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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dawn Herald" data-source="post: 4000903" data-attributes="member: 58763">Another parchment toughen is tacked onto the corkboard, written in common with a scholarly penmanship. It is unfortunate that we cannot meet stranger, for I rather keep my identity unknown to protect myself against the predators and shapeshifters that roam these lands. But, I encourage you and everyone else that seeks to investigate these things to look not far afield. For the greatest enemy will hide in the last place you ever look. There are dark events happening around you, conducted in the shadows. All you need is to illuminate these things and bring attention to it. For there is no avoiding war, it can only be postponed to the advantage of your enemy. The shade of my past is long gone, along with that old war. <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Few dispute that trade is the life’s blood of the Free City of Greyhawk. Certainly, the free city’s Directing Oligarchs have no illusions as to whence their wealth and power derive. Thus, when the Greyhawk Wars brought fire and ruin to their borders over a decade ago, the Oligarchs moved decisively. At their direction, a string of keeps was built to secure the routes along which Greyhawk’s trade flowed. One of the most important of these is Ford Keep, some ten leagues south of Greyhawk City along the Selintan River. Ford Keep guards Wainford, the point where the Western Road from Dyvers crosses the Selintan and joins the River Road. Thus, Ford Keep commands one of only three fords along the Selintan, the river itself (Greyhawk’s main artery of trade) and the junction of two main roads, one leading to Greyhawk’s main rival, Dyvers, the other to Hardby and the northern Wild Coast. The keep’s strategic importance was not lost on the dwarven engineers who built it in 585 CY. The square donjon tower is constructed from Cairn Hills granite and is surrounded by a square of 20 feet high curtain walls topped with parapets and crenulations and bolstered by four corner towers and a gatehouse. The walls are in turn encompassed by a moat fed by the waters of the nearby Selintan. A drawbridge provides access to the gatehouse, where two pairs of ironbound bronzewood gates, three iron portcullises, and a plethora of arrow loops and murder holes ward the enclosed passage into the bailey. Besides the donjon tower, the bailey holds a barracks for the garrison, stables for the keep’s cavalry troop and a smithy. A well and an extensive food store in the basement of the tower ensure that the garrison can withstand a lengthy siege without fear of hunger or thirst. I spoke with the keep's sergeant at arms about local threats when I informed her of my travelogue. In short she described to me that bandits are a perennial threat to trade along river and road and was able to describe some of the bandit bands that plagued the region. One such group is a band of highway men known as Apathy. These highwaymen often lay in wait on the main roads radiating from Greyhawk City. They usually chose lonely areas of woodland when they made their strikes of stand and deliver. The sergeant at arms also informed me that the penalty for robbery with violence was hanging, and most notorious highwaymen ended on the gallows. A fate that she looks forward to with the leader of Apathy. When I attempted to inquire her about the supernatural threats to the region, especially the planar nature of the inn across from the main gates of the keep, I found my interview cut short. Ford Keep and the neighboring hamlet of Wainford contains a host of stories that could easily fill a book on its own. From three years ago, when a burnt down smithy was discovered with the bodies of a dozen wolves during the time of lycanthropy scares. To dopplegangers from another world trying to replace their counterparts in this world.</li> </ul>_____________________________ooc note: this article heavily borrows from the living greyhawk write up of Ford keep which can be found on this site: <a href="http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=lg/lgmp/20070626a" target="_blank">mysterious places</a>  and be used for your personal home campaigns. Also information on the hamlet of Wainford is located in this article.</blockquote>

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