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PhoenixPhyre
2018-05-19, 07:09 PM
Unlike the other thread, I'm not interested in magical architecture. Instead, I want to know

a) if you (or your DMs) describe the architecture, construction methods, or other designs of the area you explore in any detail?
b) what are your favorite architectural styles/construction methods for fantasy societies?
c) what architectural styles/construction methods are over-used?
d) what architectural styles/construction methods are sadly under-used?

One partial answer for me is that I've become fascinated with cob construction (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cob_(material)) and think it makes a nice change for a prairie area without large forests. It also seems to fit well with halflings--instead of holes in the ground, they build snug homes of earth.

Tvtyrant
2018-05-20, 05:49 PM
Unlike the other thread, I'm not interested in magical architecture. Instead, I want to know

a) if you (or your DMs) describe the architecture, construction methods, or other designs of the area you explore in any detail?
b) what are your favorite architectural styles/construction methods for fantasy societies?
c) what architectural styles/construction methods are over-used?
d) what architectural styles/construction methods are sadly under-used?

One partial answer for me is that I've become fascinated with cob construction (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cob_(material)) and think it makes a nice change for a prairie area without large forests. It also seems to fit well with halflings--instead of holes in the ground, they build snug homes of earth.

A) I do.
B) Weird stuff. I prefer giving weird social fixations to groups then just copying real styles; I had a city where the culture thought that windows and doors should never be in line of sight of each other, but having as many as possible was a sign of wealth. As a result buildings had tons of ledges and walls that stand out from the walls to block sight of each other, like having a ton of planter boxes attached.

Rich homes have stone boxes, poor houses have wood ones (and often paintes on windows and doors where there aren't any.)

C. Cathedral/temple/mosque styled buildings that are for other purposes. Churches are not comfortable for human habitation and deliberately waste heat and space.

Also tree cities.

D) There is a massive lack of cliff cities. They are historically pretty common in deserts/canyon areas and outside of Pern don't show up much.

Obscuraphile
2018-05-21, 01:23 AM
A) I do, taking care to try and incorporate architectural realities into the situation (all of my underground dungeons have domed ceilings rather than flat. Also it give players more to latch onto when they can say, I want to go investigate the bas relief on that column, buttress, ect. instead of I search the room.
B) I tend to stick to Romanesque and Gothic styles for the most part in generic D&D games, but then I also enjoy a good historical/cultural inspired game so I use the styles appropriate to that setting, adobe huts in an Egyptian campaign, post and lintel in a Greek one.
C) Probably Romanesque and Gothic for the big stuff really since the baseline for D&D is this weird mix of about 1000 years European technological development all smashed together. And for the little stuff probably square wooden dwellings.
D) Celtic roundhouses. Very low walls, very tall thatched roofs.

Bohandas
2018-06-10, 11:30 PM
This is not a response to the questions specifically, but it is fantastic yet non magic so here goes:

It occurs to me that underwater races could build skyscraper sized buildings with a very low level of tech since boutancy would support most of the building's weight, provided that it was not made of a very dense material

Kaptin Keen
2018-06-11, 01:09 AM
Since I know bugger all about architecture, I describe visual impressions, and anything that's unusual enough for a layman - like me - to notice. A village of houses built from the chitinous shells of giant insects, for instance, is something I can visually describe, and architecturally weird enough that even I would notice it's not just brick and mortar.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I have the same thing with anything nautical. I know just barely enough to tell starboard from the other board, and a clipper from a cog - but I can explain that elven ships have kite sails, and only touch the water by virtue of their waterfins when at speed, or some such.

Satinavian
2018-06-11, 02:08 AM
Unlike the other thread, I'm not interested in magical architecture. Instead, I want to know

a) if you (or your DMs) describe the architecture, construction methods, or other designs of the area you explore in any detail?
b) what are your favorite architectural styles/construction methods for fantasy societies?
c) what architectural styles/construction methods are over-used?
d) what architectural styles/construction methods are sadly under-used?

One partial answer for me is that I've become fascinated with cob construction (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cob_(material)) and think it makes a nice change for a prairie area without large forests. It also seems to fit well with halflings--instead of holes in the ground, they build snug homes of earth.
a) Yes, i do describe architecture in detail. I am not a professional, but interested.
b) I do give special attention to architecture of non-humans to make it plausible and to reflect differences in needs and abilities.

Otherweise i just take care that it fits
- availible materials
- tech level
- cultural inspiration
- economical needs

c) extensive underground dungeons
honestly, those are ridiculously hard to build, tend to have static problems all over (why do you think buildings with many levels above ground are an engineering challange but automatically stable below ground ?) and are not even particularly useful. Bonus points if near a cost/under a river.

d) anything not made of wood or stone



This is not a response to the questions specifically, but it is fantastic yet non magic so here goes:

It occurs to me that underwater races could build skyscraper sized buildings with a very low level of tech since boutancy would support most of the building's weight, provided that it was not made of a very dense materialTrue. Weight of building material is less of a problem underwater. On the other hand strong current would easily knock down stuff that could manage the strongest storm above ground. I would expect lots of building activity in the current shadow of other things.
The other thing to keep in mind for aquatic races is that the environment varies dramatically depending on depth and that most races would probably only have a very limited feel-good area where they actually would want to live, even if they could go deeper or higher.

BeerMug Paladin
2018-06-11, 05:17 AM
Building on the underwater cities idea, there's bridges in certain places in the world entirely composed out of tree roots. The structures take a tremendous amount of time and care to weave together, but I imagine elves or halflings or whoever else has long lives could perhaps take to such construction methods a lot more diligently.

I've contemplated the idea of having coral be an underwater building material with similar methods and time restraints. I'm uncertain how it might actually work in a technical sense, so I'm not sure if there's some mundane reason why you couldn't get similar results if you had some tools and traditional craftsmanship culture.

LordCdrMilitant
2018-06-11, 12:31 PM
Typically, my architecture, for both magical and nonmagical locations, is fairly mundane. I give a little description based on what they'd take notice of on first glance, but not a whole lot of detail unless asked.

IE [from a recent campaign]: The castle sits on an on stone outcropping on the east side of town. A shallow ramp leads up to its outer gatehouse from the town square, with a drawbridge at the top. The river flows into the town through the northeast watergate and runs around the castle's outcropping, separating it from the rest of the town. The castle and city perimeter wall is well maintained, with soldiers standing guard atop the towers and along the city wall. The hoardings are not installed, and the soldiers are relaxed. The banners of the castle's inhabitants are hung from the gatehouse battlements.

Also [from a different campaign, on an underground city]: A steel pratt truss bridge spans the canyon over the river, leading to the city entrance. The truss is below the wooden deck. The edges of the bridge bears tall lightning rods, wobbling in the wind, connected by chains at waist height to form a railing. A pair of railroad tracks, narrow gauge, run on the left side of the bridge. The deck is made of treated wood, slick with rainwater. Across the bridge is the city entrance its gate open and flanked by sluices pouring water, shimmering with mercury and oil from the stamp mills within the city, into the canyon below. The battlements above the gate and sluices are manned, but the guards are sheltering from the storm beneath the doorframe into the city.

Beleriphon
2018-06-11, 02:54 PM
What exactly constitutes non-magical architecture? As far as we're concerned architecture is about as advanced as we can make it currently due to limits in material sciences and engineering. We can make some pretty crazy looking buildings, but most of them are based on using steel skeletons and covering them in something interesting, whether its glass or something else.

Architecture in the past worked on much the same principle, but used wood, stone or just really thick walls to achieve the same effect we can get using steel beams and lots of concrete. Really big buildings like the Notre Dame Cathedral that were built in the high medieval period were constructed using flying buttresses to support the massive walls and incredible height.

For styles, I'm personally a fan of Rococo, one the reason being that I happen to think its a funny word, also it produced some stupidly gorgeous interiors.

Example of a church interior:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/39/Kaisersaal_W%C3%BCrzburg.jpg
A different church's ceiling
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c4/Kuppelfreskowieskirche.jpg

For more fun you can combine styles. For example Imperial Crown architecture is a 20th Century Japanese style that puts a traditional looking Japanese roof on a neo-classical building. In effect imagine the something like the White House, or US Capitol Building, with a Japanese styled tile roof.


For inspiration I like Wikipedia. Medieval Architecture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Medieval_architecture)

Of particular interest to attain a look for a quasi-medieval town/city consider that buildings might use jettying (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jettying).

roybigley
2018-06-12, 08:24 AM
a) Yes, indeed
b) Castles, Catacombs and Dungeons
c) All barocco style constructions, low quality DIY interior design
d) Modern, high class minimalism

Btw, thank you for an interesting thread!