Waterdeep waterfront

The Sinking Anchorage

“The cobbles here stay slick even in a drought. It’s either the salt or the blood, but mostly it's just the city weeping for what she lets us do to her.”

Gully, Dock Urchin

• TavernThe Barnacle's GripThe tavern is built from the literal hull of a shipwrecked galleon; the floorboards groan like a ship at sea and the entire building lists slightly to the port side, forcing patrons to lean when they walk.
• ShopThalassa’s Cordage & SailMistress Thalassa constantly glances toward the basement stairs and keeps a quill behind her ear to frequently mark 'damage' on her manifest despite the stock looking pristine.
• ShopMork's Fine CarvingsThe shop is thick with white bone dust that makes everyone sneeze. Mork avoids eye contact and constantly files a large piece of ivory while muttering to himself.

district

Dock Ward

timeOfDay

Late Evening

crowdLevel

Dense and Shifting

economicTier

Low / Sordid

• NPCBarnaby Deep-Sight WickhamBarnaby is a man of sharp contrasts. He is gregarious and loud when holding court at the tavern, telling grand lies to travelers, yet he becomes deathly silent and withdrawn the moment the tide rises or the wind carries a particular scent of the deep. He is fiercely protective and stern with Gully, often scolding the boy for the slightest interest in sailing, though he spends his last copper to ensure the lad is fed. He possesses a navigator's precision but applies it only to the timing of his next drink, using his vast knowledge of the stars to calculate exactly how much time he has before the memories of the 'Screaming Maw' return to haunt him.
• NPCThalassa XirxisThalassa is meticulously transactional; she views every living soul as a ledger of debts and favors. She is chillingly polite to those she intends to ruin, yet she can be unexpectedly patient with the city's orphans, provided they do not touch her merchandise. She experiences a constant internal tension between her desire for absolute control over the waterfront and a secret, burgeoning guilt over the human cost of her black-market trade. In public, she is a pillar of icy professionalism, but when cornered or truly angry, her voice drops to an abyssal rasp that betrays her infernal heritage.
• NPCGulliver Gully LightfootGully is aggressively helpful to those who have coin but turns invisible and mute when the City Watch is nearby. He maintains a facade of street hardened apathy while secretly feeding a colony of stray cats with the scraps he steals. He is quick to offer an insult to mask a compliment, fearing that any outward show of kindness makes him a target for the predators of the Dock Ward. He treats every secret like a precious gem, often obsessing over the details until he can turn them into profit.
• NPCOryn HallowOryn is a man of fraying edges, acting with sharp, bureaucratic efficiency toward strangers to hide his internal exhaustion. He is surprisingly gentle with the street urchins of the Dock Ward, often sharing his meager rations, yet he is coldly transactional and dismissive with his fellow guards. He believes himself a ghost haunting his own life, operating on a autopilot of corruption that he hates but cannot stop because it funds the only thing he still loves.

1. 1Retrieve a crate of 'Red-Glass Lanterns' that 'fell off' a merchant galley before Sergeant Hallow finds it.

   If they succeed

   The party gains the favor of Mistress Thalassa and a cut of the illicit gold.

   If they fail

   The City Watch raids the block, arresting the players as common smugglers.

2. 2Identify who has been scratching cryptic symbols into the wooden pillars of The Barnacle's Grip.

   If they succeed

   Players uncover a message network used by the Xanathar Guild and gain leverage over a local snitch.

   If they fail

   An NPC friendly to the party vanishes, their body later found floating near the wharves.

A thick, magical sea fog rolls in from the Deepwater Isle, carrying the unnatural chill of the depths.