Thursday, January 21, 2010

Merchant Quarters: Julia's Grill

Greetings!

I present below an NPC and merchant quarters. Small details are often helpful with NPC’s, and Julia’s Grill can be used effectively and colorfully in any city environment.

Semper Fidelis,

SHARK

Julia's Grill

Julia's Grill is owned and operated by Julia, a commoner, professional cook and part-time prostitute. Julia lives in the nearby apartment complex, which is right next to the small shop. The shop is a small, stone room, perhaps 20'-ft. long, 12'-ft. wide, and 7'-ft. high. The shop has a tiled roof, and is partially open at the front side facing the street with a 4 and a half foot high stone countertop that extends perhaps 12'-ft down the length of the building. Inside, Julia has several large grills, fire-pits, brick ovens and iron cauldrons from which she and her staff of half a dozen women cook sausages, flatbread, soups, stews, biscuits and loaves of bread. Julia's Grill typically offers water, wine, and one kind of ale from several barrels and casks she keeps in the building.

Patrons of Julia's Grill are typically fellow tenants on their way to work, or coming home after a long day. During the midday hours, many come by for a quick bite for lunch, as well as others that are simply pedestrians walking by in the streets going about their business. Patrons come up to the stone countertop, and order what they want to eat and drink, which is cooked for them fresh right there on the spot. Patrons typically gather about and stand while eating, or lean against the countertop and walls nearby enjoying their meal.

Julia and her employees--typically other women that live in the apartment complex, as well as their daughters--usually open the shop up at 0600 in the morning, and remain open until 10:00 PM at night, at least five days a week.

Julia Neberus
Julia Zero-Level Commoner
Race: Human
Alignment: Chaotic Good
Abilities
STR 10 DEX 10 CON 15 INT 14 WIS 14 CHA 15 COM 14
HP: 6
AC: 10

Julia is 5'6", and weighs 145-lbs. She has olive-coloured skin, long black hair to the middle of her back, and dark brown eyes. Julia is only 24 years old, and is attractive, friendly, and cheerful. She was married to a soldier, but since he died on campaign, she is now a widow, and used the family savings to open up this little shop so she can survive and provide for her three children--a daughter, age 10; a daughter, age 8; and a son, age 6. Julia got married when she was 14 years old, and was happily married to her husband until his tragic death in some foreign campaign three years ago.

Julia rents a four-room apartment in the apartment complex, and also pays a monthly rental fee to the apartment owner for renting the building she uses for her business. Julia also pays the local city business tax, as well as paying a monthly dues fee to the local merchant's guild. Julia makes regular donations to the local neighborhood watch station, and often provides local neighborhood militia members with free meals periodically. Julia is active in her neighborhood, and also provides assistance and donations to poor single mothers and impoverished families that live in the same apartment complex.

Julia has several girlfriends that are prostitutes, and she helps them whenever she can as well. While not a professional prostitute, and increasingly becoming a successful, self-employed entrepreneur, Julia has occasionally in the past embraced especially nice and attractive men for companionship and profit to help make ends meet, and is willing to take advantage of particular opportunities that present themselves to her. Her prostitute girlfriends periodically send especially nice and charming men her way, and provide only the best referrals, as Julia is quite picky and selective for such arrangements. Julia is especially wary and refuses to embrace any such arrangements with married men of her apartment complex, or those who are married to any women that are her friends. Julia has many friends amongst her neighbors, both male and female, and her friends are typically simple, hard-working folk. Julia has several friends in the local watch, as well as the merchant's guild, and among various street urchins, beggars, and wanderers amongst the dark, unwashed masses of the urban poor.

Julia's Clientele

Most of Julia's clientele are from lower-class to middle-class backgrounds, and many of her regular customers are also fellow tenants of the same apartment complex that she lives in, and are her neighbors. Spontaneous patrons are often fishermen, laborers’, and various tradesmen and workmen as well as the local watch or militia patrol. Many servants going about their master's errands stop by as well, in addition to various working women, laundresses, fruit and vegetable vendors, wives, and prostitutes.

Menu at Julia's Grill
4 SP--Sausages and Flatbread/Biscuits
6 SP--Bowl of Sausage and Pasta with Flatbread/Biscuits
6 SP--Bowl of Stew and Rice with Flatbread/Biscuits
6 SP--Bowl of Soup and Flatbread/Biscuits
6 SP--Bowl of Stew and Flatbread/Biscuits
5 CP--Biscuits (2)
5 CP--Flatbread (2)
1 SP--Mug of Wine
2 SP--Mug of Ale
3 SP--Mug of Tea

1 comment:

  1. A few months ago, a neighborhood watch member (aka volunteer vigilante) went overboard in his harassment of suspects and got shot as a result.

    http://areyoutargeted.com/2010/01/21/first-blood/

    ReplyDelete