Hammerfast, population 12,000! what?

[Reaper Steve]

The settlement writeup (p.57) for Hammerfast in the DM kit lists it as a city of 12,000. However the entry on p.57 duplicates the one from the DMG, stating that Hammerfast is the largest and wealthiest town in the region.

I also have the Hammerfast Outpost Adventure Site book... there is no way that Hammerfast can have a population of 12,000. It even looks smaller than Fallcrest (pop. 1350 + 900 nearby.) Hammerfast's population could reasonably be 1,200, but not 12,000. However, then it wouldn't be the "largest and wealthiest" in the region. Oddly, that book doesn't give a settlement stat block or any real indication of Hammerfast's population. The best thing I found to judge it on is the map, which has less buildings than Fallcrest.

Nothing to lose sleep over... hopefully the Gazetter of the Nentir Vale will sort it out before I commit to how big it is in my adventures.

 

[Dice4Hire]

Yeah, I had a lot of troubles justifying the map withthe writeup. It is a nice map, but with all the open space between buildings and not apparent living below ground (in a dwarven city????????) the population must be miniscule. There need to be at least 4-5 times as many buildings, and some that are broken up into small rooms for lots of people to live in.

 

[AngryMojo]

I assume it was a typo, and it's supposed to be 1,200. Even if it wasn't, that's what I'm assuming.

 

[UHF]

Often population sizes include lots of the neighboring region. I'm honestly surprised when they detail the town population in the middle of nowhere in Canada. By contrast when you take a road in rural UK, you quite literally see tiny townlets (shires?) with a population of like 10. 4 buildings by the side of the road.

 

[Korgoth]

There seems to be some weirdness on the subject of demographics over at WOTC.

I remember that Winterhaven (in Keep on the Shadowfell) was said to have like 1000 people. That was another one that looked like it was off by a factor of 10. There were like half a dozen residential buildings plus a few surrounding farms.

Maybe the designers all grew up in Tokyo? "1000 people... that was the population of my apartment complex!"

 

[Reaper Steve]

^ They've since clarifed (in the DM Kit, amongst other places) that most of the population of Winterhaven live outside its walls in surrounding farms.

Which means that Winterhaven isn't really a town... or a village. It's a Keep... close to the Keep on the Shadowfell... but NW of the Keep on the Borderlands/Chaos Scar.
Argh! I can't Keep them all straight!

 

[Korgoth]

^ They've since clarifed (in the DM Kit, amongst other places) that most of the population of Winterhaven live outside its walls in surrounding farms.

Which means that Winterhaven isn't really a town... or a village. It's a Keep... close to the Keep on the Shadowfell... but NW of the Keep on the Borderlands/Chaos Scar.
Argh! I can't Keep them all straight!

Interesting. Although that would actually make it pretty sprawling, which wasn't the impression I got from the module.

I think that the average population density of France and the Low Countries during the 11th century (that's total pop per total area, so maybe Paris even skews it to be a little high) was something like 21 people per square mile. Going with that, the population of Winterhaven would take up an area roughly the size of Utah's Great Salt Lake (which is like 75 miles long). In other words, Winterhaven would actually be a very large region with a regular density of inhabited farmlands... not a point of light, but an enormous dim glowy spot.

Don't get me wrong... I'm not shooting the messenger! I appreciate the info and find what you said to be interesting. But it is pretty strange, since they're basically saying that the population of Winterhaven occupies the entire western half of the Nentir vale.

 

[GreyLord]

I haven't really read much on that since it isn't much interest too me, but isn't Hammerfast a place full of Dwarves, meaning a majority of the population and stuff should be underground?

 

[Odhanan]

Just verisimilitude and fact checking missing is all.

 

[Reaper Steve]

Korgoth, I like your analysis, but I think your math is off. Winterhaven population is 950. Let's be liberal and assume 900 live outside the walls. Using your 21 people/square mile number, the surrounding populated area would only be ~43 square miles. The radius of this circular inhabited area would be... 43 =(pi)r(squared); 13.69=r(squared); r= 3.7 miles. Or in 4E area terms, that's a square 6.5 miles a side centered on Winterhaven.