Red Tower
Frontier Town · Nentir Vale
Red Tower is the kind of town that exists because dangerous places need a staging ground. Built on the ruins of ancient elven and dwarven structures, it sits close enough to the Scarlet Citadel’s approach to be useful and far enough from Fallcrest to operate without much oversight. The people who live there permanently have made a quiet peace with the fact that adventurers die nearby on a regular basis.
The Cage is the town’s most recognizable landmark — a famous tavern constructed from the rib bones of a slain titan, decorated with ancient trophies and crowned by the mounted head of a green dragon. It is not a subtle place. Neither is Red Tower.
Role in the Campaign
Red Tower served as the party’s forward operating base during the long push into the Scarlet Citadel. When Fallcrest was too far to return to between sessions, Red Tower was where the party rested, resupplied, gathered rumors, and occasionally got into trouble that had nothing to do with the citadel.
The town also carried its own mysteries. Strange deaths and disappearances among adventurers using Red Tower as a base hinted that the citadel’s influence extended beyond its walls. Nightmares afflicted the party during their stays — vivid, structured dreams that felt less like anxiety and more like something reaching in. The connection between Red Tower’s history and the ancient structures beneath the citadel was never fully resolved, but the party understood by the end that the town had been sitting in a shadow it could not see.