E.N.Worlders help me make my non-human cities.Please.
- Thread starter elforcelf
- Start date
elforcelf.
Stormborn
Explorer
I don't really know what you are looking for. "Non-human cities" is a bit vague.
If you are looking for ideas for the standard PHB races I think you can find them everywhere. Any race with a basically humanoid body is going to design things in a simialr way. Humans might have trouble uderstanding it at first, but soon its going to be obvious to them that it is a city, just with some different concerns in mind.
Elf cities are going to built on some kind of arcane sense of feng sui, in balance with the world around it. Larger open spaces, perhaps entiely organic, but filled with small palces and hidden wonders.
Dwarf cities are likely to all start out as mines, growing as they follow veins in the rock. Larger rooms, no small areas, no privacy, and generally no light or at least very little. Low ceilings, tight tunnels, very clausterphobic and then suddenly opening up into huge space.
Halfling cities - well I always picture halflings as nomadic so you can either go with the traditional Shire-like village or you can picture a giant mongol-like tent city, always chaning, nothing really permanent. A giant fair/market day become a city. Living areas are going to be deliberately small, while merchant areas are going to accomodate the "big people"
Gnome cities (I think there was a Dragon issue about this a few years ago) are going to be hidden, burrow like. Picture a rabbit's warren and you get a gnome city.
Orcs, goblins, and the like are all going to have similar things. The big difference is that in a purely chaotic society there is no order, like human cities used to look. No central goverment, no public works, and every dwelling a miniature fortress.
Mindflayers and other more alien creatures...well there you start to get interesting. Mindflayers are parasitic by nature, they are likely to take over the dwelling of someother race and transform it, familar yet strange, lots of intersting growths.
Is that what you had in mind?
If you are looking for ideas for the standard PHB races I think you can find them everywhere. Any race with a basically humanoid body is going to design things in a simialr way. Humans might have trouble uderstanding it at first, but soon its going to be obvious to them that it is a city, just with some different concerns in mind.
Elf cities are going to built on some kind of arcane sense of feng sui, in balance with the world around it. Larger open spaces, perhaps entiely organic, but filled with small palces and hidden wonders.
Dwarf cities are likely to all start out as mines, growing as they follow veins in the rock. Larger rooms, no small areas, no privacy, and generally no light or at least very little. Low ceilings, tight tunnels, very clausterphobic and then suddenly opening up into huge space.
Halfling cities - well I always picture halflings as nomadic so you can either go with the traditional Shire-like village or you can picture a giant mongol-like tent city, always chaning, nothing really permanent. A giant fair/market day become a city. Living areas are going to be deliberately small, while merchant areas are going to accomodate the "big people"
Gnome cities (I think there was a Dragon issue about this a few years ago) are going to be hidden, burrow like. Picture a rabbit's warren and you get a gnome city.
Orcs, goblins, and the like are all going to have similar things. The big difference is that in a purely chaotic society there is no order, like human cities used to look. No central goverment, no public works, and every dwelling a miniature fortress.
Mindflayers and other more alien creatures...well there you start to get interesting. Mindflayers are parasitic by nature, they are likely to take over the dwelling of someother race and transform it, familar yet strange, lots of intersting growths.
Is that what you had in mind?
Population would be about the same as a human city for the most part, if the race was on the decline I would say you would never have a size over X.
As far as look and feel go?
I tend to go open and green for elven cities, following the lay of the land, houses do not have sharp angles but more curves. Roads tend to have waterways, streams.
Dwarf's are business and stone, ordered and thought out with a lot of stone work. You will find alike businesses in side by side, metal works will be by a forge and a mine not by a meat market. The city would not ugly, use of stone color and shape would be important.
Orcs/goblins would not really have cities of their own but would take over what they won, and would soon fall into disrepair and ugliness.
As far as look and feel go?
I tend to go open and green for elven cities, following the lay of the land, houses do not have sharp angles but more curves. Roads tend to have waterways, streams.
Dwarf's are business and stone, ordered and thought out with a lot of stone work. You will find alike businesses in side by side, metal works will be by a forge and a mine not by a meat market. The city would not ugly, use of stone color and shape would be important.
Orcs/goblins would not really have cities of their own but would take over what they won, and would soon fall into disrepair and ugliness.
