The year is 1352, and the aging King Alben Rosen IV is gravely ill.
The king has not produced an heir to the throne of Aldhaven and the kingdom that comes with it. His only child is a daughter, the princess Isolde Rosen, who is just now of marriageable age. The city’s nobility is in chaos as alliances are made and broken while the noble houses jockey for position, many intent on taking the throne for themselves when the king finally passes through the last gate. Behind them are the lesser nobles, attempting to ascend to power by winning the favor of the victorious house. Then there are the merchants and the middle class, who wish to use the political turmoil to take whatever they can for themselves, solidifying their position against the depredation of the nobility. In places no one speaks of except in hushed whispers are the thieves, the rebels, the invaders, and the saboteurs, those who want nothing more than the downfall of the city, and the kingdom, and the coalition it leads.
Word of this chaos has spread across the continent. Warriors, mages, thieves, craftsmen, ladies of the night, informants, beggars, spies, entertainers, and countless others have flooded into the city seeking their fortune amidst the upheaval.
You have heard many tales of the goings on in the city-state of Aldhaven and the opportunities just waiting to be grasped. Stories of fortunes gained and lost, power grabbed, and glory attained has reached your ears, and now you too seek to write your own story on pages of destiny.
Welcome to Aldhaven. Don’t mind the knife in your back.
Aldhaven Politics
The Noble Families
House Rosen
King Alben Rosen is dying from a malignant disease that resists all known forms of cure. The nature of this disease is completely unknown to the general populace. His only child, a daughter, is not able to inherit the throne due to being a woman and relatively young. Though the name of Princess Isolde Rosen is known throughout the kingdom, she is rarely seen in public and little to nothing is actually known of her beyond her basic appearance. She is 15 years of age, tall and thin, with long, curly blonde hair, piercing gray eyes, a nose slightly too large for her face, and thin lips. Though not ugly by any means, she would not be considered beautiful by most, if not for her political position. Paintings of her visible to the public tend to make her more attractive than she really is to the point that she wouldn’t be immediately recognizable to anyone who didn’t know her. House Rosen has no other known living members and, despite historically being the most powerful house, it is on the verge of utter ruin.
House Rocholl
Archduke Wolfram Rocholl, late 50s, is the king’s primary advisor and is currently engaged to marry the Princess Isolde, despite being more than twice her age and already having several children of his own from his late wife, all of whom are older than the princess. House Rocholl is the oldest and most powerful of the noble houses, older even than House Rosen. There are several rumors about dark dealings and criminal activities concerning House Rocholl, but there has never been any proof. The vast majority of the population believes these rumors to be lies started by people who are either jealous or bored. The Archduke is the legal heir to the throne due to his political position, which is only further cemented by his engagement to the princess; however, he would still legally inherit the throne even if the marriage were to be canceled.
House Dietrich
Duke Elsko Dietrich is leader of House Dietrich, a noble family composed almost entirely of merchants and tradesmen. House Dietrich is also the wealthiest family in all of Aldhaven by far. Despite being involved in the funding of several social welfare organizations in the city, the members of the house tend to have a poor reputation. Most people think of them as greedy, usurious cheats and liars who use their power, position, and wealth to gain greater power, position, and wealth. This is furthered by the rumor that one can quite literally buy one’s way into membership within the house, thought this is unsubstantiated. Duke Elsko is the next legal heir to the throne after Archduke Rocholl, and as such, he has a bit of enmity towards the Archduke, obviously preferring the throne to fall to himself. Most political groups that oppose House Rocholl have started to rally behind House Dietrich.
House Licorta
Known as the House of Dragons, led by Duke Arlin Licorta, House Licorta is the House most popular among the commoners. While it is fairly commonly believed that the lineage of House Licorta extends back to dragonkind, the members of the house make no such claims and deny all such suggestions when mentioned, taking it as a significant insult that someone would implicate such a thing. However, the fact that an elderly dragon lives on the family estate within the Nobles’ Quarter and that a fairly powerful gold and young silver dragon are known to visit the family openly on occasion means that the rumors simply will not stop. House Licorta has no claims to the throne but are well liked throughout the city, as the wondrous tales of dragonkind and the wealth they hoard are always popular with the people.
House Roestel
Led by Duke Rudolph Roestel, who happens to be third line for the throne, House Roestel is distant and reluctant to be seen in public, having little to nothing to do with the common people. While other Houses hold control over entire districts, House Roestel isn’t known to be openly affiliated with anyone in the city outside of their own immediate family and employees. There are several dark, but conflicting, rumors about the family, and Duke Roestel in particular, to explain the apparent secrecy. Whether any of them are true, no one seems to know, but they are all fairly scary. While the rumors about the Duke are indeed vile, the tales people tell of his wife make the Duke seem benevolent and kindhearted…
Others
There are a few other prominent noble families, though they are not as powerful nor as well known to the common people. A collection of other minor noble families also live throughout the city. Among these lesser houses are the Houses Busch, Eichel, Thelen, and Widmayer, though this is certainly not the full extent of the lesser nobles.
Common Leadership
The king rules the city of Aldhaven and the surrounding country, though it has always been largely left up to the archduke to manage the local affairs of the kingdom with the king taking a more international role. Just below the archduke in power is the Aldhaven City Council, an organization democratically elected from among the common Citizens of Aldhaven. The Chief Magistrate and Captain of the City Watch also hold prominent political and legal power within the city, both on par with that of the Council Chairman, the tree forming a Triumvirate capable of overruling all but a direct edict from the king.
While the City Council runs the day to day of the city at large, with significant oversight from the archduke, they delegate most of the responsibilities and power to a number of officially recognized guilds. Among these officially recognized guilds are The Scriveners’ Guild, The Arcane Order, Guild of Stars and Spheres, The Smiths’ Guild, The Blessed Bookkeepers, The Videum Obscurom, The Bardic College, the Guild of Painters, Artists, and Calligraphers, the Morganstern Society, the Smiths’ and Farriers’ Association, Gold and Silver Smiths’ Guild, Woodworkers’ United, the Shipwright’s Guild, Deep Treasures Guild, and a few smaller merchant and adventurer’s guilds. There exist a number of unofficial guilds as well, but membership in an unofficial guild is generally frowned upon in polite society.
The Larger World
Geographical Information
Aldhaven is the easternmost city of the Seven Cities Alliance. It lies at the point where the great river which flows from the mountains in the east to the ocean in the far west ceases to be navigable due to the harsh rapids which fill the river further upstream. The river is a major trade route across the continent, and Aldhaven is the last port along it, where caravans must pick up their goods to go further overland.
A major north/south trade route also travels through Aldhaven going through the various independent kingdoms of the north and on into The Empire of Seven Dragons. The trade route disappears into the open savannas to the south, the nomadic tribes never remaining in a single place long enough for a true road to form but send their own merchants north often enough that trade still flourishes. Another major road leads eastward into the mountains and the dwarven and gnomish kingdoms therein.
The Seven Cities Alliance
Aldhaven itself is just one city-state within an alliance of seven city-states, though it is by far the largest and most powerful among them. Two of the smaller cities, named Wetarvania and Hayes’ Landing, are directly controlled by Aldhaven as vassal states under the authority of King Rosen, though they are administered by other Houses at the king’s pleasure.
The second largest city of the alliance, Brunsgrove, is only about half the size of Aldhaven but possesses a stronger and better armed military. Centrally located within the alliance, Brunsgrove has taken it upon itself to be the primary strike force to repel any outside threats. Due to their great skill and efficiency at this, the military of the other city-states has become lax over the past few decades of peace.
Brunsgrove has one vassal city-state named Auberg, which serves primarily as a military training and staging ground for Brunsgrove.
The city of Sesbury has recently suffered a major catastrophe, which has obliterated a quarter of the city and leveled nearly half of what remains. No building has gone completely undamaged, though some have fared better than others. The general populace of Sesbury has fled, many becoming refugees in other cities of the alliance and their surrounding hamlets. It is believed that, without a miracle, Sesbury is likely to become completely abandoned within the next few years, and the leadership of that city is making plans for that eventuality.
Estermoor is the westernmost city and located on the edge of a large swamp which covers many hundreds of square miles. The city has grown due to being the first truly habitable location on the river on this side of the swamplands. The natives of Estermoor have come to serve as guides through the swamps, telling tales of hidden ruins and mysterious creatures who live within. Such tales are unfounded and serve primarily to separate visitors from their coin.
There are several dozen small villages and hamlets throughout the alliance which owe fealty to own city-state or another, though these are little more than small farming towns or base camps for logging or mining.
Surrounding Nations
The Empire of Seven Dragons to the north is watched with a wary eye by Aldhaven and its allies. While still distant, the Empire is known to be militant and expansionist, with several smaller independent kingdoms falling to military conquest in recent years. Fortunately, it seems to have its own internal problems at the moment as well as trying to wage a war with another enemy on its far distant northern border.
To the south are numerous tribes of nomadic peoples. While they have no large government, they are frequent traders with the merchant caravans that leave Aldhaven. They seem to never run out of valuable spices, furs, and other quality trade goods nor do they run short of gold and other precious metals. No one really knows where they acquire the goods they do, as no explorers into the region have ever managed to find anything worth noting. In fact, heading out without a proper guide usually leads to becoming lost and dying of exposure, or so the story goes.
To the east within the mountains lie two great nations: a nation of dwarves and a nation of gnomes, both with names nigh unpronounceable to the human tongue. The odd thing about the two nations is that they occupy the same area of land, with the dwarves living beneath the surface in their mountain halls and the gnomes living in the fertile valleys that crisscross the mountain range, the rivers of which feed the headwaters of the great river which flows through Aldhaven. While the dwarves are friends with Aldhaven and its allies and seek closer kinship with them, the gnomes are wary and cold towards any overtures of friendship. Due to the close relationship between the two, the dwarves do not progress any further in negotiations of alliance until the gnomes are in agreement. Due to the tenuous nature of the current arrangement, there are virtually no gnomes within Aldhaven.