OSR: The Eight Deadly Sins of Endon

I'm trying to find ways to better utilize a city map. Sure, there's a list of landmarks and major buildings, but I'd like to have a few pages to provide easy answers for GMs. "Where can I waste my money?" "What is my secret passion and how can I gratify it?" etc. One of the ways to make a city feel like a city is to have lots of interconnected areas, reinforced in the mind of the players by repeated associating under different context. Basically, they keep finding themselves in the same areas for completely different reasons.

If you're designing a city, consider listing where the seven (or eight) deadly sins can be gratified. It's very helpful.

Alexandru Negoita

The Eight Deadly Sins of Endon

Just as they recognize the eight points of a compass and the eight true colours, Endoners recognize (and cater to) eight deadly sins. Costs can be found on pg. ##.

An enterprising GM may want to inflict a single Sin on each PC at character creation; their secret vice, guilty pleasure, or open cause of ruination.

 

1. Gluttony: Dining Halls of Haymarket Square

Fiskelby’s, the Chuzzle, The Wobegone Club, The Red Lion, the Grand Cafe, Boutillon’s.

The fashionable restaurants and clubs of Haymarket Square (6, pg. ##) provide dishes to stagger the imagination. The Upper Class “dines out” rarely, the Middle Class whenever it can afford to, and the Lower Class gorges itself at pie-shops, gin dens, and roasting places.

2. Lust: Rampant Prostitution

Rathbone Place, Miss Chaterham’s, the New Parliament, the Duke’s Stables, Fancy-Free. 

For many, the only way to avoid starvation. In the knocking-shops around Colbraith Square (19, pg. ##) any preference can be accommodated at a few moment’s notice. Nearly everyone visits.

3. Greed: Betting Shops

Wise Fortune’s, Glengallery, Tipping House, the Great Sweeny’s, the Bell, the Chapel.

Endoners bet on everything: horse, dog, and pony races, dog-on-rat fights, boxing, tides, politics, and spur-of-the-moment wagers. Vast fortunes are lost on a throw of the dice or a turn of the cards. The best-appointed gambling dens cluster near Loxdon College (21, pg. ##).

4. Pride: Fashionable Tailors

Velvet Concourse, the Elm Trees, Matwick’s, the Brothers Bamstead, the Old Reliant.

Fashions change every Season. Dandies, courtiers, and ambitious young people follow fashion’s siren song to Needle Circus (24, pg. ##).

5. Envy: Watching Carriages at the Long Mall 

Ooh, there goes Lord Ginthem with a paid companion. And Lady Shreevly, like a clipper with all sails set. Look there, it’s the Duke of Bradham in his dress uniform, back from Foreign Parts, with Miss Scrupe, star of the stage.

Throughout the Season, the rich and powerful take long drives or pleasant walks through the Long Mall (12, pg. ##), watched with awe and envy.

6. Wrath: Boxing

Knock-em-Down Hole, the Splitters, Jack Rail’s Den, the Whisperplane, Hal Harrow’s, Squeakers 

Fighting pits and rat-rings are technically illegal but are rarely shut down or prosecuted. All red-blooded Endoners love a good fight. Anyone can participate if they don’t mind a few bruises. They can be found near Saint Nigel’s Workhouse (23, pg. ##). 

7. Sloth: Opium Dens

Land of Dreams, the Blue Steeple, the Clay Bins, Beckim’s, Master Morpheus’s Chambers
 
Though it is not a widespread vice, many people of all Classes and backgrounds take up opium to dull the everyday pain of life. Many dens of lassitude and decay can be found near Hasselby Court (10, pg. ##). 

8. Hatred: Newsagents

Foreign Agents in Our City, Sick Poor Spread Plague, Den of Iniquity, Child Murderer Walks Free, Luxury in Jail, Hanging Is Too Good For Him, Dozens Dead: Who to Blame? 
 
In Endon, it is said that any beast can be wrothful but only a men and tigers can hate. Wrath is bodily, foggy, red. Hate is cerebral, sharp, icy. Many small newspapers and pamphlets are deliberately inflammatory, playing on the worst fears and the deepest prejudices of their readers. Newsagents can be found on every street corner; discarded pamphlets in every dustbin. Of all the eight deadly sins, hate is the easiest to obtain.