A5: Guildhall of the Performing Artistes

This grand structure far exaggerates the status of this guild within the city, to the considerable resentment of other, more serious unions. However, the cas tle once known as Lord Ren 's Hold came into the possession of the guild of actors and musicians quite legally.

That lord of the last century was a no ble of eccentncities and foibles second in note only to Zagig himself. The most in flamed of his many passions was his love for the arts, whether song, drama, paint ing, sculpture, every type of art! He amassed a considerable fortune, and was a great sponsor of Greyhawk culture. The very existence of the Great Theatre, in fact, can be traced to the generosity and persistence of Lord Ren.

As he approached death with no heir, he decided upon a plan to guarantee the flourishing of artistic accomplishment in the Free City for generations after his own demise. Thus, he willed his fabulous keep, and its hoard of priceless art work, to the guild of performers who had brought him such delight.

The Guildhall now serves as an art gallery-the finest upon the Flanaess and small theatre, as well as the headquarters of the guild and living quarters for many of its members.

The Guild itself includes performers of all types: jugglers, clowns, musicians, singers, actors, acrobats, snake charmers, and so on. It enjoys the patronage of the great wizard Otto (of the Circle of Eight, see Ch3 FFF) , and a shrine to the goddess Lirr in the guildhall seems to engender her favor as well.

The guildhall is always home to several dozen young performers, too poor to have yet acquired lodgings. Roll 2d12 + 25 to determine the exact number. They pay their rent by serving to guard the hall-together with the three 5th level fighters the guild has hired as security sergeants. A staff of 20 residents (0 level) is always on hand to aid these sergeants.

The castle is small, but impressive in architecture and impregnability. The gate is locked tight except when the art gallery is open-afternoons six days a week, all day and into the evening on Godsday. The gallery, a complex of many rooms on the second and third floor of the keep, is protected by magic mouth spells, invisible strings on the valuable objects (naturally, the strings ring alarm bells at a nearby guard station), and other protections. Pieces have been successfully stolen from here, but only rarely does the thief escape the wrathful vengeance of Otto the Great.

The theatre in the guildhall is used for rehearsals and for small performances before select audiences. Often the nobles of the city and visiting ambassadors are honored with an invitation to pay 12 gp for a private preview of an upcoming performance. Such previews are performed in the guildhall, traditionally the night be fore they open in the Great Theatre.

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A5: Performing Artistes’ Guildhall. When Zagig vanished in the last century, some said that his successor in madness was Lord Ren, a noble who received his station from the Mad Archmage himself. Lord Ren loved the arts, from acting to music to painting to everything else. He amassed a great fortune by trading in ancient artwork recovered from various dungeons (by questionable means), and he had a small castle built for himself on an artificial hill. Before his death, Lord Ren willed his small castle and his entire art collection to the Guild of Performing Artistes, which was only a few years old at the time of the bequest. This catapulted the small guild into the ranks of the most powerful interest groups in the city, but its influence has been fairly subtle. The Guild of Performing Artistes includes bards, singers, jugglers, jesters, musicians, actors, acrobats, painters, sculptors, and the like. Internal politics are intense, though meaningless to outsiders.

The guildhall (sometimes called the “artists’ castle”) now houses a gallery with what is generally believed to be the finest collection of artwork in the Flanaess, along with a small theater, meeting rooms, classrooms, two small libraries of literary works, a dining hall, a shrine to the goddess Lirr, and living quarters for most of the guild’s members. The castle actually has a small multilevel dungeon used to store costumes, props, wine, and food; some guild members even live there, enjoying the solitude.

The theater is usually used for rehearsals, but it is also used to give private preview performances of upcoming plays before they reach the Grand Theater. (Nobles and ambassadors are given the chance to pay 15 gp each for this privilege.) The art gallery is open in the afternoons, six days a week and all day on Godsday; admission is one silver piece. Because the wizard Otto (of the Circle of Eight) is known to be a patron of the guild, it is believed the gallery has extensive magical protections. Apprentices of the guild often serve guard duty in the gallery, doubling as guides and answering questions about the art and the guild. On festival days, brightly uniformed “guards” parade across the castle’s battlements, and huge flags and banners fly from poles and tower tops.

DM's Notes: The art gallery is magically warded against theft, to an extreme degree. Many wizard and priest spells have been cast here, none of the sort that would damage the artwork while drawing attention to a theft in progress. Because of several attempts to steal works in the past, the guild has great antipathy for the Guild of Thieves, despite the fact that some members of the Guild of Performing Artistes also secretly work for the Guild of Thieves. A continuing, low-grade struggle goes on between the thieves, who want to get the artwork, and the guild’s backers (including Otto and a number of clerics of Lirr), who lay down the castle’s defenses. A new problem came to light during the Greyhawk Wars, when some people visiting the gallery tried to damage art from the Great Kingdom. Some pieces now reside behind glassteel barriers.

More than a few pieces of art were looted from old dungeons many decades ago, and some have unusual “problems.” Some are cursed or magically trapped, and so are set apart from onlookers and handled with great care. Some are very fragile. Some are being sought by people who believe those works are rightfully theirs (as their families once owned the objects before they were stolen from them, then “recovered” by adventurers and brought here). And a few items hold clues to ancient mysteries and sources of great wealth — and danger.