House Zulpair

House Zulpair

Personages

Matriarch: Hamaleiya Zulpair Consort: Hungar Zulpair (m) Heir: Milan Zulpair (younger sister) Membership (Nobles): 24 Predominant Faith: Umberlee

Faction Details

Common Descriptors: Cunning, bloodthirsty, pleasure-seeking Primary Classes: Rogue, Cleric (Umberlee) Alignments: CN, 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: Merchant shipping Holdings: Waterdeep

History

Ethnicity: Tethyrian Founded: 1310 DR Previous Eras: 1354 DR

Members of the Family

• Hamaleiya Zulpair: Matriarch (Renown 10) • 45 years. Practical, practical, practical. There is no higher compliment nor worse insult laid at Lady Hamaleiya's name than that, and that's precisely how she likes it. Unlike most of the nobility, Hama doesn't look down on or resent the guildsmasters and their power; how could she, when they are her biggest customers? In spite of all that, Hamaleiya makes plenty of appearances at the parties and the dinners and the galas and the balls. She simply also accepts invitations to guild parties as well.
• Hungar Zulpair: Consort (Renown 4) • 25 years. Hungar will be the first to tell you that he is Lady Hamaleiya's boy toy. Oh, he's the firstborn son of Tahrl Tarolier, the guildmaster of the Order of Master Shipwrights, and he knows that he was married off to an ally of the guild to keep both his wife and his father happy. Fortunately, he's perfectly happy with that. He isn't burdened with an overabundance of expectations, and now snobby pretty people who once sneered at him are forced to permit him into their company, so as not to offend his wife. It's all very delightful.
• Milan Zulpair: Heir, matriarch's younger sister (Renown 8) • 39 years. If Hamaleiya is practical, Milan is extravagant. She remains on the cutting edge of fashion, and with good cause: all Zulpair ships have "Milan's Bounty," a purse of coin to the captain who can bring her the latest, cutting edge fashion from far-off places. Of the three in charge, Milan is the most at home in a dainty salon and the one most comfortable aboard a Zulpair vessel. She has a naturally flirtateous way about her, and loves to encourage sailors to dote on her when she is the "helpless landlubber maid" aboard ship.

Generally speaking, there are three other branches of the family, each of whom "control" one of the House's merchant fleets. Though no branch is guaranteed mastery of one of the fleets, it is a strong enough tradition by now that whoever heads up the House would find themselves in serious opposition with their kin by breaking it without good cause. Members of these branches who come to serve aboard ships and even captain them usually do so aboard vessels in their branch's fleet.

The Shining Families

The largest branch, made up of about ten Zulpairs, who oversee the merchant lines to the Shining South, the so-called Shining Fleet.

The Swordsea Families

About seven in all, these Zulpairs govern the Islands fleet, which sees trade in the island nations in the Sea of Swords, all the way down to Chult.

The Farjourney Families

The smallest of the fleets is governed by the smallest branch, some four in total. Though they have long governed short-distance shipping runs to other Northern coastal settlements, this is the branch that also oversees the Maztican trade route. As a result, they are quite wealthy and thus, influential. Hamaleiya and her sister hail from this branch of the Zulpairs.

Holdings

• Resources Limit: If necessary, House Zulpair could probably generate about 29,000 gp in liquid coin and valuables within a month.

Thousandsails Hall (Villa)

Delzorin Street, Sea Ward

Just across the Street of Spells from the House of Wonder, the Zulpair villa is made up of three buildings.

• Thousandsails Hall: The main house, named Thousandsails Hall proper, boasts an elegant ball room on the ground floor, with a second-story balcony and musician's loft overlooking it. The rest of the first floor is basic family functions, with bed suites on the second and third floors. Though this is considered the "main house" of the compound, it is the less-luxurious of them, and so is generally given over to less-important members of the House. At the back of the garden are two other buildings: the Sweetwinds Theater and the Old Study.
• Sweetwinds Theater: The Sweetwinds does indeed have a fair-sized theater in it with luxurious seating in a semi-circle around the stage. The Zulpairs throw parties where a performance of a play or a musician's art are the center of the night's entertainment. The rest of the Theater is given over to extremely luxurious apartments, although it lacks a kitchens (meaning servants must carry trays of food to members of the House who dwell here).
• The Old Study: The Old Study is actually an old set of offices, built in the style of the business buildings around the villa. It once housed the business offices for the Zulpair Fleets, but those days are long gone. It has been converted into ample living space, this time for the Fleet Masters and their immediate families. Each floor is divided into two entire sets of rooms, each sufficient for a family of four or so. The three Fleet Masters and the Heir are usually given these suites, but Milan currently prefers her rooms in the Theater.

Zulpair Merchant Fleets

• The Shining Fleet: Western Heartlands, Amn, Tethyr, Calimshan, Lake of Steam, Shaar, Tashalar. The original Zulpair fleet, traveling between Waterdeep and the family's old holdings in Tethyr. To this day, it is still the largest and most routinely profitable of the fleets.
• The Swordsea Fleet: Whalebones, Moonshaes, Nelanther Isles, Lantan, Chult. When a schism in the family threatened to destroy it, the patriarch of the time assigned one faction half of the family's ships and restricted them to creating trade with the nations in the Sea of Swords proper. The original animosity between the sides has come and gone over the years, and the Swordsea Fleet keeps to its routes gladly.
• The Farjourney Fleet: Northern Sword Coast, Maztica. Long having been one of the smaller branches, these Zulpairs leapt on the short-ride routes that the rest of the family did not wish to undertake. The fleet's name was originally ironic, but when word of Maztica arrived, and only the small fleet looking for a true money-making endeavor was willing to risk it, they won the right to legitimately hold that title.

Rumors About House Zulpair

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Known Faction Perks

Scions and agents of House Zulpair 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.
• Ship's Captain (Title): Renown 4+. Those with the inclination toward doing so may be made the captain of one of the Adarbrent ships, as a test for future possible leadership within the House. They become the master of one of the Zulpair ships, with a full ship and crew ready and able to do their bidding - though they are not free to do as they like, for the captains answer to the House's Fleet Masters.
• An Available Ship: Renown 5+. Those in very good standing with the House can call upon the services of one of the House's ships. Ideally, a tenday is required before doing so, to make sure the ship isn't needed for any House business, but a ship can be called upon in emergency purposes within a number of hours equal to (11 - your Rank), though this does negatively impact the House's finances.
• Fleet Master (Title): Renown 7+. There are three who hold this title in House Zulpair, one for each of the House fleets.
• 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.