Growfest

Growfest is not considered a week-long public holiday in Greyhawk, though it is regarded as a time of good cheer with the full arrival of spring. The weather is usually blustery, with cool sunny days alternating with heavy rain. Merchant activity is high, as the first caravans of the year set out at this time on the first day of good weather, providing the roads are in a fair state.

The second seasonal conference between all foreign diplomats to the City of Greyhawk and the Lord Mayor and Directing Oligarchy takes place on Growfest Ist, at the Lord Mayor's Palace in High Quarter. See mention of this meeting under “Needfest” for further details, The atmosphere is usually better than during Needfest with the improvement in the weather.

Growfest 4th, Godsday, is St. Cuthbert’s Day, the largest annual festival celebrated by those of his faith. At dawn, local worshipers (of whom there are many) and pilgrims from foreign lands assemble outside the city walls at the Highway Gate, at the southern end of the city. They then enter the city and march north along the Processional, chanting and singing, while their children run alongside in great excitement and strike them with green switches. This is called “the cleansing;” the kids seem to love it. Other children are not supposed to join in, but sometimes do anyway. Catcalls from unbelievers are stoically tolerated, but not rotten fruit (anyone caught throwing produce faces the beating of his life),

The line of marchers eventually arrives at the High Market and turns left, heading down Garden Road to the Sacred Temple of Saint Cuthbert. After a service in which a magical copy of the artifact known as the Mace of St. Cuthbert is brought out, a huge feast is held for the faithful from noon to dusk. A huge bonfire is lit outside at sundown and kept burning till midnight, with clerics carefully watching to make sure the fire does not spread. It is said that this fire can remove curses from penitent followers. No one in his right mind interferes with this festival, given the church’s great local power and militant attitude.

One other religious event during Growfest is worth mention, though it has lost importance over the years, particularly since the Greyhawk Wars. This is the Feast of Edoira, which commemorates a religious unifier of ancient times. Edoira united several argumentative sects of Rao in Greyhawk and established the Edoiran Compact, a set of guidelines by which people of good alignment could work together in relative harmony. Many good-aligned churches and temples in this region once revered his memory, though he never gained divine status. Celebrations varied from church to church, with interfaith services held on Godsday (primarily involving the clergies of Rao and Pelor secular observances were usually more festive than solemn. The clergies of Rao and Pelor still have an interfaith service on Godsday during Growfest, and they occasionally get priests of Heironeous or Mayaheine to join them. This has been difficult of late, which worries the clerics of Rao.

The highlight of Growfest for the rest of the populace comes on Freeday evening, Growfest 7th. This event is the Desportium of Magic. Torchlight is the only illumination allowed as thousands of residents pour northward up the Processional to the Grand Citadel, taking up places around (but not on) the hill on which the Grand Citadel sits. To great applause, the Master of Ceremonies of the Guild of Wizardry (currently the half-elf wizard Gil Sparectow) comes out of the citadel and presents the 15 contestants for the Desportium, which goes on until midnight. The contestants are nearly always illusionists who are either not native to the city or have not yet joined the Guild of Wizardry. The contestants are grouped into five teams of three members each, One at a time, the groups attempt to cast the most magnificent display of illusion/phantasm magic possible, in a maximum time of 40 minutes. The displays, made up of any number of spells cast without use of magic devices, cannot cause harm to any creature or to the citadel, but must be as wonderful, striking, detailed, and lifelike as possible.

Each performance in the Desportium of Magic uses a long-established theme: an attack upon the Grand Citadel by various humanoids and monsters, repelled by warriors and spellcasters within the Citadel itself. This motif is based on an actual historical attack made on the city by a humanoid army, backed by spellcasters, around the year 43 cy. The assault was driven off with the clever use of illusions by the city’s defenders. The contestants can elaborate on this basic theme to include exotic monsters and spells that were not a part of the actual event, making the attackers look as dreadful and the defenders as heroic as possible.

The performances are judged by Kieren Jalucian, the Guildmaster of Greyhawk’s Guild of Wizardry; Jallarzi Sallavarian, a local wizard known to be a member of the Circle of Eight; and Torrentz Hebvard, the President of Greyhawk’s Society of Magi. The reward for victory is 500 gp per winning team member, plus training for the next experience level at half-price from the Guild of Wizardry. Admission to the guild is offered to the winners for free.

Food vendors make a killing on hot chestnuts, roast squirrel, mulled wine, ale by the barrel, and the like that are consumed by the audience during the displays. A hot meal is prepared for all outside the Grand Citadel when the Desportium ends. Most people attending this event are dead tired when they go to work the next day.

Immediately following Growfest, on the 1st of Planting, all guilds in the City of Greyhawk must present their membership lists at the High Quarter home of Gloreddi Bakkanin, the Inspector of Taxes, by high noon. The roll of recognized guildmembers is read aloud that afternoon by a team of scribes at “City Hall” (the Lord Mayor's Palace), then posted on a board outside for all to read. If a roll arrives late, the guild is declared to have no members and be officially disbanded — unless a sizeable fine (plus, it is said, a huge bribe) accompanies the errant document when it reaches the Inspector of Taxes. No guild is reported to have missed this deadline in a decade, some even turning over their membership lists as early as the end of Needfest. Slow-acting guildmasters often panic if they haven't completed their membership lists, leading to a flurry of crazed activity in some areas during Growfest.

Also on the 1st of Planting, the second quarterly Grand Council of Greyhawk Guilds meets at the Lord Mayor's Palace. Details appear under “Needfest.”

Elmshire is the only outlying town to celebrate Growfest as a public holiday. Planting competitions, foot races, weddings, ale judging, huge feasts, and so forth are commonly held. Safeton and Hardby prepare their docks, streets, and businesses for the coming stream of cogs, caravels, and. other ships from foreign ports. Only one church in Safeton still celebrates the Feast of Edoira, which was only a decade earlier a major town event; no church in Narwell or Hardby still does this, though townsfolk generally remember who Edoira was. The halflings of Elmshire aren’t familiar with Edoira at all.

Safeton conducts military drills in expectation of border raids from the Orcish Empire, which may already be taking place just to the west. Narwell ptepares itself for a stream of caravan traffic and marching soldiers from the Greyhawk Militia on patrol. Some in Narwell also prepare to leave town and begin.a bit of banditry in the countryside.