D&D 5E Which Urban Setting for D&D 5e?

[plancktum]

Hi,

I wanna start a urban "campaign" after my Players finish Lost Mine of Phandelver.

Now I'm searching for an urban setting where I can put my ideas into. It is important to me that this is not a full fleshed out campaign, but instead a setting with many plot hooks, a good description of NPCs, Locations, etc. of the city and it should be easy to use/convert within D&D 5th edition.
I want to write my own adventures, but I need a lot of ideas. Therefore the idea with such a fleshed out setting book.

My first thought was the new Freeport Book for Pathfinder. Do you recommend this?
Are there are other nice Settings one can use?
I think it should not be to "crazy", i.e. no city ruled by undead or so.

My players really liked Sandpoint from the Rise of the Runelords campaign.
So I thought the Pirate-Theme (as long as it is not too extreme) paired with Fantasy could be the right thing for them.

So, I'm curious for you input Thanks to all wo can help me.

best regards

 

[Schmoe]

If you can find it, you should consider Ptolus, the only urban setting you'll ever need.

 

[Eric V]

I was going to suggest the Greyhawk boxed set. Tons of possibilities for urban adventures.

What makes Ptolus good, [MENTION=913]Schmoe[/MENTION]?

 

[JTorres]

Recently, I have been using a book called Parsantium to set my 5E game in. Parsantium is a sprawling city that does a great job of meshing a traditional medieval fantasy setting with Greco-Roman, Indian, and Middle-Eastern influences. The city itself is chiefly based on historical Byzantium and is designed to be dropped into the middle of any campaign world. I was drawn to the fact that the setting itself, though intentioned for Pathfinder, deliberately presents little crunch to have to convert. Instead, it gives a broad overview of the many neighborhoods, power groups, noble families, and criminal factions, etc found in the city. The author gives good detail on each of these descriptions (with adventure hooks suggested) but not so much that I have no room to make the city my own. And the same thing goes for NPCs; every neighborhood or faction has some NPCs described with an adventure idea or two sprinkled in. The author maintains a blog with updates on Parsantium and he even offers free 5th edition conversions of a few key races to the setting. Lastly, when I purchased this book off of Drive Thru RPG, I got a high-resolution JPEG of the gorgeous, full-color map city map that was perfect for blowing up to poster size. If you are interested, here's the link to the author's Parsantium website:

https://parsantium.wordpress.com/

 

[Gecko85]

The City of Greyhawk and Lankhmar are both good and can be found on eBay.

 

[Thyrwyn]

I was going to say Lankhmar, too. Sharn, from Eberron makes an excellent setting for a city based campaign.

 

[Schmoe]

I was going to suggest the Greyhawk boxed set. Tons of possibilities for urban adventures.

What makes Ptolus good, [MENTION=913]Schmoe[/MENTION]?

Ptolus is, quite simply, the most amazing and complete fantasy city reference book I have ever seen. The production quality is gorgeous, the ease of use is impressive, and the descriptions of the city are immersive. It truly is a complete city-in-a-book, with more potential storylines and plot-hooks than you can shake a stick at. The cost when I purchased it was $100, and I can honestly say I believe it was worth every penny.

 

[Riley]

Ptolus is loaded with adventure hooks, and a fair bit of material on locations and NPC's to support those hooks. And dungeon locales in the city. My players have never been very interested in city adventuring, but that would be the one I would choose.

You could just throw a few encounters at your party, see which ones catch their interest, and go with that theme. There will be plenty to work with, whatever they choose. It's that big. And interesting.

 

[exile]

Early Freeport products were well received. I own, but have not used any of them. It seems like Freeport has a pirate meets fantasy meets mythos horror vibe.

I own and have played in Ptolus. Great book.

I am a sicker for Water deep and it's close association with Undermountain.

I also love Sigil, but the planar vibe may be too much for you.

 

[Queer Venger]

Hi,

I wanna start a urban "campaign" after my Players finish Lost Mine of Phandelver.

Now I'm searching for an urban setting where I can put my ideas into. It is important to me that this is not a full fleshed out campaign, but instead a setting with many plot hooks, a good description of NPCs, Locations, etc. of the city and it should be easy to use/convert within D&D 5th edition.
I want to write my own adventures, but I need a lot of ideas. Therefore the idea with such a fleshed out setting book.

My first thought was the new Freeport Book for Pathfinder. Do you recommend this?
Are there are other nice Settings one can use?
I think it should not be to "crazy", i.e. no city ruled by undead or so.

My players really liked Sandpoint from the Rise of the Runelords campaign.
So I thought the Pirate-Theme (as long as it is not too extreme) paired with Fantasy could be the right thing for them.

So, I'm curious for you input Thanks to all wo can help me.

best regards

Im using the Baldur's Gate campaign setting from 'Murder in Baldur's Gate'. Its fairly generic and Im using it as a sand-box setting to run my new D&D 5 group. We just wrapped up Lost Mine of Phandelver (excellent module, btw) and they wanted a more urban/skullduggery/lankmar style campaign. The maps in the module and the DM screen is pretty amazing, the handout maps are also cool for players to navigate the city. Im adapting it to 1373 DR and not referencing any of the 4e FR campaign events.

It only cost me $17 on amazon. While the Freeport book is pretty amazing, its also $75.