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<blockquote data-quote="El Jefe" data-source="post: 2502660" data-attributes="member: 19990"><p><strong>Discussion -- (Discussion) City of Orussus Description</strong></p><p></p><p>I went and put all my notes on this thread together last night, then fell asleep at the monitor just as I was about to post here. I log in today, and I see that LogicsFate has beaten me to it...well, thanks for doing such a good job!</p><p></p><p>I'd like to add a couple of things from my notes. The first is from the Goblin King:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px"><sheepish grin> The real reason for the sewers paragraph was so that there would be a close 'dungeon' available where a party could readily delve then return to the city. Due to magic I have always thought that D&D cities could afford things that mideval cities didn't have. Working indoor plumbing and the sewers that go along with it would be one of them. However, that is just IMHO. The line about the sewer system being oversized was to mean that someone could enter the underground outside the city and walk under the walls then come up in the city. This is so that bad guys can get into the city or escape without being seen by the authorities. I guess it doesn't make much sense. Why doesn't the town guard collapse those tunnels? </p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">The 'sewers' in Crocodile Rock are actually modeled after the storm drains I used to play in when I was growing up. I had always imagined that there were secret doors somewhere down there that lead to treasure, adventure, and Ninja Turtles. I never did find them.</p><p></p><p>And I think that's important, even though it's not specifically "about" Orussus. If you think about it, Orussus is just made for quickie throw-down dungeon crawls. It sits atop an ancient, abandoned city, with sewers that go in and out from under the existing walls. So, you hop in the sewers, and instead of just boring sewer stuff, you find bits and pieces of the old city down there. Sort of like old Seattle, or, to a lesser extent, underground New York (remember all the cool stuff in Ghostbusters II? A lot of that was real!)</p><p></p><p>Now, we also had a lengthy discussion of population, which Creamsteak wound up neatly like this:</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">Orussus is a large trade city with a port. Without giving you some arbitrary population, I can tell you that there ARE going to be guilds of armorsmiths, wheelrights, carpenters, bakers, and other jobs. The local inns are going to be well established and will try and hedge out any competition when it pops up. Everyone should know the "big" names of merchant companies and city officials, but nobody has met every person in the city. Not even Joe the bartender and innkeeper.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">But saying, "The "magic merchant" can be nameless and faceless, because there's no compelling reason for a particular character to ever see him again, as the PC will just as likely do business with a different merchant the next time. It's that "look and feel" thing again." is like saying that the kobold that runs away is as good as a dead kobold. Your oversimplifying things, because this sort of interaction depends upon the Players and not the population of the city. It's up to the players to decide whether Jacob, son of Ramthils, blacksmith of all Homlett is important. Not the fact that there are 100 odd smiths in Divers.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">The same logic applies to detailing a large city street by street. It's up to the designers how much effort to put in. Orussus, being our sort of central pivot, would be fine to detail out completely in a Freeport sense where there are troves and troves of information on a large city.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">So, my opinion is that the actual number for population is fairly trivial. I'd "guess" that the population of the city fluctuates from 8,000 to 14,000 depending on time of year and current market. Throw in a few big changes (the city of Allimon is burned to the grond and survivors scramble to their families in Orussus for safety) and things could go up or down in big numbers. Dragon burns down half the city? Same thing, it's going to change things.</p><p></p><p>Personally, I think 14,000 is just the right size. Also, that means that the city within the wall isn't jammed tight like a lot of ancient or medieval cities were. I figure the Minotaur city was much larger, and that the present residents "don't quite fill up the space" the Minotaurs left behind. I also figure there'd be lots of stone construction in Orussus, since there are lots of ruins within the walls that would be readily plundered for building materials. I'm thinking that once the permanent population starts inching up close to 25,000 or so, then Orussus will be "properly" crowded once again.</p><p></p><p>Oh, in Creamsteak's post there was a reference to Freeport. This is from the old 1.0 Judge's Guild product, <em>City State of the Invincible Overlord</em>. It was about 80 or so pages of maps and description, detailing the city of Freeport street-by-street, shop-by-shop. It was definitely a cool product for it's day, and it represents about as much detail as anyone would ever conceive for a city the size of Orussus. But for now, I doubt we really need to know that the baker at 324 Yeasty Way is named Euphonius, that he's a 3rd level commoner, that his wife is a 1st level commoner name Delmonica, and that his shop measures 15 feet by 20 feet with a door in the southwest corner.</p><p></p><p>I don't think we ever established the physical size of Orussus in that thread, although I gave it a try. If the population really is around 14,000 plus transients, I'm holding to the walls being a half mile from one side to the other. That's about a 10 minute walk, if you don't account for twisting streets or traffic.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="El Jefe, post: 2502660, member: 19990"] [b]Discussion -- (Discussion) City of Orussus Description[/b] I went and put all my notes on this thread together last night, then fell asleep at the monitor just as I was about to post here. I log in today, and I see that LogicsFate has beaten me to it...well, thanks for doing such a good job! I'd like to add a couple of things from my notes. The first is from the Goblin King: [INDENT]<sheepish grin> The real reason for the sewers paragraph was so that there would be a close 'dungeon' available where a party could readily delve then return to the city. Due to magic I have always thought that D&D cities could afford things that mideval cities didn't have. Working indoor plumbing and the sewers that go along with it would be one of them. However, that is just IMHO. The line about the sewer system being oversized was to mean that someone could enter the underground outside the city and walk under the walls then come up in the city. This is so that bad guys can get into the city or escape without being seen by the authorities. I guess it doesn't make much sense. Why doesn't the town guard collapse those tunnels? The 'sewers' in Crocodile Rock are actually modeled after the storm drains I used to play in when I was growing up. I had always imagined that there were secret doors somewhere down there that lead to treasure, adventure, and Ninja Turtles. I never did find them.[/INDENT] And I think that's important, even though it's not specifically "about" Orussus. If you think about it, Orussus is just made for quickie throw-down dungeon crawls. It sits atop an ancient, abandoned city, with sewers that go in and out from under the existing walls. So, you hop in the sewers, and instead of just boring sewer stuff, you find bits and pieces of the old city down there. Sort of like old Seattle, or, to a lesser extent, underground New York (remember all the cool stuff in Ghostbusters II? A lot of that was real!) Now, we also had a lengthy discussion of population, which Creamsteak wound up neatly like this: [INDENT]Orussus is a large trade city with a port. Without giving you some arbitrary population, I can tell you that there ARE going to be guilds of armorsmiths, wheelrights, carpenters, bakers, and other jobs. The local inns are going to be well established and will try and hedge out any competition when it pops up. Everyone should know the "big" names of merchant companies and city officials, but nobody has met every person in the city. Not even Joe the bartender and innkeeper. But saying, "The "magic merchant" can be nameless and faceless, because there's no compelling reason for a particular character to ever see him again, as the PC will just as likely do business with a different merchant the next time. It's that "look and feel" thing again." is like saying that the kobold that runs away is as good as a dead kobold. Your oversimplifying things, because this sort of interaction depends upon the Players and not the population of the city. It's up to the players to decide whether Jacob, son of Ramthils, blacksmith of all Homlett is important. Not the fact that there are 100 odd smiths in Divers. The same logic applies to detailing a large city street by street. It's up to the designers how much effort to put in. Orussus, being our sort of central pivot, would be fine to detail out completely in a Freeport sense where there are troves and troves of information on a large city. So, my opinion is that the actual number for population is fairly trivial. I'd "guess" that the population of the city fluctuates from 8,000 to 14,000 depending on time of year and current market. Throw in a few big changes (the city of Allimon is burned to the grond and survivors scramble to their families in Orussus for safety) and things could go up or down in big numbers. Dragon burns down half the city? Same thing, it's going to change things.[/INDENT] Personally, I think 14,000 is just the right size. Also, that means that the city within the wall isn't jammed tight like a lot of ancient or medieval cities were. I figure the Minotaur city was much larger, and that the present residents "don't quite fill up the space" the Minotaurs left behind. I also figure there'd be lots of stone construction in Orussus, since there are lots of ruins within the walls that would be readily plundered for building materials. I'm thinking that once the permanent population starts inching up close to 25,000 or so, then Orussus will be "properly" crowded once again. Oh, in Creamsteak's post there was a reference to Freeport. This is from the old 1.0 Judge's Guild product, [I]City State of the Invincible Overlord[/I]. It was about 80 or so pages of maps and description, detailing the city of Freeport street-by-street, shop-by-shop. It was definitely a cool product for it's day, and it represents about as much detail as anyone would ever conceive for a city the size of Orussus. But for now, I doubt we really need to know that the baker at 324 Yeasty Way is named Euphonius, that he's a 3rd level commoner, that his wife is a 1st level commoner name Delmonica, and that his shop measures 15 feet by 20 feet with a door in the southwest corner. I don't think we ever established the physical size of Orussus in that thread, although I gave it a try. If the population really is around 14,000 plus transients, I'm holding to the walls being a half mile from one side to the other. That's about a 10 minute walk, if you don't account for twisting streets or traffic. [/QUOTE]
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