Generic Townhouse A

This building is designed for a GM to use in any city or town. It may be used to represent any guild the GM wishes. The room descriptions are entirely arbitrary and may be changed as necessary. They are only offered as a guide to assist in GM development.

General Description

The guildsman's residence is a combination warehouse, workshop and home. A large house, built of fine stone, it is the sure sign of a successful man. There are no windows in the ground floor to deter thieves. The only two openings are the large double doors opening onto the street and the small backdoor opening onto the alley. Both doors are stoutly made and studded with iron nails. The doors are locked with heavy oak drawbars. A fine guild symbol hangs outside the front door. During the day, the front doors are left open with a senior journeyman to stand guard and greet the customers.

Ground Floor

1. The large warehouse is piled high with goods for sale or awaiting shipment. Large crates, barrels and sacks line the room. Smaller items are stored in the six chests along the walls. Either side of the room is covered by lofts (accessed by the ladder stored in the workshop [2]), but the central section is open to a pitched roof. Three windows provide light. The master lets his journeymen deal with average customers, but will only be too happy to serve obviously rich or important customers himself.

2. The workshop is a busy place. The master oversees all the work personally, ensuring that the journeymen and apprentices earn their keep. Several work benches line the room with the tools of the trade at ready hand. A brazier sits in the middle of the workshop, but the master rarely wastes valuable wood on journeymen and apprentices, reserving it instead for when he is working in the shop or has important guests who wish to see their purchases being made.

3. The main hall is a busy place. The master's wife supervises their two servants who prepare and serve the meals and clean the residence. The room also serves as the master's office when dealing with moderately important guests. During the evening, the servants sleep on straw ticks on the floor. A fire is kept burning in the fireplace to cook food and heat the room. When the master and his wife are not around, the men bring their work into the hall and sit around the fire to work.

Second Floor

4. The loft to the right of the main door is used by the master's two young apprentices. The loft is barren with only a single bunk bed for furniture. The two boys, Terba and Reris, have improvised; they use the trunks they store their clothes and meagre belongings in as chairs and an old crate as a table. For light, they have a stub of a candle on a broken piece of pottery and like to play dice in the rare evenings when they don't collapse into bed from exhaustion. The loft is also used by apprentices of visiting friends and business partners of their master.

5. The loft to the right of the door is mainly used for storage. Raw materials are kept here until needed.

6. The upper hall is reserved for the most important and wealthy customers. A fine desk dominates the room. Two large casks of fine wine are kept for the master's exclusive use. The wine often helps to break the ice and smooth difficult negotiations. A large window onto the alleyway lets in plenty of light and at night torches and a well-crafted bronze brazier provide good illumination. There is also plenty of room for guests. Mattresses can be brought from the warehouse to turn the upper hall into sleeping accommodations for the master's guests or their journeymen. The room is always comfortably warm.

7. This small windowless room is used by the master's two journeymen, Sterba and Balsha. Both journeymen are skilled workers. The room is simple, but clean and well kept. The beds are decent and each man has a chest for his private belongings. Sterba has a good quality but plain dagger in his chest. He wears it when travelling with his master, but day to day only carries an average quality eating knife. Two cudgels and a pair of staffs stand in the corner. The master insists his men train every holy day. He expects them to be able to defend themselves and his goods. The journeymen must surrender their room to important guests and sleep on the floor of the upper hall.

8. The solar is the finest room in the house. A luxurious tapestry of nymphs playing decorates the wall opposite a sturdy door with a heavy lock. A good quality carpet covers the floor and two comfortable leather chairs face a small inlayed wooden gaming table. The lady of the house spends her spare time here sewing and relaxing, when not supervising the servants. Thick curtains screen the sleeping area. The bed chamber has a stone fireplace and a four-poster bed. The walls have fine panelling and there are two heavy, iron-bound and locked chests against the back wall. The chests contain the guildsman's records, silver, promissory notes and valuable clothing. The room is richly decorated and a bit over done. Because it has no windows, the door is left open during the day while the master works at his desk. Servants are not allowed in the solar except under the supervision of the mistress of the house to do housecleaning. A stiff beating would be the least of the punishments for anyone who violated this rule. The mistress is hard, but fair, so punishments are not random, just severe.

Basement

9. The pantry is reached by a set of stairs from the main hall. Beer, lower quality wine and joints of smoked or salted meat are kept cool in the stone cellar. Even in the heat of summer, the room stays a comfortable temperature. In anticipation of dinner parties, a large supply of food is normally kept on hand. The additional rooms on this level may or may not exist at the discretion of the GM. Most likely, only the master himself (and perhaps his wife) knows about the rooms. The secret door is cleverly constructed to look like another piece of stone wall. It is thick and heavy enough that tapping will not reveal the hollow behind it. It is opened by pushing on a false block in the stone ceiling.

10. The small work desk is littered with pieces of parchment. The documents are written in an unknown language consisting of letters and symbols mixed together.

11. Once the house was complete, the master hired a mason and miner from a neighbouring town to construct these secret chambers beneath his house. He sent his wife on a trip with the servants in tow and his apprentices and journeymen on a long trip to deliver a shipment to an important client. Over two months, the mason built the secret door and the miner carved out the three chambers. Once they were finished, the guildsmen killed them in their sleep and carried the bodies down to the cellar.

12. A strange oval slab of black stone has been inlayed into the dirt of the floor. Facing it is a chiselled piece of stone, somewhat like a statue, but without an identifiable form. It is very cold to the touch and smooth like glass. The chest contains some sort of black robes, a grotesque mask and two daggers.