Help me out. PoL. Why don't small towns get overrun?

[small pumpkin man]

Answer Number 2.

This question is meaningless. The world exists as a backdrop to a plotline. Asking what happens to villages when the player characters are not around is like asking who fought Sauron's orcish hordes during massive sieges at Helm's Gate in the years before Legolas and Gimli were born. No one did. Sauron didn't HAVE orcish hordes back then, and he didn't besiege Helm's Gate. For some odd reason, the main characters and the plotline coexisted. Huh.

From this perspective, the wilderness between towns isn't so much filled with deadly monsters as it is mildly dangerous and mostly unknown. When problems arise that need heroes to solve, they will coincidentally arise nearby the player characters. Because otherwise the game would suck. Maybe lots of other would be heroes dealt with a local orcish tribe, or cleaned out an ancient cursed tomb, and then once the village was peaceful since they solved the only major problem nearby other than random low level bandits and wolves, immediately went on to settle down, marry a local girl, and grow fat and old.

That's fine. This isn't THEIR story.

I'm not disagreeing with your point, but next time you argue about the important of plot relavance over a consistant long standing world, you probably shouldn't use Tolkien as an example .

 

[Kurotowa]

The point to a PoL setting is that it's dangerous and uncertain.

For a small village on the edge of the dark woods, life is risky. Every able bodied man has a weapon they can lay hold of, so that minor threats can be chased off. The village will have one large and defensible building (a church or manor house or inn) that everyone can take shelter in. And every year a few people go missing. The ones who stay out in the wrong place after dark, or don't know well enough to stay away from that cave. But life goes on.

Sometimes, though, there's trouble that's too much for the village to handle. Then the call goes out for heroes, mercenaries, and adventurers to save them. Word gets handed to the next merchant who passes through and if they're lucky a band will arrive in time. If they're not lucky, well, that's when people die. Maybe a lot of people, or even all of them. Best hope that someone arrives on time.

As for those quiet crossroads with a couple of houses clinging to them, that's more a risk for the traveler. Sure, maybe that friendly old couple running the resthouse are telling the truth about the saint's blessing that keeps them safe. Or maybe they're creatures from the Feywild that'll crack you over the head while you're sleeping and make a soup from your bones. Or maybe they're in league with the local bandit chief and get protection in return for robbing their guests. No way to tell, really. But would you rather risk camping in the woods with no walls at all?

 

[Greatwyrm]

I'd say, overall, the smaller a settlement is, the less likely it is to survive. However, you're usually going to need some kind of organized effort to actually eliminate a place.

For starters, let's assume that magical critters generally act like real world ones. Yes, I know the dangers of applying "real" anything to D&D.

Hunting animals will try to pick out weak animals alone or at the edge of the herd. A couple dozen cottages within shouting range is a small town, but enough of a deterrent to make a difference. If you have the one cottage 200 yards down the road, hope you have a strong door. Also, hunting animals will also avoid over-hunting their home territory. If they kill everything today, there's nothing to eat tomorrow.

Any kind of intelligent creature(s) would generally need a reason to attack or eliminate a settlement. If they attack, there's a chance a larger organized power could retaliate. Is there anything they will get from attacking that will make their losses worthwhile? In some cases -- like orcs -- can they even stay organized long enough to accomplish their goal? The threats may not be stupid, but may not be much in the way of team players. Maybe they even like having a small settlement there, because it gives them the opportunity to pick off the occasional traveller or merchant.

Now, here's the beauty of being the DM. You don't need to explain why the local threat has allowed them to continue to be there. Honest. Either the townsfolk can provide themselves an adequate defense and that's reason enough or the threat is mysterious and nobody knows the reason why. If the characters come to a settlement that hasn't been overrun yet, one of those things is true or the battle is underway.

 

[Roger]

I'd suggest that the 'fog of war', or the 'darkness of setting', cuts both ways.

As you point out, "the world is filled with big, bad, evil things."

So, do you, the level 1 kobold, really want to sally out of your well-known forest with some of your friends to go have a look around? Or would you rather stay near home?

Of course, you might have no choice -- the kobold leader might be forcing you out, or you've been charmed by a wizard, or whatnot. But it wouldn't be your first choice.


Cheers,
Roger

 

[LostSoul]

If the world is filled with big, bad, evil things in the wilderness that separates scattered settlements, why haven't these towns been overrun?

They do. Then too many people are born in the safe places, and they need somewhere to expand into. Some brave souls carve out some territory; it lasts for a while, but the darkness continually threatens to engulf it once again.

That's where the PCs come in.

 

[Agamon]

There are no simple hamlets with a couple run-down cottages, yes, if they're all alone in the wilderness.

The best way to think of a "point of light" is a city-state. It controls the surrounding territory within a radius of maybe a few dozen miles. Within that territory, you can have farming hamlets and villages. But you shouldn't have hamlets outside, because the point of a PoL setting is that civilisation is scarce.

I'll just quote this, as it is the actual answer. There simply are no villages outside of each city's zone of control. There may once have been when there was an empire ruling the land, but there isn't now because they did get overrun. That's the whole idea behind the PoL setting, there are no towns between point A and point B (unless they're close to either point).

 

[Cyronax]

What's worth pillaging in a simple hamlet with a couple run-down cottages?

Not much.

Which is probably these tiny hamlets mostly get ignored by the Big, Bad Evil Things... There's far more worthwhile targets, than a handful of insignificant hovels that won't yeild up much more loot than a couple sackfuls of food, a sick mule and some dirty clothes.

I don't know .... peasants as food, peasants as slaves, peasants as a dark sacrifice to Tharizdun.

Or simply look at the movie Seven Samurai/Magnificent Seven.

C.I.D.

 

[hbarsquared]

99% of human history is a "points of light" setting.

From aborigines, to Native Americans, to medieval times, to the Wild West... These are all eras and regions that can be aptly described as "points of light."

Why are small communities not overrun? Because the dangers that lurk outside civilization is not a single, monolithic mass. Some are not worth the bother. Some are far enough away. Some are overrun. Some have a militia. Some have a wall. Some have just enough commerce or production to be a dependable source. Some are exploited.

Look to real world history and ask the same question, and you will very likely, and easily, find the answers.

 

[~Johnny~]

I'm running currently running two PBP campaigns (here and here) in a Points of Light setting. In fact, I'm running them both in what could be called the "default" Points of Light setting, if such a thing really existed. That means I'm using place names (like Crestfall, Winterhaven, Bael Turath, the Kadagast Mountains, etc.) mentioned in 4e preview products, interspersed with towns of my own creation (or lifted from Paizo products).

The "center" of my world mostly features larger city-states with defenders who are capable of fending off the orcs, gnolls, and even occasional dragons. There are some small towns, especially in the north where high-level monsters are rarer, that are protected by individual heroes and/or some sort of magic. (The longer-running of my campaigns is currently focused on getting back the relic that keeps the town safe.) And there are parts of the world (especially in the south) that are mostly in ruins, where all bets are off and human settlements only exist if they have a way to hide from the bad things.

I think part of what makes this work is that there's an element of mystery when it comes to what's actually in the wilderness. The very nature of a Points of Light world is discontinuous and obtuse. If a small town needs some explanation, all you need to say is that the really dangerous monsters are somewhere else. You don't need to figure out ahead of time exactly where those dangerous monsters are, or how many of them there are.

 

[Patlin]

In one of my play by post 3.5 games a couple of years ago, I put in a small community living in the woods near a bunch of monsters. They were only about 5 families living there, and they sure as heck did have walls, and were aware that the world around them is a dangerous place. While I wrote that well before hearing of 4e's "points of light" idea, it would fit fine with a PoL setting.

I think the key idea is that sometimes these tiny outposts of civilization do get overrun. People in cities probably think you'd have to be crazy to live out in the country... but hey, I've known New Yorkers who think that about the world today, and we don't even have marauding gnolls in most parts of the rural united states. I also know country folk who think you'd have to be crazy to live in a city.

Just because some small villages get obliterated every year doesn't mean they all do. If having a particular village exist suits your plot, though, you can still drop it in. Unless they're complete idiots, they'll have a militia, a wall, or other means of defense, but sometimes they are complete idiots.

I seem to remember my first 3.0 character finding a completely udefended village and berating their leadership about having fought an ettin only a mile away, and suggesting they put up a wall and get some Ballista set up. He had a low charisma, and berating is hardly ever an effective persuasive tool, so they ignored him. The local monsters proved his point for him shortly thereafter.

The more that changes, the more that remains the same.