Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Questions about population density and map size. (new DM)
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Flamestrike" data-source="post: 6926653" data-attributes="member: 6788736"><p>Environment and weather patterns influence harvest. Things like a bad season or blight wipes out a corn harvest, but wheat can be stored for years, and is less suceptable to blight.</p><p></p><p>The argument isnt that the staple of a culture is the sole determinant of that culture. Something as simple as geographical isolation is a massive factor as well. European cultures and civilzilisations were heavily influenced by Roman (and Greek and Persian) philosophy and culture and even central and far eastern Asian clultures as well. The civilisations in the Americas were more isolated from the rest of the world.</p><p></p><p>I remember just finding it fascinating that the main driver of a civilisation was its staple. In Europe during the feudal ages and dark ages, the majority of people (serfs etc) were at least indirectly involved in the production of food, and this served as a bottleneck not only to population growth, but also to technological advancement and cultural norms.</p><p></p><p>If wheat provided more kj per hectare, population would have boomed much quicker, and more people would have been free from food production to engage in other activity (mercantile, philisophical, economic, scientific etc).</p><p></p><p>It wasnt until the invention of the horse drawn plough and other inventions that sped up the production of wheat (and trade routes were opened bringing other staples like corn and so forth into the old world) that European society was left with a surplus of people who were not directly involved in food production. Population boomed with stable exesses of food, a mercantile class (and tradesmen and proeffesionals) emerged, this led to scientific advances in medicine and more complex economic systems and the growth (in both population and scientific advancement) rapidly became exponential.</p><p></p><p>Today, few people are farmers and people work in millions of different professions and trades. In the dark and feudal ages, pretty much everyone was involved in the production of food in one way or another.</p><p></p><p>Something as simple as a druid increasing the nutritional value of a harvest, reducing the man hours needed to bring in the harvest (or speeding up the time taken to bring grain to market), while protecting the harvest from blight and environmental effects frees up a lot of spare man hours and creates a population boom (and a lot of people with free time on their hands to create advanced economic, mercantile, scientific and other professions and endeavors). With PHB clerics able to cure disease on a level that is beyond modern medicine being in any way commonplace, you would expect a rapid and exponential growth in population, technology, and cultural complexity akin to the latter part of last millenium.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Flamestrike, post: 6926653, member: 6788736"] Environment and weather patterns influence harvest. Things like a bad season or blight wipes out a corn harvest, but wheat can be stored for years, and is less suceptable to blight. The argument isnt that the staple of a culture is the sole determinant of that culture. Something as simple as geographical isolation is a massive factor as well. European cultures and civilzilisations were heavily influenced by Roman (and Greek and Persian) philosophy and culture and even central and far eastern Asian clultures as well. The civilisations in the Americas were more isolated from the rest of the world. I remember just finding it fascinating that the main driver of a civilisation was its staple. In Europe during the feudal ages and dark ages, the majority of people (serfs etc) were at least indirectly involved in the production of food, and this served as a bottleneck not only to population growth, but also to technological advancement and cultural norms. If wheat provided more kj per hectare, population would have boomed much quicker, and more people would have been free from food production to engage in other activity (mercantile, philisophical, economic, scientific etc). It wasnt until the invention of the horse drawn plough and other inventions that sped up the production of wheat (and trade routes were opened bringing other staples like corn and so forth into the old world) that European society was left with a surplus of people who were not directly involved in food production. Population boomed with stable exesses of food, a mercantile class (and tradesmen and proeffesionals) emerged, this led to scientific advances in medicine and more complex economic systems and the growth (in both population and scientific advancement) rapidly became exponential. Today, few people are farmers and people work in millions of different professions and trades. In the dark and feudal ages, pretty much everyone was involved in the production of food in one way or another. Something as simple as a druid increasing the nutritional value of a harvest, reducing the man hours needed to bring in the harvest (or speeding up the time taken to bring grain to market), while protecting the harvest from blight and environmental effects frees up a lot of spare man hours and creates a population boom (and a lot of people with free time on their hands to create advanced economic, mercantile, scientific and other professions and endeavors). With PHB clerics able to cure disease on a level that is beyond modern medicine being in any way commonplace, you would expect a rapid and exponential growth in population, technology, and cultural complexity akin to the latter part of last millenium. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
*Dungeons & Dragons
Questions about population density and map size. (new DM)
Top