Skip to main content

High Forge

Dwarven Mountain City • Where the Campaign Began • Liberated from the Iron Claws

Overview​

High Forge is a dwarven city built into a mountain, where the campaign began and where Olivia served as a detective before she retired. The party fled it during the dragon attack of Sessions 6–7, and returned in Session 25 to find it ruled by Helja Ungar's Iron Claws under the dragons. Working with the Resistance, the ravers and eventually the dragons themselves, the party broke the Iron Claws in Sessions 36–37: Silas and Bru killed Helja in her Forge Heart throne room, and Silas used the dragon orb to send the besieging dragons away.

When the party left for Greyport in Session 38, the city was being rebuilt under Chalk Rock and a softening Grimjaw, Helja's former lieutenant. Helisanna was last reported riding a black dragon in the city's blocked-off depths (Session 37), and the ravers she led were sent back to High Forge from the Lotus Casino in Interlude XII.

The City​

  • The Market Ward — Where foreigners are allowed without paperwork or a sponsor: inns, traders, bars, music venues and the underground racing scene, including the Cog and Steam tavern and the Little Hovel (Sessions 1–2).
  • The residential halls — Closed to visitors without papers (Session 2). Olivia's apartment opens off the Great Hall.
  • The Great Hall and the Forge Heart — The Great Hall runs from the city gate to the Forge Heart, an ancient magma-forged anvil temple where Doomfall played its big concert (Session 5) and where Helja later kept her throne room (Session 36).
  • The Cathedral of Tyr — Doubles as the city's courthouse and jail (Session 3).
  • The royal vaults — A thousand-year-old gold-plated hall of numbered vaults, including Vault 7, robbed by the party in Sessions 28–30.
  • The Under Lake — The underground lake district, where the ravers gathered and partied (Sessions 23, 26–27, 35).
  • Tunnels and mines — Old royal tunnels and mining routes run under and out of the city; the Iron Claws controlled and taxed them (Sessions 7, 23, 26). City maps also show a once-hidden elevator running to the top of the mountain (Session 35).
  • Red Brook — A training village outside the city that grew, after the liberation, into a bustling market town where many evacuees settled (Sessions 37–38).

History with the Party​

The Night Out and the Dragon Attack (Sessions 1–7)​

The campaign opened with a tavern brawl in the Market Ward and Helisanna's breakout show at the Little Hovel, which won Doomfall a 10,000-gold concert at the Forge Heart. Over the following days Elspeth prepared for the underground Highforge Sprint amid sabotage from rival racers, Olivia began searching for her missing grandson George, and assassins targeted Silas at the concert. Elspeth won the race just as dragons began attacking the city (Session 6). The party drove into the burning Market Ward to rescue Victor, crossed the Great Hall to the mines, bribed their way past an Iron Claws tunnel checkpoint, and escaped the city (Session 7).

Under the Iron Claws (Sessions 23–35)​

After the dragon attack the Iron Claws took the city, controlling its gates and tunnels and putting bounties on the party (Session 23). Helja ruled under the authority of the dragons, who held the upper levels and took the city's gold as tribute (Sessions 24–25). The party slipped back in through tunnels they drew with Scarlet's magical paint, rescued Lark's family, recruited Ohma and joined Victor's resistance (Session 26); bombed the V drug facilities, killing Grimjaw (Session 27); robbed the royal vaults of 500,000 gold meant as tribute (Sessions 28–30); turned the dragons Duncan and Betty against Helja by revealing she did not hold the orb (Session 32); and fought Crang for control of the ravers, a battle in which Helisanna split into two women, Helisanna and Leliana (Sessions 33–34).

Liberation (Sessions 36–37)​

On the day of the uprising the Iron Claws took hostages in the Great Hall. The party freed them during Helisanna's concert, and Silas, feigning betrayal, was brought to Helja's throne room in the Forge Heart, where he and Bru killed her and Bru's charges brought the room down. In the Great Hall, Silas then used the orb to order the dragons out of the city; Duncan, ridden by Helisanna, killed Betty, and the Forge Heart exploded behind the party.

In the month that followed, Chalk Rock, who had led an evacuation of hundreds of civilians, and Grimjaw — resurrected, still authoritarian but softening — rebuilt the city together. Many evacuees never returned. Lady Corwin's mercenary army marched in, found little resistance, and reported the city "sacked and nothing worth saving," while its soldiers brought back stories of a witch riding a black dragon through the city's depths. The party kept its van, the Zoomfall, at the city gates as a base, and Leliana taught music to children, including former Iron Claws.

Departure (Session 38)​

Weeks later the party found Chalk Rock confident and muscled from training with Olivia, a new workshop bearing Tony's symbol opposite Bernardo's pizza shop, and Helja's journals in her upper-class apartment. They left the F-150 with Chalk Rock and set out for Greyport by way of Red Brook.

Session History​

  • Session 1 — The party's night out in the Market Ward ends in a tavern brawl, Helisanna's breakout show at the Little Hovel, and a 10,000-gold concert deal.
  • Session 2 — Elspeth re-enters the city's underground racing scene and finds her car sabotaged, while Olivia starts investigating George's disappearance.
  • Session 3 — Olivia gets church authority at the Cathedral of Tyr and the party attends an open Twilight Company meeting beneath a bar.
  • Session 4 — The party sabotages rival racers' cars in the garage bays for the Twilight Company.
  • Session 5 — Doomfall plays the Forge Heart while the party fights off two attempts on Silas's life.
  • Session 6 — Elspeth wins the Highforge Sprint just as dragons begin attacking the city.
  • Session 7 — The party rescues Victor from the burning Market Ward and escapes the city through the mining tunnels past an Iron Claws checkpoint.
  • Session 23 — A bounty hunter reveals that the Iron Claws took control of High Forge after the dragon attack and that purple-eyed ravers are gathering there.
  • Session 24 — Over the radio, Victor tells Bru that Helja rules the city under the dragons, who hold its upper levels.
  • Session 25 — At the refugee camp outside the city the party learns of the Iron Claws' tribute to the dragons and meets Lark, who offers a way in.
  • Session 26 — The party paints new tunnels into the city, rescues Lark's family, recruits Ohma and reaches the resistance headquarters beside a vast raver party.
  • Session 27 — The party bombs V production facilities for Victor, frees test subjects, and kills Grimjaw.
  • Session 28 — The party finds the third target was Victor's own lab and begins Lady Corwin's heist on the royal vaults.
  • Session 29 — Bru, Elspeth and Olivia take a truck from the vault garage past dancing golems.
  • Session 30 — The party completes the vault heist, reads the draconic tablets and defeats the turned Captain Corwin.
  • Session 32 — The party turns the dragons Duncan and Betty against Helja and recruits ravers at the Little Hovel.
  • Session 33 — Following Chalk Rock's missing-persons case into the sewers, the party finds April Bonal and heads for Crang's nightclub.
  • Session 34 — The party fights Crang and his ravers beneath the city, and Helisanna splits into two women, Helisanna and Leliana.
  • Session 35 — The party shops in the Under Lake district and takes city maps from Olivia's old precinct ahead of the uprising.
  • Session 36 — The party frees the hostages in the Great Hall, and Silas and Bru kill Helja in the Forge Heart throne room.
  • Session 37 — Silas sends the dragons away, the Forge Heart explodes, and in the month after, Chalk Rock and Grimjaw rebuild the city.
  • Interlude 12 — The party sets out from Olivia's apartment for the Lotus Casino, and the casino's reset sends Helisanna and her ravers back to High Forge.
  • Session 38 — The party searches Helja's apartment, gathers for brunch, and leaves High Forge for Greyport.