Fortresshead

From the outside, Fortresshead looks like if Bastille was designed by Soviet brutalists, and then had several modernist office spaces annexed on top of it haphazardly. It's massive blocks of concrete, washed greys and blacks, exhausts spilling so much smoke the streets are constantly flooded by fog and dimly lit. It's foreboding, opressive and smells of sulfur and smog.

On the inside, Fortresshead is like the beating heart of the City. It's brass pipes carrying letters and packages at high speeds, for maximum efficiency. It's footsteps echoing on massive, cold spaces.

Fortresshead is where the lawmen, detectives, bounty hunters, lawyers, judges and clerks mingle and employ their trades. Part prison-complex, part administrative building, part court of law. It's a maddening maze of bureaucracy and corruption, filled with forms to fill, procedures to follow and half-forgotten draconian laws kept in dusty records.

Public servants walk the streets with step-ladders straddled to their backs, endlessly polishing reflective mirror panels on top of poles that turn every corner of the street into a communal panopticon of mutually-assured paranoia. Machinistocrats clad in fine furs have retinues of duster-boys fan away the grime on their clothing as they walk the streets. Powder-keg revolutionaries concoct flaming manifesti of experimental politics in under dim streetlights and blue-collar workers clock in an average of 7.4 times a day to keep the well-oiled machine running.

People to Meet

The Man from Fortresshead, a short, balding bespectacled middle-aged shadow-of-a-person wearing a dark overcoat can provide you with a Lamplighter's License, for a price. License-holders can employ themselves in the trade of the private eye and the bounty-hunter - a lucrative, if demanding, line of work.

Fortresshead can't stave off the darkness that grows on this City alone. We need people like you to keep the lights on.

The Rat Lady holds court in the ventilation tunnels and forgotten annexes of the district, those that no longer exist in any official blueprints. Scrawny hair, uneven teeth, layers of clothing, tap-tap-tapping her fingers all the time. She knows her way around the place like nobody else, but finding her is a challenge by itself.

One for me and one for you: "give and take" is what they call it. Care to share a little secret?

The Last Honest Lawman is trying to crack a case, but can't get a search warrant from his higher-ups. Short and tidy hair, shaves everyday, smells very fresh. Help him out, would you kindly?

Get out of here while you still can. Nothing good ever comes out of Fortresshead.

Things to Do

There's a nice list of bounties at the reception for up and coming Lamplighters such as yourself. You have a license, right?

D4xD6	1	2	3	4
1	The Harlequinn Real identity unkown. Wanted for dissident behavior, miming withouth a license, public readings of banned works of art and arson. Reward: $320$	John W. "Whiskers" Byers Wanted for rat breeding without a license, organizing illegal "rat fights" and smuggling live rodents. Reward: $350$	Pietr "Knife Fingers" Perri Wanted for aggravated assault, illegal possession of bladed weaponry, drug trafficking, acts of terror and public exposure (of scars). Reward: $335$	Jimmy "Worm Jim" Jingles Wanted for littering, tresspassing, vandalism, inciting anarchy and illegal possession of trained worms. Reward: $275$
2	P. Quill Real Name Unknown Wanted for distribution of degenerate poetry, unauthorized use of metaphors and manufacture of disrespectful caricature. Reward: $600$	Barry "Smokestack" Bronk Wanted for illegally unionizing, sabotage of public property and hoarding public breathable air. Reward: $180$	Betty "Gearbox" Schutz Wanted for arms trafficking, unlawful possession of smoke-coloring chemicals and breach of contract Reward: $175$	The Phantom Paperclip Pilferer Real Identity Unknown Belived to be the criminal mastermind behind multiple heists on paperclip deposits, directly leading to a historical, City-wide paperclip shortage. Public enemy of the highest caliber. Reward: $1500$
3	Leston C. Burnham Formerly employed at the Office of Landscaping Affairs, wanted for his psychotic-induced episode of unsanctioned productivity that resulted in him working for 19 consecutive hours - inflicting unplanned leisure on fellow civil servants - before jumping off the window and escaping custody. Reward $500$	William "The Godscribe, Heed His Name!" Walther Wanted for unauthorized grafitti of unknown procedence in several locations around Fortresshead. Onlookers report "persistent headaches, strange dreams and back pain" after direct contact with Mr. Walther's vandalism Reward: $110$	Selena "The Spider" Silva Wanted for busking melancholic songs responsible for decreasing morale of passersby and collection of donations without a license. Reward: $200$	Monk Hill Self-proclaimed "self-help" specialist, believed to be behind motivational pamphlets loaded with unconstitutional advice. Reward: $250$
4	John D. Deceased Wanted for haunting private property, tax evasion. Reward: $310$	Elmira "Cards" Clement Wanted for divination without a license, inauspicious omens, copyright infringement and possession of instruments of randomness (dice). Reward: $380$	The Penny Pincher Real Identity Unknown Alias of a known counterfeiter of legal tender and dealer of discontinued currency. Responsible for uncountable unaccounted coins at the end of every fiscal week. $510$	Frank "The Trash Man" Durden Wanted for organizing illegal "fight rings", possession of explicit costumes, littering and excessive bravado. Reward: $410$

#Adventure Calendar Jam 2023 #NPC #Needle-Heart and the Wyldlands #district #random tables #urbancrawl

1