Free tables Improv — towns and taverns

Tavern Rumours — d50 Table of Rumours and Plot Hooks

Fifty hand-written tavern rumours for fifth-edition games. Some are true, some aren't, and you decide which.

A rumour is the cheapest plot hook there is. It costs one sentence and commits you to nothing: the party can chase it, ignore it, or forget it, and you can decide later whether any of it was true.

Roll d50 (a d100, halved and rounded up). Each rumour names something specific, because a vague rumour gets nodded at and forgotten.

The table

50 results. Roll d50.

d50	What they're saying
1	The miller's new wife arrived with no luggage and has never once been seen eating.
2	There's a room under the temple the priests won't talk about, and last week someone heard knocking from it.
3	The old baron didn't die of a fever. His steward has worn his signet ring ever since.
4	Someone paid the smith in old coins bearing a king's face nobody recognises.
5	The ferryman won't cross after dark any more, not even for gold.
6	Wolves on the north road have been seen walking in single file, like soldiers.
7	A crate at the docks has sat unclaimed for a month, and it's warm to the touch.
8	The magistrate lost his house at cards to a stranger and is pretending he didn't.
9	A well past the orchards echoes back a different voice from the one you shout with.
10	The watch captain takes coin from the smugglers — or the smugglers take orders from him.
11	Three shepherds went up to the high pasture this season. Only their dogs came back.
12	The lord's daughter isn't ill. She ran away, and the family pays people to say she's ill.
13	A caravan is a week late, and the merchant's partner hasn't asked anyone to look for it.
14	The saint's statue in the chapel turned its head in the night. The priest has turned it back twice.
15	Someone is buying every map of the old mine they can find, and paying double.
16	The inn's cellar connects to the old sewers, and the landlord knows it.
17	A travelling scholar came asking about the standing stones, and nobody saw him leave.
18	The bridge toll went up because the lord owes money to someone dangerous.
19	The mill has been grinding at night, and nobody has delivered any grain.
20	The bandits have been paying the farmers more than the lord's tax takes.
21	An old adventurer in town has a key to a vault he's too frightened to open.
22	River fish are coming up with flakes of gold in their bellies.
23	Two noble houses are about to be joined by marriage, and a third would rather see both dead.
24	The smith forged a sword for a buyer who paid in advance and never came for it. It hums at night.
25	The town's founder is buried under the market square, and he wasn't buried alone.
26	The herbalist sells more than herbs to anyone who asks for "the blue jar".
27	The old mill is haunted, but not by the miller.
28	The lord's hunting lodge has been lit every night this month, and he's been in the capital all along.
29	Something huge was seen flying over the hills — a dragon, or a very big bird, or too much ale.
30	The weavers are planning a strike, and someone wants it to turn violent.
31	The temple's collection box is light, and the acolyte has new boots.
32	A child found a silver dagger in the riverbank, and her father is trying to sell it quietly.
33	The old forest road is safer than the new one. The new one is where the bandits wait.
34	The town healer came here under another name, running from something she did in the city.
35	There's a price on the head of anyone asking questions about the lighthouse.
36	The chapel bells were cast from the statue of a god nobody worships here any more.
37	A noblewoman is hiring guards for a journey, and every one she's hired is a stranger in town.
38	The new tax collector is a crown spy, sent to check on the lord.
39	Something is eating the cabbages from the inside out and leaving the outer leaves.
40	The old churchyard graves were dug up and filled in again. The bodies are still there, turned face down.
41	A sailor swears the island on the horizon wasn't there last year.
42	The mayor's adviser can't be seen in mirrors — or just avoids them very carefully.
43	The circus left town with one more child than it arrived with.
44	The alchemist's explosion last spring was no accident. Someone swapped his jars.
45	A retired general is raising a private army in his barns and calling it a harvest.
46	The goose-girl can talk to her geese, and they tell her everything that happens in town.
47	The old mine didn't run dry. The miners found something and bricked it up.
48	The bakery's famous pie recipe was stolen from a family that was run out of town.
49	The library has a hidden room of banned books, and the librarian lends them out.
50	The lord has a twin, and nobody is sure which of them came back from the war.

Questions

Should rumours be true?

Mostly, with a twist. A rumour that is always false teaches players to ignore rumours, and one that is always exactly right gives the game away. Somewhere in between keeps them listening.

How do I roll a d50?

Roll d100 and halve it, rounding up. Or roll a d10 for the tens and a d10 for the units, and treat anything over 50 as its value minus 50.