inland sea, but a large uncharted lake.
This was done for mechanical reasons for the purposes of lighting. I wouldn’t consider this canon to the story. Much like the fact you can carry 200 thralls in your pocket.
As for the biome diversity in close proximity, I would hope not. The Exiled Lands are enchanted. I would suspect the ghost fence keeps in more than braclet wearers. But also affects much of the climate. If you look at the Maproom you can see what the Exiled Lands were before the Sandstorm was unleashed during the last days of the Giant-Kings. Most of the Exiled Lands were not desert originally.
Further to your point on Q2, Nunu the Cannibal does mention he was ostracized from his people because he ate babies. Specifically he cut the woman open and would eat the fetus which apparently was a bridge too far for the other Darfari cannibals that worship Yog in the exiled lands.
May Set be with you 
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I forgot about Nunu, when you get sent away from the Darfari, you know you’ve done something wrong 
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Deamo
49
I never listened to his story and just assumed he tried to go vegan tho to a dafari Canibal tribe is probably worse
He says something to the effect he was sent away for his religious practices.
" My crime was my belief. What matter the age of the flesh that my lord consumes? Does the Lord of Empty Abodes make a distinction between flesh in the womb and flesh outside of it? Now my tribe walks without a shaman. And I seek the pure flesh to feed my god. "
Deamo
51
It was so weird that I just read that in Nunu’s voice in my head 
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Jimbo
52
The Isle of Siptah has correct movements of the sun and moon, and when it launched they also dropped a lighting rework on the Exiled Lands. Meaning they kept it that way intentionally.
I forget which modder tried this, but they did make the sun set properly in Exiled Lands and it caused the map to be incredibly dark in the newbie area. Enshrouded also has a weird sun set, and it has no reason to be different since East-West would be based on the sun setting, not the other way around.
As someone who was around and following this game while it was still in early development I can tell why the “lore” of the Exiled Lands is so half-arsed. They literally didn’t think about it. It was not until the potential players started asking questions about it that they came up with the few silly “reasons” we know of. It just flat out didn’t occur to them that anyone would question WHY their character was in this place and couldn’t die. Same reason we don’t really know WHERE the Exiled Lands are. All the flimsy reasons and explanations FC has offered fail utterly under the light of even the most basic logic.
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Yeah…
It’s probably all head canon. There’s likely, at least not neccessarily a grandious truth behind it.
As with the Arena Champion… we had some great speculation about who she is. Snowhunter’s answer? He just just copied Dalinsia because he likes her. 
It’s fun to spin stories about how and why things are, just as people used to do with the stars. But it’s all bullshit, and we should keep that in mind. No need to argue about whose star is brighter or has the coolest imagined backstory.
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Oduda
56
Yeah, there are a LOT of things that are wrong with the lore in this game. But you know. 
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I’ll say this about that sun’s path… it stays at whats known as magic hour in movie making… if you give the sun its natural path, things are often obscured and dont look very good, despite being realistic for time of day.
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system
Closed
58
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