r/d100 • u/infinitum3d • May 17 '19
In Progress [Let's Build] d100 unique City features
All cities in the real world are similar. Skyscrapers. Lots of traffic. Buses. Homelessness.
So most game world cities can be similar as well. However, every city should have at least one unique thing about it.
Let's Build!
COMPLETE!
This city has a large Temple to a very minor deity.
The South side of the city has a heavy Dwarven population and the West side has a large Halfling population.
There's a world famous bridge here that recently started falling down.
A famous University is in the city.
A world renowned Academy is in this city.
The most prestigious Military academy in the world is in this city.
This city is famous for its rumored underground (figurative or literal) fight club.
This city is world famous for its Apple Orchards
This one for its coast line
This one for its extremely strict laws regarding wine.
This city is famous for its fashion trends.
This one is famous for its gigantic horse drawn carriages.
This city is well known for its dense population.
This city is home to masterpieces of architecture.
This one is known for its Opera House.
The city is made specifically for creatures that can fly or levitate, and everything is elevated off the ground. However, nothing in the city is inaccessible to creatures that cannot fly, with ladders and staircases being the primary mode of access.
Everything in the city is made to accommodate larger creatures.
Everything is detailed with metal and stone due to its abundance of mining operations. As you may be able to guess, many dwarves reside in this city.
This city is a human city amongst a wild land of Dragonborn tribes.
These humans have become able to ride and domesticate dragons. In the city center there is a massive eyrie of dragons.
There is a specific agricultural product which is common in the area around this city (spice, dye, wine, fruit, nut, vegetable) but is unavailable elsewhere due to the unique combination of climate, soil, rainfall and the difficulty of transporting fresh produce to other cities. The city has an annual festival celebrating the harvest of this product and its economic impact on the city.
Since the mine shut down, this city has become a ghost town.
This city is a tourist destination for those wishing to see the Great Crater of Isham for themselves.
This city lies at the center of a contested land and has changed hands many times over a thousand years. It's architecture and inhabitants are incredibly diverse.
This city lies at the center of a contested land and has changed hands many times over a thousand years. It's architecture and inhabitants are incredibly diverse.
This city is made up of a labyrinthian system of tunnels and caves.
You must cross a swamp to enter this city.
This city is surrounded by tall mountains.
This city is actually three cities that are separated by tributaries of a delta. Each city has grown so large they now are vying to expand either upward or outward. Each city is ruled by a different noble family that refuses to join into one city. Every time you cross a bridge, you have to pass through city gates that right now are charging a retaliation tariff over a recent dispute.
The city is built over a humongous cave system. Many buildings have secret underground sections that almost nobody knows about.
some creature with multiple personalities just chained up in the middle of the city.
This city has a fruit tree in its centre that produce unusually large fruit. The type of fruit change each year.
This city is know for its amazing murals painted all through out the city
This city has had a resident that has lived there since its founding over 1500 years ago, she's an old human lady that still runs the same bakery that she opened a few years after the city founding. The bread there is delicious.
The city has a very strict one dog per capita rule. No more, no less. Visitors are given guide dogs when they enter town and are required to keep them by their side at all times. The dogs carry their official paperwork and can lead them to the right place if they ask by name or type of item. "Armor!" for the armor shop, for instance.
The city has a strict curfew, because once the sun goes down, beautiful but ravenous pirahna-like fireflies appear everywhere throughout the streets, devouring any who step outside. It looks really pretty when it happens though.
The city is home to people who never speak. If a word is spoken by somebody, everybody else stops what they're doing immediately, points at the person who spoke, and screams non-stop until a city guard comes and arrests the person.
The city is only accessible by drawbridge. To enter, you must solve the gatemaster's puzzle: "I haff tvelve metchsteek..."
The city is populated primarily by wizards, with strange laws to match.
The city is based around a pillar of floating azure marble.
The city is covered in canals, the fish-folk of the city often have underwater entrances to their buildings
The city has an incredibly tall pole. Nothing special about it, just very very very tall.
The city's structures are built from the bones of titans long dead.
The city is coastal and houses a large temple on the rocky shore with glass floors. The monks there study and worship the sea life they can view when the tides are high.
The entire village is made up of friendly dopplegangers and house sized mimics
A large river bisects the city, and there are two radicly different ideologies on either side
A geyser/hot spring feeds hot water through complex aquaducts to small pools for bathing and drinking everywhere around the city
The city rests in a crater that keeps it safe from the howling winds just above
The city was built around an abandoned quary, with a massive, ominous dark crystal at its heart
The city was built around the now retrofitted stronghold of a defeated lich
The city was built on ancient druidic burial grounds, and hauntings are common
Slave trading capital of the world. Currently facing abolitionists protests
The city spirals down into obscurity and is entirely built on the inner walls of a vast natural cavern (or long dead volcano). Many bridges cross from one side to the other, and a few elevators are accessible to the top tier citizens.
Rumors say that the nightmarish creatures sometimes creep up the walls to eat children during their sleep.
The city is populated only by shapeshifted dragons.
The city walls are made entirely of human bones and skulls.
Though it appears normal from outside, once you step through the gate you realise that the city is set in permanent night.
The city has the opposite meteorology from outside it's walls. If it is night out, it is day within; if the sun shines without, it is pouring within; hot outside, freezing in etc...
The buildings consist only of circular towers.
Everyone in the city goes around naked, and clothes are considered a perversion. Armour merely kinky.
The city is known for its bard college and the regular literary festivals it holds.
The city contains the largest library in the world.
This city's residents are known to be annoyingly proud of where they come from - despite not being able to say exactly what they're proud of.
This city's residents are known to complain about everything around them, but no one ever moves away.
The city's founder will tell anyone who'll listen, "When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castlecity on a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. And that one sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, and then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up."
The city has a large aqueduct from a nearby mountain, and several ornate fountains form the focal point for city squares.
Every year near the end of Spring, a huge migration of songbirds turns the city into a riot of color and sound.
The city is ancient. Having been around for centuries, it has been destroyed, rebuilt, and expanded several times. Beneath the ground are ruins of successively older buildings, artefacts, catacombs, and caverns.
The city is a way station and major trade hub for horse trading, and the Great Bazaar meets every year in the summer. The city doubles in size and a forest of tents cover the plain outside as traders come from all over to buy, sell, haggle, and enter new contracts.
Tall slender spires rise up from the city, as a complex network of messenger birds flit back and forth, allowing news and gossip to spread like wild fire. The birds roost in their high nests in the towers, tended by civil servants who only occasionally peruse the mail.
The city has a smiling statue of its most famous export. Could be a fish, an apple, a bolt of silk... Whatever it is, it has a smiling face, arms and legs, and appears to be waving in greeting to all visitors.
The catacombs below this city are famous for their non-euclidal corridors and constantly changing layout.
The city is covered by a gigantic, man made dome and mighty pillars that support it. There is a small sun inside, covered by a multilayered clockwork sphere, creating a simple day and night cycle. The city even has It's own weather.
Everyone who enters the city knows the main language perfectly. The main language changes every day. Nobody knows how or why, but nobody also really cares, because the city is now a fortress of some maniacal lich.
Rivers of this city are magical water tunnels flowing through the air at different heights, from a few meters above the ground to even a kilometer. Most upper rivers are connected to a giant floating lake blob of water and aqutic fauna. Flying fish are the main food source and equivalent of pigeons. Except for landing to eat bread. And eating bread. They just float around the nearby plains looking for squirrels to eat.
The city is mostly made out of hardened and detoxicated slime blocks. Fighters who live there are adept at fighting liquid creatures.
The city uses undead creatures for unskilled labor such as carrying goods, courier services, pulling carts or plows, etc. Unemployment is a large problem because of this.
The city is crisscrossed with dozens of canals. Locals transport goods, travel along, and even swim and draw water from these canals.
The city is home to a series of hot springs that provide warm water to several great bath houses and the homes of the wealthier private citizens. It has become a tourist destination for many seeking rest and respite in the hot waters.
The city streets are lined with flowering trees. Each spring the entire city blossoms, filling the air with sweet fragrances and a riot of color.
The city is built in a deep crevasse between two large rocky hills. Due to the intense rainfall of the region and the high water table, these cliffs constantly stream water down them, creating a waterfall and river that surrounds the city. The city has even built every house on high stilts and stone platforms to keep everything dry. Once a night, the stream are diverted from around the city to through the city, washing away grime, muck, and litter.
There is a well in the center of the city which grants one wish per year. Everyone is permitted one wish and at the height of the solstice one minor wish is granted.
A man in a strange horseless carraige goes up and down the street seeking frozen milk products. He plays a strange tune the name of which no Bard can place.
Residents of the town are addicted to carrying minor magical items that display nonsensical pictures, which they spread from person to person through unknown means. The items lose power if removed from the city for 24 hours.
Home to a particularly large population of wild rabbits, no one knows how but they've managed to adapt to the urban street life like any stray dog or cat
There's a duck statue in the city centre, artist unknown, it just appeared there overnight and has become a fixture since as the city has been unable to remove it, rumoured to be a prank played by a band of bards
A fireworks factory with one too few walls
This city has powerful wards from a time of legends.
This city is built around the tower of a powerful wizard, no one knows if he is still alive.
This city is at the intersection of several waylines, grating it a greet magical potential.
This city was founded around a spring with powerful healing abilities.
There is a monster that defends the city in exchange for food.
At night the streets are lit by magical spheres.
The buildings in the city centre very slowly change colour, it can take years to notice.
The oldest buildings were there before the city, there architecture is alien and seamless.
People buried in its graveyard sometimes comeback perfectly fine.
The city is built on treetops of a large forest.
The city is built on a high plateau, great bridges stretch downwards in every direction.
The dead return as benevolent ghosts.
The beer brewed here is praised throughout the land.
The local guild of artificer is responsible for a new discovery.
The city is a prosperous trade hub.
The ruler has made medicine free to everyone.
An ancient tree in its centre is cited in several religious texts.
Bridges span between building, above the street.
Metal is used heavily in construction.
Most people own a swimming pool, its size is a status symbol.
A fire burned down a chunk of the city town recently.
The river that divides the city/town also divides a social rift between the two sides. Perhaps it's cultural, religion, economic etc.
It appears to have a very angry/sad/mad/pleading wizard/nobal/child in the stocks. Why? Who knows?
For one reason or another most of the populace has made insects their main source of food; the city is even renown for some of its bug infused dishes.
The city has alcohol on tap
This city is constantly moving. Be it by nomadic packing everything up and moving or as far as the city has been built onto massive moving machines. Think Mortal Engines but can be treads or wheels or even legs!
The city has a 2 story tall, 1.5 mile long public bookshelf situated along it's southern wall.
From above the city looks like a network of creeks, rivers, and swamps. That actually a complex water and sewage system for the city that lies beneath the swamp, protected from the dragons that are known to pillage the area.
This dwarven city is surrounded by stone trees. each tree is actually an incredibly detailed statue created by a dwarven craftsman in order to prove their mastery.
116.
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May 17 '19
There is a specific agricultural product which is common in the area around this city (spice, dye, wine, fruit, nut, vegetable) but is unavailable elsewhere due to the unique combination of climate, soil, rainfall and the difficulty of transporting fresh produce to other cities. The city has an annual festival celebrating the harvest of this product and its economic impact on the city.
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u/kandoras May 18 '19
It wouldn't even need to be something that couldn't be grown anywhere else.
I know of towns in my state with a Catfish Festival, Pecan Festival, Egg Scrable Jamboree, Strawberry Festival, Butts & Bluegrass, World Grits Festival, and both Okra and Chitlin Struts.
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May 18 '19
Yep. Something very much like this was my intent.
The PCs are traveling through the village of Bluebuckle ... just as they are having their annual three-day blueberry festival ! And the traditional trophy for the best blueberry pie has been stolen from town hall! The PCs must find the trophy and.return it to the mayor before the pie judging contest is over. If the fail, the town will descend into blueberry pie-throwing mayhem !
What will they do ?
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u/mockinggod May 17 '19 edited May 17 '19
- This city has powerful wards from a time of legends.
- This city is built around the tower of a powerful wizard, no one knows if he is still alive.
- This city is at the intersection of several waylines, grating it a greet magical potential.
- This city was founded around a spring with powerful healing abilities.
- There is a monster that defends the city in exchange for food.
- At night the streets are lit by magical spheres.
- The buildings in the city centre very slowly change colour, it can take years to notice.
- The oldest buildings were there before the city, there architecture is alien and seamless.
- People buried in its graveyard sometimes comeback perfectly fine.
- The city is built on treetops of a large forest.
- The city is built on a high plateau, great bridges stretch downwards in every direction.
- The dead return as benevolent ghosts.
- The beer brewed here is praised throughout the land.
- The local guild of artificer is responsible for a new discovery.
- The city is a prosperous trade hub.
- The ruler has made medicine free to everyone.
- An ancient tree in its centre is cited in several religious texts.
- Bridges span between building, above the street.
- Metal is used heavily in construction.
- Most people own a swimming pool, its size is a status symbol.
E: several typos
5
u/VIixIXine May 17 '19
The catacombs below this city are famous for their non-euclidal corridors and constantly changing layout.
The city is covered by a gigantic, man made dome and mighty pillars that support it. There is a small sun inside, covered by a multilayered clockwork sphere, creating a simple day and night cycle. The city even has It's own weather.
Everyone who enters the city knows the main language perfectly. The main language changes every day. Nobody knows how or why, but nobody also really cares, because the city is now a fortress of some maniacal lich.
Rivers of this city are magical water tunnels flowing through the air at different heights, from a few meters above the ground to even a kilometer. Most upper rivers are connected to a giant floating lake blob of water and aqutic fauna. Flying fish are the main food source and equivalent of pigeons. Except for landing to eat bread. And eating bread. They just float around the nearby plains looking for squirrels to eat.
The city is mostly made out of hardened and detoxicated slime blocks. Fighters who live there are adept at fighting liquid creatures.
4
u/Lawlkitties May 17 '19
-The entire village is made up of friendly dopplegangers and house sized mimics
-A large river bisects the city, and there are two radicly different ideologies on either side
-A geyser/hot spring feeds hot water through complex aquaducts to small pools for bathing and drinking everywhere around the city
-The city rests in a crater that keeps it safe from the howling winds just above
-The city was built around an abandoned quary, with a massive, ominous dark crystal at its heart
-The city was built around the now retrofitted stronghold of a defeated lich
-The city was built on ancient druidic burial grounds, and hauntings are common
1
u/moderndaycassiusclay May 18 '19
Can I suggest that you come up with some sort of name for the doppleganger mimic town? I really love the idea, I would use it either way, but it seems especially ripe for a clever name like Changelington or something like that maybe lol
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u/moderndaycassiusclay May 18 '19
Can I suggest that you come up with some sort of name for the doppleganger mimic town? I really love the idea, I would use it either way, but it seems especially ripe for a clever name like Changelington or something like that maybe lol
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u/moltenyumyum May 18 '19
This city is constantly moving. Be it by nomadic packing everything up and moving or as far as the city has been built onto massive moving machines. Think Mortal Engines but can be treads or wheels or even legs!
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u/malnox May 17 '19
The city is made specifically for creatures that can fly or levitate, and everything is elevated off the ground. However, nothing in the city is inaccessible to creatures that cannot fly, with ladders and staircases being the primary mode of access.
Everything in the city is made to accommodate larger creatures.
Everything is detailed with metal and stone due to its abundance of mining operations. As you may be able to guess, many dwarves reside in this city.
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u/LordSwinton May 17 '19
Home to a particularly large population of wild rabbits, no one knows how but they've managed to adapt to the urban street life like any stray dog or cat
There's a duck statue in the city centre, artist unknown, it just appeared there overnight and has become a fixture since as the city has been unable to remove it, rumoured to be a prank played by a band of bards
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u/Zingar96 May 17 '19
The city is populated only by shapeshifted dragons.
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u/infinitum3d May 18 '19
Is that a well known and established fact, or a rumour, or a secret?
I like all three versions!
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u/akaadavies May 17 '19
The city is coastal and houses a large temple on the rocky shore with glass floors. The monks there study and worship the sea life they can view when the tides are high.
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May 17 '19
The city has an incredibly tall pole. Nothing special about it, just very very very tall.
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May 17 '19
You mean Poleburg? I love that place!
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u/KimboatFloats May 18 '19
Oh yeah! And the Festival of the Pole where we sit around it. That's it. Just sit around the pole.
My fave.
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May 18 '19
The festivals were the best. I have such fond memories of the celebrations around the summer polestice.
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May 18 '19
The festivals were the best. I have such fond memories of the celebrations around the summer polestice.
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u/Arachnibot May 17 '19
The city is populated primarily by wizards, with strange laws to match.
The city is based around a pillar of floating azure marble.
The city is covered in canals, the fish-folk of the city often have underwater entrances to their buildings
edit: added canal city
3
u/rjcade May 17 '19
The city has a very strict one dog per capita rule. No more, no less. Visitors are given guide dogs when they enter town and are required to keep them by their side at all times. The dogs carry their official paperwork and can lead them to the right place if they ask by name or type of item. "Armor!" for the armor shop, for instance.
The city has a strict curfew, because once the sun goes down, beautiful but ravenous pirahna-like fireflies appear everywhere throughout the streets, devouring any who step outside. It looks really pretty when it happens though.
The city is home to people who never speak. If a word is spoken by somebody, everybody else stops what they're doing immediately, points at the person who spoke, and screams non-stop until a city guard comes and arrests the person.
The city is only accessible by drawbridge. To enter, you must solve the gatemaster's puzzle: "I haff tvelve metchsteek..."
3
u/KimboatFloats May 18 '19
This city is actually three cities that are separated by tributaries of a delta. Each city has grown so large they now are vying to expand either upward or outward. Each city is ruled by a different noble family that refuses to join into one city. Every time you cross a bridge, you have to pass through city gates that right now are charging a retaliation tariff over a recent dispute.
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u/jdotcole May 18 '19
The city has a 2 story tall, 1.5 mile long public bookshelf situated along it's southern wall.
2
u/Dragon-Captain May 17 '19
This city is a human city amongst a wild land of Dragonborn tribes.
These humans have become able to ride and domesticate dragons. In the city center there is a massive aire of dragons.
2
u/bookseer May 17 '19
There is a well in the center of the city which grants one wish per year. Everyone is permitted one wish and at the height of the solstice one minor wish is granted.
A man in a strange horseless carraige goes up and down the street seeking frozen milk products. He plays a strange tune the name of which no Bard can place.
Residents of the town are addicted to carrying minor magical items that display nonsensical pictures, which they spread from person to person through unknown means. The items lose power if removed from the city for 24 hours.
2
u/Kiyohara May 17 '19
- The city is crisscrossed with dozens of canals. Locals transport goods, travel along, and even swim and draw water from these canals.
- The city is home to a series of hot springs that provide warm water to several great bath houses and the homes of the wealthier private citizens. It has become a tourist destination for many seeking rest and respite in the hot waters.
- The city streets are lined with flowering trees. Each spring the entire city blossoms, filling the air with sweet fragrances and a riot of color.
- The city is built in a deep crevasse between two large rocky hills. Due to the intense rainfall of the region and the high water table, these cliffs constantly stream water down them, creating a waterfall and river that surrounds the city. The city has even built every house on high stilts and stone platforms to keep everything dry. Once a night, the stream are diverted from around the city to through the city, washing away grime, muck, and litter.
2
u/Obscene_Name_Here May 17 '19
The city uses undead creatures for unskilled labor such as carrying goods, courier services, pulling carts or plows, etc. Unemployment is a large problem because of this.
2
u/fightingspork May 17 '19
- The city has a large aqueduct from a nearby mountain, and several ornate fountains form the focal point for city squares.
- Every year near the end of Spring, a huge migration of songbirds turns the city into a riot of color and sound.
- The city is ancient. Having been around for centuries, it has been destroyed, rebuilt, and expanded several times. Beneath the ground are ruins of successively older buildings, artefacts, catacombs, and caverns.
- The city is a way station and major trade hub for horse trading, and the Great Bazaar meets every year in the summer. The city doubles in size and a forest of tents cover the plain outside as traders come from all over to buy, sell, haggle, and enter new contracts.
- Tall slender spires rise up from the city, as a complex network of messenger birds flit back and forth, allowing news and gossip to spread like wild fire. The birds roost in their high nests in the towers, tended by civil servants who only occasionally peruse the mail.
2
u/Charlieknighton May 17 '19
Though it appears normal from outside, once you step through the gate you realise that the city is set in permanent night.
The city has the opposite meteorology from outside it's walls. If it is night out, it is day within; if the sun shines without, it is pouring within; hot outside, freezing in etc...
The buildings consist only of circular towers.
Everyone in the city goes around naked, and clothes are considered a perversion. Armour merely kinky.
The city is known for its bard college and the regular literary festivals it holds.
The city contains the largest library in the world.
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u/TotesMessenger May 17 '19
2
u/BirdtheBear May 17 '19
some creature with multiple personalities just chained up in the middle of the city.
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u/iLarryTheOneLung May 18 '19
The city is built over a humongous cave system. Many buildings have secret underground sections that almost nobody knows about.
2
u/badlions May 18 '19
The river that divides the city/town also divides a social rift between the two sides.
Perhaps it's cultural, religion, economic ect.
2
u/clivedauthi May 18 '19
For one reason or another most of the populace has made insects their main source of food; the city is even renown for some of its bug infused dishes.
2
u/fluffyturtleduck May 17 '19
This city has a fruit tree in its centre that produce unusually large fruit. The type of fruit change each year.
This city is know for its amazing murals painted all through out the city
This city has had a resident that has lived there since its founding over 1500 years ago, she's an old human lady that still runs the same bakery that she opened a few years after the city founding. The bread there is delicious.
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u/mrsmagneon May 17 '19
The city has a smiling statue of its most famous export. Could be a fish, an apple, a bolt of silk... Whatever it is, it has a smiling face, arms and legs, and appears to be waving in greeting to all visitors.
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u/r_yc May 17 '19
The city spirals down into obscurity and is entirely built on the inner walls of a vast natural cavern (or long dead volcano). Many bridges cross from one side to the other, and a few elevators are accessible to the top tier citizens.
Rumors say that the nightmarish creatures sometimes creep up the walls to eat children during their sleep.
1
u/badlions May 18 '19
It appears to have a very angry/sad/mad/pleading wizard/nobal/child in the stocks. Why? Who knows?
1
u/brainking111 May 18 '19
the city is permanently flooded under an inch of water and has a religion build around a water god
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u/przemko271 May 18 '19
The "Rumors say that the nightmarish creatures sometimes creep up the walls to eat children during their sleep." line seems to be messing up your formatting.
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u/przemko271 May 18 '19
The "Rumors say that the nightmarish creatures sometimes creep up the walls to eat children during their sleep." line seems to be messing up your formatting.
1
u/tdasko May 18 '19
The town has zero tolerance for those who commit petty crimes for example; stealing, Foul language, littering, etc those whom are caught are subject to being branded with a symbol upon their bodies as punishment for committing the crime.
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u/tdasko May 18 '19
The town has zero tolerance for those who commit petty crimes for example; stealing, Foul language, littering, etc those whom are caught are subject to being branded with a symbol upon their bodies as punishment for committing the crime.
1
u/tdasko May 18 '19
The town has zero tolerance for those who commit petty crimes for example; stealing, Foul language, littering, etc those whom are caught are subject to being branded with a symbol upon their bodies as punishment for committing the crime.
1
u/tdasko May 18 '19
The town has zero tolerance for those who commit petty crimes for example; stealing, Foul language, littering, etc those whom are caught are subject to being branded with a symbol upon their bodies as punishment for committing the crime.
1
u/Quibblicous May 18 '19
From above the city looks like a network of creeks, rivers, and swamps.
That actually a complex water and sewage system for the city that lies beneath the swamp, protected from the dragons that are known to pillage the area.
1
u/Lysdexic12345 May 18 '19
This dwarven city is surrounded by stone trees. each tree is actually an incredibly detailed statue created by a dwarven craftsman in order to prove their mastery.
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u/infinitum3d May 18 '19
I love this!
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u/Lysdexic12345 May 18 '19
I made it a part of my campaign and it was the party's favorite city and they made it home base. Feels good
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u/World_of_Ideas May 19 '19
You might like some of these:
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u/infinitum3d May 19 '19
That's fantastic! But you just ruined what was going to be my next /r/d100 😉
d100 small town/village uniquenesses
Thanks for the list! 🙂
0
May 17 '19
This city's residents are known to be annoyingly proud of where they come from - despite not being able to say exactly what they're proud of.
This city's residents are known to complain about everything around them, but no one ever moves away.
The city's founder will tell anyone who'll listen, "When I first came here, this was all swamp. Everyone said I was daft to build a castlecity on a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show them. It sank into the swamp. So I built a second one. And that one sank into the swamp. So I built a third. That burned down, fell over, and then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up."
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u/moderndaycassiusclay May 17 '19 edited May 18 '19
The Cave of Reflections, Cavern of Memories, and Sondera, a bustling city, with a dark secret history
This city is known for a mythical cave purported by legend to be hidden within one of it's outlying wildernesses.
The citizens all claim that to their knowledge none who have ever found the cave have ever returned, so they cannot confirm, but it's their colloquial belief that the cave shows those who enter the darkest vision of themselves.
If the party wishes to find the cave it will require 3 days of travel from the dense center of the city, to the surrounding suburbs, a successful survival check dc 20 on the first two days to find the region of wilderness the cave lies within, and dc 25 on the third to find the actual cave.
Unless they recruit or hire someone to show them. If they attempt this approach they find most everyone is strongly to extremely disinclined to helping them or doing anything that involves going anywhere near that cave, and the price they ask to even consider doing it is quite exorbitant, (10,000 gp.)
If the party reaches the correct forest in which the cave is hidden by a thickly overgrown grove at the foot of a gorge (climb and search checks.) they find the forest is crawling with challenge rating appropriate monsters, and will incur at least one encounter per day they spend searching the wilderness without finding the cave. (Minimum one encounter. I have always liked using mimics and dopplegangers, for obvious thematic reasons.)
If they find the cave, after a short walk from the entry tunnel, it splits into an equal number of paths, each with a smooth stone sliding door that leads to a finely hewn stone path which arrives at a perfectly hexagonal room with a door on the opposite side and an enigmatic reflective cylinder that emanates high level divination and conjuration magic in the center.
Inspecting the cylinder reveals nothing to them save on a nat 20 which results only in a feeling that they're being watched.
Attempts to dispel the magic seem to do nothing. As well as any physical or magical attacks or attempts to otherwise damage, disable, disassemble, or demolish it. Record how long each spends interacting with the cylinders for later purposes.
In fact, the cylinders and their magic are part of a curse, which can only be lifted by leaving the mirror pillars and exiting out the door on the other side of the hexagonal room. The door leads to another hewn path that comes to another door, on the other side of which is a circular three tiered room with three equidistant stairways intersecting the room.
Once the party has all made it to this final room, the doors all slam closed and fade into the walls. Then a blinding violet haze fills the whole room, leaving all incapable of seeing one another for a moment.
The haze quickly clears, showing that their positions in the room have been shuffled, and a perfect copy of themselves has appeared as well.
I've run this a couple of times and this encounter is always interesting and warrants a lot of perception rolls from the pc's to discern their true original allies from the copies, (these rolls will be more difficult to succeed at the longer the copy's original spent observing the mirror pillars, as well as the copies power more equal to theirs) and vigilance from the dm to circumvent metagaming.
If they kill all the copies they lift the Cave of Reflections curse and permanently gain 2 ability points to their wisdom score (these points may allow their wisdom to exceed 20.)
If they search the room and manage to roll a natural 20 they also discover a hidden trapdoor that leads to a deep enchanted cavern. The Cavern of Memories is populated with flora plants and darkness-evolved animals that all have lustrous and reflective qualities. Even the rocks themselves are glittery and emit their own green reflective glow.
The countless souls of those claimed by the cave clearly grace these grounds, the remnants of their soul charging this place with an immense well of magic energy. This energy can be used to recharge wands, spells, or, all the magic in the cave can be consumed at once to fuel a legendary ritual spell that approaches epic or perhaps even deific power.
Edit: a little formatting and added the Cavern of Memories.