After being inspired by TheFlux's post, I wanted to take a crack at His Majesty The Worm's free citybuilding stuff. The city building rules are free, so here we go.
First draw, the core of town, which was the Six of Cups. Giving us: "The Cult of Mythrys reigns. The Secret Pope makes papal bulls which become the law of the land, enforced by the Inquisition. The High Mithraeum is hidden somewhere under the center of the City."
A city ruled by a Secret Pope! Instantly, I'm thinking that the Pope is not known to the population. This could be a thing like there's an entire puppet government in place. The cult running real elections with 90% of the candidates being their own members, allowing enough "regular" people to get elected every few years to seem less suspicious. Even then those people could be outvoted easily to "pass" a mandate from the Secret Pope.
Let's look to the North: The Four of Pentacles, which is "Lampwright's Street", a district of lamp, candle, and other light source creators. This area is always lit, so the thieves guild is pretty active here. The leaders of this district and the guild are in a friendly rivalry. You can also buy Fireworks here.
To the East of the city center: The Ace of Pentacles". This is "The Licehouse" and it's the poorest district of the city. Low status labor is done here, such as tanners and something called Gong Farmers, and Knackermen (?). The special action here allows you to dispose of bodies as a pig farmer will feed it to their pigs, no questions asked.
South: Eight of Wands. "The Garden of Ravenous Roses". A large green space in town, but its mazelike paths have many dead ends, while the plants seemingly reach out for you. You can have a delightful picnic in this too-quiet place, which allows for new backstory creation for every party member.
Final city hub area, which is to the west of city center. The Knight of Pentacles, which is "Whorestown" AKA "The People's Republic of Pussy". This section rules lmao. "The whores of Whorestown rebelled against the central authorities
two years ago. Everybody has been so busy with the coming of the Underworld,
nobody has yet expended the resources to return this district to the yoke. In some
ways, Whorestown is a tiny political experiment in the midst of feudalism. The
women and men who make their living there are experimenting with philosophies
that are hitherto absent in this pseudo-historical fantasy kitchen sink." Sex workers unionized and because a semi-autonomous state. The Rumors for here is that you can find a tunnel to almost anywhere from here, and it's City action allows you to gain a secret about a City NPC. Very cool.
For the Sprawl of the city, I need to lay out 6 more cards. 1 for each of the Pentacles and 3 for the Wands. We'll start north and go clockwise again.
Branching off from the Lampwright's Street, we get the Queen of Cups, the "Centrum Bank". Main money changer location but also, is coincidentally, run by the same Cult that runs our government. Money shenanigans abound. They can also store gold for you should you need them to. Their special action, I want to post verbatim because it's great. "Take out a loan: You can take out a loan of almost any size. It has a 30% interest rate. It's not a great idea."
Next to the Licehouse, we have the King of Wands: "The Court of Wands". This is the Sorcerer district, where also the governing body of magic resides. A place to punish rogue sorcerers. It's part guild, part government, and part living district. If you join the Court of Wands, you can receive a magic staff, once you pay your dues.
Off the Ravenous Rose Garden, we'll have 3 sprawl districts.
- Knight of Wands - The Temple of God's Wives - Formerly where the God's Wives lived, a highly regarded religious sect, comprised of intersex and third-gendered people. They wielded significant social capital. Now, the district is a ruined temple and some houses where people outside the gender binary congregate. Still hospitable, they can reciprocate gifts in kind, and be a useful source of wisdom.
- Eight of Cups - The Philosopher's Forum - Oh my god they made Twitter a city district. This district is full of philosophers who debate things, and make wagers on rhetorical arguments between other parties. Many of the philosophers here reject modern education, including the value of the written word. You can use your City Action here as essentially an auger. Spend some money to gather a crowd and get them liquored up then speak your theory about the Underworld. If it's mostly correct, they'll cheer, if they boo, it's mostly wrong, and if they argue it's partially right but has some flaws.
- Ten of Cups - Alchemist's Hall - The Alchemists benefitted greatly from the appearance of the Underworld. The potent and mysterious reagents down there made them more popular and prolific than ever. A perfect spot for delvers to sell the spoils of their descent.
Final sprawl district, off to the west: The Queen of Wands. This is "The Tower Gnostic", a place where unnatural philosophers reside. These are people who speculate on things outside the Natural world, such as demons, the shape of magic, and far planes. You can spend your city action to create a spell, which requires you to PULL LETTERS FROM A SCRABBLE BAG????
This city is SO GODDAMN MAGICAL. We have the Court of Wands, the Alchemist's Hall, and the Towner of Gnostic. We have the underground paths of Whorsetown, the chance to find the Rebellion in the Forum. There's a lot of fun stuff here. If I had to pick a district for the Underworld entrance to appear in, I am torn between the Alchemist Hall, the Tower of Gnostic, or... I think the Garden of Ravenous Roses would be really interesting too.
This rules. This feels incredibly evocative. I want to run a Blades game in this city, or just His Majesty the Worm I suppose. Thanks again to Flux for this.