Cauldron

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Les bâtiments de Cauldron, compacts et construits à partir de roches volcaniques et de bois, bordent le bol intérieur d’un volcan endormi et sans nom. Les routes pavées forment des cercles concentriques autour d’un petit mais profond lac d’eau froide, qui remplit le bassin du volcan. Bien que les eaux usées de la ville s’infiltrent dans le lac, les clercs locaux purifient régulièrement l’eau pour les citoyens en échange de dons de charité à leurs temples.
Un mur fortifié de 50 pieds de haut de malachite noire encercle la ville, traçant le bord extérieur du volcan. Quatre routes par descente des pentes du volcan, devenant des artères principales qui mènent à d’autres villes et royaumes éloignés. Les régions plus proches du bord de la ville ont tendance à être occupées par des familles de la classe supérieure et des marchands d’élite. Plus on se rapproche du centre de la ville (Et plus les odeurs souvent piquantes du lac central), plus la construction et plus dangereuses ses ruelles sombres deviennent dangereuses. La plupart des gens se déplacent Cauldron à pied, bien que la ville a sa part de chariolles et de voitures, mais la plupart d’entre eux appartiennent à des marchands et des nobles.

Les principales exportations de Cauldron proviennent de deux sources : les mines et les plantations. Les deux industries sont basées dans les collines entourant la ville, et sont gérées par les différentes familles nobles qui vivent dans la région. L’obsidienne et les diamants sont les principaux produits extraits dans la région. Les plantations produisent habituellement de la canne à sucre et du café. Beaucoup de ceux qui habitent dans la ville elle-même sont soit des marchands, des érudits, ou des travailleurs dans les mines et les plantations dans les basses terres. L’eau n’est jamais rare en ville, mais la plupart de la nourriture de la ville doit être importée de l’extérieur de la région du Chaudron puisque les entreprises locales de pêche et d’agriculture sont maigres au mieux.

Les impôts sont assez légers dans Cauldron. Les citoyens paient un modeste impôt forfaitaire annuel de 1 po, tandis que les commerçants et les nobles paient un impôt sur le revenu de 5% chaque année. En outre, une taxe de 1 pa est facturée pour les non-citoyens qui entrent dans la ville par l’une de ses quatre portes.

Plus d’informations peuvent être obtenues dans l’ensemble de Chaudron par différents contrôles dans différents endroits.

Infos à trier

Locations within Cauldron

Cathedral of Wee Jas – Temple of Wee Jas

Cathedral of Wee Jas

This towering structure is one of the most impressive and beautiful in Cauldron. The church of Wee Jas has always been powerful in Cauldron, but not as well liked as the churches of Kord or St. Cuthbert, since the clerics of this church tend to be standoffish, curt and even creepy. The clerics of Wee Jas are responsible for dealing with the unclaimed dead of Cauldron and maintain vast catacombs for anyone who’s rich enough to afford the burial but doesn’t have a personal crypt. Most of the dead of Cauldron are cremated.

Church of St Cuthbert – Place of Worship & Jenya Urikas’ Home

Church of St Cuthbert

The two-story Church of St. Cuthbert, its white marble walls suffused with veins of vivid blue, stands in stark contrast to the buildings of bare black stone that flank it on the north end of Obsidian Avenue. A pair of white marble statues depicting armored warriors stands on either side of the temple’s heavy oaken door. Each of the statues raises a great mace to the sky. Above the door’s marble architrave are boldly inscribed the following words: “Within Law Lives Hope.”

Coy Nixie – High Class Tavern & Dance Hall The Coy Nixie is an upscale tavern and dancehall owned and operated by the Aslaxin family. Although prices here tend to be nearly double the normal asking price, only the Cusp of Sunrise rivals the food and drink. These two locations have a healthy competition – while the Cusp is generally held to have better food, drink, and entertainment, there are no membership fees at the Coy Nixie.

Cusp of Sunrise – High Class Inn & Tavern This high-society club is a favorite place for Cauldron’s rich and powerful to meet and relax. Owned and operated by Lady Ophellha Knowlern. The Silver Phoenix Adventuring Company had their membership fees covered by Lord Vhalantru as part of the payment for rescuing Zenith Splintershield from Bhal-Hamatugn. Drunken Morkoth Inn – The Adventurers’ Usual Haunt This is perhaps the most popular inn in the city. A regular stop for many merchants and traveling adventurers, the combination of comfortable beds, good food, and reasonable prices makes it a favorite among the city’s returning visitors. Each of the rooms here is decorated with a humorous painting of Cauldron’s legendary lake monster, a large morkoth. The paintings depict the morkoth in any number of embarrassing and ridiculous scenes, always with the morkoth drunk and confused, and often in incongruous locations. This place also serves as home for Tyro Amberhelm, a dwarven merchant with ties to the Striders of Fharlanghn.

Lakeside Pavilion This open pavilion is one of the oldest structures in Cauldron. Said to have been formed via magic cast by Surabar Spellmason himself, the pavilion is traditionally where the lord mayor issues announcements and decrees. It has also become a favorite place after dark for illicit meetings. This is the site where Flannigaul purchased a map leading to the Kopru Ruins which led to the recovery of most of the wands of water control.

Lantern Street Orphanage The orphanage rests on the corner of Lantern Street and Lava Avenue, its charcoal-colored stones held together with mold-encrusted mortar. The windows on both stories are tightly shuttered, but a few slivers of light manage to escape from within. Lanterns hang on either side of the oaken front door, mounted to which is a green copper knocker shaped like a smiling gargoyle’s visage, its nostrils pierced by a copper ring.

Minuta’s Board – Low Cost Inn (Burned Down) This low-cost inn and flophouse caters to anyone who can’t afford to stay in Cauldron’s better inns. Prices here are 75% normal, but the owners make no guarantee against theft or loss of property. Minuta’s Board was burned down in the wake of the Cauldron Tax Riots, presumably because it was housing a number of the half-orc mercenaries employed by the Lord Mayor.

Skie’s Treasury – Local Magic Item Shop Numerous stores in Cauldron sell magic items and gear, but only one of them makes its sole business buying and selling magic items to adventurers: Skie’s Treasury is a modest building crafted from blocks of volcanic stone. The façade of the building bears dozens, if not hundreds, of symbols and sigils that have been carved into the face of the stone with chisels. One door and a pair of tiny windows face the road and overlook the lake below. Above the door, a sign proclaims the establishment to be Skie’s Treasury, but more impressive are the numerous items of treasure – rings, coins, wands, necklaces, rods, potions, scrolls and more – that seem to slowly orbit the sign and shine with soft golden light. Every now and then, two of the items bump against each other, ringing softly like a wind chime. The runes on the façade of her store are in Gnome, and are in fact the names of various adventuring parties that have throughout the years, patronized Skie’s store enough that she offered them a special “Adventurer’s Discount” in return for their loyalty. Some of the names include the Greenswords, The Unhumans, The Singers of Ehlonna, Varmint Patrol, and most recently

The Silver Phoenix Adventuring Company. Inside, the store’s shelves are fairly sparse, but never empty. Skie sells enough magic to keep herself in comfort and has no real ambition to make a fortune at the job. Each of the items on her shelves is kept in a glass cabinet under lock and key, displayed on a silk pillow with a small placard that describes the item’s history, powers, and what party sold the item to Skie.

Slippery Eel Tavern – Low Class Establishment Ignored by the Watch The Slippery Eel is a favorite tavern for the city’s miners, plantation workers, and other working-class citizens. The food and drink is cheap, and the town guard tends to ignore the place, making it a handy site for illicit deals and clandestine meetings.

Temple of Lordly Might - Church of Kork The church of Kord is nearly as powerful and popular in Cauldron as the church of St Cuthbert, if only because they sponsor numerous sporting events and demonstrations for the people of Cauldron throughout the year. This church is currently headed by a male half-orc cleric of Kord named Asfelkir Hranleurt.

Tygot’s Old Things – Antiques & Oddities Tygot Mispas, a 120-year-old halfling who has been retired from adventuring for two decades, owns a small but well-stocked antiquity shop on Lava Avenue. “Tygot’s Old Things” specializes in nonmagical art objects gathered from across the known world. His shop is a two-story structure with a small flat on the upper floor and a well-organized business area on the lower. The main shop itself contains an impressive assortment of less valuable antiquities, mostly vases, statuettes, small furniture, and tapestries. It was from Tygot that the party acquired the Hegemonic Plate, which led them to Vaprak’s Voice.

Other Notable Places can be found in the Player's Guide

Autres

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History

Cauldron Timeline 2,409 CY: Spell weavers from an unknown plane arrive in the area and settle in the region destined to become the Demonskar. They subjugate local ogre tribes and use them to help build a great city. At this time, the region to the east of Cauldron is ruled by the yuan-ti of Shatterhorn, and the underground rivers and lakes are ruled by the kopru. Frost giants rule the mountaintops.

1,309 CY: Last of the kopru are driven off by spell weaver explorers.

1,229 CY: When the spell weavers make a critical error in the construction of a massive planar transport device, their city is destroyed in a tremendous explosion that tears a hole in reality. Portals to the Abyss open randomly in the region for the next century, allowing demons to gather and grow strong in the ruins. The massive crater later becomes known as the Demonskar.

119 CY: One of the greatest wizards of the time, Surabar Spellmason, receives a vision from Nidrama, who has grown concerned about the demon infestation in the region. She gifts Surabar with a potent magic weapon named Alakast, and charges him with the task of settling the region and driving out the demonic taint in the Demonskar.

108 CY: Surabar Spellmason leads a small army inland from the newly founded city of Sasserine, on the pretense of founding a new city of his own. He founds Redgorge in the shadows of a great volcano and raises the Basalt Bastions to protect his men from attack while they begin building.

103 CY: Kozomagon Lidu, one of Surabar’s friends and competitors, arrives in the region and founds the nearby village of Liduton, intending to horn in on whatever action had enticed her friend into the region.

98 CY: Surabar defeats the demon Nabthatoron in combat and breaks the back of the demon host from the Demonskar. While the place remains dangerous to this day, the demons never fully recover from this sound defeat and have remained in the crater. During the battle against Nabthatoron, Kozomagon tries to draw upon the power of an ancient kopru necropolis she discovered on the nearby lakebed but loses control over the necromantic energy and destroys the village of Liduton instead. The village becomes known as the Haunted Village and is shunned from that point on.

88 CY: Discovery of numerous profitable mines in the region attracts hundreds of prospectors and adventurers. Redgorge quickly outgrows its walls. Surabar determines that the nearby volcano is extinct and that its cauldron would make an excellent natural defense against attack from Nabthatoron’s armies. Many of Redgorge’s inhabitants relocate to this region—Cauldron is founded. Over the centuries, the discovery of many large underground complexes and caverns below the city draws the attention of dwarves and gnomes from far and wide. Two of these regions become Jzadirune and the Malachite Fortress.

58 CY: Surabar dies of natural causes. He is entombed in an undisclosed location. Over the next several centuries, Cauldron continues to prosper.

8 CY: Kingfisher Hollow and Hollowsky founded. The citizens hold their own against the nearby yuan-ti and even manage to drive them back from several small encampments on the jungle’s edge.

191 CY: Shatterhorn is sundered by the yuan-ti god Merrshaulk’s displeasure with the religious leaders there and their inability to drive back the advance of humanity; the yuan-ti presence in the area dwindles to a shadow of its former glory.

391 CY: The red dragon Hookface arrives in the region. His attacks on merchants and cities of the region continue intermittently for a century—no heroes are able to defeat the dragon.

491 CY: Hookface retreats to his lair north of Cauldron with his mate, Taliraxia. The two dragons do not emerge from their lair, although periodically one of their spawn emerges to terrorize the area before being slain or moving on to other regions.

516 CY: Jzadirune is hit with the Vanishing. The gnomes abandon the stronghold and never return.

559 CY: The rainiest winter in centuries results in massive flood damage to the lower reaches of Cauldron. The Flood Festival is founded the next year, and for the next several years, the freakishly wet winters continue before the weather finally returns to normal.

560 CY: Fetor Abradius discovers the Soul Pillars. The Cagewrights relocate to the region, settling in ruined Shatterhorn until they can complete construction of the Fiery Sanctum deep under Cauldron.

561 CY: The Cagewrights begin construction of the Tree of Shackled Souls and hire the Ebon Triad to aid in the construction of the soulcages.

576 CY: Cauldron’s newest noble, a generous half-elf named Vhalantru, is welcomed into the city’s aristocracy after he donates huge sums of money to fund the rebuilding of the Town Hall and several other ancient structures that were starting to fall apart.

581 CY: Zenith Splintershield disappears into the Underdark on a crusade to cleanse it of evil.

582 CY: A young guard named Triel Eldurast murders several of her fellow guards—her motive is never discovered. She eludes capture and becomes one of Cauldron’s most wanted criminals, although over the years her capture grows less of a concern as she remains in hiding.

584 CY: A plague of filth fever strikes Cauldron. Several hundred die before the city’s clerics can get the plague under control.

591 CY: The Silver Phoenix Adventuring Company retrieves most of the wands of water control stolen by members of the Ebon Triad, which prove instrumental in protecting the city from a particularly bad flood season.

592 CY: The Cauldron Tax Riot leaves hundreds dead. The Lord Mayor vanishes, leaving Lord Vhalantru in temporary control of the city.

Historical Figures

Adimarchus: Demon Prince, Former Lord of Occipitus Jarl Tedryk: Founder of Clangeddin Worship on Oerth, Jarvyk’s Ancestor Kozomagon Lidu: Founder of Liduton, Now “The Haunted Village” Surabar Spellmason: Founder of Cauldron

Locations

Belmek: Jarvyk Tedryk’s Hometown Bhal-Hamatugn: Kuo-Toan City in the Underdark North of Cauldron Cauldron: City Located in a Dormant Volcano Demonskar: Site of the Disaster Caused by the Explosion of a Massive Planar Gate Fiery Sanctum: The Cagewrights’ Base of Operations Beneath Cauldron Jzadirune: Abandoned Gnomish Enclave Beneath Cauldron Karran-Kural: Spell Weaver Ruins Containing the Soul Pillars Kopru Ruins: Ruined Demon City Beneath Cauldron Lucky Monkey: Road House to the West of Cauldron Malachite Fortress: Abandoned Dwarven Stronghold Beneath Jzadirune Niol Dra: Greyjek’s Hometown, Location of the Elan Enclave Occipitus: The Cursed 507th Layer of the Abyss Pearlglen: Small Village North of Cauldron Pit of Seven Jaws: An Entrance to the Underdark North of Cauldron Redgorge: Farming and Mining Village Near Cauldron Sasserine: Port City North of Cauldron, Ashton’s Hometown Sigil: The City of Doors, The Cage, Karamus’s Hometown Vaprak’s Voice: Ruined Spell Weaver Stronghold on the Edge of the Demonskar

Organizations

Religious Groups

Ebon Triad: Cult Trying to Unite Three Dark Gods Fate: Embodiment of Destiny Kord: God of Strength and Sports Pelor: Sun God! Sun God! Ra! Ra! Ra! (Okay, that’s just me having fun.) Spring: Embodiment of the Season of the Same Name St. Cuthbert: Retributive Cudgel Wielding Judge God Wee Jas: Lady of Death and Magic

Secular Groups

Bluecrater Academy: Primary Educational Facility in Cauldron The Chisel: Guild of Artisans out of Redgorge Last Laugh: Premier Thieves’ Guild in Cauldron Striders of Fharlanghn Town Guard: City Watch

Supporting Cast

Allies / Friends Clergy / Holy Men & Women Enemies / Nonfriends Merchants / Business Associates Nobles / The Upper Echelon of Cauldron Others /Everybody Else

Timekeeping

An explanation of the Greyhawk Calendar:

There are 364 days in an Oerth year. The seven days in the week are broken down thusly:

• Starday: Work
• Sunday: Work
• Moonday: Work
• Godsday: Worship
• Waterday: Work
• Earthday: Work
• Freeday: Rest

There are also 12 months of 28 days, interrupted every quarter by seven days of festival, named thusly:

Common Season

• Fireseek: Winter
• Readying: Spring
• Coldeven: Spring
• Growfest: Vernal Equinox
• Planting: Low Summer
• Flocktime: Low Summer
• Wealsun: Low Summer
• Richfest: Midsummer
• Reaping: High Summer
• Goodmonth: High Summer
• Harvester: High Summer
• Brewfest: Autumnal Equinox
• Patchwall: Autumn
• Ready’reat: Autumn
• Sunsebb: Winter
• Needfest: Midwinter

The elves and nomads have different names for the seasons, which I will provide should anyone decide they need to know. The pale Great Moon, called Luna, waxes and wanes on a fixed cycle of 28 days, which is what the months are based upon. The aquamarine Lesser Moon, Celene, follows a path that reveals her full beauty but four times each year, thus showing the time for civilized festivals.

An interesting feature of the Greyhawk calendar is that the days of the week always occur on the same day every year, a result of the year having a number of days divisible by seven. The first of the month is always a Starday, and the rest follow as shown below:

• Starday: 1st, 8th, 15th, and 22nd of the month.
• Sunday: 2nd, 9th, 16th, and 23rd of the month.
• Moonday: 3rd, 10th, 17th, and 24th of the month.
• Godsday: 4th, 11th, 18th, and 25th of the month.
• Waterday: 5th, 12th, 19th, and 26th of the month.
• Earthday: 6th, 13th, 20th, and 27th of the month.
• Freeday: 7th, 14th, 21st, and 28th of the month.

For a better graphical display of the calendar including lunar phases, you can go here or here. There is also a Wikipedia entry for the Greyhawk calendar.