House Artemel

House Artemel

Personages

Patriarch: Arneth Artemel Consort: None Heir: Taldiruth Artemel (thirdborn son) Membership (Nobles): 18 Predominant Faith: Malar, Waukeen

Faction Details

Common Descriptors: Greedy, violent, slightly wild Primary Classes: Ranger, fighter, rogue Alignments: CN, N, NE, CE

Faction Ranks

• Favored: Rank 1. You are a favored member of the House. If you are a scion of the House, you have pleased the patriarch sufficiently to gain his notice. If you are an agent or retainer of the House, your efforts to aid the House have gone well-noted. • Lynchpin: Rank 2. You are given a position of some responsibility in the House's operations. If you are a scion of the House, the patriarch considers you one of the favored scions of the House, and consults with you on matters of House importance. If you are an agent or retainer, your contributions and skills in service of the House have won you a position of no small regard and respect in the patriarch's eyes - although that may earn you the jealousy of his blood kin who are less favored than you. • Matriarch/Patriarch: Rank 3. You are the acknowledged and legal head of the household.

Interests

Trade & Interests: Hunting (boar, monsters), money-lending Holdings: Waterdeep

History

Ethnicity: Illuskan Founded: 1233 DR Previous Eras: 1354 DR

A family of hunters and money-lenders, the Artemel have always had a reputation as being somewhat...uncivilized. They seem to take great delight in less-than-polished manners, and often seem contemptuous of Waterdhavian social mores. In all honesty, there are only two things that have kept them from being outright pariahs: their willingness to lend some of their ample money to their peers, and their reputation as ferocious, vibrant lovers.

Members of the Family

• Lord Arneth "the Boar" Artemel: Patriarch (Renown 10) • 41 years. A heavy, but muscled man with appetites as notoriously expansive as his belly, Arneth is also absurdly influential. In his keeping is multiple generations worth of debts owed his House by other nobles of Waterdeep, and he does not hesitate to call them due when it is useful to do so. By and large, though, he prefers to hold them over the heads of other Houses as a guarantee of civility between his House and theirs. Voracious in his appetites for good food, good wine, and a good rut, Lord Arneth has sired several bastards, only one of which he has deemed promising enough to officially acknowledge and make his heir.
• Taldiruth Artemel: Heir (Renown 4) • 19 years. Young Taldiruth grew up in the South Ward, his mother the head of a tannery at the edge of the city's walls. He grew up fighting, and when he was thirteen, he was taken in to help on Artemel hunts. It wasn't long before he learned that he was the House patriarch's bastard, mostly because of the taunts and contempt of full-blood cousins. But Taldiruth didn't take such abuse laying down, and found himself in more than one fight with those highnose brats, to the amusement of the Artemel adults. At the age of sixteen, his father had seen enough: he formally offered to acknowledge the boy not just as his son, but as his heir. His mother was paid a fat purse, and Taldiruth went off to lord it over his former tormentors at Wingseat villa in the xx Ward. His Presentation went off without a hitch, and he's found himself to be the darling of his generation's social set: he's a stranger in a crowd who have mostly grown up together, and he has rough edges that, as one young lady put it, "are a pleasure to rub up against."

Buildon Artemel Patriarch's cousin (Renown 3) • 19 years Anyone who spends any amount of time around Buildon soon learns that he grew up with his mother, a ranger, on the road until he was twelve, when a goblin ambush nearly cost her her life. Though they both survived, she has been in bad health physically ever since, and his cousin Lord Halmor has made it very clear that she will always have the best of care...so long as Buildon works for the family's interests in business. So now rather than roaming the forests of the North as he'd prefer to do, he helps his House deal with the army of various hunters and woodsmen who work for them.

Holdings

• Resources Limit: If necessary, House Artemel could probably generate about 38,000 gp in liquid coin and valuables within a month.

Wingseat (Villa)

Sul Street, Sea Ward

A chest-high stone wall surrounds the Artemel villa, with a tall fence of wrought iron rising another three feet above that, with vines growing up the wall within the compound to entangle the fence and block views from outside.

• Artemel Seat: Two stories in height, the Artemel Seat house is the domicile of the patriarch and his family, a tradition that goes back multiple generations. The Seat's only concession to the size of a noble house is in the very large dining hall, with room for dozens of diners, and the lord's table upon a dais overlooking the hall. The rest of the structure has living spaces for the lord and his immediate family: parlors, den, offices, and conservatory on the first floor, kitchens and pantry in the cellars, and a second floor given over solely to housing for the family, with a small collection of guest spaces for their visitors.
• The Antler House: In many ways, the Antler House is considered more of the Artemel villa, at least by outsiders, for it is this structure that they see the most of. The ground floor is rich with spaces for socializing, on both a small, intimate scale, and in a much larger capacity, with a ballroom that stretches the entire back of the house overlooking the garden. The upper floor (that is not taken up with the upper reaches of the ballroom) has housing for other members of the house, divided mostly into individual chambers. The Antler House does not have a set of basements, nor kitchens: its members are expected to dine in the Seat.
• Hunter's Respite: A single story building with a bit more utilitarian purpose, the Respite serves two purposes, both imagined to be of utmost relief to those returning from a long hunt. The Respite holds the villa's stables, with household mounts cared for here, and the house's carriages stored in a space down the middle of the building. On the other side of the carriage-way is a large set of baths. Most of the House bathes here (save the servants, who have a baths in the cellar of the Servant Quarters). It is tradition that those returning from abroad – not just hunting, but any distant travel – do not dare to enter any other part of the villa before they have cared for their mount and scrubbed the road from their bodies.
• Heir's Hall: By tradition, an heir of legal age is given the lush apartment suite on the second floor of this building. The heir is made master of this structure, able to extend invitations to others of the family to take up rooms here. The rooms here are a bit more lavish than those in the Antler or Hardride Houses, so the jockeying to win the heir's favor is notable. Generally speaking, most heirs invite those of their generation who share the same interests. Taldiruth has taken great delight in denying his old tormentors this favor, while giving others (like Buildon) all the space they like. He has set aside rooms for his mother, hoping she will join him there, but she has thus far demurred. The first floor has garden-facing apartments, and a modest party hall, with an attached kitchens mostly used for party foods and the like. The upper floor is usually considered the heir's domicile entire, with apartments he may hand out to his favorites.
• Hardride House: Two stories in height, Hardride House is traditionally the place where older and infirm members of the House are given residences. There is a residence for a physician, although there hasn't been call to have one on hand in many years so far. The apartments here are comfortable, well-suited for those with a life's worth of aches and pains, or even the limitations that a hunter's life can inflict on Artemel scions.
• Servant Quarters: A dignified and comfortable space, the Servant Quarters is two stories, mostly divided into living spaces, with several work areas for sewing, baking, laundry, and the like.

Known Faction Perks

Scions and agents of House Artemel in good standing might receive the following benefits:

• Living Quarters: Renown 1+. Those in good standing with the House are given quarters within the House's Waterdhavian villa appropriate to their role in the House.
• Living Expenses/Salaries: Renown 1+. Those in good standing with the House also receive a stipend of 1gp plus 5sp per day per point of Rank. This is not actual cash, but simply familial credit towards payment of Lifestyle costs. This stacks with the same kind of familial credit received from the Waterdhavian Noble Background (see Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide).
• Business Opportunities: Renown 3+. Lynchpins to the House's operations receive access to a variety of business opportunities within the House's money-making endeavors. This is handled as "Running a Business" in downtime months. This does not incur a business expense, but if too many of the character rolls results that end in a loss of money, he can and will find his Rank in the House reduced.
• Heir or Consort (Title): Renown 3+. The holder of one of the legal titles Heir of House and Consort of House, as recorded with the city of Waterdeep, is entitled to an additional 2gp per day in familial credit, per the "Living Expenses/Salaries" entry above. The heir is also accorded certain privileges within the legal system of Waterdeep, including the ability to speak on behalf of his House in some legal proceedings and the like.
• Wealth of the House: Renown 10. The patriarch of the House is in total control of the House's finances and various holdings, established by the laws of Waterdeep.