WLD as a city

[Nisarg]

Don't forget Port Blacksand!!

Speaking of which my Port Blacksand campaign starts tonight!
I'm using: Blue Rose (for the system), Port Blacksand (for the setting), Dynasties and Demagogues, Cityworks, and Toolbox.

Its going to be a blast.

Nisarg

 

[Hand of Evil]

Hmm... It's a shame that my group isn't very Dungeon oriented at the moment, it would be interesting to play through it with my current group...

But what would people want of "The world's Largest City"? Should it be a port city? How modular should it be (as in where you could chuck it in your campaign)? How big should it be (in terms of population)? How should the devision of races be in the city? Should the City be written with different settings in mind? How should it be written (organizational)? Is there a book that does a good job at describing a city, but should be done bigger (i thought Sharn was pretty good, but with an aditional 700 pages of details it would be near perfect).

I would have to think it would have to be like Signet (is that the right name) in planescape, to allow the mixing os all the races and to offer the greatest appeal to the players other than that anything goes.

 

[Steel_Wind]

It should be a port city, yes. Dock areas are iconic, after all.

But more to the point I expect it to take a "quarter" approach. We'd have too many "quarters" for it to be actually one-fourth of the city, but you know what I mean.

So yes, there's the docks, the red-light district, merchants bazaar, noble district, slums, sewers, palace, etc. All detailed out. Some floor plans here; NPC's there, metaplots and microplot hooks. Rumours etc.

It need not absolutely fit together as an absolute coherent whole, but the part about WLD that attracted me was that the tactics in the encounters made sense and they meshed with one another in their specific area group within the dungeon.

That approach in a World's Largest City would entertain me and be a valuable resource.

The difference in most city designs vs. Dungeons is that city's tend to be purely reference resources and are not meant to be active adventures in the sense that there is a set encounter happens if you go *here*

With a product as extensive as a World's Largest City, it might be a lot of fun to have several set encounters in the City areas - approximating a more dungeonesque design as opposed to Carse, City State of the World Emperor or Invincible Overlord, etc. approach.

Several metaplots running through the City as well; be it warring Thieves Guilds etc. and it promises to be a lot of fun.

Looking forward to it Mr. Pinto (if you have, in fact, decided to go forward with it)

 

[Tonguez]

The Largest City in my world is Bishnagar a Port City which sits at the crossroads of the East-West Silk/Spice trade , is a major terminus of the North-South Gold/Diamond trade and whose port is the closest and easiest reached by the Far Northern Barbarians (the Medieval Europe-analog).

SO three points
1. Yes make it a Port
2. Give it a good reason for being the worlds biggest (Trade makes since)
3. Give it a good reason for multiple races/ethnicities/adventures to be present (again trade makes since)

Also using the Quarters (Districts) approach as mentioned by Steel Wind is the way to go especially if they are modular and in fact can be moved around jigsaw like - that way no two cities need ever be the same and bits could be melded together to make new cities!

The book should have a section on City Life - what NPCs do in the city when adventures aren't happening - and a Section of Urban Adventure Plothooks (like the Warring Theives Guilds, or the Murders in High Street, or the of the Royal Yatch into Port, or the Strange Happenings down Fishergate Lane etc)


Treat it like a dungeon
Corridors = Link Roads/Gates "The road leading to the Judges Quarter is cobbled and well kept ..."
Room = Districts "Entering the Judges Gate you see that the buildings are of fine quality with low white-stone walls enclosing the gardens and houses... "
Treasure = Place of Interest/Plothook "Moving past the first few houses it is not long before you spot the Judges Hall to the east....."
Monster = NPC "Judge Malik Aknar ibn Doud is a tall thin man of Half-elf extraction..."

 

[punkorange]

I would like to hear any info regarding the world's largest city from AEG, even if its one of those ad's like they have for the WLD on their website.

 

[Pbartender]

Hey. While an epic dungeon crawl isn't my campaign cuppa tea either, don't knock WLD. It's a massive effort, very well done, and most of the encounters alone are so well thought out and detailed they can be plucked out and used as stand alones or in groups.

Sorry, I seemed to have dropped the "to me" that should be adorning the end of my previous post. Again, sorry about that.

Even if it's a product you would not likely use as a massive dungeon or as 16 large dungeons. it's still *very much* worth your time to look at it.

Oh, I did take a long, hard look at it. It wasn't a matter of it not being worth my time, it was more about it being worth my money. Regardless of the content, it's a rather expensive book as far as most gamers' budgets are concerned. While there are parts of it I might use occasionally, I certainly won't use all of it, and the parts I do use can only really be used once.

A massive city book, on the other hand, would see a lot of use by me and my group, if well done. I be much more likely to use everything in the book, even if I split it between several towns. Plus, characters will return to a city and interact with its inhabitants repeatedly, whereas character rarely return to a dungeon, once it's been sacked and looted.

I could justify the cost of a massive city book, but I can't do the same for a dungeon book.

They did a risky thing with WLD in terms of commercial viability and massive investment of time and effort - all while daring to do something that has never been done. And they pulled it off.

And I congratulate them wholeheartedly for it. I hope they keep it up. Their first daring risk, while admittedly impressive and well-done, was, as you put it, just not my cuppa tea.

On the other hand, a city book, if done as well, I would suck down in great gasping gulps.

 

[Digital M@]

On the other hand, a city book, if done as well, I would suck down in great gasping gulps.

I think this is true of many gamers and with the success of WLD preceeding it, I think WL City will have a much warmer initial reception and if well done possibly change how the industry looks at its customer.

A well done city even without or after the initial adventure designed for it (and I do think it should have one) can be used as a base for whole campaigns or at the least many adventures. As PB said, it could be divided up into small cities or towns. As far as the feel of the city, it would have to be generic D&D. Any of us who customize our worlds are used to tweaking things and would have it no other way. If we did not enjoy the creative control of tweaking and customizing we would just use a generic D&D FR or Grayhawk world.

 

[elforcelf]

One of the latest Inquest's which I can not find now;talks about it. Its 600 pages long. With 10,000 npc's. elforcelf.

 

[Wraith Form]

One of the latest Inquest's which I can not find now;talks about it. Its 600 pages long. With 10,000 npc's. elforcelf.

Count me in, AEG, you've got my money!

(Unless, by 10,000 NPCs, you're saying 10,000 stat blocks with no personalities/physical & psychological & equipment descriptions. Those I can generate on my own, and would be a huge waste of my $.)

 

[DaveMage]

Count me in, AEG, you've got my money!

(Unless, by 10,000 NPCs, you're saying 10,000 stat blocks with no personalities/physical & psychological & equipment descriptions. Those I can generate on my own, and would be a huge waste of my $.)

I doubt its 10,000 stat blocks. I mean, even if you figure 10 per page, that would be a 1,000 page book of nothing but stat blocks. I have a feeling it's more along the lines of:

***
Dave's Bar and Grill

Dave's Bar and Grill is run by Dave the Mage (hm W9 CG), a strange, eccentric mage who likes to talk too much.
***

Hence, that's 1 NPC. Then you could easily have 9,999 more while still providing detail on the city.