How big is your campaign world? How many people? What type of terrain?

[Poster Bard]

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at 900 miles an hour.
It's orbiting at 19 miles a second, so it's reckoned,
The sun that is the source of all our power.
Now the sun, and you and me, and all the stars that we can see,
Are moving at a million miles a day,
In the outer spiral arm, at 40,000 miles an hour,
Of a galaxy we call the Milky Way.

Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars;
It's a hundred thousand light-years side to side;
It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light-years thick,
But out by us it's just three thousand light-years wide.
We're thirty thousand light-years from Galactic Central Point,
We go 'round every two hundred million years;
And our galaxy itself is one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding universe.

Our universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding,
In all of the directions it can whiz;
As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,
Twelve million miles a minute and that's the fastest speed there is.
So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
How amazingly unlikely is your birth;
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere out in space,
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth!

--------------------------

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Download the MIDI version here -

http://www.montypython.net/sounds/midi/galaxy.mid

From www.montypython.net

 

[I'm A Banana]

Uh...

How big is your campaign setting in terms of the square miles of land masses?

As big as I need it to be

People actually answer this question? Details like this don't concern me too much...I just think about how far I'd like them to travel from Point A to Point B, and it's That Far. I'll write it down so I don't forget. That's how my world grows.

How many people live in the entire campaign world?

Again, as many as I need to.

Again, people actually answer this question?

I just figure the areas I want to be cities and the areas I want to be rural. It also helps to figure where the highest-level people are, as that helps determine the demographics for the area. High-level folks tend to congregate in large cities.

How does your campaign world break down into terrain types? That is, what percentage of plains/forest/mountains/desert/jungle/hills exist in your campaign setting?

This seems a bit more my style. I allow, in the world, all types of terrain found here on Earth, and a few that aren't (such as Underdark and Aqueous Air territory). I decide the area that most of the action takes place on based on what "style" of campaign I wish to run. For instance, my current campaign is influenced by South and Central American culture, so I choose an area somewhat similar to that: jungle, mountains, desert. Again, I usually go from the inside out, seeing what I need and then designing my world to suit it.

If there is any other campaign info that you'd like to share that might help in my world-planning, feel free to share.

This may help: draw a map. Doesn't have to be reasonable or intelligent, just sketch land masses of the globe. Then, think about the campaign, and zero in on a part of the world that may have similar climate...work from there. Think of where continental plates may make islands, mountains, volcanoes, and the continents themselves.

For instance, for my current campaign, I went back into the history of earth, and pulled some continental shapes based on where they had drifted in the distant past, chose something in a tropical region, and decorated it with the flavor I need.

Don't concern yourself overtly with stats and demographics. Think of what you need, and add it. That's the easiest way to go about. it, methinks.

 

[MythandLore]

I'm developing a home-grown campaign setting, and I'm curious to what the stats are for other folks' campaign worlds. If you don't mind, would you answer the following questions about your campaign setting?

Sure.

How big is your campaign setting in terms of the square miles of land masses?

Almost 60 million square miles of land masses. (a little more then 70% water, 97% salt, 1% fresh, 2% frozen about 140 million square miles)

How many people live in the entire campaign world?

5-6 billion.

How does your campaign world break down into terrain types? That is, what percentage of plains/forest/mountains/desert/jungle/hills exist in your campaign setting?

plains % most of it.
marshes/swamp 2-5%
forest/jungle 5-10%
desert 12.5%
mountains 20%
hills 10-20%

If there is any other campaign info that you'd like to share that might help in my world-planning, feel free to share.

Not really, just keep it simple if you can, try to look at published campaings like FRCS or Greyhawk to see how they set up their's.
Think of what kind of cultures your baseing your ideas on and how events, the terrian, tech, magic and religion have shaped that culture to make it the way it is now.
This can help you get into the heads of the people of your campagin.

 

[Schmoe]

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at 900 miles an hour.
...

Thank you so much! I love that song. Just hearing it again has brought a smile to my face.

 

[Vymair]

Campaign World

I always use Earth as the basis for my campaign world and just move the locations around.

My current game is set in Indonesia. The characters are 12th level now and have spent their entire campaign life on Borneo. I find real world maps are easy to use and the PCs rarely figure it out.


For example, game starts on a peninsula. That could be San Francisco, Seattle, Italy, Florida, the malay peninsula, scandinivia, denmark..etc.

I use races for my nation states. I use humanoids for any unexplored territory and just fit the other races in where necessary.

 

[Eosin the Red]

I always thought Birthright & Harn were very well and realistically developed.

Personally, my homebrew takes place on a chunk of land 800-450 more or less. It has three primary countries with two other nations creeping the water margins. It is very English (1350 ish).

Has a population in decline - 1.5 million down from 2.5 a century earlier. Dual plagues, widespread decrease in temp (4-8 degrees), and wars are responsible for the attrition. Population has started to grow again.

The major city has a pop of 50,000 (like London) but the next largest city is 16,000. A total of 12 towns have pops greater than 2,000.

Heavily wooded with frequent glades. Lots of rivers and small lakes/locks. Much that was built in the previous century has grown over.

I took England and added some magical spin to it. I like the demographic info referenced by others but find it wrong as often as I find it right. It is a valuable resource though.

 

[Someguy]

Most of my world is desert...becuase i like deserts, the harshness, the fact that you have to be selfreliant...

I also have alot "medevil" stuff. Mainly the overcast/rain. the sun almost never shines in those areas...

 

[FungiMuncher]

"Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars..."

Well, on that note, I'll mention my campaign. It actually has five worlds.

The players started out in the Realm of Mortals, which is Earth around the time of the dark ages. The remnants of the Roman Empire exists, plus a lot of barbarians. The players have traveled around central Europe, in an area no bigger than about 350 miles in diameter. I've decided that Asia and Africa exist, but haven't developed them yet. I haven't decided if the other continents exist.

Dotted around the countryside are portals to the Realm of Shadows, which is the Plane of Shadows as described in the Manual of the Planes, with some minor changes. The players have visited this realm several times, but only brifely each time.

Within the Realm of Shadows are portals to the other realms, those of the Fey, the Dragons and the Giants. Each one is an alternate material plane. The players have visited the Realm of Fey for a few months, and the Realm of Dragons briefely. For each of these, the players have only visited a small portion, so I haven't developed them completely; I probsbly won't unless the players show an interest in exploring them.

The highest populated area, of course, is Earth. The civilized areas are dense, the frontiers less so. I haven't put any numbers on all of it, but the capital city of the empire is approaching one million inhabitants (it's a very well organized empire and city).

For terrain, I've followed the terrain of real world Europe as best I can. The Realm of Fey is mostly forest, with a few mountains and a sea. There is an area of jungles, as well. In the Realm of Dragons, the players visited an area covered in glaciers and tundra, with lots of mountains. If I need to develop this realm further, there will be areas for each dragon type's favorite terrain.

FM

 

[the Jester]

My campaign world is a great big ocean. The pcs and their homelands inhabit the inside surface of a great air bubble about 780,000 miles in diameter. The sun is a great ball of flame that orbits the isle of Forinthia at a distance of half a million miles. Night is when the sun sinks into the water.

There is obviously a lot more room in terms of surface area than our little planet has, but little has been explored by pcs. The "local region" is a rough square about 5000 miles on a side, more than big enough to start with. Mostly it's dominated by humans (the Forinthian Empire being the biggest state), and in the near-Forinthian region there are lots of tropical terrains- including jungles (it's the area that gets the most sun without getting too much). There are exceptions, since the air and water currents move the heat around tremendously.

At one point pcs got as far as 60,000 miles away from home... the sun was no longer overhead, instead it was way to the south in the sky. It was kind of a trip (huh huh, no pun intended.)

 

[Agamon]

1. I really don't know. When I drew out the whole world, it didn't seem like relevant info, as the PCs wouldn't have any idea about such a thing, so I never bothered to figure it out. The country that the setting is based in is roughly 24 000 sq. miles, though.

2. Um, ditto. I fugure such things out on a need to know basis. I do know that the town that is the base of operations of the party has about 2700 people, and the capital city has about 29 000. As for the whole country, I'm not sure.

3. Again, this is more info than is really necessary to run a game that doesn't include geographical scientist PCs. In fact, I only know the terrain of one of the continents (there's two). The base country is almost all forest (about 75%), with about 15% plains and 10% swamp.

One thing I think you should know is that there is a wonderful little book that was put out during the 2E reign called the "World Builder's Guidebook", quite possibly the best 2e supplement ever made. If you can find it somewhere, it seems to me it would contain much valuable information for you.