City Name: Hearth
Population: On average 2000-3000 beings
Location:Western side of the Deserts Mouth Mountians just north of the Shadows Gap.
Government: Co ruled by the dwarf Crypt and the whisper gnome Malla.
The city of Hearth was founded by Crypt a tatooed monk and Malla the assaian, as a place for all to come and study their basic trades. Crypt runs the cities guard force from his monastary while Malla runs the political structure from her tavern. They have adopted all is welcome in their town as long as they follow some very simple rules. Racial hatred is checked at the gates. Rogues that come here for training will not steal from the "Real merchants" (Malla oversees a small training hall). Spellcasters will limit their magical experiments to throughly spell guarded chambers in the Mages wing. No killing. Those found guilty of braking these rules/laws are exiled or in the most extreme cases sentenced to death.
The city itself if seen from the sky would remind you a dragons outline as seen in full flight. The tip of the tail is the entrance into the city at the base of the mountian. The tail itself houses the merchant district. The body hold the local homes, Inns, and Keeps. The left wing is the Martial training wing. The right wing holds the Mage Keeps. The kneck is just a long road snakes up to Dragons Keep. The head houses the Dragons Keep the Monastary. Malla keeps her training grounds hidden from the locals...it is actualy a large under ground complex located under the dragons body part of the city.
Some other noticeable key NPCS.
Alex: Human Level 28 Wizard. Magical advisor to the Lord and Lady.
Drens: Mind Flayer local card player of unknow class, was the subject of the alter alignment spell.
Elkantar, Zarra, Chali: Drow family that owns their own tavern.
I know this real basic but I generaly flesh out the town when vocaly describing it as I talk better than I type. Please let me know what you think.
Background On some of the main NPC's:
Crypt: Gold Dwarf from the Great Rift. As a child Crpyt spent most of child hood down in the family crypts. The dead intrigued him, he would spends days down there them reading the inscriptions and learning his family's past. He spent so much time down in the crypts that his family and what little friends he did have started to call him Crypt as a nickname. He was a very stoic child and spoke very little sometimes going days without uttering a word. After he reached the age of majority he took Crypt as his adult name. His father seeing that he had no skill with armor or axe he sent him to a monastary. There he learned the ways of unarmed combat. Crypt also learned to use longsword (which he only draws when he knows there is no other means to end the conflict than death.)
Crypt is agerage hight for gold dwarf, his beard reaches his belt and is warn loose with no braids. His head is clean shaven to show off some of his tattoos. When just out walking the town he wears simple linen pants and a pair of sandles. When it is time for him to go out adventureing he adds a pair of vampbraces and his longsword which worn across his back. He is ardorned with tattoos all across his chest, back, arms kneck, legs and the back and top of his head.
Homebrew:
The city of Esbresh was originally the town of San Tuar, which literally translates to 'Blessed Minotaur' in some obscure Mujhari dialect. It got that name when it was just a small fishing village, and was attacked by sahuagin raiders. A Minotaur chieftan happened to be in the village, trading on behalf of his hill tribe, and single-handedly drove off the dozen Sea Devils that thought the settlement 'easy pickings'. Unfortunately he lost his life in that battle, to a Sahuagin Shaman just before the remainder of the Fish-folk retreated.
The village erected a statue to it's hero, and named itself 'San Tuar' in his honor, and have always welcomed Minotaurs from the hill Country ever since (even to this day). It was renamed Esbresh after a Dambrath invasion took most of the Golden waters region, and the Dambrathi used it as a base for many of their inland conquests, even assigning one of the King's younger sons as Governor of the growing settlement.
When the Dambrath finally picked a fight they couldn't win - the Drow that took THEM over instead - most of the armies were recalled home to fight the (losing) war. Unbeknowst to most people today, the Governor and some of his key men stayed on., seeing the eventual outcome in their homeland.
Today Esbresh is a Pirate port O' call, and traffics in much illicit trade, including slaves - technically banned in Ulgarth, but the Ulgarthi King looks the other way in regards to Esbresh - something that has raised many questions over the years (Esbresh acts for Ulgarth as Skullport does for Waterdeep - it keeps all the 'bad seeds' in one place, away from the 'goodly folk'). Technically city governors in Ulgarth are appointed by the king, but Esbresh's Governorship has become hereditary, and the King's blessing is merely a formality.
It is also a well-kept secret that the Governor is a direct decendent of the human King of Dambrath - something that few outside of Esbresh know (except, of course, the king of Ulgarth). There is small but growing group of 'Freedom Fighters' who want the governor to lead them against the Drow and re-take their homeland... but he is not stupid (and he certainly doesn't want the Drow to know of his heritage, nor does the Ulgarth King, who doesn't want Drow armies showing up on his doorstep).
DMs Notes: The statue of the Minotaur has been moved around a lot over the years, but has always had a place of honor within the city, even during the Dambrathi occupation. Today it sits in the central square opposite the gates to the palace, on a raised dais and surrounding by beautiful fountains (designed by an Elven artist and built by Dwarves). What no one seems to remember - because it was never recorded anywhere - is that the statue IS the minotaur! The Shaman had turned him to stone, giving the last of the Sahuagin time to escape the rallied townsfolk.
I use the maps and all the NPCs that came with the RPG adaption of the Thieves World books that I bought years ago, and merely replace Kadakithis (the Imperial Governor) with my Dambrathi one.
Projecting forward into 4e, and the fact that the humans finally DID oust the Drow, one might surmise that one of the current governor's decendents grew a pair and lead the revolt of his people.
Special thanks to Dark Wizard and BadCatMan for helping with much of this during the Utter East project.
As for the RPG Material, the original stuff is what I use, which you can view HERE.
I couple of years ago someone did a D20 version , which I bought, and I was disappointed by it. They had changed EVERYTHING from the original plot and stories, and advanced the timeline some 40-50 years (once again, sound familiar?).
Try to find the original novels (not any newer ones that they are supposedly doing), and the original RPG stuff as well - it will be well-worth the effort. That city was designed to be a DMs paradise, full of plothooks and interesting characters. You can run an entire campaign with just that city, without the PCs ever leaving.