A serious question for serious role players...

[Jai_V]

While I'd really like to have the place for the prestige (or infamy), the bonus money to my faction paycheck, and the RP reasons, I really don't want any arguments started over this. If anyone's not ok with it, I'm not going to pursue it.

[Doubtful]

Given the lore, its attitudes towards sex, sexuality and the general deific layout I don't see anyone objecting icly to a brothel.

Whoever builds it though needs to keep the setting lore in mind and not rl human history.

[Tupoun]

Ah. Well, I suppose there's no need for a duplicate establishment in the Port, when the sailors coming in can hop on up to the city while on float, and take turns with the two girls at Jimmy's.

Sorry, folks. Didn't mean to get anyone excited. Thanks, Tupoun ^_^

Hi,

brothel in port makes sence. The establishment in Jimmy's Den is at this moment only an escape route with no rooms, NPC serve there only as "extras".

Sundren City is to far away from the Port to be substitute for the Avantyr's possible brothel.

Cheers.

[Farmboy2003]

I find overly slutty characters rather tiresome. Characters that call armed strangers for 'dear' in the middle of combat and in hostile territories, I'd very much like to avoid.

but this does not mean that I am not behind a fest hall. Ed geeenwood is a veritable lustmonster, and his creation reflects that.

As long as you pimp to a high RP standard, and expect the same of any prostitute characters that may emerge.

[Jai_V]

I honestly hadn't given thought to anyone wanting to play a prostitute.

[Doubtful]

I feel your pain Farmboy. To my eternal shame (not really) I once disintegrated an overly slutty character at the second wind purely because the rp was so, so bad.

For a giggle I'm going to quote some Ed Greenwood on the subject of brothels.

quote:
Ardashir, “festhalls” (Jeff Grubb’s word, substituted for my “brothels” for TSR Code of Ethics reasons) vary in customs, but the more elaborate ones ARE “a cross between a private club, a casino, and a brothel.”
This is due to the fact that many folk in Faerûn can readily couple with someone (on a rooftop or behind a midden in crowded cities, and ‘out in the woods’ or in a nearby thicket or hollow in a distant pasture, in a rural setting) if mere sexual gratification is all they want. What they go to the brothels for (and yes, some of these establishments are private clubs, particularly those specializing in S&M, mate-swapping, or inter-species congress) is for ‘added fun.’
By this term, I mean: striptease performances, playacting and dressing up in outlandish costumes (“Hah, my pretty, I’m not merely Rorold the fat butcher from down the street - - I’m Ravagar Wanderglar, dread pirate of the Serpent Seas!”), the chance to gamble (betting one’s body, temporary freedom, or items of clothing) or gambol (yes, dance), make love to music, have access to situations visitors wouldn’t dare try outside a club (mock rape of a priest or priestess or ruler or other authority figure), making love on a tomb, crossdressing, eating food off the bodies of strangers, and so on), and the chance (particularly in masked revels) to enjoy someone else in a small community who’s married to someone else - - to ‘find’ each other in public, or even be seen heading off to a tryst, would cause a scandal, but going to the brothel separately and getting up to all manner of hijinx there, even (in some cases) if observed by fellow community members, is ‘okay’ (the brothel is accepted as ‘outside’ normal society, a safety valve in which folk can temporarily set aside their usual public manner and status).
I see the popularity of brothels in the Realms as based on the Faerûnian love of play: as in our real world, children lose many opportunities for playing as they grow up (unless they can shift into participation in a sport, or acting, or performing and use that as an outlet), but brothels offer a place to go on playing, lifelong.
Some people never engage in a sexual physical act at a brothel, but visit them often. Some of these go to watch the fun (ogling), some go for the chance to flirt or make lewd suggestions they’d never dare utter elsewhere, and some just like to chat or play cards or drink with others while naked, or while crossdressing, or while pretending to be of a race or profession (example: the pirate above) that they’re not. Some folks frequent festhalls to play tag, or blindfolded tag, or all sorts of other games that again, are play but not necessarily sexual.
(And then of course there are also brothels that are ‘simple whorehouses,’ particularly in ports where sailors make landing after long voyages without access to ‘fresh faces,’ or caravans disperse ditto.)

And

Shadowdale’s house of pleasure exists because of the many caravans that stop there. You’ll find modest cathouses (of the sort Ed referred to, at the end of his post, as ‘simple’) in most caravan stops throughout the Realms, no matter how small and rural they are (desert oases of course excepted). I’ll pass on your request for more info, but I understand Ed might be doing a ‘hands off’ on Shadowdale because of his needs when doing the not-yet-written second and third Knights novels.

Dargoth, a “feasthall” (as opposed to ‘festhall’) is a room or event of temporary dining and debauchery, situated in an establishment that doesn’t offer such amenities the rest of the time. (Real-world equivalent: “Friday Night Wings” offered at a drinking-spot where a patron can’t get ANY food on other nights.)

So when a tavern offers “something more” for a limited run engagement of travelling ‘professionals’ (an arrangement that usually means said ‘pros’ avoid paying full taxes because they ‘move on’ before a tax collector can ever get to them, and the establishment pays little taxes on the extra coin generated because they ‘forget’ as many nights as possible of the extra takings), they’re running a “feasthall.” The term of course is a contraction of “feasting hall,” a name applied to a large room whose purpose is allowing larger numbers of folk to sit down and dine together

I think overall there is much, much more rp and fun to be had with the first type of festhall rather than the latter type, after all while Avanthyr may be a port and caravan hub it's also home to a range of wealthy merchants, clergy and richer folk who would probably want more than a simple fumble.

I honestly hadn't given thought to anyone wanting to play a prostitute.

There have been a few players who've played prostitute or ex prostitute characters over the years I've been here, to varying degrees of success.

[Jai_V]

Yeah, I definitely wanted to run a classy, upscale joint. With an option of host-out specialists and courtesans for wealthier clients. If you're interested in my idea, Doubt, would you rather I PM them, or discuss them here?

[Kaybrie]

There also needs to be one set up in the basement of the Lathanderite temple.

Why would we have it in the basement?

We'd build a whole new wing in the LaCroix estate, were it not for those meddling nobles.

[OnyxTigress]

The pool, duh.

[Kaybrie]

The pool, duh.

That pond, given it's specific little-known purpose, would be detrimental to any solicited escort service.

[Doubtful]

Yeah, I definitely wanted to run a classy, upscale joint. With an option of host-out specialists and courtesans for wealthier clients. If you're interested in my idea, Doubt, would you rather I PM them, or discuss them here?

Depends, you're free to discuss it here and receive feedback and ideas from players and staff alike (this is both a blessing and a curse), or start a thread in Character Requests where it'll be just you and the staff.

[bipolar bear]

personaly I think this makes total sence. with the city taking flight and the security measures in place to access it. most lonely and poor souls would need to have want and desire to get up there. let alone time to travel from the port (sailors).

it only makes sence that a port city where traffic is high and the economy is good to have a "red light district".

[sonuvalich]

There also needs to be one set up in the basement of the Lathanderite temple.

Finally, a faction that makes sense for Artemis to join! The Lathanderite Semi-Free Love Society will help improve morale in the valley by at least 6000%. And maybe the Enclave can get rid of that slutty dancer in our opium den (though I do love the idea of that being Torio's eternal fate, suck it Luskan!) for a tidy sum.

[Laurk]

Hey! Abby needs a faction! Hookers need a healer! Can I grind banners for the pimp faction?

Seriously though, every port needs a place like this.

[Fury]

Can I grind banners for the pimp faction?

Considering we are discussing a brothel here, this comment takes on entirely sinister new meaning. And I cannot scrub the visual from my mind's eye, no matter how hard I try.