Hi folks,

I am doing a write-up for a Fading Suns city, and I would like to know what you people think about RPG city source material. What works and what does not work in such material? And what kind of, if any, wanted information do you find city sourcebooks and the like typically fail to include? In short, what is your dream RPG city book/article like?

Thank you in advance for any feedback

Best wishes,
Vidar (FSR developer at FASA Games)

Hey, Vidar. Congratulations on the gig, FS is a great game and it's good to see it back in print.

Here's what I look for in a city supplement:

• Interesting NPCs
• Interesting NPCs
• Interesting NPCs
• Locales which entice players to explore, and reward them for doing so
• Interesting NPCs
• Locales which get across the "mood" of the place (rough-and-tumble frontier town, ancient capital fallen on hard times, bustling trade hub, whatever is appropriate). Stuff that drives home that "not in Kansas anymore" vibe I look forward to as a player, and try to drive home as a GM.
• Last but not least, if you can cram in the odd interesting NPC, that'd be great.

Now, what I mean by an interesting NPCs is:

• The NPC has an agenda of its own, no matter how banal (e.g. an innkeeper wants the inn to keep running and the gold to come in) and will act to carry it out independent of whether or not the PCs show up.
• The NPC has a distinct personality and/or appearance, not necessarily quirky but memorable enough to give players a "handle" on him ("the innkeeper with the handlebar moustache").
• The NPC's agenda and/or personality open up avenues for interacting with the PCs, that turn into adventure hooks (an enemy finds out that the PCs are holing up at his inn and sends a squad of assassins there, a huge fight ensues and the inn ends up burning down).
• The NPC interacts with other NPCs and with the city at large (the innkeeper, having been mistreated by the PCs before, blames them for the fracas and tips off the Assassins' Guild on what he overheard about the PCs' plans).

Hope that helps any. Good luck!

This is gold, Butcher, I love it! Very good advise

I have so far concentrated on getting the layout and backstory in sync (with a map), although the odd interesting NPC has demanded to come along for the ride here and there in the text. I guess NPCs can be good channels for setting atmosphere as well as adventure hooks.

Again, thanks, Butcher

Maps and floorplans, loads of 'm.

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

Thanks, 3rik! For reasons of space and cost, there won't be loads of them in this product, I'm affraid, but there will be city maps which FS has had to do almost completely without up until now. These city write-ups (there are actually two of them) will appear in an adventure anthology, so there is space limit.

That said, what kinds of locations do you like to see floorplans of, 3rik? Which ones do you find the most usefull?

Different moods for different areas. A city can be the business center of the universe, but that doesn't mean it can't have bad neighbourhoods or a red light district. Those areas have a different vibe, different NPC's and different buildings. Make sure those match with each other.

Concise and well-organized format for ease-of-use at the table (i.e. lots of sub-headers; no walls of text; cross-referencing where applicable). Any material that a decent GM could improvise on-the-fly should be considered "fat" and trimmed for the sake of utility. Minimal "off-screen" background material (e.g. insular NPC relationships or political plots that PCs have no power to influence).

Players often catch the GM flat-footed during city adventures because every location is just a short walk from everything else, so a few random tables can be helpful, as well as multiple linkages between NPCs and locations. In a city adventure the relationships between things are often more important than the things themselves IMO.

A variety of themes and genres - even though a focused "city of thieves" adventure is awesome, over the course of 5+ sessions most groups appreciate a couple of other flavours being added to the stew.

Here's what I look for:

• Street Plans with notable buildings marked
• Descriptions of Guilds/Organisations
• Descriptions of Famous/Powerful/Important People
• Plans of very important buildings
• Scenarios
• History of the city/region

Of course, I am heavily influenced by Pavis/Big Rubble, which has just the right level of information for me as a GM.

When you do up the maps, even if they are not all or even most included in this product, don't make them look like it's been done by some urban planner (unless of course the whole city and it's growth was in fact planned).

Thank you guys, all of this is very inspiring!

I have very limited space to describe a very big city - probably about 8000 words to describe a planetary capital of 10+ million. What should I, do you guys think, focus on? I have to make some hard choices with this...

Quote from: Angelman;736873I have very limited space to describe a very big city - probably about 8000 words to describe a planetary capital of 10+ million. What should I, do you guys think, focus on? I have to make some hard choices with this...

Look at Wikipedia and read about the different large capital cities. Copy the text and check the word counts. If they are around 8,000 then use a similar format. In fact, the Wikipedia format is a very good one for a summary of a city.

London comes out at around 11,000, Tokyo around 6,000 words. Do you need the description more detailed than those?

That's a very good suggestion, Soltkass! Very good indeed! Thanks

Of course, Wikipedia's city overviews doesn't show many locations or floorplans, but still, it is a very good approach to writing something like this.

Quote from: Angelman;736873I have very limited space to describe a very big city - probably about 8000 words to describe a planetary capital of 10+ million. What should I, do you guys think, focus on? I have to make some hard choices with this...

Whatever format you choose, a description of that density will probably benefit from working up a detailed outline beforehand. Start with a rough outline e.g.

Overview 400 words
History 400 words
Politics 400 words
Economy 400 words
District 1 800 words
District 2 600 words
etc.

Then drill down into each section and bullet-list everything that needs to be said on the topic. You'll inevitably want to revise your original wordcount estimates along the way. When you start writing and sections are falling over/under wordcount, keep the outline estimates updated so you don't get caught needing to make unplanned compromises at the end.

This process might weed out the "average" and possibly some of the "good" ideas before they're even written, because there might only be enough space for the "excellent" ones (and it's much harder to kill a baby after it's already been born). Keep the outline flexible, and let the quality of your germinating ideas dictate the fluctuating wordcount allotments.

Regarding floorplans, I'd prioritize the danger/intrigue-heavy locations where PCs are most likely to get into trouble. If there will be adventure support for your city, discuss with the author at the outline stage which locations will be detailed in the adventure text, and which ones you should include in the gazetteer.

I've been getting a pretty good response from my free Guidebook to the City of Dolmvay supplement for Labyrinth Lord. It's not nearly as big in scope or population but it might help spark some ideas for you (whether it be things to do or things to avoid).

http://www.rpgnow.com/product/125884/Guidebook-to-the-City-of-Dolmvay-PDF

Hrm.  I just pulled up one of the districts of the large capital city out of which my lead party is based, and it's got a hundred businesses, a few landmarks, and runs 9,881 words.  I'd think 8000 words to adequately present a 10 million person city to be pretty inadequate.

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.