The Waterdeep Sewers

[Mele]

We've all been there at some point. BAWDAR! The Waterdeep Sewers.

This area has forever been a stock area, supplied from the mud coding itself. So Dalvyn and I have been plotting to wipe out the area and make it completely new.

Here's where I reach out to all of you! Tell me some things YOU would like to see. SMALL quests, underground tunnels to places, caves of specific races.(No drow, please.) etc. I promise you not all of the things will be included, unfortunately. But any and all ideas and inspiration is appreciated!

[Gwain]

A quest involving a rat king http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rat_king_%28folklore%29

Alligators in the sewers

Dark cults to evil gods and spirits that hide in the unreachable recesses of the deepest sewers.

More access points in the city.

The sewer store being open to sell things to spelunkers.

[Alaudrien]

mmm could have a quest revolving around having to help the watch capture a thief that escaped into the sewer. Perhaps even a cunningly hidden thief hideout.perhaps have part of the sewers the half located nearer the city of the dead have an outbreak of undead that instead of going up for thereway into the sewers or what have you. I know in the city of splendors book the beast god had a temple in there..forget hs name which had alot of mongrelmen that resided in there.

[Isaldur]

Going back quite a few years here but I seem to recall the Eye of the Beholder series of games taking place in Waterdeep's Sewers, or at least at the start of them.

Might be good for inspiration. Here's some of the sewer maps/encounters/quests.

Upper Sewer
Middle Sewer
Lower Sewer

Anything deeper goes into dwarven ruins but that may be inspiration as well for quests involving lost artifacts, mapping, etc.

[Alaudrien]

Dalvyn mentioned it before about entrances outside of waterdeep and also into undermount so that gives the races that shouldnt be in waterdeep another path into there to! The maps are pretty awesome!

[Mele]

I'm not sure how large Dalvyn wants it to be - but those maps are definitely an awesome base.

[Raona]

I'd suggest the were-rats not go away, but instead transform into a society of sorts, with a king (perhaps a rat king or were-rat-king, pursuant to Gwain's suggestion). To hip young players to risks later on, they could infect them with lycanthropy upon biting them, but place a wise old cleric or somesuch at a sewer entrance with an intercept on them to say "Whoo, you have lycanthropy! I'll fix that for you, if you like, before you become a rat." That same mob could offer a quest to deal with said rats, and/or inform them of Lord P's bounty. I think lycanthropy is coded, yes? If so, they could become rats with the full moon, if they leave it be until then...to revert by day to human form.

I like the way the sewer system empties into the sewer pipes, providing some help to the observant new player. I'd urge keeping that, too. [This is intentionally vague so as not to give away something IC...if you don't know what I mean, Mele, please PM for clarification.]

I'd add street urchins that pinch your stuff, but you can catch them and get it back. Perhaps make some desperate and hungry, let them plead for their lives when cornered, and give folks the option of what to do with them. (They could even give OOC information on killmodes, and help early on with setting alignment?)

Perhaps people sleeping in the lower reaches of the sewers could be awakened by whatever creature makes that endless ominous rumbling - your choice as to what it is! Along similar lines, tunnels into undermount could be random, dug by giant worms, but made to warn away young PCs with something like "the tunnel looks as though it could collapse at any moment, and smells of death." Go in, and there's a 50% chance you encounter said worm. The tunnel terminates randomly, say 20% of the time a dead end, 50% of the time elsewhere in the sewers, 20% of the time the wilderness, and 10% of the time the first level of undermountain? I'm brainstorming here, slap me if I'm getting stupid.

Cleaning quests, recovery of lost article quests (noble lost his bauble, noble girl lost her cat), vermin removal quests, and scratched messages leading to quests, in various languages, would all help new players as well as give them a taste of what's to come. The superb coding of Express Deliveries, which explains quests, could either be duplicated or re-used to offer such quests. (The problem currently with ED is that you have to be level 10 to work there, and by then you have likely learned a lot about questing the hard way. They could either have an apprentice system, giving out these sewer quests, to prove your ability and reliability, or the same explanatory code could be used by another organization, say "Sewer Services" of Waterdeep, and when you have their four feathers, or tiny shovels, or whatever emblem they use, they refer you to Express Deliveries.)

[Sithiel]

I'd like, as almost everyone else, to see a entrance outside of waterdeep. Maybe the sewers could even be somehow connected to Daggerford sewers.
Also I like the idea about chasing the thief, but I think the quest should have option of bargaining with the thief. Also I would like to see smugglers and stuff with some quests for evil folk too, and of course the same smugglers could be a quest for the good ones too, to put them out of business.

[Lerytha]

Great stuff here!

Maps very useful, and Raona's comments about killmodes are useful suggestions.

I don't think we should tie the Waterdeep sewers to Daggerford sorry, Sithiel, since IC its several long miles away.

Maybe however, there could be one false wall (somewhere) which leads to an earthen tunnel guarded by some sorts of thieves or guild, providing a place for evil people to infest the sewers.

I think this should be possible, and the sewers should be places the Watch will only enter in times of extreme and absolute emergency. It should be a place where the law is harder to enforce, where monsters fight the Watch, where Mazikeen and Zarafae enter to speak to their dark, secret agents that sow discord amongst Waterdeep. The sewers should be a dangerous place filled, as Raona has suggested, with both the pitiful and the evil.

As long as we don't sterilise it too much and as long as we're not afraid of OOCly building an IC weakness to the City, I'll be happy. If we try and make it so the sewers are not a big security threat, I'd be a bit dissappointed. Just remember Baldur's Gate II in Shadows of Amn. The Watch wasn't really ever there. It was a no-man's land. I'd love our sewers to be like that.

[Mele]

Just breezed through for now.


Were rats are staying! They're part of FK's history!

[Dalvyn]

To be precise, I'd rather keep a wererat quest where you have to bring back the head of the big were rat to the Official. That being said, wererats could be relocated to a "side-area" or something. That's entirely possible.

There's no set size limit for this area ... I would think that 100 vnums should be enough (maybe 50 for the main sewers plus 5 x 8 rooms for 5 side areas), but if that's not enough, we can consider making it bigger. Too big might not be a good idea though, since it's supposed to be a rather labyinthine area for new characters (i.e., it's better if it is relatively simple/small as a "first area").

[Kirkus]

There is some good info in City of Splendors book... Here are a couple suggestions that interested me when looking through the section on the sewers after seeing this post.

The sewers are serviced by the Cellarers' and Plumbers' Guild, so we could put in some 'clean the sewers' quests. Stuff like removing debris and sweeping muck etc..

if we are looking at some description clean up as well... The sewers are mostly divided into primary and secondary passages. Primary passages are 20 feet wide with 3 foot rail-less walkway ledges on each side. Sewer workers cross passages by means of a 16 foot 'catch-pole' to vault across or by using boards, which they lay down as temporary bridges. The 'catch-poles' are also used to clear debris from sewer grates and from below the waterline. Secondary passages are 12 feet wide with one ledge.
There are roughly 70+ surface shafts which are covered, believe it or not with what is roughly described as a manhole cover, metal or metal-banded wood.

I think the 'catch-poles' could be a cool addition, we could use these as a manhole cover remover and to cross passages in the sewers.

I think one of the best additions would be the Savants of the Dark Tide. I think they are aboleths who have a stronghold in the sewers and are actually capturing and enslaving members of the Cellarers' and Plumbers' Guild. With this I think we should do just a couple easier quests that way we don't kill all of the newbies. We can always make an additional area later if someone wants, for the older, stronger characters and groups.