City Map of Kalan-G'eld

City Districts

The city is divided into nine districts, many of which are further subdivided into wards.

Fane of Loth: This is where the academies of Melee-Maghtere, Sorcere and Arach Tinilith reside.

Colnbluth Quarter: As its name would imply, those residing here are strangers to Kalan-G’eld, which teems with run-down dwellings for both permanent and transitory visitors from the surface world.

The establishments found here reflect this in many ways: the use of light, far more prevalent here than in any other part of Kalan-G’eld; the presence of foreign temples, for no outside deities are permitted worship elsewhere in the drow realm (and even here they are treated as just another business catering to non-drow); and even the food and drink are made to better suit surface tastes, though more exotic fare is always available for a price. The Necromantica School is also found in that part of the city.

Few live here on a permanent basis, most rent out rooms on a temporary basis. Accordingly, it is the easiest location in the city for PCs to find rooms. While the traffic on the main thoroughfare to the Market is typically thronged, the back and side streets are relatively empty. Moreover, those who do reside here are typically engaged in their own mysterious errands and are likely to think nothing of suspicious activities. Female drow patrols are common here.

The Fuer'yon Quarter: Large numbers of non-drow soldiers, whether of goblinoid stock or members of the scaled-races, make this ward home.

Bugbears and troglodytes form the bulk of these fighters, whose status in Kalan-G’eld hovers somewhere between mercenary and slave. The most prominent of these mercenaries is a bugbear bounty-hunter named Pruuma Shebear; when not chasing escaped slaves, she serves as mistress of ceremonies at the arena, and she carries her heavy, spiked Morningstar of Office wherever she goes.

The Gaahr: Is the lair of the undead in Kalan-G’eld, ceded to them in honor of their service to the Queen of Spiders. The city’s vampiric denizens are most often found here, rather than in one of the more upscale areas; for even in Kalan-G’eld, a city devoted to addiction and depravity, the vampire and vampire spawn’s addiction to blood is considered declasse, little better than the ghouls’ craving for flesh. Necromancers dwell here too, where they can practice their craft without restriction. They produce an almost endless supply of zombies and skeletons for their own use, as well as animating some of the creations of the taxidermists of the artisan’s quarter. The ghouls who lair here are reasonably tame, following the leadership of their ghastly masters, for they have learned that they need only wait— eventually, all the inhabitants of the city become their meat.

Heights: Standing atop the Scar or the Wall, the Heights District has a commanding view of the rest of the city, which its residents look down on—both figuratively and literally.

Nearly all of Kalen-G’eld’s power players reside in the Heights.

The Bazaar: When most people think of Kalen-G’eld, they think in the Bazaar.

The Bazaar is divided in Wards: The Underwall Ward, The Scholars Ward, The Artisans Ward, The Performers Ward, and the Rift.

Underwall Ward: One of the larger residential district, these tenements are crowded and chaotic, with one slum seemingly built atop another. It is easy to get lost here, and any non-drow certainly will. The drow here are distinctly unfriendly to outsiders and will demand bribes to guide/let them pass (if powerful) or will gang up and threaten (if seemingly weak).

The Inns and pleasure houses are few and far between here. The Inns are quite expensive.

The Artisan Ward: The insular craftsmen of the drow make their homes and businesses in the Bazaar. Alchemists, jewelers, sculptors (of stone or flesh), scribes, painters, poisoners, tailors, taxidermists, and more all serve the needs of an eclectic group of customers.

As with their neighbors in the Scholars Ward, the artisans form cabals and guilds with ever-changing alliances, disputing the quality and worth of each other’s craftsmanship while tormenting their own apprentices with impossible tasks and cruel, demeaning criticism.

Much of the Ward is inaccessible to visitors, being a maze of private walled communities, within which are houses and workshops, as well as taverns, bordellos and gambling dens open only to the local residents. Small shops and storefronts ring these closed neighborhoods, guarded with traps, curses, and trained monsters (trained wolf-spiders are commonly found roaming the premises of local shops), as well as hired mercenaries (though the latter are hardly considered trustworthy). They also sometimes employ xvart menials as “runners” to fetch raw materials or other necessities from elsewhere in the city or Kalan-G’eld. Some of the artisans have made contracts with specific merchant clans, trading their finished goods for needed raw materials, while the rest sell their wares to both drow merchants and outsiders.

The Scholars Ward: Located next to the Foreigners District, the Ward of Scholars is the next most common destination of travellers from the surface. Indeed some of the savants and scholars found here are human, or once-human, and the language of almost any race can be heard somewhere within the Ward’s confines. Tutors in any of the arcane professions can be found here, divided into differing and rival philosophical schools, though all are devoted to evil. These folk spend much time in vicious debate and disagreement, creating conflicts in which truth is not the only casualty.

The Performers Ward: Drow players and performers live in the Performers Ward.

Musicians, jugglers, tumblers, dancers, actors, puppeteers, playwrites, poets, and singers—as well as the dreaded lurking mimes—all practice their arts in the theaters, halls, squares, streets, and even the alleys of their Ward. All save the mimes seek the attention of the largest crowds they can gather. The more lurid and gaudy the performance, the better they and their audience enjoy it. In spite of constantly changing fads, there is always a certain sameness to drow performances; however, since most drow performers are severe addicts to every vice, few of them live long enough to develop any real perspective. Most wish only for a glorious demise. To their audience, it is all the same, and they quickly find some other “star” to watch until it too falls.

The Rift: (Beggar’s Ward) This section of the city is given over to the Outcasts, the ultimate undesirables of Kalan-G’eld. Among their number are the beggars, tainted by disease; the half-breeds, tainted by mixed blood (either human, elven, or outsider); and the lost foreigners, who bear the taint of their own inferior races. One quality unites all who dwell here: poverty.

The drow dislike poverty, as they dislike sickness, weakness, and ugliness, but they still occasionally have uses for those so afflicted. Therefore, the outcasts are permitted to remain here, on the edge of dark elven society. Thieves abound here, though they practice their art throughout the rest of the city, as do the ubiquitous beggars.

Old Kalan-G’eld: As its name implies, Old Kalen-G’eld is old.

The Old Kalan-G’eld holds city’s slave and livestock pens. The slaves’ treatment (and resulting quality) varies widely by trader. Many of the best slaves and beasts are located in the southern sections of the district, or anywhere along the High Street. Traders offer undead and even demonic slaves along with natural creatures, though such unusual chattel usually comes from hags visiting the city from their refuge in the Lower Planes.

Demons and undead also come here to buy slaves or other livestock, as do derro, illithids, and the occasional surface dweller. The markets primarily serve noble drow, of course, who also enjoy the specialty brothels found in this district. The priesthood of Kiaransalee is predominant here, though always under the watchful eye of Lolth’s priestesses and their servants in the city patrols.

South Shore: The newest district, South Shore became a part of Kalen-G’eld only a quarter-century ago.

South Shore’s population consists mainly of the city’s nouveau riche hoping to escape the cramped conditions found elsewhere in the city.

The Mines: This is were the richness of Kalan-G’eld comes.

The drow also work a series of mines from which they draw the minerals needed to perform their complex metalworking. Iron, copper, silver, gold, and occasional finds of adamantite and mithril provide them with a steady supply of raw material.