Need help with the scale of a map for population density...

[magnusmalkus]

I'm developing a "Points of Light" starting point for my D&D game. I've always had a problem with size, population and scale.

Being a point of light, there are no other towns or cities very nearby. My location is located on the edge of a small inner sea and there are enough resources nearby to support a small town.

For average population density, what size location can house what amount of people? Can anyone give a simple ratio? What is the square foot per person ration for average population density?

Considering the above, on what scale would you draw a large town map with a population of about 2,500-3,000 inhabitants?

Originally, I mapped the town to be roughly 19 squares by 35 squares with each square being 50'. That makes roughly 1,662,500 square feet. Considering my population of 3,000 (at most), that's more than 550 sq ft' per person. I'm thinking that won't do for average population density.

So if I want my map to fit my population of 3,000 people, I need to change the scale of my map.

25' per square = 415,625 square feet. = 138 sq ft per person

Is that still too much? For some reason I was thinking 50' per person was average population density...

 

[Clavis]

Medieval population densities for urban areas tended towards about 20,000 to 30,000 per square mile. Yes, 20,000 to 30,000 per square mile. People lived on top of each other, and whole families lived in one room. The density of the towns was due to many factors, including the ease of defending narrow streets versus wide ones (medieval streets could be as little as 5 feet wide), the limited land that was granted to cities by their charters, the inefficiency of pre-industrial transportation, and the fact that medieval people actually liked living close to each other in large extended families.

A medieval town of 3,000 could easily fit into a space about 600 x 600 feet. The streets will always be clogged with people during the day, and it will be unbelievably noisy and filthy by modern standards.

Also, remember that however big you make a pre-industrial urban population, you need 7-9 times that amount of farmers to feed it, preferably within 1 day's travel by wagon. A town will be surrounded by farmland, and those farmers will expect to be able to take refuge in the city (or nearby castles) if they are attacked. There should be a village of about 300 people or so every mile. To make it easy, I surround major cities with villages and farmland out to about 20 miles, smaller cities with 10 miles of farmland, and towns with about 5 miles.

 

[magnusmalkus]

Medieval population densities for urban areas tended towards about 20,000 to 30,000 per square mile. Yes, 20,000 to 30,000 per square mile. People lived on top of each other, and whole families lived in one room. The density of the towns was due to many factors, including the ease of defending narrow streets versus wide ones (medieval streets could be as little as 5 feet wide), the limited land that was granted to cities by their charters, the inefficiency of pre-industrial transportation, and the fact that medieval people actually liked living close to each other in large extended families.

A medieval town of 3,000 could easily fit into a space about 600 x 600 feet. The streets will always be clogged with people during the day, and it will be unbelievably noisy and filthy by modern standards.

Also, remember that however big you make a pre-industrial urban population, you need 7-9 times that amount of farmers to feed it, preferably within 1 day's travel by wagon. A town will be surrounded by farmland, and those farmers will expect to be able to take refuge in the city (or nearby castles) if they are attacked. There should be a village of about 300 people or so every mile. To make it easy, I surround major cities with villages and farmland out to about 20 miles, smaller cities with 10 miles of farmland, and towns with about 5 miles.

I do appreciate that real world citation. I guess I should point out a few things to help me get an answer in the vein I'm looking for.

I don't really wish to mimic real world condition. This is a "Dungeons and Dragons Points of Light" kind of setting where areas of civilization are cut off from each other.

My Large Town is a fiefdom who's major resource is fish. The city is in poor condition with much of the population being fishermen. They are remote and removed from the outside world, they barely have anyone to trade with.

The town is run by a Judge whos family, generations ago, were loyal to the king of the land. But generations ago the kingdom had crumbled and no longer exists. But the Judge still holds his fiefdom where he and a few nobles conduct business make pretend in regards to courtly politics to keep themselves entertained.

The city does not have, nor can it maintain, a large population as resources are scarce. There is nowhere else for the people to go as no such 'safe' location exists anywhere nearby. The closest place of protection is reputed to be days and days away and there is much danger between here and there.

On the other hand, I don't want my town to have an overabundance of room; I want it to be small in population but not TOO roomy. So i need to make it large enough to house 3,000 people but not look like they're swimming in oceans of real estate.

In the end, I can just make it however large I want and just say there is an overabundance of abandoned houses... which actually feeds into the theme and atmosphere of the campaign.

 

[Gilladian]

I've always started with a population, say 3,000 people since you gave that number. Then I decide how densely populated I want the town to be. I figure if 20 people live in a building, that's very dense and probably very low to low class. 10 people live in an average building, that's dense population, probably lower to middle class folks. If 5 live in it, that's moderate population - maybe upper middle to upper class. If only 1 or 2 people lived in a given building space, that would be either VERY elite or nearly abandoned property.

So then I figure out what percentage of the town is what class of people. Maybe 50% are low class, so you're gonna have 1,500 of them living in 75 buildings. Maybe then 25% are middle class at 10 per building, so another 750 in 75 buildings. Then you have the upper class at 20% of the population so 600 people live in 120 buildings. And the remaining 5% (150 people) live in another 75 or so buildings. That gives about 295 buildings. Call it 300 for rough estimate. If your town has a smaller population now than when it was originally founded, you could increase this by 10 -20% and still not have them rattling around.

What size the buildings are, is another question altogether... I usually figure, including public buildings like government halls, forts, temples, etc... that each person needs about 100 sq ft of space to live in, medieval style or slightly more roomily. Again, you can loosen or tighten this depending on the feel you want to give.

Clavis is right about how many farmers it takes to support a town's population. Even if they're getting 50% of their nutrition from the lake, they're still going to need about 15,000 farmers to support 3,000 townsfolk. So you're going to have small walled villages interspersed with mound-forts or walled manors and castle/tower/forts spreading out for a day's ride or more around the town. Otherwise everyone will have starved, long since...

That, or you need to really stress how dependent the townsfolk are on their rooftop gardens, the food the clerics produce daily at all the temples, the several magic food kettles that the lord of the town owns, etc... AND still have at least some farming outside town.

Or maybe wandering herds of bison and brave hunting parties who risk their lives to bring back extremely valuable meat. Or all of the above.

 

[magnusmalkus]

Gilladian, that seems like sound input. Thank you very much!

The biggest problem with the Points of Light approach to a campaign was indeed how does the town support itself cut off from a larger civilization in addition to the lands surrounding the town being so filled with monsters and other na'er-do-wells preying upon the hapless townsfolk.

Farmers are a necessity. I guess I could place a few functional farms outside the city. I need to justify somehow the reason why the surrounding dangerous evil humanoids, flora and fauna do not harass the famers.

Or maybe they DO get harassed and that's where basic low-level adventurers come in handy!

 

[Gilladian]

I apologize if I'm less than sensible - I'm home sick from work!

I think you're on the right track with saying low-level adventurers would be the "resource" farmers would need. You'd probably have small bands of adventurers hiring out to groups of farms as "muscle".

After all, that's how feudalism got started - a guy with a horse said to a bunch of farmers - feed me and my horse and my family, and I'll run the bandits off for you - and then a generation later his son said - hey, farmers, now that you can't do without me, I'm the boss!

In the game terms, I think the low-level adventurers would be afraid to try to "muscle in" too much, or make too many demands, because then the farmers would just go find a more powerful bunch of adventurers to level the playing field. So instead, you'd end up with a balance between farmers, monsters and adventurers.

I think another factor that would make it possible to have "some farms" rather than "many" would be the presence of clerics and druids to heal wounds, cure the sick, bless the fields and (substantially) increase crop yield.

So I think if you emphasise those factors, you'll do all right (for a fantasy game setting!).

 

[Clavis]

I think another factor that would make it possible to have "some farms" rather than "many" would be the presence of clerics and druids to heal wounds, cure the sick, bless the fields and (substantially) increase crop yield.

There is a problem with increasing crop yields by magic: who is going to harvest all the extra crops?

The crop yield of historical pre-industrial farms is enough to keep the farmers working from dawn to dusk from spring to autumn. In winter, there is animal slaughtering and meat curing to be done. Agriculture without machinery is hard work, and pretty much a miserable life.

Magically-enhanced, high-yield crops wouldn't actually increase the amount of food available, unless the crops harvest and process themselves. Even if you use slaves, the slaves have to eat, increasing to total need for food. Of course, since we are talking about societies with real magic, perhaps the crops are harvested by enslaved demons or zombies created from the corpses of criminals... In which case the people who control the demons and zombies should rule the society absolutely. Then some heroes can come along, free the people from the oppression of their tyrranical overlords, and inadvertently condemn everyone to starvation when the demons and zombies stop working the fields.

 

[magnusmalkus]

To illuminate on the town I'm creating, I've got these bullet points:

The town can be something of a 'crazy house'. Most citizens lead normal lives so long as they don't call attention to themselves.

Generations ago, the town was once a feifdom governed by a paladin loyal to the monarch of the kingdom.

Due to an ancient cataclysm, the great kindgom crumbled and left the survivors to fend for themselves. Despite no lord over them, the vassals to the king held onto their lands as best they could.

The town in my campaign provided protection and survived well enough post-cataclysm.

The paladin ruled as a monarch, always holding the law as absolute, his rule was the glue that was going to keep civilization thriving. Barbarisim and chaos raged upon the land. For his entire rule, the paladin kept his people safe. During these troubled times, he was judge, jury and executioner against anything that would stand in the way of his vassals survival.

Generations pass, and ruler passed leadership to his heir, always keeping it in the family.

During the most troubling of times, the people of the city became very xenophobic, barring any contact with anyone or anything that came to their gates. As the cataclysm settled, and things became less dire, things became less xenophobic with every passing generation.

The current heir is a maniacle egomaniac who lords over the city. He fancies himself a judge like his forefather. Generations of inbreeding have caused mental instability.

Judge Barclay is a stalker. He will find someone or a group of people and make them the total focus of his entire existance. At best, he can be a smothering benefactor. At worst, he can be the agent of pain and misery as he brings to bear the full extent of his title and legal powers upon his unwitting victim, scrutinizing and punishing said victim for the slightest infraction to the full extent of the law.

Often, Judge Barclay will hold open court sessions and lord over the court like a god.

For the entertainement of the people, he hosts weekly public shows showcasing peoples depravity (like a Jerry Springer show).

People live in fear of the Judge or people are amused by the Judge. So long as you pay your taxes, be productive, and don't draw attention to yourself, you can live a hassle free life and never find yourself the subject of his cruel obsession.

People can't leave because there is nowhere safe to go. And due to generations of brainwashing from the inbred ruling family, most laborers are miserable and downtrodden, and not really willing to better their own lives.

Middle and upper class citizens often enjoy the entertainment provided by the judge so long as none of their own skeletons is brought to life for all the town to gawk at.

There is an usurper among the townsfolk. An evil priestess who seeks to topple the Judge. She has started an underground movement against his rule.

The PC's are citizens of this place.

 

[Gilladian]

I think that in a fantasy game it would be okay to gloss over the fact that higher density crop yeild would require either more laborers or magical/mechanical harvesting tools.

Maybe there ARE magical harvesting tools; not undead, but magical animated objects that do nothing but harvest a field, thresh the grain, even grind it. Can you imagine a magical mill that takes neither wind nor water to function, and can be transported to the farm where it is needed? No need to haul sacks of valuable grain in to town and back out again; instead the reaper/thresher/mill comes to each farm in turn and leaves with the miller's share on board. That would certainly keep the farmers under the thumb of whoever had control of the magic - because if they failed to accept the magical aid, there'd be no way they could harvest the full crop they could grow. And they'd lose the extra income/protection from starvation that the bonus provided.

 

[dako1001]

I came accross this site a while back. perhaps it can help you. It is a kingdom generator. Plug in your square miles and adjust some variables and BAM. A whole kingdom. Number of cities, population, etc. It even goes so far as to tell you professions of the people in the cities if you want it to.

It has come in very handy for me. Hope it helps you.

Kingdom Population Calculator