Quote from: pspahn;736957I've been getting a pretty good response from my free Guidebook to the City of Dolmvay supplement for Labyrinth Lord.

And little wonder, having just skimmed it myself; it's quite a good product.  Lots of NPCs with good descriptions, lots of small businesses, and I do like how your section on random encounters gives enough meat to each that many are solid adventure hooks.  Well done.

From here

What do I want when I buy a city off somebody? I want them to do work for me. Not necessarily work I couldn't have done myself, I just want them to have put in the hours to put a little love into things I myself was too busy with other things to do.

So, scoring your city supplement:

Size

-You get one point for each thing described. An NPC, a building, an item, a unique local custom, a bar game, a legal system, etc. For example: you can say "there's a church" and you get a point.

Clarity at High Speed

-You lose that point if you tell me anything about it that could just as well have been randomized or made up on the spot by anybody with a brain, like: "the church doors are eleven feet high and made of oak."

I can make up generic details myself, I don't need professional game designers for that. More importantly, doing that clutters up the graphic design on the page when I'm in the middle of the game trying to figure out what's going on with your church. This may seem harsh, but the whole point of using someone else's setting is that you have to do less work and if I have to prep and highlight all over the page or rewrite it then it suddenly becomes more trouble than just writing my own thing.

-You lose a point if you explain the function of a thing when I already know what it does. Like if you say "the Cathedral of Chuckles is the center of the worship of the Great God Chuckles" you're wasting your space and my time.

Notice that from these rules the effect is: if you include a church and do nothing but give me generic details about it and describe what a church is, then you've actually lost a point and so you are better off leaving the church out entirely if that's all you're going to do.

Map

-You gain 0 points for putting the thing on a map or otherwise locating it, unless where it's located has some especially distinctive effect on the game or setting, in which case it gets you one point. Telling me the crypt is in the northeast quadrant of the city doesn't get you a point unless that means the graveyard is built on top of the all-girl juggling school. Again, if you're giving me a detail it needs to be a detail that couldn't just as well have been randomized.

-0 points if there's a map that's keyed with only numbers or letters referring to paragraphs spread out across the supplement. Five points if it's keyed with the names of places and/or some sort of distinctive shape telling you what something is just by looking at it. Twenty points if the spread with the map manages to both locate a place and encapsulate most of the important things I need to know about each location.

Character

-You gain a point for adding a descriptive detail that affects the style of the thing. That is: creates some sort of shift in the idea of the thing by its mere presence. For example: telling me the church is shaped like perfect sphere, or an antler, or is made entirely of leather, or is a monolithic grey streaked with long dark stains from centuries of rust and rain. Ideally, You get this point even if it I don't like it--like you say the church is made of burlap and magic lutes.

Adventure Fuel And Completeness

-You gain points for adding distinctive features to things that create playable depth --information, "adventure seeds", mini-challenges--to a thing you've created, according to the following scheme:

-One point for a detail that basically says "There's an adventure you could go on outside the setting" (no matter how lame). i.e. "It is rumored that the priest has a map to the location of a sunken wreck full of treasure." (Assuming the description of the actual wreck and map are not provided in your setting.)

-One point if the adventure being pointed to isn't lame.

-Two points for a detail that points the PCs towards an adventure outside the setting and implies that some person or institution in the setting will be pleased, displeased or in some way affected by completion of the task, and if that person or institution has any identifiable and persisitent personality or role in the setting. i.e. "It is rumored that the priest carries the map because he hopes, one day, to recover the dog collar belonging to his dead puppy, Randolph, who died on that voyage."

-Three points for a detail that could send the PCs out of the setting but which will, if they succeed or fail, create a substantial change in the setting. i.e. "Legend has it that returning the collar to Charneldyne will cause all the madmen in the city to become sane."

-Four points if it sends the PCs out of the setting but also requires or implies that in order to complete the task they must do something substantive within the setting. "The ruined galleon is a mile beneath the waves. It is said there are only a handful of devices and substances that allow one to reach such depths, and a scant few in the city who know how to use them--and they all have been imprisoned by the Baron for either necromancy, lechery, or fraud."

-Five points if the task can be performed entirely within the setting. "The wreck is actually located deep beneath the surface of the Baron's moat."

(Or, to put it another way, the easier you make it for me to run the city just like a dungeon, the happier I am.)

(I'm all for "leavng space for the DM to invent things" but I don't need you to provide that--I know I can create space wherever I want. I'm subcontracting you.)

-Six points if a detail could be of general use to many, most, or all of the PCs activities within the setting. "The priest, like all the clergy in the city, is unknowingly subject to a ancient curse from the Sea Gog, Nykkto, whereby his intimates are doomed to die by drowning."

Style

Five points for each part of the basic premise of the city that is actually interesting. i.e. "The City of Charneldyne is a bustling metropolis at the heart of the orcish empire" would get 0 points, whereas ""The City of Charneldyne is a bustling metropolis at the heart of the orcish empire and is built entirely from the bones of slain foes" will get 5 points.

Subjectivity

Twenty points if the setting as a whole is actually interesting. Like Viriconium.

Neither gain nor lose points either way if it's just basically a medieval place.

You lose twenty points if it goes out of its way to be uninteresting, like Stamford, Connecticut.

Value

Divide the number of points by the cost in U.S dollars of the setting.

Wow... guys, you are fanstic. This is all very inspiring! There is no doubt that my city articles will benefit from this discussion. Thank you loads!

Herr Arnulfe: (Hi by the way ) I have quite a few compulsory bits to cover, so I do not have the option to cut too many things (although how I present the compulsory bits is another matter entierly). These articles/appendices will appear in a scenario anthology, and much of the material is referrences to those adventures. Also, I'm pulling in referrences from throughout Fading Suns canon to create consistent and well-rounded city descriptions.

pspahn: I'll grap your freebie right away. Sounds like a brilliant product. Thanks for the tip!

Quote from: Ravenswing;736964 I'd think 8000 words to adequately present a 10 million person city to be pretty inadequate.

I wholeheartedly agree. In a perfect world, I'd have 100.000 words to do this in. I do suspect that this will grow into something a bit bigger then 8000 words... I might have to cut some things and publish them seperately as downloadable freebies.

I love your system, Zak S, and I will definitelly run my articles through your scheme and see what comes out of it.




Give me more please

Quote from: Angelman;737004Herr Arnulfe: (Hi by the way ) I have quite a few compulsory bits to cover, so I do not have the option to cut too many things (although how I present the compulsory bits is another matter entierly).

*waves* You might find that the compulsory bits can be covered very economically leaving more wordage for original material. Generally the more solid an idea, the less it matters how you say it. It's usually the weaker ideas that require spicing up with additional flavour text IME.

Good point.

To touch again on Ravenswing's point of detailing at the character level. Consider why the PC's may be in the city. I know when my players enter a new city they start asking people where things are. It helps the Gm to have those answers. So start outside the city as a player/character and walk through the gates. Start asking guards where the best inn is, where can I get weapons, Who are the scholars who can transcribe this ancient scroll etc. the Gm should be able to answer fairly quickly these questions. Like Ravenswing said. Seldom have the asked hey who's the king. Unless there is a very specific plot reason. Now the leaders are important and reflect a lot of the city but going into too much detail is wasted on the PC's and that is the view point to concentrate on.

Provide the GM with simple and easy directions/information.
I use city books as my note pad, so to speak, to keep/remember details for me.

I use it to plug in parts into a whole web so I don't have to figure out the web on the fly but all I need are kernels of info not a life store.

Hope that helps

I agree on the major NPCs stuff. They are at best flavour and background noice - I mean, if I travel to New York it might be cool to learn that such and such rock hero lives there, but chances are I won't ever meet any of them. Still, they make up a cultural landscape which informs the atmosphere, I guess. But yeah, there is no reason to go on about major celebs.

Quote from: Angelman;737037I agree on the major NPCs stuff. They are at best flavour and background noice - I mean, if I travel to New York it might be cool to learn that such and such rock hero lives there, but chances are I won't ever meet any of them. Still, they make up a cultural landscape which informs the atmosphere, I guess. But yeah, there is no reason to go on about major celebs.

Depending on the types of adventures you expect PCs to engage in, it could sometimes be the opposite. e.g. the current city gazetteer I'm writing is very much geared towards political intrigue, so we're focusing on elite NPCs and skimming over the plebs.

Quote from: Herr Arnulfe;737042Depending on the types of adventures you expect PCs to engage in, it could sometimes be the opposite. e.g. the current city gazetteer I'm writing is very much geared towards political intrigue, so we're focusing on elite NPCs and skimming over the plebs.

True. If one plays in a Babylon 5 type of high court and VIP characters, the major NPCs becomes a lot more important.

Quote from: Ravenswing;736966And little wonder, having just skimmed it myself; it's quite a good product.  Lots of NPCs with good descriptions, lots of small businesses, and I do like how your section on random encounters gives enough meat to each that many are solid adventure hooks.  Well done.

Thank you, sir! I started out with the premise of "if I were setting a campaign entirely in a city, what would I find useful as a DM" and went from there. I probably have a little more leeway than the OP because I'm writing for myself, but I think the premise is pretty sound. Chances are if you've been running games for years you already know what sort of information is needed for gaming and what is just fluff.

Some good suggestions so far.

One thing that a large urban area should have to make it come alive is a mechanism for change. People die, people are born, buildings or whole blocks burn down, new construction takes place, etc. All too often, NPCs only die, or property is only destroyed due to adventure/scenario related activities.

These things happen naturally and regularly. It is especially effective when change happens in areas very familliar to the players. If the PCs befriend a club owner and develop a relationship with him, what happens when he suddenly dies of natural causes and his grown daughter now runs the business?

A city that is constantly changing feels alive and more real. A series of event tables that drive that change could help quite a bit.

Quote from: 3rik;736800Maps and floorplans, loads of 'm.

This. It makes GMing much easier if I have maps to reference whether or not the players interact with them in detail. I can make up setting details and NPC a lot easier than orienting things in space, which is what a map does for me.

Quote from: Ravenswing;736964
What I need in a citybook is basic.  Most city descriptions lavish attention on geopolitics, history, broad cultural strokes and the like, and in my experience, players care a lot less about those things than game companies and authors seem to believe.  Players want NPCs with whom to interact, and businesses in which to shop.  

So you need businesses, and a good many of them.  We need to have an idea of the quality, breadth and price of the goods.  We need to know a few things about the person -- whether it be owner, counter person or salesman -- with whom the PCs will interact.  It's nice to have a couple sentences of shop description.

And that's it.  I don't need loving descriptions of how many gold, silver and copper pieces are under a floorboard in the owner's third story living quarters; thinking back over the last decade of gaming, I can count the times that PCs have been in a proprietor's living quarters at all on one hand.  I don't need illos, because the players will give them a second-and-a-half glance, shrug, murmur "That's nice," and forget about them a moment later.  I don't need long stat blocks for the owners, because on the remote chance someone wants to throw down with the neighborhood candlemaker, I can pretty much just plug in my system's standard for Terrified Mook Shopkeeper Brandishing A Cudgel.  I don't need maps of the place, because people usually don't have melees when they've popped into the greengrocer's to stock up on tea and spices for the next overland trek.  

Truth be told, I've stopped making maps at all for smaller cities: they're superfluous.  All a GM needs to know -- and only sometimes -- is where Place A is, relative to the party, and how long does it take to get from Place A to Place B, roughly.  A simple "These businesses are in the Old City, and these businesses are in the East Gate District, and these businesses are by the University, and these businesses are in Twilight Hill ..." will do.

Another mistake citybooks make are in the NPCs they choose to embellish.  All too often it seems to be the ruler, the city council, key government officials, all with a column or more of description, combat stats, gear and the like.  Sorry, but I've seldom known a group to interact at this level.  Heck, I've been running parties out of the aforementioned large capital city since about 1979, and the first time any PC ever met the King was last year ... and that PC is a princess who was the envoy of her government.  No one's ever met the chancellor.  No one's ever met the chief of the secret police.  No one's ever met the chief justice.  No one's ever met the Queen.  No one's ever met the High Admiral.  No one's ever met the head of the criminal syndicate. Yet these are the NPCs on whom citybooks tend to focus, to the exclusion of people they are likely to meet.

All of this is good as well, although I disagree about the maps. I don't need them for the players, but for myself when GMing.

So there are really two categories of things:

1. stuff that is there for the players to interact with, locations and NPCs that they will frequent and interact with;

2. stuff that is there to orient the GM, maps and higher level details that help the GM "get" the city, both physically and in terms of flavor.

Quote from: Artifacts of Amber;737019To touch again on Ravenswing's point of detailing at the character level. Consider why the PC's may be in the city. I know when my players enter a new city they start asking people where things are. It helps the Gm to have those answers. So start outside the city as a player/character and walk through the gates. Start asking guards where the best inn is, where can I get weapons, Who are the scholars who can transcribe this ancient scroll etc. the Gm should be able to answer fairly quickly these questions. Like Ravenswing said. Seldom have the asked hey who's the king. Unless there is a very specific plot reason. Now the leaders are important and reflect a lot of the city but going into too much detail is wasted on the PC's and that is the view point to concentrate on.

Yep, exactly.  The NPCs we need more than a couple sentences on are not the King, the Exalted Archpriestess, the High Admiral or the Grandmaster of the Alchemists' Guild.  The NPCs we need are the guard lieutenant in charge of the neighborhood in which the PCs' inn is located, the priestess of the neighborhood temple around the corner, the officer commanding the harbor patrol boat, and the defrocked apothecary who sells bootleg healing elixirs.

Now, yes, indeed, a game emulating B5's plots would focus on high level wheeling and dealing.  I even have a situation like that myself: I started private runs with my wife several years ago, after her PC's group retired in favor of a new beginning group, and she still wanted to run her wizard.  That wizard is now the most powerful PC in my campaign's history, she's married into the imperial family of one of the world's great empires, she's on a first name basis with the Empress, she works for the Empress' father (who is himself the world's most powerful wizard), and she's about to be appointed the governor of the empire's capital city.  She interacts routinely with the great powers of the world, and for her, I do have to have all these high officials worked out.

But that level's very rare; I've never had a PC at it before, and only sporadically have any PCs dealt with those folks over the decades.  A commercial citybook dealing with the great and powerful would have been useless to me for the great majority of my GMing career.

This is all gold, people! Thank you all for your help. You've been awesome!

Butcher said everything I would have.

I'll add - every place should have an associated NPC to give character and a point of interaction with the place.

That NPC should be, um, interesting.