Nimblewright Guard

Nimblewrights: Cunningly Crafted Clockwork Sentinels Habitat: Urban; Treasure: None

Nimblewrights are fabricated from durable wood and animated by magic and clockwork gears. Some nimblewrights bear metal plates to protect their cogs and springs, while others have their workings exposed. No mere automatons, nimblewrights can form rudimentary plans and adapt their routines to account for dangers. Nimblewrights are surprisingly dexterous for creations made of animated wood and metal. A nimblewright walks with a flowing grace and fights with whirling pirouettes. Nimblewrights can serve as interesting background flavor in Calimshan or other areas where they are common. Roll or choose a result from the Nimblewright Tasks table as inspiration for what a nimblewright guard or nimblewright hulk might be doing in a busy public place.

Nimblewright Tasks:

Nimblewright Guard: Nimblewright Guards are humanoid-shaped constructs that are typically employed as bodyguards, assassins, or spies. Watchful sentries that patrol important sites, nimblewright guards serve as loyal soldiers or work as vigilant bodyguards.

Combat Tactics:

• Concealed Weapons: They fight with two built-in rapiers that fold into their forearms and can deploy instantly.
• When disguised with clothing and magic, they can easily pass for any humanoid creature of similar size.

Notable Nimblewright Guards:

• Nim, a particularly creative nimblewright who lived in the House of Inspired Hands. It was capable of creating other nimblewrights and had developed a nimblewright detector.
• The Rogue: Out of loneliness and boredom, Nim secretly built a second nimblewright. This second construct fled the temple and eventually found its way into the service of the corrupt noble Yalah Gralhund, becoming an assassin.

Description: Nimblewrights are are built from wood, metal, magic, and clockwork.

Personality: Nimblewrights are created with intelligence, and each possesses a distinct, though chaotic, personality. This allows for more intuitive thinking and creativity than most other constructs are capable of.

• Rogue Actions: Nimblewrights are sometimes manipulated by nefarious nobles. For example, a rogue nimblewright was once hired by the Gralhund family to assassinate a gnome, accidentally triggering a deadly fireball explosion in Trollskull Alley.

Moral and Legal Status: In cities like Waterdeep, nimblewrights are strictly viewed as property with no inherent rights. City guards generally do not intervene if a nimblewright is destroyed or goes on a rampage, which often creates philosophical dilemmas for adventurers navigating the ethics of construct sentience.

Creation: Nimblewrights were originally created by ingenious artificers, and the procedure to create one is demanding in terms of money and power.

• The creator has to know the spells geas, haste, wish, and polymorph.
• Creating the body of a nimblewright requires approximately 500 pounds (230 kilograms) of flexible, precious metal alloys, and requires the creator to know either sculpting or masonry to shape.
• Making the body costs about 15,000 gold pieces; the ritual as whole can cost up to 35,000 gold total.
• Like golems, nimblewrights are created by binding an elemental ― in the case of a nimblewright, a water elemental ― to the artificial body and binding it to the creator's will.

History: In the late 15th century DR, numerous nimblewrights constructed in Lantan existed in Waterdeep. Four of them worked at the Sea Maidens Faire, under the command of Jarlaxle. Jarlaxle Baenre sold them cheaply because he embedded secret scrying crystals in them, allowing him to record everything the constructs see and hear.