Simulationist Question on PoL

[Engilbrand]

There are some great ideas and points here. I liked the idea of just having certain magical groves and "greenhouses". Pbartender had an awesome idea, though. I can't believe I didn't think about towns making deals with the monsters in the area. It's a "Malevolent Protector" idea. "Well, my options are kill you or trade with you. In exchange for trade or gifts, I won't kill you. We can do this for a long time. If you break this, we don't care who destroys you. Hell, we might even do it."
I've been developing an area called Crossroads with 5 towns set up like a pentagram. The surrounding area is goblinoids and stuff. This could definitely make some interesting changes to the area.

 

[DarkAngel1979]

DarkAngel; A mercantile Capitol would be bloated with people because the previous trade would mean that food would be shipped in from all over the Empire.

I might not have made myself clear enough. The city-state would have been the province's capitol, but the province itself was mostly considered a backwater of the Empire. The flow of trade was mostly negative: basic ressources and foodstuffs back to the Empire, manufactured goods to the province. Kinda like a colonial arrangement. So now they wouldn't be exactly missing out on ressources, but would have trouble getting manufactured goods (weapons, for instance, which is why the army is stretched thin). The authorities were mostly custodians and representatives of a far-off government in the first place. Also, some of the old nobility had been bought off by the Empire during the conquest of that province by getting to keep some measure of power. The serfs, for instance, are all owned by human lords. Most of the powerful dwarves were actually traders and capital owners (sort of a Renaissance, leading-to-industrialisation thing, until the whole thing toppled), and consider serfdom/slavery as 'barbaric' practices that those dumb humans haven't grown beyond . Of course, in the Empire the practice was that most dwarves were 'bondsmen' to a trader clan, meaning that they have a debt to repay by working for the clan until they can pay it off, though in practice the debt is never paid off through various machinations, so really they're just letting chauvinism tint their view. Now that the Empire is kaput, some of the lords will be getting a little big for their breetches.

How does that change your assessment? I'm willing to think of the major city as having taken a big hit in population (some of which would have been filled up with refugees), which would explain why the city proper has lots of areas that are unsafe enough for adventurers to be around. But what I'd prefer would have been for that one particular PoL to have been kinda like a huge lighthouse, with almost everything else in the 'known world' being snuffed out. More city than village. Hence why it's cosmopolitan enough that I could get a thiefling, a dragonborn and an eladrin together when the province itself is mostly dwarves and humans

 

[Thyrwyn]

Any Feudal period anywhere qualifies as a PoL setting. The Wild West, would be a PoL setting; Gangland Chicago was a PoL setting.

Feudal era settlements settled where the resources were. This was usually far enough away from the nearest power center that they had to fend for themselves. As a community, they could keep out the bandits, brigands, etc... but once you were out of sight of the walls, small groups and out-setttlements were vulnerable.

The threat does not have to be immediate nor does need to be constant. How long would the spoils of one modest farmstead support a group of bandits? The threat could be seasonal (Drought, Tornadoes or Hurricanes) or geological (Avalanches, Volcanoes or Earthquakes).

These are just real-world examples - I haven't even gotten into magical or fantastical threats.

 

[cignus_pfaccari]

There are some great ideas and points here. I liked the idea of just having certain magical groves and "greenhouses". Pbartender had an awesome idea, though. I can't believe I didn't think about towns making deals with the monsters in the area. It's a "Malevolent Protector" idea. "Well, my options are kill you or trade with you. In exchange for trade or gifts, I won't kill you. We can do this for a long time. If you break this, we don't care who destroys you. Hell, we might even do it."

There is a certain "Once you pay the Danegeld, you're never rid of the Dane" to that. And that's *fine*. That's, in fact, one reason for heroes to get involved, if the tribute becomes too onerous.

Also, it may just be easier for the hogoblins to trade with the civilized folk rather than overrun them. Yes, they will likely be able to overrun the humans/elves/dwarves/whatnot, but they might take such casualties doing so that the surrounding tribes will eat them for lunch.

And, finally, population movements may screw things up. Sure, Hommlet may have decent relations with the Eggbreaker tribe of hobgoblins, but if the Baconator clans show up having been shoved out of their lands, that fragile peace may collapse.

Brad

 

[Jack of Tales]

Wow thanks for all the great advice. I made a short checklist of sorts regarding posts that had things I'd love to implement in my game. Whoever mentioned armored caravans as a sort of PoL gave me a great idea for this small group of merchants/hunters/gatherers who travel from area to area and are a central PoL.

From what I've gathered I plan on re-inventing my previous idea (a small, 3,000 square mile alliance of provinces with 5-10 villages each with populations from 750-1600 and only three towns, with one central city) to a smaller, focused area of perhaps three villages with the starting one located within the ruins of a major town. Buildings will be part wood (modern) and part stone (what was already standing). Adventurers will be encouraged to have long lineages for their starting weapons and armor since new sources of iron will be relatively rare and the ability to forge steel weapons consigned to a small group (dwarves). travel will be dangerous due to surrounding goblin/hobgoblin, gnoll and harpy clans. In addition to this, the end of the world freed numerous low and mid level demons, devils and elementals. These creatures occasionally rampage although are usually content to either: 1) pose as gods, 2) extort money for protection or 3) sleep in random ruins.

The main issues I brought up were food: Will be dealt with using crop rotation and animals that are brought in at night.
Wood: Primary source, lots of forests nearby, no issues.
Stone: Pre-established cities are practically the only source. Perhaps a quarry may be discovered? not sure yet.
Iron: Brought in by halflings/armed caravans. Large mercenary groups (50-100 as someone else mentioned) using the idea of past weapons having long histories (something else mentioned) and dwarves holding the information on how to smelt steel fairly secretive.
Protection: As above, mercenary groups, pacts with monstrous humanoids, pacts with bandits, and pacts with the occasional demon.

I can sort out population density using Medieval Demographics Made Easy articles. Thanks for all the helpful postings!

 

[Clawhound]

Cattle raids!

Getting iron is tree intensive. Look up Pine Grove Forge . A remote iron forge is a perfect place for an adventure. A need for iron is a need for trees, and a need for trees is sure to cause problems with the fey.

My PoL setting currently has a town inside a hill fort with a single, ancient tower sitting at the top of the hill. The area has horse ranches, an iron forge (its main economy), and numerous farms. The area was settled by a mercenary regiment that was paid in land. They're tough, but they do run into stuff that they can't handle.

They are part of a human alliance against the goblin tribes. The human alliance is what remains of the empire and is deeply divided by its own infighting. They do cooperate just enough to keep the highways going.

Their dangers include: their own neighbors who may try to conquer them, unfriendly tribes, the rising goblin empire, the haunted forest where lies an ancient city, a fey kingdom to the south that is easily insulted, a recent incursion of bandits on the highway, and the recent defeat of their best veteran companies, along with their leader.

The setting wasn't PoL from the get-go, but instead imaged with "adventure oriented design". I found that the two system meshed very well.

 

[Pbartender]

Stone: Pre-established cities are practically the only source. Perhaps a quarry may be discovered? not sure yet.

Take note... As already mentioned above, mudbrick can be a reasonable alternative to stone. Though not quite as resilient as stone, mud bricks can be relatively easy and plentiful to make... Especially if you large supplies of wood to fire kilns.

Also, wattle and daub could be another plentiful and very inexpensive means of building homes.


Stone buildings would be considered an exceptional luxury and a mark of great wealth, without a quarry nearby.

 

[TwinBahamut]

Well, regarding some of the "monsters in PoL" debate that I seem to have missed earlier...

In my opinion, a Points of Light setting is not a setting where civilization itself is at risk of complete destruction from a great threat. Instead, it is a setting where civilization is simply unable to deal with the moderate threats, because there are too many really minor threats tying up resources elsewhere. You don't need a hundred monsters wandering the countryside, raiding whole regions every night, you just need a single monster in the right place.

For example, let me use the classic PoL-style monster: the troll. Take two or three trolls and put them under a bridge (because trolls just happen to like living under bridges). Say that this bridge is the main link between a mining town and various surrounding towns. The trolls' presence chokes off the trade between the mining town and the rest of the world, and threatens to slowly starve out the miners trapped in the town.

In a non-PoL setting, such a treat can probably be dealt with by the nobles or other powerful figures in the surrounding area. Perhaps they could send some troops, or perhaps gather some funds to hire a wizard to chase the trolls away. The difference with a PoL setting is that those nobles or other power figures are unable to help. Maybe they have troubles with goblins (which are no threat to a community, but only so long as there are guards watching the town walls), or maybe they simply are not as wealthy. As such, in a PoL setting, the isolated mining town doesn't have any way of fixing the problem built into the setting itself. Perhaps it can be described as the difference between a stable equilibrium and an unstable one?

Another way of thinking about it is that PoL assumes there are a lot of monsters in the "regions of darkness" between settlements, but it does not assume that these monsters are even usually interested in attacking settlements. Certainly, if a strong monster decides to attack a point of light, or even move too close to one, then that point of light is in severe danger and needs to be rescued by the PCs, but the odds of this should be low enough that it doesn't happen very often at all.

A mythological example would be he Sphinx from the story of Oedipus. A single monster shuts down an entire city, until a hero arrives and saves it. Monsters like the Sphinx don't always cause trouble in greek myth, but when they do they cause severe problems. On the other hand, a lot of monsters like Cerberus or Scylla and Charybdis exist in that world of myth, but for the most part their place in the world is known and understood and they can be avoided completely, except for when a brave person tries to take a dangerous route through their home.

 

[Ydars]

This is indeed a great thread.

DarkAngel; you made yourself quite clear, I just didn't read your post carefully enough. Another example of me acting like a demented Kangaroo

If the city was a producer then the food issue does still arise if the hinterland (the area from which the city draws resources) has shrunk in any way or if there has been a reorganisation of wealth and a disruption of food supply. This would probably occur because once you base trade and supply on abstract wealth (coinage) and then take away the guarantor for the currency, all systems would collapse, at least temporarily.

The chaos caused by this would be very profound but could be partially alleviated, in your City, because of the presence of the old nobles. These would probably have seized power if their wealth is based on ownership of land and serfs as they could supply the cities food needs and have manpower. They could probably rob and steal with impunity. This is what happened in Roman Britain; the Iron Age tribal leaders were originally used as client kings but once Rome left, they reverted to the old ways again because Roman coinage could no longer be trusted. In this chaos, I think food and other supply systems would be far less effective and the population that could be supported would drop for a while.

The merchant class, whose wealth is all tied up in coins and not material goods, would instantly be in trouble and their houses looted; their mercernary guards would all desert or even join looting once it was clear they could not be paid.

In a historical setting, the land would become the principal focus again, as most people try to become self-sufficient and so there is a natural tendancy for Cities to become deserted as people move out to find farmland. In a fantasy setting, people might stay in Cities to get protection from monsters as the walls would provide protection.

I think by 70 years after such a disaster, up to 60-80% of a major City would probably be abandoned, with the remaining population huddling together behind crumbling walls. I expect that such a settlement would be stable because the old landowners could have managed some sort of transition of power and chosen a leader, although the general collapse or order would encourage constant infighting between the nobles. I would also suggest that the abandoned parts of the city might well have been demolished to allow for crops to be grown inside the city walls. As for the rest, life would settle down to some semblance of order, and the Noble leader would probably start minting his own coins. Once this happens then abstract wealth again becomes possible and much of civilisation would probably return to the City if the whole cycle happened within about 10-15 years of the fall of the Empire.

I would also suspect that animals would be brought within the walls at night and that much of the population of the city works outside the walls herding the animals or growing crops by day.

Hence such a City could have quiet a high population (perhaps 30% of the original Imperial population but possibly with much greater crowding because of refugees from outlying settlements having crammed in) but the city would be a very noisy, smelly animal dung plastered place that was very agarian in character with the old crumbling civic buildings of the Empire slowly decaying away.

I would also suggest that more fortifications would surround the city, in the form of earth ramparts and ditches to protect the farmland immediately abutting the city.

The final element of such a city would be crime. Chaos creates the opportunity for crime lords and your city is Certain to have one. Especially as the nobles would be sure to exploit the common people for their own gain. Also, expect that most people in such a city would be serfs and beholden to a Noble for a time and this might still be reflected in the makeup of society, even a considerable time later (perhaps it evolves into rival political parties or factions).

 

[Mirtek]

other useful stuff will get used up fairly quickly and won't be replaceable in most settlements. As such commodities are used up, they will get more and more valuable until at some point (and it won't take very long IMHO) some crazy and/or tough bastards are going to be willing to take the risk and ply the roads trading in the stuff. Expect merchants to group together for protection, forming huge caravans guarded by veritable armies of mercenaries, paid for with the super-fat profits these valuable goods will bring in.

These expensive caravans can porbably afford to make their circuit one or maybe two times a year, but when they show up at a village, boy do they make a killing.

However this leaves the question: How do they pay for it?

Sure, the poor villages may badly crave new iron, but even if a merchant takes the costs of outfitting a heavily guarded caravan to bring them iron, what can they offer in return?

I imagine the poor trader arriving with his caravan only to find a PoL unable top pay enough to merely cover the costs for his guard, don't even think about making profit.