The village of Redtower, home city of the Scarlet Citadel megadungeon, is a modest community, boasting just a handful of interesting locations for the adventuring crowd that the neighboring Scarlet Citadel sometimes attracts. You’ll find a smithy, stables, an inn, a brewery, and two temples (with a third abandoned temple to boot).

What you won’t find is a proper place to move the loot you find in your travels or a supply of provisions heroes need for dungeoneering. These two new locations (plus NPCs and sidequests to go along with them) fill in those gaps!

Oak & Valerian Apothecary

Valeria Formankova, an elfmarked herbalist from a village outside the Old Margreve, has come to Redtower with the hope of opening up her own apothecary. She picked out a two-story cottage just across from Sweet Sap Brewery.

Unfortunately, Valeria was accosted by bandits while carting her supplies. With her wares and herbalist kit in the hands of the bandits, Valeria’s dream of opening her shop relies on adventurers to recover her belongings.

Getting Started. Bring Valeria into the game after the PCs come back from their first delve into the Scarlet Citadel. The PCs can find Valeria at The Cage Tavern & Inn, lamenting her plight over a drink. By talking to her, the PCs can embark on a short side quest to deal with the local bandits.

To find Valeria’s lost belongings, the PCs must investigate where she was attacked (outside the village at the GM’s discretion), which leads them to a random encounter with bandits (or a creature that got to them first) from the Random Encounters section in the Scarlet Citadel campaign book. Depending on the success of the investigation, you might rule that the PCs have the element of surprise when finally encountering the current owners of Valeria’s belongings.

If the PCs decide not to help Valeria, she eventually hires someone else, perhaps one of the pre-generated characters not used by the players. This comes at a cost—Valeria likes to hold a grudge and happily cooperates with the Mayor Broz on his “discount” deception.

Short-term Development. Once Valeria gets her belongings back, she makes her deal with Mayor Broz and gets Oak & Valerian open to the public after a week. She sells potions, spell components, arcane scrolls and supplies, and magic plant cuttings (see Tome of Heroes for more on magic plants and Hedge Magic) at standard cost if she likes the PCs or at a 25% markup if she bears a grudge. Valeria has common and uncommon items in ready stock but only a 20 perecnt chance of having rare items, and a 5 percent chance of very rare items on request.

Long-term Development. Oak & Valerian fits well in Redtower, with or without the PCs’ patronage. Valeria’s remedies provide comfort for the lumber workers, guardsmen, and townsfolk alike.

This breakout success causes some friction with Sister Cecylia at the Temple of Rava as well as the witch, Zula. Sister Cecylia grows to resent Oak & Valerian because the apothecary offers similar remedies to the temple’s but without the requisite piety and tithing. Zula faces competition in the potion making business and, rather than compete honorably, eventually approaches someone to help sabotage Oak & Valerian’s success.

In addition, Valeria sells a special treatment for insomnia she learned back home.

Valeria’s Sleeping Draught

Wondrous Item, Uncommon                   75 gp

This tincture is distilled from wildflowers taken from the hazardous sleeping fields common to the White Woods. As an action, you can throw this flask up to 20 feet, shattering it on impact. Make a ranged attack against a creature or object, treating the sleeping draught as an improvised weapon. On a hit, the target must succeed on a DC 13 CON save or fall unconscious for 1 minute. The unconsciousness ends if the sleeper takes damage or someone uses an action to shake or slap the sleeper awake. Alternatively, you can use the sleeping draught like an ingested poison, gaining the same effects as using it like an improvised weapon. Constructs, Undead, and creatures immune to being charmed aren’t affected by the sleeping draught.

Templine Trading Post

Templine Trading Post, located just a couple buildings away from Redtower’s river lumberyard, hasn’t been open since the town was called Redleaf. Mayor Broz has long wanted the trading post reopened.

To that end, the mayor sent for Zobeck merchants to reopen the shop. The two gnome merchants, Hibno Dolezal and Ichbon Teastrainer, left for Redtower on a pony and cart laden with goods.

Upon arrival in the White Woods, they fell victim to local dangers: bandits and intoxicating magical flora. Hibno and Ichbon became separated and their belongings lost to the wilds.

Hibno made it to Redtower without his friend. He now rents a room at The Cage and searches for someone to locate his missing supplies and lost friend. Mayor Broz chafes at this obstacle blocking the outpost’s reopening and is eager for any solution to getting Templine Trading Outpost up and running.

Getting Started. You can bring Hibno into the adventure whenever you need to more incentive for the PCs to go back to the Scarlet Citadel. In the adventure, Ichbon Teastrainer is a prisoner in the Scarlet Citadel’s prison area. If the PCs meet him first instead of Hibno, they could work from the angle of prison breakout rather than rescue mission.

As written, Ichbon has no connection to the new NPC outlined here. You could change that to fit this narrative or choose another angle such as body swapping via doppelgänger or memory loss due to extended exposure to magical fauna or induced from the tortures in the citadel.

Finding the pair’s pony, cart, and belongings is a trickier adventure. PCs can find these items in 1d4 terrain encounters, also found in the Random Encounters section in the Scarlet Citadel campaign book.

Short-term Development. With Ichbon safe and the goods returned, Hibno gets to work prepping the Templine Trading Post to open. It takes him a week to get everything ready or three days if Ichbon or someone else helps him. The Templine Trading Post sells adventuring gear, tool kits, simple weapons and ammunition, and light and medium armors.

More importantly, goods can be traded here for 50 percent of their standard cost, or up to 75 percent if the seller made a good impression on the gnomes and is a shrewd haggler. Hibno can also cast identify three times per day courtesy of a magical clockwork magnifying glass he carries at all times. He offers this as an appraisal service for just 75 gp per item.

Long-term Development. The Templine Trading Post suffers from a lack of interest in the community. This is reflected by a lack of interest the gnomes display in running the business. The ordeal that Hibno and Ichbon endured forever colors their outlook o nthis business. Unless the gnomes can be encouraged to find new meaning in their trade, Mayor Broz starts looking for a replacement merchant. Furthermore, if the bandits aren’t fully dealt with, they plan a future heist of the trading post that threatens the safety of the entire village.