Levels in a Population

[Bloodzy]

I have a pretty simple question. I am not looking for city generators or anything. I was just wondering what the rule of thumb is for a populace when it comes to their levels. Say we have 10,000 citizens in a city, what would their levels be? 5,000 level 0, 3,000 level 1, then a variety of others? Random numbers but just using to clarify my question. Also, what would the numbers be like for a basic army of 10,000 trained soliders? Would just like an idea or template to go off of when thinking about character levels.

Thanks guys

[Optimator]

I think the DMG2 has an entire section on this very subject.

There isn't really a good answer though because it is setting- and theme-dependent.

In a high-fantasy world it might be perfectly reasonable that a small town's captain of the guard is a level 13 wtfbadass and a platoon of career soldiers in an army may be made up of level 6 fighters. In a "realistic" world the captain may only be level 5-6 and a career soldier may be a level 3 Warrior with plenty of folks at level 2 or even 1. The general consensus is that level 1-6 is realistic, 7-12 is heroic, and 13+ is legendary/mythical/superheroic.

Personally I like having heroes abound. Is D&D supposed to be realistic or like a comic book? Are there not dangerous and ferocious monsters or depraived bandits and raiders wandering the wilderness? I don't think it's unreasonable to have the general populace be levels 1-4 with level 5-6 for the notables and 7+ for the nametag-wearing, portraited, voice-acted NPCs (and not even have them be that rare. It's a dangerous world out there!)

My group makes it so heroes are Warblades, soldiers are Fighters, and only conscripts are Warriors. The average citizen may be a Commoner 3, Aristocrat 2/Wizard 2 or Expert 4/Rogue 1, a town guard be an Expert 1/Fighter 3. Magewrights and Adepts can be your neighbors with the occasional Wizard 9 around the corner or the retired adventurer innkeeper be level 10.

[Kelb_Panthera]

Since you don't want to actually use the city generator yourself, I'll just point out that in any population, all but the top 10~ish percent are 1st level commoners. A significant portion of that remainder are 1st level members of other NPC classes. The last little bit are PC classes of all levels with frequency dropping as level increases.

For DM customized settlements, ask your DM. If you are the DM, then those generators are all there is to go on. Cityscape has a few sample cities but nothing to suggest they deviate from the generator tables significantly.

If what you're getting at is the commonality of spellcasters, they're exceedingly rare, save 1st level adepts and, in eberron, magewrights.

[MyrPsychologist]

The vast majority of individuals are going to be level 1 commoners or other NPC applicable class. With any levels being given to the special few that have served and distinguished themselves as something important. in your sample of 10,000 I would say maybe 1,000 have levels. And of those the vast majority would be like 1-3 levels and are pretty unimpressive.

I would also caution against adding too many levels to NPCs because it can very quickly become a case of "well, why don't they solve the problem?" and it can be very difficult to answer this question when you're in a city with like 30 mythic level mages or clerics or druids. Levels should be given out sparingly and keep into consideration the fact that the PCs are the focal point, not the random guard captain out in the middle of nowhere.

[Fouredged Sword]

There should be few people over level 11. They are by definition "legendary" enough to be targets of the Legend Lore spell.

[Crake]

My group makes it so heroes are Warblades, soldiers are Fighters, and only conscripts are Warriors. The average citizen may be a Commoner 3, Aristocrat 2/Wizard 2 or Expert 4/Rogue 1, a town guard be an Expert 1/Fighter 3. Magewrights and Adepts can be your neighbors with the occasional Wizard 9 around the corner or the retired adventurer innkeeper be level 10.

Shouldn't you be a little worried when "the average citizen" is able to take more punishment then a band of level 1 adventurers?

[Telok]

Since you don't want to actually use the city generator yourself, I'll just point out that in any population, all but the top 10~ish percent are 1st level commoners...

I've done the math and brute forced it with a computer.
By the book, offical D&D numbers give you (average for rural populations):
85% 1st level commoners
7.6% adventurer classes (fighter, sorcerer, cleric, etc.)
The remaining 7.4% are experts, adepts, and aristocrats with around a 68%/22%/10% split.

Of all these people:
3.4% are divine casters
1.7% are arcane casters
0.2% can cast 2nd level spells or higher

The smallest thorp has a ~10% chance of having a commoner of 10th to 13th level.
A village has a ~10% chance of having a commoner of 12th to 15th level.
You start seeing 19th level commoners in large towns.
The smallest thorp has a 5% chance of having a druid of 8th to 13th level.

By my estimates factoring in the urban population will increase the 1th level commoner population to about 87% because the population is 90% rural anyways.

[ILM]

The way I'm breaking it down in my setting is this: first, I figured out the total population in my world (the world had between 350 and 500 million people in the middle ages, for reference). Then I decided how many countries I had (12). Then I worked it from the top down. So:
- level 16+: 1 in 5 million.
- level 12-15: 3 per level 16+
- level 9-11: 4 per level 12-15
- level 6-8: 5 per level 9-11
- level 5 and less: as needed by Plot ;)

These are just PC class levels by the way. Commoners and experts and warriors can have whatever level, they don't really matter anyway.

This gives me a whopping 0.0015% of the population with class levels above 5, and a solid kernel of powers at the top of the food chain. On average, each country has 5 mega-powerful guys (who may or may not be aligned with that country) and like around 400 lower-level, but still occasionally relevant people. It gives me credible threats at any level for players and an idea of the extent of the possible influence of NPCs in my setting.

[Telok]

Another thing you can do is look up the US census data and find the numbers and ratios of occupations per unit of population. Then you can decide if you want clerics to be as common as plumbers, doctors, or something less common.

The advantage to this method is that you usually have a better feel for how easy or hard it is to find a paticular type of person rother than just relying on random rolls.

[Kelb_Panthera]

I've done the math and brute forced it with a computer.
By the book, offical D&D numbers give you (average for rural populations):
85% 1st level commoners
7.6% adventurer classes (fighter, sorcerer, cleric, etc.)
The remaining 7.4% are experts, adepts, and aristocrats with around a 68%/22%/10% split.

Of all these people:
3.4% are divine casters
1.7% are arcane casters
0.2% can cast 2nd level spells or higher

The smallest thorp has a ~10% chance of having a commoner of 10th to 13th level.
A village has a ~10% chance of having a commoner of 12th to 15th level.
You start seeing 19th level commoners in large towns.
The smallest thorp has a 5% chance of having a druid of 8th to 13th level.

By my estimates factoring in the urban population will increase the 1th level commoner population to about 87% because the population is 90% rural anyways.

How do those numbers change if you add entries to the table for each of the non-core classes at the same values as the most similar of the core classes for each?

[Optimator]

Shouldn't you be a little worried when "the average citizen" is able to take more punishment then a band of level 1 adventurers?

Not really. Why should I? A bunch of greenhorn newbies swinging their pointy sticks may very well not be a threat to someone who, while not an adventurer, has at the very least "seen some ****". Furthermore, these NPCs wouldn't have the stats of the level 1 kids so the fight may be more in their favor regardless--not to mention maximum HP at level 1 vs NPCs.

[jiriku]

I have a pretty simple question. I am not looking for city generators or anything. I was just wondering what the rule of thumb is for a populace when it comes to their levels. Say we have 10,000 citizens in a city, what would their levels be? 5,000 level 0, 3,000 level 1, then a variety of others? Random numbers but just using to clarify my question. Also, what would the numbers be like for a basic army of 10,000 trained soliders? Would just like an idea or template to go off of when thinking about character levels.

Thanks guys

The DMG assumes that greater than 99% of humans and demihumans are 1st level. So in all of your examples, essentially everyone is 1st level. A trained soldier is 1st level too; he's just a 1st-level warrior instead of a 1st-level commoner or expert.

I am not fond of this assumption because it means that units of troops are not meaningful challenges to PCs of 6th level and higher. IMC, I assume that in armies, new recruits and conscripts are CR 1, veteran troops are CR 3 or perhaps even CR 4, and elite soldiers are CR 6. Among extremely militant races or very long-lived races with a martial tradition, typical troops are veteran, experienced troops are elite, and the best class of soldiers are super-elites of CR 8.