By the by, another note on Ghaazala's viewpoint-and-behavior, and a little bit about the setting for those who aren't steeped to their eyeballs in Faerun (I am such a geek).<br/><br/>Correct me if I'm wrong, Calrond, but as I remember it, the uppermost level of the sewers of Waterdeep is patrolled pretty regularly by squads of the Cellarers (who were mentioned as the source of our magical mystery boots) who are pretty low-level types for the most part...If I remember right most of them are just normal level 0-1 civilians. They go about in groups and they get reinforcements if they run into something really horrible, but they do try to keep the sewers from becoming quest central for epic characters seeking a challenge. In really horrible and cold winters, your encounter table will probably be full of a lot of "homeless vagrant, shivering and smelly." They're bad, but not so bad that people don't use them as shelter or as ways to conduct illegal smuggling (since they run under the entire city and connect with the ocean and with the Underdark). So it's totally realistic that the party could turn a corner, weapons ready, and find ourselves confronting a bunch of bootleggers or even some noble and his bodyguards with his nose buried in a sachet full of perfume and potpourri, on his way to or from some whorehouse or other business transaction he doesn't want to be seen visiting, or some lower-class prostitute, rogue, fence, whatever.<br/><br/>Having said that, one CAN find some pretty horribad things in there if one's luck runs out. Stuff which has snuck up from the depths of the Underdark, or come in from the ocean. Ghaazala isn't afraid to come down into the sewers alone, and even to mug the occasional other wanderer when she needs information about what's going on (as earlier). But she can see in the dark and has plenty of tricks up her sleeve (including sounding like a small group of mail-armored people jingling and rattling rather than just one). She's a little more nervous with a team behind her using lights and talking a lot (sound carries over water, and in enclosed stone-walled spaces...and the sewers are a combination of both), and with the Watch being in high alert and suspecting that something awful might be sneaking around.<br/><br/>But her reactions to the idea that the first sneaky thing they encounter in the sewers doing nasty stuff is (1) their target, or (2) obviously about to outsmart and ambush them are going to be not merely skeptical, but a little bit incredulous. Everybody can get hit crossing the street, there's some inherent risk, but people don't stop trying anyway, because most people succeed. During the Ripper years in London, people still went out at night. After all, Red Jack only took one or two, and nothing of that sort had ever happened to<em>them</em>personally...So just because the sewers are a bit dangerous, I wouldn't expect them to be at all untravelled, even by 'normal people'.<br/><br/>In the same vein, Ghaazala's sense of things is that the Watch is concerned by the combination of the fires and the disappearances with emphasis on the fires. Row-building fires that get out of control endanger the city. On the other hand, in a city the size of Waterdeep, twenty vagrants going missing in a night is practically normal. So she's assuming it's the combination of the two in such close proximity that has the Watch spooked (but with an emphasis on "stop the arson" more than on "stop the snatchers").<br/><br/>That's just my interpretation and what I remember from a couple of other campaigns set in Waterdeep...Which doesn't mean Calrond's sewers are identical, obviously.<br/><br/>Thoughts?