Area of a medieval town?

[Alan Shutko]

A big question is how common the threats are? People tend to defend against catastrophic losses only if they feel they're likely to happen.

For a real world example, after the big St Louis flood of 1993 receded, millions of dollars were spent building homes and commercial property in land that was underwater within recent memory. The people figure "Well, that was a hundred year flood, I'll be gone before it happens again."

As long as dragons, and attacks from fireball wielding armies, are reasonably infrequent, people will ignore their capability to do harm. Those big stone walls are great against defending against the goblin horde to the north... we don't need to worry about the off chance that a few wizards get pissed off at us. That last happened to my grandfather... I'll be long gone before it happens again.

 

[gizmo33]

As long as dragons, and attacks from fireball wielding armies, are reasonably infrequent, people will ignore their capability to do harm.

I disagree with this generalization. I think people freak out as much about stuff that has no chance of happening (think about the genre-appropriate example of the witch hysteria) as they do ignore other things. People go to great lengths to protect themselves from threats that are entirely imaginary, as well as those that are very unlikely. I think the correlation here is what people believe, more than actual likelihood, and also how much control they feel that they have over a situation.

So why don't I think the flood example is a good match here? Because a castle (and to some extent a walled town) can be seen as symbols of control and defense. If people can get it in their minds that such things are easily destroyed, that's going to undermine the authority of the local rulers. Knocking down buildings that have an important social function can *really* upset people. If wandering bands of strangers (ie. adventurers) can burn down towns and collapse castle walls with impunity, this threatens the stability of the area. IMO a ruler has the resources/information necessary to understand the problem and strong motivation to act on it.

This doesn't mean that there aren't individuals who are willing to build their villages on flood plains or next to ogre lairs (especially if there's money to be made and insurance to collect). And those sorts of people are probably full of all kinds of rationalizations. But the security minded individuals in a society aren't going to sit around and wait for something bad to happen. Witches are going to be burnt, ogres are going to be pre-emptively chased out of the woods, and metal detectors are going to be installed at the entrances of castles - regardless of the actual chances of anything happening. If for no other reason that to make people feel secure.

 

[NewJeffCT]

I disagree with this generalization. I think people freak out as much about stuff that has no chance of happening (think about the genre-appropriate example of the witch hysteria) as they do ignore other things. People go to great lengths to protect themselves from threats that are entirely imaginary, as well as those that are very unlikely. I think the correlation here is what people believe, more than actual likelihood, and also how much control they feel that they have over a situation.

While we know there was no chance of the "witches" really doing anything in terms of casting real spells upon people, the people of Salem, Mass (and elsewhere) thought differently 300+ years ago. While it was hysteria, they thought they had real live witches to deal with...

However, as the previous poster had mentioned, if there was no threat for the last hundred years, would there be hysteria over possible fireballs? I'm sure if Wally the evil wizard tried to torch the town yesterday, the town elders or town lord would soon afterwards attempt to take countermeasures in case Wally had a little brother or an angry wife bent on revenge. However, if there was no subsequent attack after Wally was defeated, how long does the town keep on having nightly fire brigade patrols? How many town wells are continually dedicated towards fire prevention, instead of towards providing water for people and livestock? How many buildings are built out of expensive (and heavy) stone instead of cheaper and renewable wood?

 

[Treebore]

I too often think it goes without saying, but you do have to look at what the "norms" of your particular game are going to be. How many wizards who can do fireballs are running around? How susceptible are your town populations to rumors? Especially when your striving for a game that feels as real as possible.

So if your running a game with a very low occurance of true spell casting, your going to have different base line assumptions about how your world works, how people view things, etc...

 

[gizmo33]

While we know there was no chance of the "witches" really doing anything in terms of casting real spells upon people, the people of Salem, Mass (and elsewhere) thought differently 300+ years ago. While it was hysteria, they thought they had real live witches to deal with...

But IMO this makes my point. Think of it this way: chance of dying from witchcraft nowadays = 0%. Chance of dying from witchcraft during the 1600s = 0%. Nothing has actually changed about the underlying statistics - so it is very much about what people *thought*. It's also very arguable that people even thought *at the time* that their chance of dying from witchcraft was greater than being killed from other causes. I think it would be a misleading exaggeration to say that the people of the 1600s thought that the bulk of deaths occurred due to witchcraft.

But then take it a step further. Which is a more likely situation - dying in a car crash or an airplane crash? Far more effort is spent in trying to prevent the one than the other. This is not a matter of statistics, obviously (statistics that everyone actually knows). This has to do with a psychology of perceived risk. The amount of vulnerability people feel about a situation needs to be factored into the way a society prepares for the situation.

This kind of thinking, arguably, was a huge motivator behind the witch hysteria of the 1600s. Much to the point: the concern about witches spread into areas *in spite of the fact* that there had been no previous activity. People and their grandfathers don't need to have experienced it in order to be afraid of it. And to spill a lot of ink and blood in an attempt to prevent it. All it would take, given the right circumstances, is some lurid story (true or not) and some anxiety about the unknown. What *could* happen scares people as much as any statistical information about what has happened (look at most of the television news).

Consider a typical DnD world: are there groups of strangers walking around with the capability to burn down your town? Is there a sensational story being told in the taverns about such an occurrence (real or not)? While a witch-hysteria-type reaction is an extreme case, I think it illustrates that people won't always ignore threats - even when they aren't statistically plausible.

Now if one would like to make a lot of the "hasn't happened in 100 years" line of reasoning, then ultimately I concur with Treebore's comments. At some point if the campaign world bears no resemblance to the "Points of Light" type campaign setting then it's beyond what I think my ideas can cover. My comments were originally intended for a DM who felt that his towns were too vulnerable and support the notion that NPCs won't necessarily wait for something bad to happen before they are prepared. Beyond that I don't think they can be of much use.