Baldur's Gate
Baldur's Gate began its life as a hidden harbor where traders would meet with pirates and ghost lighters, folk along the Sword Coast that used lights to lure fogbound ships toward shore where they would run aground and have their goods scavenged.After hitting their targets, plunderers would journey leaguesupriver to the future site of Baldur's Gate, at a turn of the Chionthar that gave good harbor and relatively easy access to the Trade Way and then sell their bounty to traders without fear of meeting the goods original owners.
In time industrious traders and herders decided that the excellent, albeit illicit commerce outweighed the bluffs poor soil, and they put down roots. Due in part to its frequent mists and surely its residents reputations, the settlement became known as Gray Harbor-a name Baldurians still use for the bay today.
The city gained its current name centuries ago when the great explorer Balduran returned from his journey to the other side of Evermeet. the homeland of the elves. where he searched for the fabled isles of Anchorome. He spread around wild stories of his adventures as well as huge amounts of wealth. Balduran left again for Anchorome and never returned.
Baldur's Gate is a city on the verge of war-a simmering stew pot of social tensions where even the smallest drop of unrest might cause it to boil over and turn the city against itself. Walls cut Baldur's Gate into three cities. The rich live atop bluffs protected from the bourgeoisie. Their homes cling to the slopes that literally prevent member of the middle class from rising above their stations.
Beyond the protection of the walls, the city's many outcasts live with no law aside from that enforcedby the daggers of thieves. ln this powder keg, an old threat flickers to new life. The plot of a murdered deity finally comes to fruition, resurrecting the god of assassins. Bhaal will live again.
