Westruun
The city of Westruun is the center of Tal’Dorei, a crossroads of culture along the Silvercut Roadway that welcomes adventurers, traders, and vagabonds of all kinds. Despite its name, Westruun is more east than west, and was in fact named after Palest Westruun, the trader and philosopher who founded the city.
Demografieken
65% Human, 10% Gnome, 7% Tiefling, 5% Half-Orc, 1% Gnoll, 12% Other
Regering
Westruun is ruled by Margrave Brandon Zimmerset. A margrave is a military official appointed by the Council of Tal’Dorei, and is a position held for life, or until the council deems them unfit to govern. Westruun’s standing margrave has executive power over the region’s military forces and holds power to establish and dissolve trading guilds, the lifeblood of Westruun. The city’s margrave commands a standing military of about 800 trained soldiers known as the Shields of the Plain, or simply “Shields.” Despite Westruun’s importance, its military is often spread too thin to properly mount an offensive against the guerrilla Ravagers.
Infrastuctuur
Yuminor Observatory
Westruun is a fairly flat city, and one tower on the edge of the Scholar Ward looms high above the nearby Westhall Academy. It looks forever skyward, the arcanists inside constantly charting the movements of heavens
Geografie
Miles of farmland and fields surround Westruun’s towering walls—except to the west, where the city is bordered by the Bramblewood and dwarfed by the mist-shrouded peak of Gatshadow. The city’s interior is divided into six wards.
The Scholar Ward
The Scholar Ward is Westruun’s northwestern ward, and is home to the Cobalt Reserve, Tal’Dorei’s largest library and repository of information. This vast archive is defended and maintained by a live-in monastery of Knowing Mistress-worshiping monks known as the Cobalt Soul. Across the way lies the comparably small College of the Savvy, a school for the arts founded by the renowned bard and champion of intuition referred to only as the White Duke. Beyond the Reserve, the Scholar Ward also holds Tal’Dorei’s newest (and the Dividing Plains’ only) general university, the Westhall Academy.
The Temple Ward
The Temple Ward is a small, southern ward where all people are afforded free worship within various sanctuaries. Though the most important gods of the Dividing Plains are the Lawbearer, the Wildmother, and the Platinum Dragon—and they certainly have the Temple Ward’s largest shrines—the residents of the Temple Ward welcome all faiths. Westruun’s smallest temple is the Ruiner’s “Empty Socket,” maintained by the handful of orcs in Westruun, and its largest is the Lawbearer’s “First Bastion,” an opulent temple supported by a steady influx of gold from the local government.
The Opal Ward
The Opal Ward is the center of the city and the heart of its law and governance. The ward has no residential housing, but is home to Margrave’s Keep, the Hall of Reason, and the public square. Margrave’s Keep, a squat mansion that houses the Margrave , is buttressed against military barracks and housing for Margrave Zimmerset and his family. The Hall of Reason is a beautiful courthouse in High Elven style, and bears a marble statue of the Platinum Dragon, God of Justice, before its steps. The public square is a forum for public gatherings and bears a fountain depicting Palest Westruun, the founder of the city, atop an onyx horse.
The Residential Ward
The Residential Ward fills the northeastern section of Westruun, and is the city’s most densely-populated—
some would say overpopulated—ward, housing over two-thirds of its population. There are no major locations in this ward, though countless petty criminals make their homes here, and the Shields are stretched too thin to properly deal with them. Unlike in the Temple Ward, free expression of religion is frowned upon here, even within the privacy of one’s own home. Though the Lawbearer, the Wildmother, and the Platinum Dragon are all benevolent deities, many of their Westruunian followers are not particularly tolerant of other faiths.
The Market Ward
The Market Ward is Westruun’s southwestern ward and contains the majority of the city’s businesses, trade stands, and production warehouses. It is currently in fashion for store owners to live in a second story above their shops, though less scrupulous businessfolk have turned their residences into gambling dens, black markets, and illegal brothels. The most significant building in this ward is the World Market, a marble-walled auction house where hundreds of vendors hawk rare and unusual items from across Tal’Dorei.
The Underwalk Ward
The Underwalk Ward is the city’s newest ward, an extension of the residential sprawl built from repurposed sections of the sewer system. The Underwalk was initially built during the invasion of the Chroma Conclave in hopes of keeping the populace hidden, but it has now been largely abandoned except for those either too poor to return even to the Residential Ward, or by those humans and monsters who would prefer to go unseen. Every day, new and unsettling rumors of many-headed monstrosities prowling the Underwalk’s shadowed roads spread to the surface, keeping even Westruun’s bravest mercenaries from exploring the
den of sorrow and evil beneath the city. The most well known entrance to this subterranean labyrinth is a single inauspicious manhole in the Opal Ward, topped with a metal cover emblazoned with the crest of Westruun.
Opmerkingen