Plagues have made a big difference in world history, and may in your fantasy world. In the course of studying military and diplomatic history over most eras I’ve encountered a lot about this frighteningly frequent occurrence.
Absent widespread healing or vaccines, plagues have historically been a fact of life, one of those things you hoped to avoid but sometimes could not. The effects were far-reaching. In building a world, you can ignore plagues, just as you can ignore famines and extended droughts that can bring down empires and even civilizations, or you can incorporate them into the history of your world. Whether that will increase the immersion of your game depends on your players. I’m going to talk about some characteristics of plagues and how you can incorporate them into your world building.
After the fact, a plague could radically change the nature of society. After the Black Death, the standard of living rose significantly. Ordinary people ate better because there was a lot more food (especially meat and fish) in relation to the population. The poorer land went out of cultivation and reverted to nature, for lack of farmers - but that meant on average people farmed more productive land. Laborers were paid more because there was a shortage of labor. Plagues had far-reaching social effects, e.g. widespread persecution of minorities and lawlessness. Effects were so pronounced that the time of the Black Death is sometimes regarded as the end of the Middle Ages.
Yet the Byzantine Empire suffered a great plague, possibly as bad as the later Black Death, in 541-549 (not disappearing entirely until the 700s). This doomed Emperor Justinian’s efforts to reunite the full Empire, for lack of manpower, though he did recapture much of Italy, North Africa, and even southern Spain before the plague.
In pre-Roman-domination times, a plague killed many Athenians including their leader Pericles (d. 429 BCE); some historians believe his death doomed the Athenians in the Peloponnesian War with Sparta.
As you build the history of your world a plague can make a huge difference, especially a plague as bad as the Black Death or the Justinianic Plague. In a fantasy world with many intelligent species, a plague might affect only one species to its detriment. When someone asks why there are so few of a particular species, an answer might be disease. Even today birdwatchers observe that house sparrows rapidly disappeared from much of the countryside, possibly because of disease.
Your Turn: How have you implemented plagues in your campaign?
Absent widespread healing or vaccines, plagues have historically been a fact of life, one of those things you hoped to avoid but sometimes could not. The effects were far-reaching. In building a world, you can ignore plagues, just as you can ignore famines and extended droughts that can bring down empires and even civilizations, or you can incorporate them into the history of your world. Whether that will increase the immersion of your game depends on your players. I’m going to talk about some characteristics of plagues and how you can incorporate them into your world building.
Lethality and Randomness
The Black Death of the 14th century (also known as the Pestilence or the Great Mortality, peaking in Europe1347-1351) helps provide a guide to the lethality of historical plagues. Depending on the affected location, between a quarter and a half of the population died. Plagues in general are random, so that there were locations such as Milan, Italy that were essentially free of the Black Death. If you look at a map of the effects of the Black Death, you can see this variability for yourself. Some plagues almost always killed anyone who was infected, while others saw many recover and possibly gain immunity. Plague usually affected everyone, young and old.It Kept Coming Back
Historical plagues didn’t just peter out or disappear never to be seen again. They kept coming back in waves, with periods (often many years) in between that were relatively plague free. Obviously, there were no vaccines, and even if the plague were one that you became immune to after contracting it, there were people who had not yet contracted it, plus younger people born since the last outbreak. In some areas forms of plague continued to occur periodically into the 17th (and rarely 19th) century!After the fact, a plague could radically change the nature of society. After the Black Death, the standard of living rose significantly. Ordinary people ate better because there was a lot more food (especially meat and fish) in relation to the population. The poorer land went out of cultivation and reverted to nature, for lack of farmers - but that meant on average people farmed more productive land. Laborers were paid more because there was a shortage of labor. Plagues had far-reaching social effects, e.g. widespread persecution of minorities and lawlessness. Effects were so pronounced that the time of the Black Death is sometimes regarded as the end of the Middle Ages.
The Fall of the Western Roman Empire
A fairly recent explanation of the weakness and fall of the Western Roman Empire is that it was depopulated by plagues 180-250 CE. This is rarely touched on in the literature of the time (perhaps because it was so common), but archaeological investigation of Roman cities shows a great contraction of the lived-in area, indicating a much lower population long before the actual failure of the Empire. This is not the only reason of course. When you talk about the fall of Western Rome, the question is always why didn’t Eastern Rome (what we now call the Byzantine Empire) fail? Eastern Rome had a much higher population, far more cities, and could suffer a series of plagues more readily than the West.Yet the Byzantine Empire suffered a great plague, possibly as bad as the later Black Death, in 541-549 (not disappearing entirely until the 700s). This doomed Emperor Justinian’s efforts to reunite the full Empire, for lack of manpower, though he did recapture much of Italy, North Africa, and even southern Spain before the plague.
In pre-Roman-domination times, a plague killed many Athenians including their leader Pericles (d. 429 BCE); some historians believe his death doomed the Athenians in the Peloponnesian War with Sparta.
What This Means for Your World
Fantasy worlds are different from the real world in the availability of magic that can cure diseases. The question is always how much healing is available in comparison to the size of the population? We could say that the elites (such as Pericles) are much more likely to survive a plague thanks to magic, as opposed to historical plagues where anyone from an Emperor on down (including several Roman emperors who died from pandemics) was just as susceptible as anyone else.As you build the history of your world a plague can make a huge difference, especially a plague as bad as the Black Death or the Justinianic Plague. In a fantasy world with many intelligent species, a plague might affect only one species to its detriment. When someone asks why there are so few of a particular species, an answer might be disease. Even today birdwatchers observe that house sparrows rapidly disappeared from much of the countryside, possibly because of disease.
Your Turn: How have you implemented plagues in your campaign?
