Sandypoint

“Welcome to Sandpoint! Please stop to see yourself as we see you!” —Mirrored Sign Outside Sandpoint

Sandpoint has faced many hardships but also great prosperity in its 42-year history. A small town on the Varisian Bay, fishermen, farmers, and other simple folk make the community one of the rare truly peaceful havens in Varisia. Yet, while the townsfolk have known dark times in the past, a new shadow has begun to loom over the unsuspecting town.
Players in the Rise of the Runelords Adventure Path are encouraged to create characters with reasons to be in Sandpoint at the campaign’s beginning. While reasons to visit the community and a more detailed look at the town appear in Pathfinder #1, what follows is all common information that even the newly arrived might know.

The Town

A simple, relatively peaceful town with all the color and common oddities one expects from a tightly-knit community,Sandpoint sits at a point on the Lost Coast halfway between Magnimar and Windsong Abbey. Wood buildings and cluttered docks line the town’s natural harbor, while farms and the manors of wealthy citizens dot the surrounding countryside. During the day, fishing, farming, lumbering, glassmaking,and shipbuilding occupy most of the townsfolk, who commonly retire to their homes by way of Sandpoint’s many taverns. A playhouse and would-be museum make unusual attractions in such a small community, but Sandpoint’s true landmark is the Old Light, a lighthouse of ancient origins that lies in ruins.
A relatively peaceful town, devoid of many of the dangers of a true frontier town and intrigues of a sprawling city, Sandpoint has nonetheless had its share of troubles. The fading scars of a recent terror still linger, a time most folk refer to as the Late Unpleasantness. Just over five years ago, a madman stalked the streets of Sandpoint, killing dozens. Known as Chopper, the killer’s monthlong terror ended bloodily when an eccentric local artisan was revealed as the murderer and killed during his attempted capture. Adding to the pain, less than a month later the local chapel burned to the ground in a conflagration that nearly consumed the town’s northern half and left the local priest dead.

Test this

Maps

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  Sandpoint Town

As in any small community, gossip accents every business transaction and spices every evening meal. Anyone who makes a DC 10 Gather Information check might hear one of the following rumors, some of questionable veracity. • Sheriff Hemlock shares a long-running, “secret” romance with Lady Kaye, madam of the town brothel. • The ghost of the murderer Chopper haunts Chopper’s Isle, just north of town. • The White Deer Inn used to be the Black Deer Inn, but was tastefully renamed after the fire. • Ask Ven Vinder at the general store to see the “wine cellar” and he’ll sell you a jug of disgusting but potent orc rotgut. • Farmer Grump claims the Sandpoint Devil, a horselike monster with bat wings, once flew off with one of his prized sows. • Old Ilsoari at the museum sometimes wanders the beach at night, looking for treasures. • Don’t go down to the junktoss after dark: goblins steal the trash at night. • Solsta Vinder claims Sczarni stole her sheets last week and two cooling pies a week before that. • The new cathedral is magically protected from catching fire. • Murdermaw, a giant red snapper big enough to bite a boat in half, lurks in the Varisian Bay. • The Deverin family was once affiliated with the Chelish resistance, but was forced to flee to Varisia.

Type

Town