Guilds

The Adventurers’ Guild

Joining Fee: 50 thalers
Monthly Dues: 5 thalers

Purpose:
Register adventurers
Post quests
Provide hints and clues (cumulative 5% chance per week of asking. Non members pay 5 thalers per week)
Provide legal protection
Supply maps and non-combat guides (non members pay double)

The Burial Club (“Death Guild”)

Joining Fee: 50 thalers per character level
Monthly Dues: 5 thalers per character level

Guarantees proper burial or cremation if a member dies under normal circumstances.
If the body cannot be recovered — lost in battle, missing in the wilderness, or eaten by a dragon — the guild records the death, sends prayers, and memorializes the member in some fashion.
The guild also sends death notices to family, allies, or affiliated organizations.

Optional services include protection against grave robbery, funerary magic, access to guild mausoleums, and high-end memorial statues.

Obligations
Members must keep dues current; missed payments may void the burial guarantee.
Members must also provide accurate personal information and preferred burial instructions.

Guild of Chirurgeons, Healers, and Necromancers (“The Black College” or “The College of Flesh”)

Joining Fee: 50 thalers per character level
Monthly Dues: 10 thalers per character level

Typical prices: (non-members pay double!)

Stitching wounds: 5 thalers (recover 1d3hp, once only)
Intensive recovery care: 10 thalers/day (recover 5hp/day)
Cure Light Wounds: 75 thalers
Cure Serious Wounds: 100 thalers
Remove Disease: 250 thalers
Neutralize Poison: 100–200 thalers
Regeneration or limb restoration: 750 thalers per character level
Autopsy & cause of death: 50 thalers
Corpse preservation: 20 thalers

To protect reputation, the guild enforces strict rules:

Forbidden:
raising undead armies
soul imprisonment
corpse theft
intelligent undead creation

Allowed (regulated):
corpse animation for research
autopsies
spirit communication
corpse preservation

Violators are Hunted.

The Guild of Shadows (Thieves & Allied Trades)

Joining Fee: Invite only, must prove worthiness
Monthly Dues: Assist the Guild at least once a month.

The Guild provides:

Thief Training - any relevant non weapon proficiency
Thief Equipment Sales - Poisoned darts, smoke bombs, minor gadgets
Information & Networking - Information on guard rotations, noble estates (Information gives +10% to checks while on a job)

Guild Enforcement
Rival thieves who steal from guild members or break guild rules receive a warning - a “visit from the enforcers.” Baseball bat diplomacy is common: a blunt reminder rather than murder.

Guild of Fighters

Joining Fee: 50 thalers per character level
Monthly Dues: 10 thalers

Offers the chance to learn Fighting Styles, at a cost of 50 thalers per character level.

Fighting Styles:
Non-Fighters can pick ONE Fighting Style.
Fighters (and ONLY Fighters!) gain 1 style slot per every third level of experience.

The idea of Fighting Styles is a Style is not a weapon itself, but a way of using a weapon in combat that confers tactical benefits if you know it.

Agile Fighter: Gain a +1 Armour Class bonus when you are wielding a single weapon
Darkness Combatant: You only suffer a –1 penalty to hit in total darkness (no penalty inpoor lighting) and no Armour Class penalties.
Defensive Stance: +1 AC vs first attack per round.
Deft Parry: Gain a +2 bonus to your Parry total when parrying with two weapons.
Dirty Tricks: A successful Wisdom check grants you a +1 on either initiative, to hit, or damage rolls, or imposes a –1 penalty on an enemy’s rolls. You can use this ability once per opponent.
Disarming Strike: (Weapon Proficiency) Spend an attack to attempt to knock a weapon out of enemy hands (Foe must Save vs Paralyzation).
Feign Weakness: A successful Charisma check feigns a weakness. If an enemy acts on this apparent weakness, your next attack against them receives a +3 to hit and damage. You can use this ability once per opponent.
Feint Attack: (Weapon Proficiency) Spend an attack to cause the enemy to lose their next attack (Foe must Save vs Paralyzation).
Haft Strike: You can strike with the butt of your polearm, gaining one extra attack for 1d6 damage in addition to your normal attacks this round.
Improved Balance: You can fight with two short swords, one in each hand.
Maintain Ammunition: Your missiles never break when fired.
Opportunistic Strike: (Dexterity 13+) When an enemy misses you in melee, you may make an immediate counterattack.
Perfect Shot: Sacrifice all multiple primary missile attacks in a round. Instead, attack once and deal maximum damage on a hit. You can only do this if you have multiple primary attacks available.
Perfect Strike: Sacrifice all multiple primary melee attacks in a round. Instead, attack once and deal maximum damage on a hit. You can only do this if you have multiple primary attacks available.
Polearm Sweep: (Polearm proficiency) Can attack multiple adjacent enemies with a single attack roll (1/2 damage each).
Power Strike (Strength 13+) Add +1 damage on a successful attack, once per round.
Ranged Backstab: Allows Thieves to make a single ranged attack to backstab with a missile weapon.
Ranged Critical: Score a critical hit with a missile weapon on a 19 or 20.
Rapid Strike: (Dexterity 13+) Can make one extra attack per round at -2 to hit.
Shield Bash: An extra attack that can stun foes; foe must Save vs Paralyzation, needs an attack roll against one target per round.
Smash: (Strength 15+) If the melee attack kills a foe, spillover damage can hit another adjacent foe.
Swordmaster Flourish: (Sword proficiency) Once per round, can add +1 to an attack or reroll a missed attack.
Tactics: Spend a round studying up to four opponents to gain a +1 on initiative or attack rolls against them for the duration of combat.
Two-Weapon Fighting: (1 weapon in each hand) Reduce the penalties for fighting with two weapons from –2/–4 to 0/–2.
Wall of Blades: Gain a +1 Armour Class bonus when wielding two weapons
Weakness Identification: A successful Wisdom check reveals an enemy’s weakness. A called shot against them will then inflict double damage. You can use this ability once per opponent.

Another service is employment: one could hear of an opportunity for the city guard, mercenary contracts, or special missions

The Mage Guild (or “College of the Arcane”)

Joining Fee: The “Outside-the-Box Test”: Must demonstrate a novel use of magic, showing ingenuity and understanding.
Monthly Dues: 50 thalers

The guild exists as a study, research, and regulatory body, rather than a shop.

Guild Services (for members only!)
Research Access: Use of libraries, laboratories, and access to rare books, planar knowledge, and experimental components.

Guild licenses members to perform magical services: protective wards, summoned aid, and magical surveillance. All use is regulated; rogue magic is punished harshly.

Arcane Law / City Control
No unlicensed magic within city limits: Any spell use must be authorized.
Guild enforcement: Only guild members can legally cast magic publicly. Rogue magic triggers guild intervention (warnings, fines, or magical containment).
Purpose: Prevent accidents, magical crime, planar breaches, and preserve guild authority.

Priests’ Guild (or “Holy Orders Consortium”)

Joining Fee: Any cleric may join.
Monthly Dues: Perform basic rituals, prayers, minor healing for the community.

In return for performing ceremonies, minor magical healing, officiating rites for the community, the cleric may study rituals, holy texts, and divine laws, or even gain access to rare spells.

Those who betray the guild, misuse sacred magic, desecrate temples or holy relics or are involved in heresy or forbidden research, may be subject to excommunication.

The guild may hold a formal excommunication ceremony, often public to reinforce authority; the priest is declared a pariah of their faith, and their holy symbols are revoked. A magical effect “marks” them, a minor visible effect that hints at divine disfavor.

Mechanical Effects:
Loss of Clerical Powers.
Divine class features (turn undead) is suspended.
Minor curses (ill luck - disadvantage on saves/checks, feeble healing - minimum healing, nightmares)
Other priests refuse contact, healing, or sanctuary.
Merchants, guards, and nobles may treat the excommunicate as an outlaw or pariah.

Redemption / Reinstatement: Requires atonement, penance, or dangerous quests to regain full powers.

Blacksmiths’ Guild (“Guild of the Anvil”)

Joining Fee: 50 thalers
Monthly Dues: 10 thalers

“A guilded hammer shapes destiny; a rogue hand brings misfortune.”
Guild exists to maintain standards in weapon and armor crafting.
Membership guarantees: functional, durable, and properly balanced equipment.
Nonguild smiths: risk of poor fit, shoddy materials, or hidden flaws.

Non-Member Risk Table
Buy weapons/armor from nonguild smith → roll 1d6:
1–2: Item flawed (misbalanced, brittle, fails under stress)
3–4: Overpriced (pay 25–50% more than guild standard)
5–6: Acceptable, but no warranty or recourse

Example: Nonguild sword: might break on a critical hit, fail to cut cleanly, or rust faster.