Orius
Unrepentant DM Supremacist
I've been doing some campaign world work recently, had the itch to write up some creative world building stuff and it needed to be scratched badly. Anyway, while I was doing that, I found some notes I put together a few years ago on building cities.
I use the 3.5 DMG Web Enhancement as a base for my city building. I was impressed with it the first time I looked at it, and printed it out immediately, because it meshed pretty well with stuff I was using from the World Builder's Guidebook from 2e. Both sources were excellent for determining what sort of goods and services might be available to PCs, class demographics and things like that. But one thing that felt missing to me was the stuff that players don't necessarily pay attention to, but should be part of a city. In fact, some of these elements are probably more important as they contribute to the day-to-day viability of a city whereas players are just looking to unload treasure, buy new gear, and blow their cash on ale and whores. I don't want the cities to look look like a relatively mediocre video game where the only buildings in town are shops, inns, places to get cured and the like, and the NPCs just exist to hand out plot hooks.
One place I looked for information was the computer games from the City Building Series. As largely historical games, they presented (albeit simplified) elements of a city's infrastructure and economy that should be necessary, but which players often routinely ignore. I did some brainstorming as well, and probably went over some old Dragon articles on the topic and the like. Anyway, here's some of my notes and ideas on city building structure, and some of the things a DM should think about when constructing a city. These things will vary depending on the size of the city, the dominant race, the government of the city, and the technology and magic levels of the campaign. Some of it may seem obvious, but I'm trying to be comprehensive.
People obviously live in the city, so the DM needs to be able to describe at least in general what residential areas look like. The PCs after all might need to visit an NPC at his home, or they might even end up buying a house if they make the city a base of operations. To start with, there is the residence of the city's ruler. This could be just the house of the mayor, the grand and opulent palace of the emperor of a mighty realm, or anything inbetween. It's probably one of the largest residences in the city, and the more important the ruler, the bigger the household, and thus the bigger the building. A significantly large household may consist of a compound of several buildings.
Then there are the dwellings of the city's aristocracy and commoners. The aristocracy will have larger grander resisdences, while the commoners have smaller ones, anything from shacks and shanties up to Romaneque insulae or small houses placed closely together.
Next are the city streets. This isn't really too hard to figure out, generally the more upscale the district, the better the streets. Low class districts will have muddy unpaved streets filled with hay, muddy water, and excrement, or badly paved streets with open cesspools. In both cases, there's probably plenty of garbage and offal around, and depending on how rough the district is, even a few dead bodies. These areas of the city will be mostly poor, but some services like fences, black marketeers and the like will probably be found more often here, as there's less scrutiny from the authorities.
Better districts will have better fitting pavement (even pavement at all!), and will be cleaner, safer, runoff channeled into a sewer, and so on. The most upscale districts might even be shaded with trees. Cities that are more warlike or on a hostile border should have narrow streets to make it harder for an invading army to occupy the city, where a capital of a powerful realm might have grand boulevards as a statement of the city's glory and power. This should also vary be district, poor districts will usually have narrower, more rambling streets, while more wealthy ones will tend to be straighter, broader, or at least easier to travel.
The city needs a source of food. They may import some foodstuffs, but unless a lot of magical transportation is being used, much of it will have to be produced nearby. There should be farms, orchards and pastures that produce grains, vegetables and fruits, and meat. If the city is on a sizable body of water, then fish and seafood will also be a source of subsistance. In some cities, the people may also hunt game animals.
The city needs some industries to provide labor to the inhabitants. The industries could produce either raw materials, finished goods, or both. A city will probably have industries that supply basic needs to the citizens, but should have at least 2 or 3 industries that provide a source of income to the city.
Raw materials can fall under several categories. First is agriculture, this can include any surplus crops or food the city produces as well as agricultre that produces non-food items. Cities that raise livestock will also produce animal byproducts as well, like hides, horns, glue, etc. Non-consumable agriculture includes materials for textiles such as wool, cotton, hemp, flax, or silk, things like coffee, tea, spices, or tobacco or even narcotics like opium. There are things like fur and timber or bamboo. Then there are quarries, which can produce any thing from rough building stone to ornamental stone used in palaces and temples, and mines which might produce common metals like iron or tin, valuable metals like silver or gold, very rare metals like mithral or adamantine, or non-metallic substances like salt, peat, coal, or gems.
There are industries that refine these materials, like mills, slaughterhouses, foundries, tanners, lumbermills, and so on. Then there are industries that make finished goods out of the materials. Many of these industries may be represented by guilds in the city that control the business, and these guilds will have their various guildhalls. There may be trade streets where members of a particular guild all ply their trade.
Whatever the city needs to produce needs to go to market. These markets could be anything from open air bazaars to shops and stores. There needs to be places to store goods as well, such as granaries, stockyards, warehouses, and storeyards. Caravan yards, docks, shipyards and the like are needed for importing and exporting goods. Trade companies may exist to make a profit on the commerce in the city. There many be mercenary companies in the city looking to sell their swords to the highest bidder. Other major sources of business that the players will likely be concerned with are inns and taverns, moneylenders and bankers, and stables.
There needs to be services that cater to the health of the city. Things like physicians, doctors, or healers, dentists, barbers, apothrcaries, and even undertakers. The citizens also need a source of water including public wells or aqueducts and the like which provide water to the city.
Safety for the cities residents is also important. This includes the city watch or guards, which should have barracks and watch posts. There needs to be people who take care of things like fires as well. These should fall under the authority of the city's ruler. Also under the ruler will be magistrates or judges, tax collectors, and the other various administrators who serve him. They will need courts and offices to perform their duties. The size of the administration depends on just how much the ruler rules. If the city is the capital of a kingdom, there may also be a Senate or assembly building (if the ruler isn't autocratic) and embassies from other realms.
The religious beliefs of the citizens will be met by various clerics who will naturally have temples, churches, or shrines throughout the city. Other religious building include housing for the clergy, clinics to care for the sick, monasteries and seminaries, and soup kitchens and other places which offer charity.
The city may have various scribes, sages, alchemists, astrologers, and schools for the children of wealthier inhabitants. There may even be libraries and/or museums. And of course there are wizard guilds and wizards for hire. There should also be all sorts of entertainment, everything from street performers, to theaters, arenas, brothels, and so on, and perhaps even a bard college.
If the city needs to defend itself, it should have walls and other fortifications, barracks for soldiers, docks and shipyards for a navy (if applicable), and industries will probably include armor and weaponsmiths. Some cities will have internal fortifications if the city expands outside older walls. In some cases, the aristocracy may erect fortifications to "protect" themselves from the city's commoners.
A city should have tings like parks, stautes, fountains, plazas, monuments and so on to beautify the city. And of course gazebos (evil cities will have dread gazebos!
). These elements will probably be found in the more upscale districts of a city.
The city's dead could be buried in cemetaries or necropolises thoughout the city or outside the city walls, or in catacombs running beneath the city's surface. There may be undead.
There maybe be a network of sewers running underneath the city. Particularly old cities may be built upon the ruins of older cities, and there may be an undercity existing underneath the city. Wererats, evil cults, communities of goblins/orcs and so on may exist here. There may even be extensive dungeons underneath a city, or a vast megadungeon, such as Undermountain.
Some fantastic elements to consider in a high-magic campaign are stables for flying mounts, magical lights to light the city at night, even docks and yards for airships.
That's all for this post. Other material I have is an expansion for the DMG Web Enhancement of the World Builder's Guidebook's numbers for how many trades exist in a city by population types, and concepts for urban druids. If anyone's interested in this stuff, I'll add it to the thread. If anyone has any ideas they want to add or share, feel free to do so.
I use the 3.5 DMG Web Enhancement as a base for my city building. I was impressed with it the first time I looked at it, and printed it out immediately, because it meshed pretty well with stuff I was using from the World Builder's Guidebook from 2e. Both sources were excellent for determining what sort of goods and services might be available to PCs, class demographics and things like that. But one thing that felt missing to me was the stuff that players don't necessarily pay attention to, but should be part of a city. In fact, some of these elements are probably more important as they contribute to the day-to-day viability of a city whereas players are just looking to unload treasure, buy new gear, and blow their cash on ale and whores. I don't want the cities to look look like a relatively mediocre video game where the only buildings in town are shops, inns, places to get cured and the like, and the NPCs just exist to hand out plot hooks.
One place I looked for information was the computer games from the City Building Series. As largely historical games, they presented (albeit simplified) elements of a city's infrastructure and economy that should be necessary, but which players often routinely ignore. I did some brainstorming as well, and probably went over some old Dragon articles on the topic and the like. Anyway, here's some of my notes and ideas on city building structure, and some of the things a DM should think about when constructing a city. These things will vary depending on the size of the city, the dominant race, the government of the city, and the technology and magic levels of the campaign. Some of it may seem obvious, but I'm trying to be comprehensive.
People obviously live in the city, so the DM needs to be able to describe at least in general what residential areas look like. The PCs after all might need to visit an NPC at his home, or they might even end up buying a house if they make the city a base of operations. To start with, there is the residence of the city's ruler. This could be just the house of the mayor, the grand and opulent palace of the emperor of a mighty realm, or anything inbetween. It's probably one of the largest residences in the city, and the more important the ruler, the bigger the household, and thus the bigger the building. A significantly large household may consist of a compound of several buildings.
Then there are the dwellings of the city's aristocracy and commoners. The aristocracy will have larger grander resisdences, while the commoners have smaller ones, anything from shacks and shanties up to Romaneque insulae or small houses placed closely together.
Next are the city streets. This isn't really too hard to figure out, generally the more upscale the district, the better the streets. Low class districts will have muddy unpaved streets filled with hay, muddy water, and excrement, or badly paved streets with open cesspools. In both cases, there's probably plenty of garbage and offal around, and depending on how rough the district is, even a few dead bodies. These areas of the city will be mostly poor, but some services like fences, black marketeers and the like will probably be found more often here, as there's less scrutiny from the authorities.
Better districts will have better fitting pavement (even pavement at all!), and will be cleaner, safer, runoff channeled into a sewer, and so on. The most upscale districts might even be shaded with trees. Cities that are more warlike or on a hostile border should have narrow streets to make it harder for an invading army to occupy the city, where a capital of a powerful realm might have grand boulevards as a statement of the city's glory and power. This should also vary be district, poor districts will usually have narrower, more rambling streets, while more wealthy ones will tend to be straighter, broader, or at least easier to travel.
The city needs a source of food. They may import some foodstuffs, but unless a lot of magical transportation is being used, much of it will have to be produced nearby. There should be farms, orchards and pastures that produce grains, vegetables and fruits, and meat. If the city is on a sizable body of water, then fish and seafood will also be a source of subsistance. In some cities, the people may also hunt game animals.
The city needs some industries to provide labor to the inhabitants. The industries could produce either raw materials, finished goods, or both. A city will probably have industries that supply basic needs to the citizens, but should have at least 2 or 3 industries that provide a source of income to the city.
Raw materials can fall under several categories. First is agriculture, this can include any surplus crops or food the city produces as well as agricultre that produces non-food items. Cities that raise livestock will also produce animal byproducts as well, like hides, horns, glue, etc. Non-consumable agriculture includes materials for textiles such as wool, cotton, hemp, flax, or silk, things like coffee, tea, spices, or tobacco or even narcotics like opium. There are things like fur and timber or bamboo. Then there are quarries, which can produce any thing from rough building stone to ornamental stone used in palaces and temples, and mines which might produce common metals like iron or tin, valuable metals like silver or gold, very rare metals like mithral or adamantine, or non-metallic substances like salt, peat, coal, or gems.
There are industries that refine these materials, like mills, slaughterhouses, foundries, tanners, lumbermills, and so on. Then there are industries that make finished goods out of the materials. Many of these industries may be represented by guilds in the city that control the business, and these guilds will have their various guildhalls. There may be trade streets where members of a particular guild all ply their trade.
Whatever the city needs to produce needs to go to market. These markets could be anything from open air bazaars to shops and stores. There needs to be places to store goods as well, such as granaries, stockyards, warehouses, and storeyards. Caravan yards, docks, shipyards and the like are needed for importing and exporting goods. Trade companies may exist to make a profit on the commerce in the city. There many be mercenary companies in the city looking to sell their swords to the highest bidder. Other major sources of business that the players will likely be concerned with are inns and taverns, moneylenders and bankers, and stables.
There needs to be services that cater to the health of the city. Things like physicians, doctors, or healers, dentists, barbers, apothrcaries, and even undertakers. The citizens also need a source of water including public wells or aqueducts and the like which provide water to the city.
Safety for the cities residents is also important. This includes the city watch or guards, which should have barracks and watch posts. There needs to be people who take care of things like fires as well. These should fall under the authority of the city's ruler. Also under the ruler will be magistrates or judges, tax collectors, and the other various administrators who serve him. They will need courts and offices to perform their duties. The size of the administration depends on just how much the ruler rules. If the city is the capital of a kingdom, there may also be a Senate or assembly building (if the ruler isn't autocratic) and embassies from other realms.
The religious beliefs of the citizens will be met by various clerics who will naturally have temples, churches, or shrines throughout the city. Other religious building include housing for the clergy, clinics to care for the sick, monasteries and seminaries, and soup kitchens and other places which offer charity.
The city may have various scribes, sages, alchemists, astrologers, and schools for the children of wealthier inhabitants. There may even be libraries and/or museums. And of course there are wizard guilds and wizards for hire. There should also be all sorts of entertainment, everything from street performers, to theaters, arenas, brothels, and so on, and perhaps even a bard college.
If the city needs to defend itself, it should have walls and other fortifications, barracks for soldiers, docks and shipyards for a navy (if applicable), and industries will probably include armor and weaponsmiths. Some cities will have internal fortifications if the city expands outside older walls. In some cases, the aristocracy may erect fortifications to "protect" themselves from the city's commoners.
A city should have tings like parks, stautes, fountains, plazas, monuments and so on to beautify the city. And of course gazebos (evil cities will have dread gazebos!
). These elements will probably be found in the more upscale districts of a city.The city's dead could be buried in cemetaries or necropolises thoughout the city or outside the city walls, or in catacombs running beneath the city's surface. There may be undead.
There maybe be a network of sewers running underneath the city. Particularly old cities may be built upon the ruins of older cities, and there may be an undercity existing underneath the city. Wererats, evil cults, communities of goblins/orcs and so on may exist here. There may even be extensive dungeons underneath a city, or a vast megadungeon, such as Undermountain.
Some fantastic elements to consider in a high-magic campaign are stables for flying mounts, magical lights to light the city at night, even docks and yards for airships.
That's all for this post. Other material I have is an expansion for the DMG Web Enhancement of the World Builder's Guidebook's numbers for how many trades exist in a city by population types, and concepts for urban druids. If anyone's interested in this stuff, I'll add it to the thread. If anyone has any ideas they want to add or share, feel free to do so.
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