D&D General A Question about Waterdeep - Where does the Drinking Water come from?

[doctorbadwolf]

I’m guessing in the Realms, the magic that pervades the Underdark known as faerzress has something to do with keeping the seawater out.

That said, during the Spellplague, the Sea of Fallen Stars did partially drain into the Underdark. It then refilled during the super rainy part of the Second Sundering.

Man I hate the Second Sundering so much.

 

[Parmandur]

Man I hate the Second Sundering so much.

I hate both the Spellplague and the Sundering. That's why I still use the 3E FRCS mixed with 5E material.

 

[Azzy]

I hate both the Spellplague and the Sundering. That's why I still use the 3E FRCS mixed with 5E material.

Heck, I hate the Time of Troubles—which soured me on the setting.

 

[LordBP]

As for the climate of Waterdeep, I always figured it was drier than Seattle/Portland due to not having the Cascade Mountain range to keep the rainfall close to the city.

The one thing with the wells is that unless they are spread throughout the city, there would be a lot of walking to get water for the day. I would think they would have them spread throughout the city, so it's not a long trip for anyone to get to a water source (Rome is a good city to look at for this as there are public fountains all over the place).

The bigger issue for me is the transport of all the food that would be needed to support the population of Waterdeep (going by 1e as that is what I have, 122,000 people year round and up to 610,000 during the peak trading season, so I averaged it out to 366,000 for the year). You would need to transport 183 tons of wheat each day (this gives about 1500 calories per person per day which is about what the average Medieval person ate for grain) to just feed the people. The only way to do this at scale would be to use river barges (which don't look like modern barges at all) to bring the grain downriver during the two months of harvest (assuming you would get a spring and fall harvest of wheat). Even with barges there would be hundreds required to bring that much grain downriver during the harvest time.

 

[pukunui]

As for the climate of Waterdeep, I always figured it was drier than Seattle/Portland due to not having the Cascade Mountain range to keep the rainfall close to the city.

There are the Sword Mountains to the north, plus Mt Waterdeep itself. But regardless, according to Ed, it rains a lot (with snow in winter).

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I hate both the Spellplague and the Sundering. That's why I still use the 3E FRCS mixed with 5E material.

Heck, I hate the Time of Troubles—which soured me on the setting.

Both very fair.

The “sundering” makes me mad because it just…isn’t honest. It’s a retcon that desperately insists it isn’t.

That, and Tymanther is cool, Genasi had several cool places in the setting, earthmotes were cool, Myth Drannor being a place you could live was cool.

My FR campaign revolves around Shadovar Netheril as an antagonistic force, and they didn’t just yeet them, They balefired them out of existence so hard you can’t find a Netherese refugee anywhere in Faerun, somehow. No, they all just…stopped being Netherese, and the non-floating cities sank back into the sand, and the phaerim came back (not as something to fight, just as a retcon tool) to turn it back into desert again, and the continent in 1495 or whatever is just…magically completely unaffected by the last 130 years of history. Overnight.

Absolute garbage. Even if I hated the 4e realms, I’d have a hard time looking at all that and thinking FR in 5e is anything but a sad joke.

 

[Hussar]

I have something of an advantage here. I didn’t get into the realms at all until I ran Dragonheist a few years ago- so all this sundering stuff entirely passed me by.

 

[LordBP]

There are the Sword Mountains to the north, plus Mt Waterdeep itself. But regardless, according to Ed, it rains a lot (with snow in winter).

From every map I've looked at, the Sword Mountains would be in the wrong position to increase Waterdeep's rainfall amount as it would need to be East of Waterdeep to have the same effect as the Cascades do.

If I remember correctly from the 2e City of Splendors box set, Mt Waterdeep is only like 1200-1300 ft, so it wouldn't have much effect on the rainfall (if it was taller, it might actually lessen the amount of rain to Waterdeep as the city would be in the rain shadow of the mountain).

 

[Parmandur]

Both very fair.

The “sundering” makes me mad because it just…isn’t honest. It’s a retcon that desperately insists it isn’t.

That, and Tymanther is cool, Genasi had several cool places in the setting, earthmotes were cool, Myth Drannor being a place you could live was cool.

My FR campaign revolves around Shadovar Netheril as an antagonistic force, and they didn’t just yeet them, They balefired them out of existence so hard you can’t find a Netherese refugee anywhere in Faerun, somehow. No, they all just…stopped being Netherese, and the non-floating cities sank back into the sand, and the phaerim came back (not as something to fight, just as a retcon tool) to turn it back into desert again, and the continent in 1495 or whatever is just…magically completely unaffected by the last 130 years of history. Overnight.

Absolute garbage. Even if I hated the 4e realms, I’d have a hard time looking at all that and thinking FR in 5e is anything but a sad joke.

I think the Setting would be stronger with a hard reboot to the Grey Box time period, free of all metaplot. Which I wouldn't even be surprised to see happen in the Obelisk Adventure.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I think the Setting would be stronger with a hard reboot to the Grey Box time period, free of all metaplot. Which I wouldn't even be surprised to see happen in the Obelisk Adventure.

Nah 0% chance, IMO.

Highish chance of a reboot to an earlier year, but rewriting problematic elements and bringing Ed onboard to help do it so fewer grognards cry about it, though. It would be more 5e Ravenloft than Grey Box Redux.