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OTHER ADVENTURERS' GUILDS
Few guilds besides the Clifftop guild are widely known,
but the following organizations have carved out reputa
tions for themselves:
Deathsgate Explorers' Club. Named for the lower-class
district in Sharn where it maintains its guildhall, the
Deathsgate Explorers' Club is.a rough-and-tumble
guild made up largely of Last War veterans. Deaths
gaters rarely undertake adventures from altruistic
motives, demanding prompt payment or other recipro
cal arrangements. They have a fierce rivalry with the
Clifftop Adventurers' Guild.
Wayfinder Foundation. Founded by a renowned hunter
and explorer, Lord Bornman ir'Dayne, the Wayfinder
Foundation is an exclusive adventurers' guild that
welcomes only experienced and renowned members.
Dayne suffers from a wasting curse that prevents him
from undertaking further adventures of his own, so he
has put his considerable fortune to use in sponsoring
great expeditions. The Wayfinder Foundation has an
unusually wide reach for an adventurers' guild, with
guildhalls found across Khorvaire as well as in the
city of Stormreach, in Xen'drik. Its headquarters, and
the residence of its wealthy patron, is in Fairhaven.
CRIME SYNDICATE
Your group is a team of crooks that's part of an orga
nized crime syndicate. You're more talented and have
a wider range of skills than most thugs and burglars,
so your crew might be entrusted with more important
tasks than simply roughing up local merchants or break
ing into empty apartments. If you're anything like a typi
cal adventuring party, you bring a combination of power
ful magic, physical might, and a broad selection of skills
to your work, making you well suited to missions like
grand heists, high-profile assassinations, and epic cons.
Crime syndicates thrived during the Last War. The
war left many people desperate, driving them into lives
of crime. The war also demanded huge numbers of
able-bodied soldiers, which reduced the ranks of law
enforcement across Khorvaire. As a result, most settle
ments have some organized criminal element, ranging
from small local thieves' guilds to international organi
zations with dozens of interconnected branches.
BOROMAR CLAN
The Boromar Clan is the most powerful criminal orga
nization in the city of Sharn. From its humble start as
a gang of smugglers and thieves, the Boromars have
risen to become one of the most influential fo rces in the
city. They have a stranglehold on the smuggling trade
and own the majority of the gambling halls in the city,
while most of the fe nces and thieves in Sharn either
work directly for the them or pay tribute in exchange for
independence. The Boromars control a vast network of
extortion, blackmail, and graft that extends throughout
the city, and their influence reaches far beyond the crim
inal underworld. The early Boromar patriarchs invested
wisely over the centuries, and today the Boromars are
one of the Sixty, the elite tier of Sharn's aristocracy.
The Boromar Clan owns warehouses, taverns, and inns
CHAPTER l J CHARACTER CREATION
throughout the city, and it has a considerable interest
in the shipping trade. A Boromar heir sits on the city
council of Sharn, and the current head of the clan is a
member of the Gold Concord of the Aurum (described in
chapter 4).
As much as some members of the Sharn Council and
the Watch would like to see the Boromars disbanded,
the syndicate is unlikely to collapse any time soon.
Membership. The core membership of the Boromar
Clan-comprising about one in six of its members-is an
extended family of halflings descended from immigrants
who came to Sharn from the Talenta Plains. Another
third of the members are unrelated halflings, and the
rest belong to other species. The syndicate employs a
wide variety of bookkeepers and administrators as well
as burglars, con artists, smugglers, and other criminals.
When a situation calls for physical violence, the Boro
mars usually hire freelancers-members of the Sharn
Guard or agents of House Tarkanan. The Boromar
family proper has a team of personal bodyguards called
the Clawfoots, who are mostly fierce halfling warriors
recently relocated from the Talenta Plains. They primar
ily defend Boromar holdings and headquarters in the
halfling district of Little Plains.
Allies. The Boromar Clan has a reputation for omni
potence that makes even the forces of law and order in
Sharn hesitant to cross it. It's far safer to be an ally of
the syndicate, or at least to stay out of its way, than it
is to be its enemy-and it's more lucrative to boot. The
following groups count themselves among the Boromar
Clan's closest allies:
Housejorasco. The head of the Boromar Clan, Saidan
Boromar, is married to an unmarked heir of House
Jorasco, Mala Boromar d'Jorasco. This marriage has
created important ties between the Boromars and the
halfling healers of Sharn. Members of the Boromar
family can secure healing for free, and other members
of the syndicate receive a 10 percent discount atJo
rasco houses of healing.
Sharn Council. Of the seventeen members of Sharn's
city council, four have close ties to the Boromar
Clan-including one, Ilyra Boromar, who reports di
rectly to the head of the syndicate. These four vote as
a bloc to ensure that the council doesn't take direct ac
tion against the Boromars, while enough of the other
council members fe ar the syndicate that they tend to
carry the vote. A member of the Boromar Clan can
call in a favor to secure an audience with one of these
councilors, though such does not guarantee aid.
Sharn Watch. The Boromars have been bribing cap
tains of the Sharn Watch for generations. What's
more, if the Boromar Clan collapsed, the underworld
would erupt in anarchy as dozens of petty crime lords
fought for territory and position. As a result, a member
of the Boromars can call in a favor to get minor crimi
nal charges dismissed.
Enemies. Despite the Boromar Clan's position of
strength in Sharn, it has many foes, and their unrelent
ing assaults have put the syndicate in what might b� its
most precarious position ever. Currently, the followmg
groups pose the greatest threats to Boromar interests: