Waylon's Landing
Waylon's Landing was established in 1823 by Jack Waylon, an explorer and trader. While exploring The Shattered Sea he discovered a sheltered cove on the easternmost point of Shield Island, right at the end of The Channel, and built a settlement there, little more than a dock and a single bunkhouse. His vision was that the settlement would serve as a point to bring goods from the nearby islands, and gather them there until there were enough to fill several ships and make a journey through the treacherous waters of the Shattered Sea worth it.
Waylon's Landing has since grown into the largest settlement in the Shattered Sea region, with imposing stone walls and bustling docks. The city engages in active trade with the surrounding settlements and makes regular shipments of exotic goods back to the mainland.
Appearance
The walls of the city are made of ancient, well weathered stone, reclaimed from a nearby serpentfolk ruin, and surround the city on three sides. Ballista are mounted in the towers which dot the walls, and the city guards patrol them regularly. The lack of walls around the harbor should not be mistaken for vulnerability to seaborne attack, as the warehouses lining the docks are designed to act as a makeshift wall, funneling enemies towards one of two main entry points, and are designed to allow the guards easy access to their roofs from the back. Many of the warehouses have siege engines mounted on top of them, as well as simple crenelations to allow guards a safe location to fend off attackers from.
Most of the buildings in the city are timber framed with stone walls, and usually have a white plaster applied over the stone. The main route in from the docks and the roads leading from all three gates all lead to a central city square, which is dominated on the east side by City Hall, a formidable stone building which once served as a sort of keep for Waylon's Landing in it's early days. The central square serves as an open air market most of the time, and is also used for large gatherings and special events. In the north east of the city has another open air market with a road directly out to the docks, but this market is specifically aimed at merchant ships rather than the locals, with lumber, ore, preserved fish, and a broad variety of the other products which are produced in the area around Waylon's Landing.
Government
While not a lawless pirate port, Waylon's Landing doesn't enforce the laws of any country, instead having a very simple code of laws which only ban the most basic categories of crime; theft, murder, assault and the like. The city is run by a semi-elected council of prominent residents who don't exercise a lot of power. The council mostly just ensures that enough taxes and fees are collected to pay for the guards and infrastructure maintenance.
The Current Council
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Gimmur Lustretongue
Main Article: Gimmur LustretongueThe current ambassador from Shield Mountain Keep, Gimmur is a dwarf who likes his creature comforts. Dressed in an eyecatching ensemble of fine silks, dinosaur leather, and carved dinosaur bone inlaid with precious metals, he's always happy to strike up a conversation. He acts as a moderating force on the council, providing an outside point of view and lacking strong opinions on most topics.
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Sir Arlington Ashbridge III
Main Article: Sir Arlington Ashbridge IIIHailing from Bommbergonia, he rose to fame as an adventurer, having a storied career and accumulating a large fortune. An avid big game hunter, tales of tremendous scaled beasts taller than houses drew him to Waylon's Landing, where he ended up settling down. These days he's very overweight but dresses well, in silks and well trailored clothing, but he always wears a custom fitted breastplate over his prodigious belly to remind people of his storied past. He's strongly opinionated about many topics, and will loudly express his opinions regardless of his actual knowledge of the issue at hand. Quite fond of adventurers, he never passes up the opportunity to regale them with tales of his past glories.
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Selena Fairisles
Main Article: Selena FairislesThe owner of large fishing and trading company, Selena Fairisles is a topic of much discussion in Waylon's Landing. Her company runs multiple boats and it's own warehouse and processing center, and has succeeded where many others have failed, and that success has lead many to speculate about the secret to her success. She's a fit woman, wearing well made leather pants and fine silk shirts, and seems to draw amusement from the speculation about her company. As a council member, she doesn't typically hold strong opinions on topics which don't directly affect her business, although she thinks that adventurers are glory hogs and is relucant to hire them if there's an alternative.
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Isaac Waylon
Main Article: Isaac WaylonWhile Isaac Waylon is a direct descendant of Jack Waylon, the founder of Waylon's Landing, no-one can say he didn't earn his way onto the council. His great-great-grandfather ran their company into bankruptcy, and Isaac has worked his entire life to restore it. Today, the Waylon Shipping Company owns two ships and rents out a number of warhouses and some dock space. He's a vocal proponent for expanding the city, seeing it as his family's legacy, and wants to expand to include the outlying settlements as well, eventually forming a country rather than a simple freeport.
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Kent Leighton
Main Article: Kent LeightonA former officer in The Crater Sea Trading Company Marines, Leighton now serves as The Captain of the guard in Waylon's Landing. A stern man who wears his armor to council meetings, although he at least removes his helmet while at the table, Leighton is vague about why he chose to cash in his pension and move to Waylon's Landing, as he would have lost a good bit of it's value doing so. He's a vocal proponent for increasing taxes and fees to support a larger guard force, and dislikes adventurers, feeling that the money that goes to pay them would be better spent expanding the guard.
Diplomatic relations
As the largest and most stable settlement in the area, Waylon's Landing maintains diplomatic relations with most of the settlements in both Eastern Shield Island and the western end of The Shattered Sea.
The Shield Mountain Dwarves
From very early in it's existance, Waylon's Landing has engaged in trade and diplomatic relations with the Dwarves of Shield Mountain Keep. The Dwarves had no good way to trade their goods outside of Shield Island, and limited trading partners on the island. They now do a healthy trade in both dinosaur leather and bone items and more traditional dwarven goods. In addition to trade, the dwarves helped them build the city walls and the relationship is so important that the dwarven ambassador has a permanant seat on the city council.
Outlying Settlements
There are a number of settlements scattered around the Waylon's Landing side of Shield Island, and most maintain at least a trade relationship with Waylon's Landing. The limited ability of the Waylon's Landing guard force to police the surrounding countryside is one of the main reasons that most of the surrounding settlements don't consider themselves to truly belong to Waylon's Landing.
Pirates
Waylon's Landing has engaged in energetic diplomatic relations with a number of different pirate crews, starting from almost the moment it was founded. Within months of the first buildings going up came the first raids, as a new settlement right on the coast presented an irresistable target for the various pirate crews of the Shattered Sea. The initial solution was to hire a small contingent of Crater Sea Trading Company marines to protect the settlement, but as the settlement grew larger, docking fees and a small tax were imposed and a proper guard force was raised. Once the guard force was in place and a number of seige engines were installed, Waylon's Landing became too hard of a target for most pirate crews.
Some pirates tried to take advantage of the settlement's free port status to use it as a base of operations, but quickly found that the merchants and fishermen who operated out of Waylon's Landing had little tolerance for them. Compounding their problems, the local guard force had little hesitancy about turning in bounties to the Crater Sea Trading Company to boost their meagre funding. Even the "rats" who plague many other freeports, waiting for juicy targets to arrive before rushing to tip off the pirates have found Waylon's Landing a hard place to operate out of, their ships mysteriously scuttled and the guards having little interest in their complaints.
The Lizardfolk
Relations with the lizardfolk tribes living in the saltmarsh along the coast to the north of Waylon's Landing got off to a rocky start, with a hunting party from each faction encountering each other on the edge of the marsh. The human hunters believed that they had encountered living serpentfolk and retreated in a panic, fleeing at full speed back to the safety of the walls of Waylon's Landing. The two factions clashed a number of times before the Shield Mountain Dwarves cleared up the human's misconceptions and brokered a peace between them. Today, they engage in limited trade and generally leave each other alone, although on the rare occasions that a young lizardfolk decided that he wants to see the world he will start his journey at Waylon's Landing.
Notable Persons
Besides The Council, there are a number of other people in Waylon's Landing who might be of interest to visiting adventurers.
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Preston Harper
Captain Preston Harper is an experienced seafarer with decades of experience navigating the treacherous waters of The Shattered Sea, and currently captains the Lark. Under contract with Waylon's Landing, he makes a regular trading route through the islands within the city's area of influence.
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Samuel Roehr
The Trade Ambassador for Waylon's Landing, Roehr spends much of his time visiting nearby settlements both on Shield Island and on islands in The Shattered Sea. He occasionally accompanies the Lark on it's rounds, and once every few years makes the long trip across the shattered sea to visit the various "mainland" nations.
Potential Work
The City council often has jobs available that the city guard either doesn't have time or manpower for or is unsuited for, and the individual councilors may have personal jobs available as well. There is a constant flow of merchant ships in and out of the port, and it's possible that one of them has interesting news or jobs available for adventurers as well.
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