Capital:
The Wild Coast consists of 5
independent city-states and their surrounding lands: Safeton, Narwell,
Fax, Badwall, Eldredd
Ruler: Each city-state has its
own ruler and system of government.
Racial make-up: Major strains: Suloise; minor
strains: Oeridian, Flanaess; other: demi-humans (various), humanoids
Major resources: None outstanding
You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
The western shores of the Sea of Gearnat have long been called the Wild Coast, for the region has been a haven for malcontents, dissidents, demi-humans, humanoids, outlaws, and the outcasts of other states. It is a fair but not particularly fertile area — rolling countryside interspersed with woodlands, fens, and scattered clusters of dwellings. Parts of the Gnarley Forest , all of the Welkwood east of the Jewel River, and Suss Forest are considered as being in this region. The Wild Coast remains a free territory comprised of petty nobles, robber barons, guildheld towns, fishing and forest villages, freebooters, mercenaries, criminals, bandits, freaks, and displaced persons of all sorts. This is due to the remote and isolated position it holds, its lack of resources, and the fact that it has never been a desirable position strategically.
Portions of the area have been under the control of Celene, the Prince of Ulek, the Gynarch of Hardby, and the Free City of Greyhawk at various times. The inhabitants, being of a mind otherwise, have always managed to regain their freedom. They seem to be experts at rebellion, but quite incapable of nationhood.
There is no question that the Wild Coast is known throughout the Flanaess as a place of sanctuary for the hunted, albeit a highly dangerous one. Its racially mixed peoples are well known as mercenaries and adventurers themselves. Interestingly, the area gives rise to many outstanding people who were raised or fostered in the cutthroat atmosphere. Legendary natives of the Wild Coast include such persons as Mordenkainen, Robilar, and Tenser, to name but a few.
Tales relate that somewhere within the Suss there exists a lost city of the Old Suloise — from which the Jewel River gained its name. It has never been found, and the legend is highly doubtful. Since the Pomarj has been in the control of rapacious humanoids, the southern portions of the Wild Coast have been less than wholesome in any event, and expeditions into the Suss Forest have not been attempted of late for obvious reasons.
Population: 16,000
The Wolf Nomad Uroch founded the city over a century ago after becoming enamored with civilization. Uroch was a mercenary leader, and an expert at the trade of war. He learned much from civilization, and used this knowledge to build a fort on the original site of what is now the city of Elredd as a base of operations for his warriors, and a place to store booty, slaves, and plunder. As his fame spread and more mercenaries flocked to his banner, the fort became the town of Alrad, later Elredd, and eventually grew to become a thriving city, on the coast of Woolly Bay.
The area of Woolly Bay itself became a village as trade increased, due to the wealth and success of the mercenary companies. The village was soon incorporated into the larger city and became known as the Port of Elredd. Throughout its existence, Elredd has been a military city and continues to cater to mercenaries.
Even the path of ascension to rule is barbaric and bloody. Descendents of Uroch's blood are expected to slay the ruler of Elredd if they wish to govern it, and possess all of its treasures.
Elredd is now ruled by a capricious and obese baron who came to power, as did many of his predecessors, by murdering the person who stood in his way. In this case, it was his uncle. However, the current Baron Crenallen Oken Uroch has gone one step further. Over the past 15 years of his violent tyranny, he has murdered all possible male challengers to his leadership.
Baron Oken protects his precarious position with an iron fist, as he is not well-liked even by the mercenary companies who helped to put him in power. A stray word spoken ill of him may end your life, as Baron Oken has sought sorcery to help him spy on his many enemies (both real and imagined).
Fortunately, due to Baron Oken's many hedonistic passions, he has not had the time to ruin the city completely.
Population: 12,000
Badwall was founded on the ruins of a sacked Flan settlement. Originally, it served as a hideout for bandits, cutthroats and thieves. However, as success grew and powerful leaders organized the ragtag bandits, a small city of outcasts, ruffians, and slaves grew. The early days of Badwall are steeped in legend and horror. There are tales of piracy, rapine, plunder, defilement, and murder so lascivious that it would make an executioner blush. What it has evolved into is not much better, but the organized criminal groups that have emerged, keep a semblance of order.
Badwall is now essentially controlled by five organized gangs that have split the city into territories. There is an uneasy truce that exists between the five groups, which allows the dark pleasures that pass for commerce in this city to commence. But the city always has the feel of a tindertwig ready to ignite. Each faction in the city not only controls a different territory, but a different economic aspect of the city too. Twice a year, the gang leaders all meet in the Tavern of the Black Blade to negotiate, haggle, and bring up grievances. Most of the time these are settled diplomatically. Sometimes, an all-out street war follows.
Current gangs in control of Badwall: Blood Axes, Redswords, Ladies of Venom, The Butchers, Triads
Population: 15,000
Fax is a broiling, boiling, oozing sore on the face of Flanaess. It is a pirates' den, for slavers, raiders, and smugglers. Hundreds of taverns and brothels cram the ill-conceived, ramshackle streets and alleys. There is no law or order to speak of. There is an old pirate by the name of Captain Skulljack who is the official leader of the town, but as he is fond of saying with a jack of rum in his fist, "…wear a sword, cuz anything goes."
Fax has a deepwater harbor that caters to dregs and pirates of any kind, from all over the Flanaess. The bay is actually a great place for merchants of strong stomach and stout heart to unload their goods, legal or illegal, because Captain Skulljack has no organized system of taxation. Whenever he deems the city needs something, he takes up a collection from ruffians and pirates, or goes off raiding coastal towns.
Population: 5000
Narwell is an isolated city on the borders of the Gnarley Forest. The city was founded by a mercenary group known as Hammerfist, but has since come to be controlled by the Lumber Guild. Since then, the guild has organized the city into an efficient and productive trading town. They supply and build ships for the pirates of Fax, produce paper for wizards, students, clerics, and rebels. They craft shields, arrows, and weapon hafts for the region and the humanoids of the Pomarj, and even brew a popular yellow-tinged liquor known as "Honeywell."
Narwell is now made up of rough and tumble, hardworking frontiers men and women, scouts, bandits, wandering rangers, half-breed outcasts, mercenaries, and wandering adventurers.
The town is well protected by wooden palisades, towers, and anti-siege works. They have a standing army of 500 Hammerfist mercenaries that are well-paid to preserve order and run the defenses of Narwell.
Population: 10,000
About half a century after the Suel Imperium was burned to ash by the Rain of Colorless Fire, a band of Suloise wanderers settled atop a low ridge overlooking an inlet of Woolly Bay. Exiles and vagabonds all their lives, they were determined to claim a new home for themselves and in some small way live up to the dimly remembered glories of their grandsires. Quarrying the abundant local stone, the Suel fortified the settlement against the unnumbered bands of marauders that roamed the lands. The settlers were fierce in the defense of their new home and after several attempts to storm the high stone walls came to bloody grief, the place came to be known as Safe Town (later shortened to Safeton).
From the very beginning, many doubted how well the name suited the place. Certainly, the loose alliance of families that came to form the town's nobility ensured that it remained safe from attack from without. However, the haphazard attitude of the Old Families (as the nobles are called) to lawmaking meant that walking the streets of Safeton could be anything but safe. Might made right and the Old Families had might to spare. So, along with fishing, quarrying and trade, brigandage and, later, piracy filled Safeton's coffers. Like their forefathers, the Suel of Safeton used slaves to work their quarries and their fields.
Down the long centuries, though two-bit strongmen and petty despots have risen and fallen, no tyrant has established himself long in Safeton. A decree by the founders of the city forbidding dynastic succession is regarded as sacred and would-be dynasts have time and again found their ambitions (and their line of succession) cut short by an assassin's blade.
The last of Safeton's strongmen met a slightly different end, however. Styling himself the Szek of Safeton, his small private army of brigands terrorized the northern Wild Coast in the middle years of the current century. The szek's fatal error was to kidnap a gynarch of Hardby and then murder her when her family refused to pay ransom. Retribution was swift and bloody. Two of the dead gynarch's grandchildren – Deirdre and Oscar Longland – rode into Safeton alone and rode out with the szek's head, which they mounted on a pike over the gates of Hardby.
Safeton, now leaderless, is on the brink of a war of nobles within the city. It is a dispute that a contest of Yaletok* will be able to settle.
*Yaletok. The Old Families of Safeton resolve their not infrequent disputes using a tradition that dates back to the apogee of the Suel Imperium. When the noble houses of the Imperium fell out, their grievances were often settled through Yaletok – 'noble's truth' – a game that tests the intellect and endurance of the players. Played using a pair of magical spheres inscribed with complex runes and geometric shapes, each player must use his fingers to activate sequences of runes to best his opponent. With every lost play, poisoned needles snick forth from the sphere to prick the fingers of the loser, slowly sapping his strength, till at last they yield the game or are rendered senseless by the venom. Either circumstance settles the dispute in favor of the victor. The game is played to this day among the Old Families and Safeton is home one of the few sets of Yaletok spheres in the Flanaess that predate the Rain of Colorless Fire.