The Armorium

City Guide I

Shop Exterior

The two-story wooden house that stands before you is painted red, with white railings along the wide front porch and upper balcony. Broad wooden steps lead up to the spacious porch. Two suits of armor, one plate mail and the other scale mail, stand guard next to the steps. There are two doors leading into the structure, one at the top of the stairs labeled “Armorium,” and another smaller door at the extreme right of the porch. A wooden sign depicting two shields and a suit of armor painted in black hangs out over the porch to attract the attention of passersby.

The two suits of armor that flank the entrance to Norville’s place remain during the day, but in the evening he brings them inside.

The smaller door to the right opens onto a stairway that leads up to Norville’s dwelling. It is locked at all times.

Norville has hollowed out a large, oval-shaped window to the left of the front door. A wooden flap is locked over it at night, but during the day the flap is propped up by a beam to allow light into the establishment. This window is fashioned in the gnome style, and is small evidence of Norville’s longing to return to his people.

Two normal glass windows on the side of the house follow the stairs up at an angle, being 8 and 15 ft. off the ground respectively. Three similar windows shed light on the second floor, two overlooking the balcony and one more to the rear of the house.

Walnut Doors: Hardness 5, Hit Points: 22, Break DC 24, Open Lock DC 40.

The Armorium

1) Store

Inside the central door is a large display room that showcases Norville’s latest creations. Four square wooden posts support the ceiling and various suits of armor are mounted on wire mesh mannequins around the room. Shields of all types and sizes ring the walls and lay stacked in piles on the floor. A wooden door stands closed on the wall to your left.

A small gnome wearing strange looking leather armor over common clothing walks out from an alcove at the back of the room and greets you.

Norville has a desk set up at the back left corner of the room, and directly opposite, hidden from patrons view, lies a small alcove that serves as a miniature workshop. He uses this to make minor repairs to clasps, buckles and the like.

When in the shop he always wears “tiled” leather armor, a bulky suit that has sliding tiles that can provide more or less protection in different areas as the wearer desires. The armor is bulkier than normal leather, having all the properties of studded leather armor except the armor bonus, which remains at +2. He keeps a masterwork light hammer at his belt at all times and another behind the desk in this room. In a pinch he can use his tool hammers as weapons, but he suffers a –1 to hit and damage with these makeshift weapons.

The door on the left wall leads to a thin hallway filled with Norville’s special collection. Inside rests an assortment of magical shields and armors, as well as a few protective devices including an amulet of natural armor +2 and a pair of bracers of armor +3.

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City Guide I

Goods

Customers can find any type of common armor or shield in the Armorium, and Norville is pleased to custom fit a suit of armor, even full plate mail. Magical items and items made of special materials are detailed below.

1) Studded Leather +1 2) Chain Mail +3 3) Breastplate +3 (sized for a gnome or halfling) 4) Scale Mail +2 5) Leather Armor of Sneaking +2 (sized for a gnome or halfling) 6) Small wooden shield +2 7) Large steel shield of bashing +2 8) Small steel shield of fire resistance +1 (ignores first 5 points of fire damage each round) 9) Large adamantite shield

2)Norville’s Quarters (Front Room)

An open doorway leads into this large room. A square glass window to your right sheds light on the room, which is furnished in a comfortable manner. There are two similar windows on the far wall to your left.

A small, well-stuffed red chair sits under the nearest window, and a side table holding a pipe and several interlocked pieces of metal rests beside the chair. A glass bowl filled with water sits upon a mahogany stand, and several tiny, exotic fish swim inside. Two colorful rugs cover the wooden floor

Standing open on the opposite wall are two doorways that appear to have had their doors removed. A poorly drawn portrait of a proud looking dwarf hangs on the wall in between these doorways. This is Norville’s sitting room, where he quietly reads his book of folk tales whenever he allows himself a quiet moment. The pipe on the side table is full of normal tobacco. Anyone searching under the chair’s cushion will find a section of embroidered silk, given to Norville by a secret admirer. It fell here one night as he fell asleep in the chair, and his distracted mind has since forgotten about the charm.

The portrait staring down at him is that of his dwarven mentor. He doesn’t really like the painting, but he couldn’t refuse his teary-eyed companion as he bequeathed to him this amateur work.

The Armorium

3)Norville’s Quarters (Bedroom)

Only two pieces of furniture stand in this windowless room: a bed with two gnomish “moss pillows” neatly stacked at its head, and a bookshelf upon which several books are neatly arranged.

Metal bits and pieces cover the floor here, making walking without shoes a treacherous proposition. Springs, joints, bolts, and washers join a variety of strange little tools to cover the room.

In the back corner of the room stands a wire mesh mannequin holding a gnome-sized steel shield that bears a painting of a duck flying over a mound of earth, all this in front of a colorful sunset.

On the bookshelf are Norville’s collected tomes on engineering, armorsmithing, and metallurgy, many of which he inherited from his dwarven master. A thick book with an orange cover and gold trim contains gnomish folk tales, a book he takes down whenever he feels wistful and homesick.

The wire mesh mannequin holds Norville’s greatest creation: a gnome-sized shield that bears his family crest. He had the shield enchanted to sing to him in gnomish whenever he speaks the word “mother,” for that is all he remembers of his mother, who died when he was barely 3 years old. It will radiate Transmutation magic if detected.

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City Guide I

The metal bits are worthless, but all of the tools in the room are of masterwork quality. Under a loose floorboard (Search DC 16) near his bed Norville keeps his accumulated wealth. The stash amounts to 22 pp, 83 gp, 6 finely cut sapphires worth 75 gp each, and a deck of illuminated playing cards he stole from the engineering school.

The Armorium

4) Norville’s Quarters (Common Room)

This plain room is nothing but a junkpile, with bits of metal, wire, and tools strewn about everywhere. Some larger pieces are also thrown into one corner, mostly half suits of armor modified in strange ways that look difficult if not impossible to wear.

There is nothing of value in this room unless a character is making a particular study of the cluttered mind of a gnome.

5) The Forge

A mixture of sawdust and hay covers the floor of this area. One end holds a sophisticated forge while the other is enclosed. A variety of saws, hammers, and other tools are strewn about the closed part of the structure, and another few dozen specialty tools hang on the wall. Several workbenches and cabinets fill the room, and you can see drawer after drawer filled with metal bits, screws, and nails.

Behind the house that serves him as shop and home is Norville’s forge and workshop. Beneath this open wooden structure is a smithy that Norville uses to make repairs to armor as well as forge new pieces. There is a 50% chance that he will be in the forge when PCs arrive at his shop.

He pays a local orphan 1 cp a day to watch the shop for him while he works. The orphan boy, his face streaked with mud and his clothing in tatters, will greet the PCs with a heavy accent and try to keep them busy until Norville presents himself. At night Norville locks the door to his workshop with a sturdy lock, but he often leaves tools scattered around the forge area, which gets him into trouble from time to time (see below).

Oak Door: Hardness 5, Hit Points: 20, Break DC 21, Open Lock DC 28.

Plot Hooks:

Lately Norville’s tools have gone missing, and he would very much like to have them recovered. Alas, Norville has no time to go chasing thieves and so the mystery has gone unsolved. He offers a reward to the characters if they will find out who has been taking his things. After some investigation, the PCs find the lair of a kobold tribe that has been taking the tools. They have lost a valuable tribal artifact down a crack in the earth, and they are using the stolen tools to dig their way down to it.

Item: Sharpshield

Sharpshield- This small metal shield has razor sharp edges and is used to defend against monstrous attackers whose long reach and dangerous appendages can spell the doom of an unprepared combatant. In any round in which the character wielding the sharpshield fights defensively or uses total defense, he may take one attack with the shield as a free action against any opponent who attacks him with natural weaponry (this includes characters using unarmed strike). This attack is at his highest base attack bonus and does not provoke an attack of opportunity (the shield counts as an

exotic weapon for this purpose, so the normal –4 penalty applies unless the character takes a proficiency with the sharpshield). The wielder retains the AC bonus of the shield while using it in this way.

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City Guide I The Armorium

Cost Damage Critical Range Increment Weight Type

28 gp 1d4 19-20 x2 - 6 lb. Slashing

*Any damage inflicted with the sharpshield can be added to any ensuing grapple check due to a creature’s Improved Grab ability.

Norville Gaxonn: Male Gnome, Exp13, Size: Small humanoid; HD: 13d6+26; hp: 75; Init: +2; Spd: 15 ft.; AC : 19 (touch 12, flat-footed 17) Atk: +10/+5 melee (1d4+1, light hammer) or +11/+6 ranged (1d4+1, light hammer); AL: CG ; SV: Fort +6, Ref +6, Will +8; Str 12, Dex 14, Con 15, Int 16, Wis 10, Cha 10.

Skills: Appraise + 17, Craft (Armorsmithing) +21, Disable Device +17, Gather Information +14, Hide +20, Knowledge (Engineering) +21, Open Lock +16, Profession (Blacksmith) +14, Profession (Engineer) +14, Search +17

Feats: Armor Proficiency (Medium), Endurance, Shield Proficiency, Skill Focus [Craft (Armorsmith)], Skill Focus [Knowledge (Engineering)].

Possessions: two masterwork light hammers, scale mail +2, Gaxonn Shield

Personality : Norville is a cheerful gnome, always busy fiddling with small contraptions and “defensive improvements.” He enthusiastically greets all that enter his shop and insists on showing them his latest creations. Even when potential customers show more interest in his shields than in his good selection of modified armor, he keeps a smile on his face and a bounce in his step. He will quickly lose interest in customers who refuse to at least examine his latest invention, though, and move on to more “interesting” clients.

Appearance: Norville loves to wear a suit of his tiled leather armor while showing customers the shop. This odd looking armor is made in a checkerboard pattern and pieces can flip to other sections of the suit. He also wears a red cap topped by a shaggy white ball and off white tunic and trousers. History: Norville’s father always tried to interest his boy in something besides fighting. As a young gnome he was pugnacious and inquisitive, an explosive combination that always seemed to get him into trouble. Neighbors would often find him in their homes “fighting” pests, even if they happened to be the family pet. Finally, in a last bid to divert his son’s excess energy, the beleaguered man sent him to train with nearby engineers. The lad showed immediate promise as an engineer. He quickly identified and classified even complex problems, although his lack of formal knowledge often kept him from solving them. Norville worked through the night to find answers, but much to his mentor’s dismay he often discarded his books in favor of unique and novel solutions. Eventually this tendency got him into big trouble when one day he decided to help one of his professors with a particularly difficult problem he had been working on. The results were disastrous. Not only had he wrecked an expensive piece of equipment and the professor’s lab, but he had also ruined a presentation his mentor was giving to the mage’s guild the following week. Embarrassed and indignant, he left the engineers and made his way to the city. He found work as a claspmaker for a local dwarven armorsmith, and eventually began to apprentice with the jovial dwarf. Although he sometimes added “improvements” to the suits of armor he created, he was a reliable employee and followed the dwarf’s instructions. When the old smith decided to retire, he asked Norville if he would like to buy the shop and stay on as chief armorsmith. Norville jumped at the chance, and he has run the shop successfully ever since.

Traveler Knowledge: Norville Gaxonn is an eccentric armorsmith who occasionally turns out unique and helpful items. His renown for creating excellent shields may be a myth, the measure of their quality increasing only in comparison to the strange armors he produces. Nevertheless he is a trustworthy and friendly fellow, and his shop is worth a visit when in the city. Resident Knowledge: Norville seems a happy fellow who doesn’t drink or get into much mischief. He spends much of his time working in his forge or up in his home, though he does get out to public gatherings and meetings on a frequent basis. The only problem with striking up a conversation with Norville is he will either get caught up in talking about his latest creation or insist that he has just the right solution for a problem that you are having, whether real or imagined by the inquisitive gnome. Hidden Knowledge: Norville has carved out a good living in the town, but he dearly misses his home. He would love to see his father again, but isn’t sure he can face the shame that his dismissal from the engineering school. Any information about his home village, or talk of gnomes in general, elicits much appreciation from the gnome and a deal on goods for sale.