Cities and Towns
Cities and towns are important locations for role playing game campaigns. Characters can get supplies, information, tips, adventures, training, healing, NPCs/henchmen, new spells, sell things, etc. They are also great locations for sidequests and opportunities to waylay a campaign.
These are tough to design from scratch, especially if you are new to this. Before we get into some thoughts on how to do this remember that you don't have to do it from scratch. There are a lot of campaign cities and towns online (many are free as pdfs!) so this is something you can use and just tweak to your game system or your campaign.
Now, to do this from scratch, a few things that it helps me to remember:
- Unlike in Roman times, medieval towns and cities didn't have many people in them. Fourteen thousand was a decent sized city in medieval Europe. Now, it's a fantasy game so you don't have to be "real" when you design your city. But if you want a medieval feel then 1,000-15,000 is great for everything but the capital city.
- Cities and towns are complicated places. Politics, guilds, religions, factions, organized crime to name a few. People seem good but aren't, others seem bad but have complicated reasons for their actions. You can have players turned around and lost pretty quickly with how complex this can get, this is also a great source of sidequests and adventures.
- Cities and towns are dirty and smell bad. People threw their trash and excrement onto the streets. City walls keep there from being a breeze (what would this be like in a hot region of the world?). There would be dead bodies, trash, and worse in the river. Etc. All this means that cities are great places to get diseases or parasites.
- Think about government, economics, and getting into the city. Can characters just walk into the city? Most would have charged something to get in. What if the characters look poor and disreputable? Economics: how much do things cost relative to the Players Handbook? What about selling things to city merchants? What kind of government is it? Is there a police force? Etc.
- Cities and towns have to eat and drink. If people live in a city they need to be able to grow enough crops or import food if they can't. They also need a water supply - which is why a lot of towns and cities were near rivers or lakes. This is why you can't set up a medieval metropolis in the middle of the desert.
- Where are building supplies coming from? You have to build buildings out of something. Usually wood and stone. Where is that coming from? And, if it's mostly wood then there's a great chance of fires (no fireball in the city!).
- You don't have to design every building in the city. This is important, every building and residence does not have to be on a map. Just put what's important for the adventure and read a narrative of the rest. If players want to break into residences and rob them then you can go a different place with the adventure.
- Random encounters will be different in different parts of the city and at night. The bad part of town has different random encounters than the rich part, both of them are different than the religious quarter. Night is different than daytime.
- You can borrow from real cities. This is important. Ancient city maps can be found online. These can all be borrowed and tweaked. I have an example below. Saves you some time and your players won't know.
Free City of Stella:
This is where higher level characters end up in my campaign. I borrowed heavily from the city of Ankara as the Byzantine Empire did it (that map is below):
This is what I did with it. It's now the Free City of Stella.
Next is part of the city of Greymane. This one is not based on another city and is where most of the campaign either takes place or ends up through ninth level, so it's really well developed (I have over 221 pages written up for this city). It's a city with 14,000 inhabitants and sits on a river. Below is part of the map for the city (there are 12 maps for this city that have evolved over time), the extreme northwestern corner:
Northwest Barracks
Training Grounds
Armorer
Weapon Maker/Smith
Mess
The Broken Sword (Tavern)
The Broken Sword is a tavern that caters to the City Guard and other types. For all that, it is an extremely rough and tumble place. It is run by a retired, grizzled 8th level fighter named Fiddler. Fiddler has one that he likes to play at night, though he is tone deaf and is terrible at it. Due to his size (6’5, 260 pounds, 18/00 strength), nobody tells him that his fiddling skills need work. Everyone working at the Broken Sword is a retired soldier (ranging from 3rd level fighters who serve the tables to a 7th level fighter that works the bar). While this is a very attractive place to soldiers and reasonably priced, it also means the quality of the food and drink is suspect.
Eating the food or drinking the results in a chance of contracting a disease or a parasite. If food or drink is ingested at the Tavern, roll a d100:
01-03: Character has contracted a disease
04-06: Character has a parasite
07-00: No effects
All infections will be mild and will resolve in 1d4-1 weeks. What follows is from the DMG:
Fiddler will be happy to talk to paying patrons and give them information about the city, gossip, the city’s history, what lies beyond, etc.
The Broken Sword sells:
Room and board at pubs/hostels:
The Long Sword (Brothel)
This brothel caters to soldiers and the city guard. It is cheap, the quality reflects that, and there is an excellent chance of catching a disease or a parasite from here (01-05 disease, 06-10 parasite) which will be mild and will last 1d4-1 weeks. Prices are 1sp per visit. Current City Guard members contract out to be guards at this brothel, so it’s not a place to cause trouble. The Long Sword is run by Circe, a 7th level witch, who is chaotic neutral in alignment.
Earl the Painter
Earl is a middle aged dwarf who will paint anything from buildings to shields. He charges 7sp per day or 3 gp per week for work.
Chop’s Shop (Butcher)
The party will smell this part of the merchant district long before they see it. The butcher purchases animals and kills/prepares them on the spot. Everything here is fresh. The butcher is a large human (6’ tall, 240 pounds, 17 strength) named Chop. Chop’s Shop sells:
Tanner
Stinky the Tanner prepares leather hides. Since this is from cows this is a very smelly and vile place to be at. Stinky has done this job for 30 years so the smell is permanently a part of him. As he puts it, he doesn’t get invited very many places. Stinky can make:
The equipment will fit the character and will be 10% lighter than normal equipment. It will also last longer.
Miller
This is the Miller for this part of the city. Grain is brought in from the farms or off ship, brought here, and made into flour which other vendors purchase.
Catch the Sweet (Breads and Pastries)
Catch the Sweet is a bread and pastry shop operated by the sister of the Catchpole. She is 4’6” tall, weighs 240 pounds, and looks just like the Catchpole and also speaks with a fake accent. Here the party can purchase:
Straight Razor the Barber
Straight Razor is a grizzled sixty year old human who operates a barber shop in the Merchant District. The shop sells hair cuts and beard trims. Services are for 2 sp. Straight Razor knows everything about the city and if asked a direct question from a patron he will answer.
Fine Clothes
This is a vendor that sells fancy clothes. If the party wants to access the Hill District they will need to purchase clothes from here. The Catchpole is the model in the middle of the store showing off clothes that people could purchase. The Cathchpole’s brother is actually the owner of the store and the tailor. Like the Catchpole he is short (5’ tall) and around 280 pounds and effects an accent.
This store sells:
Abandoned warehouse
Or is it…
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