Dwarven Merchants' Guild
The Dwarven Merchants' Guild is a powerful and extensively connected organization comprised of surface dwarves. Some of the Guild's members left the dwarven city of Orzammar to pursue business and trade on the surface while others joined after being exiled from the city.
The upper-class surface dwarf members of the Guild are composed of two distinct groups; the kaina who insist of maintaining caste and rank and the kartan who believe in leaving Orzammar's traditions behind and embracing surface life. One's grouping can directly impact who they will work with and how they conduct business.
Their influences stretches across almost the entire reaches of Thedas, both above surface and below.
Structure
"These are dwarves who would sell their own mothers if they thought it'd get them a better share of the lyrium market."The Merchants' Guild is a world unto itself, one of social hierarchy and influence between kaina and kartan as rigid as that found in Orzammar. Being a member of the Guild affords power and wealth and the membership is exclusive. The Guild is administered by a council who hold meetings to maintain the function of the organization. Missing meetings is considered an insult. Crossing the Guild is also seen as a deadly offense. Council members hold the title of Deshyr, which is also used by members of the Assembly in Orzammmar. Alliances tend to form around family houses, much like in Orzammar. Many exiles from Orzammar reconstitute themselves as influential families of the guild, or alternatively the Carta.
Public Agenda
The Guild's main source of profit is the lyrium trade. In most cases, they serve as the middle-man between Orzammar and the Chantry in these dealings. Since the Chantry uses lyrium in both the Templar Order as well as in the Circle of Magi, these transactions occur all over Thedas.
Beyond lyrium, the Guild also sells sought-after pieces of art. Their main focus in this endeavor is Nevarran sculptures, which usually have religious themes and iconography. Many Orlesian nobles will pay the Guild exorbitant sums of money to get them rare pieces of art. The Guild has a reputation of taking most of the money in these transactions and giving very little to the artists, claiming high "handling fees".
They appear to have an understanding with the Coterie, Kirkwall's principal thieves' guild, presumably because the Guild pays them not to harm Guild members or steal their property.
If a large enough sum of money is offered in a potential contract, a Guild member may work outside their usual lines of work.
Assets
Dwarves emigrating to the surface bring with them the skills and talents they possessed as members of their caste in Orzammar. For those of the Noble and Merchant caste, this also means ties to surface traders and suppliers and the wealth to begin trading of their own on the surface. Many formerly Noble or Merchant caste dwarves maintain respectable if unofficial ties to their former houses and use them as a means to trade. For many years, maintaining ties to Orzammar via trade was seen as essential to making a lucrative living. In more recent times, families are far more likely to cut off all ties to someone going top-side as it's the perception has shifted more towards a person doing that being a betrayer of some sacred duty to their homeland.
worn down these types of relationships and the sentiment within Orzammar has – even as a sacred duty to their kin or a patron in Orzammar as leaving the city meant sacrificing their caste and clan.
However, in recent years, many surface dwarves, particularly kartan, have developed new ways of making a life on the surface by starting banks, mercenary companies, and overland trade caravans. These entrepreneurial dwarves became investors and speculators in purely surface trade without connection to Orzammar. These new industries have been lucrative sources of wealth but are looked down upon by those dwarves who respect maintaining strong ties to Orzammar.
For less affluent surface dwarves, association with a powerful kalna can open many doors. They can get credit with dwarven merchants and are offered work opportunities by the powerful Dwarven Merchants' Guild more readily, sometimes, than more qualified but less-connected individuals.
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