Create a Homebrew Campaign | #8: Shops and Notable Inhabitants
Introduction
Hey there and welcome to the eighth entry into my Homebrew Campaign Creation series! We’re a little over halfway done, so congratulations on making it this far! In the previous two parts of this series, I talked about giving your players information and then using the information that they give back to you as a result. Your players should have given you a thorough backstory for their characters that can help you flesh out the world and put their characters into it smoothly. In this session, we’re going to continue fleshing out our world by adding shops and notable inhabitants to the setting where our first arc will take place.
Your players may have given you the names and a few details of some people they may know who could be part of your story’s first arc. I know mine did! If that’s the case, take time to note down everything your players told you about those characters. It’ll be important for this lesson! Once you’ve got that, you’re ready to dive into creating the shops and notable inhabitants for the setting of our first arc. I’ll be creating some NPCs and stores for the town of Kessit, where the first arc of my homebrew campaign will be taking place.
As always, if you’d like to, you can check out the video version of this same content! Whether you want to watch that instead of the blog post or if you just want it as a companion, I’d really appreciate you taking the time to look into it. You can watch that here:
The Shops
If you participated in the exercises from previous courses, you’ll remember that we have been working through a form that I like to call the Settlement Information Form. This form is used to track all of the important information about a particular settlement in our world. If you open up yours, it should look something like mine, wherein the Points of Interest section is not fully filled out. The last time that we worked on this, I listed out the various points of interest but didn’t specify anything beyond their names and a considerably basic summary. This means I have Tavern listed, but the tavern is nameless, quite basic, and doesn’t even have an owner or list of workers present, let alone associated costs and descriptions! This is what we’re going to correct here.
This part should be relatively easy because we have already taken time to list out every shop and other points of interest that should be present in our settlement. For Kessit, I know that I need to create a Tavern, Apothecary, and a Chapel as shops. I know the chapel doesn’t sound like a shop, but players will be able to pay for services there, so I’m going to include it in this list. For each of them, I’m going to list the names of important people associated with it, a brief description, and a name for the shop itself.
I do have other points of interest, like the sewer and the guardhouse, but those are fairly straightforward and I can flesh them out as needed. Right now, I want to make sure that I have the shops right. We’re going to start with the Tavern.
The Tavern
Tavern names can be fun! I tend to follow a simple formula of adverb followed by a noun, and I also like to make them names that are either puns or some other form of humor or amusement. Having a tavern with a unique and amusing name can help players remember that tavern’s name for many months. Now, it doesn’t have to be a silly name, of course--I have Emerald Heights and Wolfhowl Tavern as taverns in my world that my players remember well--but I find that tavern names are a great opportunity to add some fun flair to your world, even if it’s otherwise serious.
I’m going to call the tavern in Kessit The Flatulent Fiend. We all like fart jokes. Just from that name, I can start coming up with descriptions of this tavern. Caricatures of demonic beings will be painted on the walls and the drinks will likely be named after hellish attributes, such as hellfire whiskey or demon horn mead. This is just me thinking off the top of my head, I’m sure I could come up with something better.
Once it’s named, I can start filling out the associated people section. In the Point of Interest table, I just list the individual’s name, a brief descriptor (generally sex and race, for this fantasy setting), and the person’s job at the location. Then, I can add more depth to the character in the Notable People section, if necessary. For The Flatulent Fiend, I’m going to list the tavern owner and two staff members, then move on.
The next section here is the Relevancy section. I believe I’ve mentioned before that this is a place to explain why this particular point of interest is noteworthy. Why does it stand out and why is it so important? For The Flatulent Fiend, it’s important because this is the only tavern in Kessit that is accessible to people on the mainland. There are sources of alcohol on the ait for the wealthy, but if you’re a poor commoner, this is your one and only opportunity to get a drink.
Lastly, you have the Other Notes area of the point of interest. This is where you can put anything and everything that you want to make sure is easily accessed at this stage. For me, I like to list out things that can be purchased at the relevant location. For The Flatulent Fiend, you can buy food and drinks. I’ll list those here in the Other Notes section, along with their prices.
Other Shops
I won’t go line by line for every shop in this post, but I will be fleshing out the Apothecary and the Chapel. The apothecary will be run by one person and will have all sorts of herbs and medicines for sale while the chapel is going to be devoted to a goddess in my world called Sorovea, the weather and nature goddess who blesses the trade routes that pass by Kessit’s harbor, or so her worshippers believe.
Apply the same processes I suggested for the Tavern to the other shops present in your settlement. Be sure to name the location, list the names of people who are important to it, and explain why the location is relevant. If you want to get into the finer details, take time to write down available goods and services (and their costs) in the Other Notes section.
Notable Inhabitants
At this stage in the creation of our settlement and first arc, we should have a lot of people who need to be fleshed out. There are people associated with the arc, people in the backstories of our players, and now people who work in establishments within your settlement. At this stage, we don’t have a lot of details about these people, but it’s time to fix that, now! You can start off by going through the Notable People section and duplicating the table in the section a few times. Then, start filling out the name of each table with the name of someone who has been mentioned thus far in the process of creating your homebrew campaign. This will give you a concise list of everyone who needs to have details written out for your settlement. We’re going to do that here. I’ll do one person for this course, but you’ll want to supply this information for each individual.
I’m going to be writing out the details for someone affiliated with the Merchants of Kessit that one of my players mentioned in his backstory.
Arturio Laetious
Arturio Laetious is the secretary for the Merchants of Kessit, keeping track of documents, appointments, books, and other such matters that the merchants deem trivial. Arturio’s son, Eugene, attended the University of Central Elzveir in Caggoz where he met my player’s character Philetius. Thus, Arturio will have a connection to the players right from the start, albeit a subtle one.
I try to keep the details for Notable People concise so that there is plenty of room for growth as it pertains to each non-player character. Race, age, alignment, and sex are all quite straightforward and shouldn’t need more than a word or two. For appearance and personality, I like to have one or two very simple, easy-to-recall sentences that give me a good idea of how I would both describe and portray this character.
Appearance
Disheveled compared to others of his wealth and status. Arturio’s glasses are often lopsided and strings of hair protrude this way and that from atop his head, giving the impression he threw his long hair gray mop into a bun after rolling out of bed and never bothered looking in the mirror.
Personality
Arturio always behaves as though he’s in a rush, eagerly moving from one thing to the next and considering anything that does not progress him forward as frivolous and time-wasting. Arturio is constantly on the move, rarely sitting for more than a minute or two, even for meals. He cannot be still.
Wrapping Up
Even from these simple descriptions of the secretary’s appearance and personality, you get the impression that this is someone who is overworked and underslept. He is exhausted and will always look so. Conversations with him will need to be kept brief if you even manage to have one at all, and you’ll probably always catch him at a bad time when he has something else going on.
The last thing I do for notable people is add a bulleted list beneath the table where I can track important details. This is where I’ll mention that he’s a secretary for the Merchants of Kessit, that he has a son named Eugene, and that his son knows Philetius. As the players interact with this character or I mention additional things about him, I’ll add more bullet points to this, allowing me to easily refer back to Arturio and all of his relevant notes at any time.
Other People
Of course, there are many, many more people that need to be added to this list of notable people. You and I both should have a swath of individuals that need to be fleshed out. Between now and the next course, repeat the steps that I did for Arturio for all of your characters and I’ll do the same. Anyone of note in your settlement who needs precise details and a slew of notes should be listed here, making that individual’s details easily accessible.
Conclusion
This has been the last course in this series in which we’ll be putting a single settlement under the microscope. From here on, we’ll be looking at broader, big-picture things. After you’ve completed this course, you should have a solid foundation for the first several sessions of your campaign. We’ve developed a settlement, the surrounding areas, and the story that our players will be participating in for the first arc of the campaign. If you want to, you can even begin running the campaign from here!
I hope you got something out of today’s course and that you’re excited to see what’s coming up next! In the post that I have slated for release next week, I’m going to be talking about the history and politics of our world as a whole. We’ll talk about what the world used to be and what happened to make it what it is today. This information can be really useful for inspiring deeper campaign hooks and can give you the opportunity to provide bits of lore and information to your players as the story unfolds for them over the course of several sessions. I’m really excited to talk about how I’ve applied history and politics to my own campaigns, and to give suggestions for what to do with your own!
If you did enjoy this post and are looking forward to what’s coming up next, please consider supporting me! I’d really appreciate it. The best way to do so now is to subscribe to my YouTube channel, but you can also follow me on social media. I’m @tlbainter on most social media platforms, with Instagram being my most active. Those links will be at the bottom of this post.
Next week we’re looking into history and politics, so get ready for that! Until then, bye!