D&D 5E "Monster density" and wilderness settlements in D&D campaign worlds

[Derren]

Well, according to Derren it's logistically impossible. And who is history to argue with him?

Is not impossible, but it raises a question of how to pacify monsters. Compared to them, pacifying other humans is rather easy as you just have to defeat their military and their farmers leave you alone as they are generally not interested in combat.

This approach might also work with evil humanoids like orcs although their unbalanced civilian to soldier ration makes it harder to pacify them in the first place, but what about the real heavy hitters like Ogres, Giants or Trolls?

You would need a big army stationed there all the time during construction which does create the mentioned supply problems or you have this army exterminate whatever monster is in the area in which case its not the monster filled wilderness the OP wants.

 

[Grainger]

Hang on though. Lots of history shows forts being built first and then farmers coming second. By and large, that's how the Americas were settled. Same goes for how the Romans generally worked (and yes, that's very broad brush strokes). You pacify an area sufficiently, at least to the point where you do have a few years of relative peace to get things going, and then you bring in your peasantry to start farming and whatnot.

Is there something wrong with that model?

The Roman-style setup is certainly possible in D&D, but then you're not using a medieval-style world. There's nothing wrong with that, but you have to remember that the two are very different (if you care about such things, of course). For one thing, the Romans had an extremely large, centrally-funded state military. Secondly, when they settled an area, such as Britain or Gaul, the areas were already settled, and they had to worry about local unrest - not outsiders rampaging through the farmland, slaughtering peasants and burning crops. When this did happen in large numbers, even the empire couldn't cope, and it declined and collapsed (OK, civil war also played a large part in weakening it). There were borders that they had to keep under control, but again, they had very large numbers of professional troops to do so, something that medieval society didn't have.

When we look at medieval times, local unrest was rare (by and large). Rulers instead had to worry about other rulers (i.e. rivalry between barons or nations). If you were a peasant farmer, odds are that you led a very safe, if arguably dull life. It was only exceptional situations where an enemy force descended on your village and pillaged it. If that had happened regularly, we're back to fortified farmsteads, and probably the towns and cities would collapse because they wouldn't have the agricultural support they needed.

 

[WayneLigon]

I think one bit of trouble you might be having is taking rules that worked in a dungeon setting, things like wandering monsters and the like, and applying it to the world in general - which I think doesn't much work.

One thing I normally use, even when I use a wandering monster table, is to consider the area that it occurs in. If they are traveling through settled lands with rolling farms and the like, I usually just ignore anything but the most human-like of creatures (make it some sort of hostile group of locals, or bandits, etc), or if it might be something that I can use as a mini-plot. For instance, I got a result of Ghoul one time in a settled area. So I made the ghoul also a boar. You have this almost unkillable thing running around the area, driven by it's mad desire to kill and infect, and the populace is terrified. They have their doors locked, the animals under guard, etc - the PC's encounter the effects of the thing, and soon they're hunting down the 'demon boar', the product of a happenstance encounter between a ghoul somewhere out there and an animal.

Once you get beyond settled pacified lands, all bets are off - this is why you have things like rangers to guide travellers and caravans, or to ride the roads between settled area to report on any fell beasts that might have managed to occupy an area, so they can round up a posse and hopefully deal with it. If they can't then a settlement gradually gets cut off, and someone goes to find a group of heroes to deal with the things.

The other idea I usually think of it territory. Animals in our real world have territory and they seldom leave it. They only become hostile when you intrude on them, or if natural pressures have forced them from their territory.

 

[aramis erak]

Vikings were farmers too. Raiding was a hobby, or perhaps a sideline business. IANAHistorian, but I believe their real advantage was simply that they were better sailors and could attack "out of nowhere" and retreat where they couldn't be followed.

I tend to agree with that assessment. With a caveat.

Vikings often would coerce trade. The threat of getting nothing in return meant that there was a compelling need to come to terms with many vikings. They did also, however, do massive damage to churches and monasteries (who had nothing for trade, but had goods of value).

 

[Andor]

Is not impossible, but it raises a question of how to pacify monsters. Compared to them, pacifying other humans is rather easy as you just have to defeat their military and their farmers leave you alone as they are generally not interested in combat.

This approach might also work with evil humanoids like orcs although their unbalanced civilian to soldier ration makes it harder to pacify them in the first place, but what about the real heavy hitters like Ogres, Giants or Trolls?

You would need a big army stationed there all the time during construction which does create the mentioned supply problems or you have this army exterminate whatever monster is in the area in which case its not the monster filled wilderness the OP wants.

Like I said, you have to think about it. The answer for King Edward was: You land a large force, pacify the locals and keep your force there dealing with trouble, supplied by ship, until at least the outer walls are up. Then you can reduce your forces in the field to a level sufficient to man the walls. The reason castles were an offensive structure in Edwards time was that they gave you a secure base which could be defended by a tiny force allowing your elite troops to sally out at will to raid your foes in the exact manner of the orcs we are discussing. Defensively they allow you to protect your non-combatants and portable wealth in times of trouble.

Now in D&D terms? It depends on who founded the town and what their resources were/are. If you really have an area heavily populated with orcs and worse, and 0 level human commoners try to settle it without support then they all die horribly and there is no town. Ergo, they had support. It could be they were placed there by an Edward who built the castle and expects his taxes to be paid thank you very much. It could be that some high level adventurers 50 years ago liked the view from the hill and decided to retire there and the town grew up around their manor. It could be that a 1st level acolyte had a vision that the Orcs would be off warring with the Hobgoblins during the winter of green snow and that they would have 6 months to get the walls up and be dug in with crops planted before the orcs came back. Since they came back there was a lot of initial trouble but they survived and now they have a well trained local militia and are brokering an understanding with the hobgoblins. It could be the area was an ancient elven/dragon/illithid ruin and a place of horror and legend to the orcs. When the settlers first came the Orcs mistook them for the feared foes of old and stayed clear until it was too late.

If you (or the OP) want an undefended farming community without protectors and inhabited only by nameless mooks, then it really cannot be in hostile D&D grade wilderness. If you give them some walls, some balls, and some brains then they'll scrape by. But you're right that they are going to need an elite force to answer the orc raids or trolls to really do well. If you go Medieval on the orcs then it'll be the local lord and his knights and court wizard and priest. If not, it might be up to Our Heros. It might also be little Jimmy and his pet Grey Render or a local druid who has a soft spot for Goodie Whemper and her chicken and currant pie. Remember the Shire was defended from horrors by the Rangers of the North simply because that's how the Rangers kept in shape. But the Halflings, who were about as 0 level farmer as you can get, were still dangerous in their own right and fought off wolves, goblins, Sharky's Bandits and hostile trees on their own.

 

[GreenTengu]

There are certain enemy races that can be pacified and others that cannot.

Kobolds are at home in underground caverns and can dig them out. While you can certainly get a group of frightened Kobolds to do whatever you want, it won't be long before they escape down into little holes too small to follow them through. When they cause trouble, they are going to burrow up right under your feet, take what they want and then run away. You aren't even safe in your own house as they will dig their way into your cellar or through your floor in the middle of the night and rob you blind. They won't kill you in most cases and are generally not difficult to deal with, but they may leave you in a position to starve to death. If they really want to destroy your town, they will be extremely clever about it and dig a big hole underneath your town. And once they are done with their project, your entire town will suddenly collapse into a sinkhole 1 mile deep instantly killing everyone in town (and probably squashing a lot of their own in the process) and everyone in town will just be dead. Just dead. Middle of the night, effectively vanished into a hole in the earth.

Goblins can be forced to work, but only if you drive them and make them do so by fear. Much like Halflings, they would rather relax and have fun than toil away to produce the most-- only they are even more naturally idle and would prefer to leech off others. If they can steal what they need to survive, they are going to do that. If they can find a place to live right under your feet without you knowing it, they are going to do that. And if the nastiest of Goblin tribes wants the people in your village dead, they are going to emerge from hidden caverns and tunnels and from the forest in the dead of night, creeping as well as your best trained Rogues and slit the throats of everyone in the dead of night and set the town ablaze before the watchmen even knows the town is under attack.

Orcs can be beaten into being docile and submissive. At least the lowland Gray Orcs, the Mountain Orcs who are content to live in vast underground caverns are a different story. But there are places in Forgotten Realms where human domination is so overwhelming that they have been broken and reduced to docile farmers working the field who take abuse and don't fight back anymore-- their wild spirits broken and tamed leaving them a truly pitiful creature. But that is when humans have totally dominated the region. Prior to that? When the Orcs own the region? Humans moving in is no easy business and they will receive nightmarish backlash every step of the way. And perhaps that's not unexpected. Even in a world without black and white morality and a Gruumish commanding destruction and death of everything, it is totally understandable that Orcs will take all the food growing in the regions they used to gather food from and hunt the livestock in the regions they used to hunt in. And they are going to stomp all over those who try to get in their way and stop them.

Hobgoblins are the easiest to "tame"... I mean, you beat their army and prove your military might is greater, then they are going to join you. Same as they join the Orcs or the Ogres or the Giants or the Drow or whomever else beats them. Which means they will swear their sword to your cause and enforce your will to an extreme that will probably churn your stomach and make you wish you didn't send them to perform your task. At the same time they will cleverly and diligently work their way up within your society until before you know it, your town's captain of the Guards is a Hobgoblin and he appoints only his own kind as his officers and then turns the town's own guard against the lord or mayor of the city, replaces them and the leader declares martial law and assumes control of the city, turning the human citizens into his workers for his own will. And you are going to have to treat the Hobgoblins you tame just blatantly unfairly and unjustly to prevent this from happening. Because if they get to earn their ranks through deeds like everyone else, they will earn them and then they will abuse them.

Lizardfolk aren't even, but... kind of like a mixture of the problems you have with both the goblins and the orcs combined into one package. And, again, they aren't really being evil about it so justifying wiping them out... a bit harder.

Gnolls are wild and violent to a point that makes the Orcs version look almost more like a heroic version of wild and violent. Their discipline and loyalty is momentary at best. They are gleefully wicked and demonic. There is no way to tame them because no part of their nature to try to have overwhelm the rest.

And Bugbears? Ogres? Well... first, beating them is pretty difficult. They are pretty quick, travel in small numbers and are often constantly moving. You would need a squad actively hunting them and even then they would be a pain to find. I have seen them tamed and turned to work. Typically at the hands of Hobgoblins. But humans managing that? It would have to be some pretty evil and cruel humanoids willing to enact the nastiest of tortures and punishments for disobedience. Anything short of just... well... let's say the worst of the things you hear police and prison guards doing to prisoners under their control or the things you hear about people doing to prisoners of war that make you shudder to even hear the words? Yeah... anything short of that and they are going to say "why should I listen to such puny creatures?" throw down their tools and if anyone pushes them lightly, they are likely to smash and eat that person.

And Trolls? Well... yeah... you don't tame those things, you just get eaten.

 

[Hussar]

The Roman-style setup is certainly possible in D&D, but then you're not using a medieval-style world. There's nothing wrong with that, but you have to remember that the two are very different (if you care about such things, of course). For one thing, the Romans had an extremely large, centrally-funded state military. Secondly, when they settled an area, such as Britain or Gaul, the areas were already settled, and they had to worry about local unrest - not outsiders rampaging through the farmland, slaughtering peasants and burning crops. When this did happen in large numbers, even the empire couldn't cope, and it declined and collapsed (OK, civil war also played a large part in weakening it). There were borders that they had to keep under control, but again, they had very large numbers of professional troops to do so, something that medieval society didn't have.

When we look at medieval times, local unrest was rare (by and large). Rulers instead had to worry about other rulers (i.e. rivalry between barons or nations). If you were a peasant farmer, odds are that you led a very safe, if arguably dull life. It was only exceptional situations where an enemy force descended on your village and pillaged it. If that had happened regularly, we're back to fortified farmsteads, and probably the towns and cities would collapse because they wouldn't have the agricultural support they needed.

There's a danger here though of getting too tied up in historical analogues. Europe by the Middle Ages didn't have any "frontier" to speak of and really hadn't had any frontiers for centuries. The land had been thoroughly pacified and the nomadic tribes (barring Mongols of course, but, that's a different issue) had been dealt with.

A better analogue might be, as mentioned, the American West or Australia, or even early Chinese history where the Chinese kingdoms expanded through military force first, creating largely self sufficient military garrisons which were then used as the base for civilian expansion.

And, let's not forget, we're not limited to real world farming either. Why are our fantasy farmers limited to European farming techniques, which were generally very poor? Perhaps our farmers use Native American farming techniques - planting in rows and planting multiple crops on the same plot - granting much higher food yields and thus allowing much more concentrated populations for safety. Or rice farming which, again, has much greater yields. And, in a fantasy setting, we could get even more exotic. Maybe we don't herd sheep but giant fire beetles, which are good eating, dispose of waste quite effectively, and are somewhat capable of defending themselves.

Or maybe we've planted/enslaved/traded with the local Treant population so that our hedges become mobile defences against raiders. We've cut a deal with those dryads to help us against the humanoids in return for us not burning down the forest and being a lot more ecologically friendly.

Heck, I could see farming communities having a tame ogre on hand for the heavy lifting stuff. Keep him well fed and whatnot and you could quite possibly see relationships starting up for mutual benefit. Sure, that ogre eats to much, but, he sure keeps the riff raft away.

It's not a good idea to imagine a fantasy world that is just like medieval England and ignore all the other fantasy bits. The analogs just aren't there.

 

[aramis erak]

Hussar: modern and medieval crop yields are about all we have for reliable data points. And they differ by a range of about x10 for average yield; native american farming really wasn't significantly better in terms of people per acre than European medieval; it was better in overall diversity and overall nutrition than medieval, and thus general health. But it didn't sustain significantly more people. And Mesoamerican and South American crop yields were often based upon monocultures as bad as modern.

If magic can exceed this, great, but... the more reliant upon magic a population is for its daily food, the more trouble it is in when that magic fails.

 

[Hussar]

Still, Chinese crop yields were far higher than European. That's the point I was making. That we don't have to automatically default to medieval England for population density.

One of the big differences is planting in rows, which medieval European farmers didn't do.

 

[Grainger]

There's a danger here though of getting too tied up in historical analogues. Europe by the Middle Ages didn't have any "frontier" to speak of and really hadn't had any frontiers for centuries. The land had been thoroughly pacified and the nomadic tribes (barring Mongols of course, but, that's a different issue) had been dealt with.

Oh, absolutely. D&D purports to be "medieval like", but it has never felt very medieval, and I just wanted to raise these points in case other DMs want to portray a somewhat medieval world. Of course, DMs can have any social setup they want in their campaign... I just don't want people thinking that a frontier setup is medieval! In fact, DMs (unless they want to go for an authentic medieval feel) can and arguably should diverge far further from the medieval-like setup than happens in most D&D worlds.