-The name and "feel" of the city were inspired by China Miéville's New Crobuzon. Also Gotham City. It's a very dark and sinister place.
-It sits on the east coast of the continent. It's a port city. There's a river flowing through the middle.
-To the north is a long road that leads to Axthordun, a dwarven kingdom and then to the Frostfell. The road west leads over the Muscogee Mountains and eventually arrives at Suldar, City of Winds. The vast and primeval Wodian Forest lies just north of the city and east of the dwarf-road.
-Krogdon is called the "City of Smoke" because of its large factories that constantly belch smoke into the air, leaving the city forever dark. I don't know what these factories produce or who they trade with. The campaign setting for the most part is not industrial. Last night, I thought the smoke might have something to do with Ehkahk the Smoldering Lord (from The Plane Below).
-Though the city is mostly populated and controlled by humans, many of the largest factories employ and/or are owned by warforged, dwarves and duergar. The duergar in particular see endless toil in the factories as an excellent way to honor their god Laduguer.
-The city is about 1,000 years old. It was once part of the Yzillian empire, a human empire that spanned the entire continent and which fell about 900 years ago. The Yzillian empire was destroyed from within by a great civil war. Warforged were created during this war, but they originated in a different city, not Krogdon. Yzillian archwizards were very interested in the Elemental Chaos, and most wizards had a particular element they were interested in. Ancient sealed vaults can still be found throughout the world that contain the remnants of Yzillian wizards' elemental and extraplanar studies. Most Yzillian wizards had a purely academic interest in these things, but of course a few were evil.
What I need to know:
-Why does Krogon have factories? What is made there? And where does it all go?
-What opportunities are there for conspiracies, corruption, crime, and other things that go well in a "dark" city? Despite creating the city I'm not very good at thinking about "dark" things!
-What else does the city need??
-Why does Krogon have factories? What is made there? And where does it all go?
Not being too familiar with your game world, this is the hardest one for me, but I'll give it a go. The way you describe it, they could make several things. Most obvious would be components for metal ships (which could be a unique feature of the Krogon shipping industry) and weapons. The ships would be for trade and war, since it is a costal city. They could also make materials to be used in manufacturing of buildings and vehicles, which could be made onsite or shipped off to the dwarves/other races.
-What opportunities are there for conspiracies, corruption, crime, and other things that go well in a "dark" city? Despite creating the city I'm not very good at thinking about "dark" things!
The possibilites for this are endless. How does the city's government work? Is it a king, president, mayor or what? Depending on this, you could have assassination plots, rival political parties, worker revolts, etc. A solid plot no mater what the governing structure would be to have the city owned by a criminal organization like the mob, and have a rival group trying to take over. This could lead to many subversive actions on both parts, political and sabotage. It could even escalate to open war in the streets if it got bad enough. Have PCs able to affect the outcome of this power struggle and you have yourself a story that changes dynamically based on PC actions, and one that they fully decide the outcome of, instead of having a generally predetermind outcome (fight this big enemy, fulfull this prophetcy, etc.) and one that could go on for awhile (maybe whoever wins/loses wants revenge, or to try and expand to the next city?)
-What else does the city need??
It doesn't sound like it needs much IMO. It's a fairly good concept, and developing any further detail might lead to a point where you need to change something in order for the plot to work. Keep it a little vague and you have wiggle room. Maybe describe the archetectural styles a little more, and give it some unique feature that would affect everyday life, like the smoke overhead making even day a low-light senario (for places below the smoke) with some towers rising above it into the real sunlight?
Hope this helps!
In a Points of Light setting, who does a big city like Krogdon trade with? Krogdon is the largest city in its part of the world. To get to other cities of comparable size, you have to cross mountains or oceans or go around them somehow. Points of Light means that there are lots of small settlements, no one has too many resources, and getting anywhere is dangerous. Where are those ships going?
HSHM, Krogdon is ruled by Lord Mayor Guy Letty. He is a fairly competent politician and he is not terribly corrupt, but neither is he a white knight. I decided I didn't want a bumbling puppet ruler or an evil tyrant as mayor of Krogdon because both of those are so typical and overdone. Letty is primarily interested in expanding the power and wealth of Krogdon, to leave his mark on history. His chief rival (at least in the big picture) is the Lord of Suldar, but the two cities are so geographically distant that they have not come into direct conflict yet.
Sadly I don't really understand politics or economics really well, so I don't know how I would tell a story about politicial parties or worker revolts.
I do like the idea of one large spire that reaches above the smog cloud. Perhaps it is used as a dock for an airship or even a spelljamming ship.
Another question. If the mob owns the city, who do they steal from? Themselves?
Not Mob, but mobs.
Gangs of New York style. Warriors (come out and play) style.
The Lord Mayor has to juggle the gangs, the Nobles, and the Guilds.
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Hum? Two huge cities in an otherwise empty world.
You need the threat of exportation/forceful colonization.
There could be plenty of material to mine from the ancient cities. So the would be penal colonies near them and those could be sources of friction between the great cities.
Smoke city sounds like a great name for the place. Maybe it manufactures a high quality steel or something.
So you need resources - the iron ore that comes into smoke city must come from somehwere - perhaps there is a dwarven mine, or several mines in surrounding vallies owned by different mining companies. Perhaps it is the quality of the ore mined in the area that makes the metal so prized - so perhaps it is easier to make masterwork items with metals from smoke city.
2/ To make the smoke you are going to need something to burn. So wood and coal and the resources to make charcoal. Maybe the wood comes down river. Thi smeans some rangers are going to be around. Perhaps the wood cutters are starting to enroach upon elven/druidic/ancient evil forest territory which is starting to cause tensions which will lead to war.
3/ The Lord Mayor may not be corrupt, but his advisors and the special interest groups might be. The miners might want more rights and be unionising - the players might be hired to break a strike, or protect union leaders from assasins hired by a mine owner. The loggers are going to want logging permits and to be allowed to cut ever closer to sacred groves. Maybe some loggers already have. A disgruntled druid set wild animals upon them and killed many. Teh logging company want the players to go and find the missing loggers. As result the players end up mediating between a logging company and angry druids whilst trying to fight off ravenous beasts.
So all these interest groups are going to want to spend time with the Lord Mayor and will pay lobby group sto put their point of view across or hire thieves, mercenaries and such like to discredit the other groups point of view. So you could set up some guilds, unions and owner groups which have conflicting interests.
4/ The mob would make money by demanding protection money from those owning businesses in and around the town. They would also smuggle contraband in and out of the city. They might be selling steel to hobgoblins, an act forbidden by the empire, selling slaves to mine and/or factory owners and kidnapping the relatives of rich industrialists for ransom. There will be more than one mob present who will be engaging in a turf war over who owns the city.
5/ There will almost certainly be an (evil) cult or bored archeologists trying to find the secret vaults. There will be several vaults located under the city which contain various nasty things and rich treasures. It imay be forbidden for anyone to open a vault on pain of death - only the chief wizard, cleric and Lord Mayor may order the opening of a vault and this is done with extreme caution. Needless to say the cults, the mob and treasure hunters seek the vaults to pillage them. Every month 2 or 3 hapless individuals are publicly executed in the square for high treason - namely puttin gth ecity in danger by opening the vaults.
What were the evil powers used be the other factions of the civil war.
The civil war needs a REALLY COOL & SCARY NAME!!!
The war was started by someone known as The Prophet of Glory. During the height of its power, the Empire of Yzill was rife with corruption. The gods chose a young boy to travel to the capital and speak their messages to Yzill's rulers, to show them the hurt and suffering their actions had caused, to show them how their path led to destruction, and to peacefully beseech them to turn from their ways. Unfortunately, the boy was captured by evil powers who tortured and corrupted him. When he finally reached the capital, the boy was a man. He declared himself the Prophet of Glory, declared that he spoke the word of the gods, and declared that all who did not follow him would perish. He tried to destroy the rulers of the empire by force. This led to a long, bloody conflict that tore the Empire apart, even though the Prophet himself vanished not long after the fighting started.
That's what I got. So maybe the War of the Prophet or something? I dunno.
The Searing, The Burning, The Cataclysm, The Chosen's War, I like the War of the Prophet too.
If your players have read Dragonlance that is where the Cataclysm comes from.
The Searing is from an MMORPG called Guild Wars, so if they play it avoid that one too.
Just purely on a logistical level it makes sense for the factories to be refineries. Its a large port city so it could be very much a "raw ore comes in pure metal goes out" kind of place. To the scale that if you have anything thats made of metal in this half of the world it was probably smelted in Korgdon.
Except that there are no big places to ship it to... so they are moving it around in the city. HOW?
Monorails.
Trains.
Wagons.
Air Barges.
All of the above and more.
Well he said he liked the idea of an Airbarge or Spell Jamming Ship that launched from a spire that reached above the smoke.
My idea would be to have the 'product' transported via that vehicle (whichever it may be). This could lead to quests where the Heroes are requested to aide in the transport of particularly valuable goods from the factory to the air barge. Possibly because the metal they are transporting is needed in the manufacture of the keys that open the large vaults below the city. Which of course the cults would then need so that they can open the vaults to release the now Lich Prophet of the Gods.
If the heroes fail to protect the shipment then of course they have to chase after the cult to retrieve the particularly valuable metal before they use it to bring certain doom to the city, and possibly the world.
If the heroes succeed then they may be asked to travel with the air barge as protection staff. The air barge may choose a direction and travel in that direction till they find a city/settlement large enough to trade with, sort of like the spice traders of old.
But I am bored at work so all this may seem horribly mad 