Is bigger better?

[Bluelantern]

Hi, I am creating a rpg "mini-setting" a micro-world that can be added to any other.

Anyway, It will be a moutain-oasis in the middle of a big desert, it has a magic fountain and is every isolated from the rest of the world.

At first I thought it should be 2miles wide, but a friend said it was too little.

I was thinking in maybe give 6 miles? It is supposed to have a small indepedent city in it, with about 9 thousand people (some dwarves so they are underground) and a dense florest in the right side. =P
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a5/th_ar_al/MapaMonteverdeCor.jpg

the place history

long time ago a meteor fell on the top of a moutain and shaped the place like it is today, the impact created a scar between the planes, conect the material plane and the planes of fire and evil. Some blame the scar for creating the desert, but it is likely to be a legend.

A Group of Wizard studied the scar for a unknown period of time, however something goes very wrong. The place is take over by fire giants, effretis and devils sometime later, called the Red Citadel, the Giants use the moutain as a capital in a war with nearby kingdoms

Because it is the middle of nowhere, the kingdoms have problems to attack the Red Citadel and destroy the Scar. But (by fate maybe), three small armies from diferent kingdoms are sent at same time. Because they are small and separated they aren't detected and reached the Red Citadel, realizing a unique opportunity the 3 groups forge a Aliance and are able to take the city, during the siege, the casters try to seal the scar, unable to do so in time, they decided to try reverse the "polarity" of the scar, and succed, and the scar becomes the Source, and is connect with planes of water and good, the new energie that the Source creates weakens the remaining giants and the war is on. The kingdoms start to colonize the place, soon there should be a battle over it...

Unfortunaly, the kingdoms din't realized that, now that the Giants are gone, other evil creatures could take over they place a BIGGER war between the kingdoms and monsters starts, and because of that, the citadel and the magical source are forgotten and abandon. Alone the people from the different kingdoms start new lives in the place, now called the Greenmoutain.

The Source
The Source is a magical opening between planes, it is much smaller than the Scar that it used to be, but still has great magical propeties, first, it creates water that suplies the Greenmoutain, the water itself appear to increase healing, also the fertility in Greenmoutain is increased but controled, there is always enough food to people to eat (outside factors like fires and trading with outsiders of course) at same time it is never produces too much to food, the same happens with the population so greenmoutain is never gets "crounded", also, despite there is so many races living there, they all live in relative harmony. Many theorize that the Source turned Greenmoutain in a literal "heaven on earth".

The desert
The desert where Greenmoutain is can be any desert of the planet where there is a very isolated area that no one would want to visit. Because of the Source, there is always lots of monsters (and people) around Greenmoutain trying to take it by force.

To make things worse, around Greenmoutain there is a phenomenon that was caused by the Scar that still persist to this day, the "Thirsty Dunes", magical sends that can dehydrate any one crossing it, even water closed in bottles appears to vanish to nowhere.

The population
The armies that composed the Alliance are made of Dwarves, Orcs and a mixed army from the Human kingdom who also had elves on it. They are the ancestor of today population of Greenmoutain. Who is composed largely of Half-elves, Humans, Half-orcs, Dwarves and Elves.

[DracoDei]

Professional quality map!

They are doing some serious hunting or have food imported... I see no farmland... unless most of that green is orchards and even then they might be a little short, especially since trees aren't the most efficient food producers I should think...

[Bluelantern]

Professional quality map!

They are doing some serious hunting or have food imported... I see no farmland... unless most of that green is orchards and even then they might be a little short, especially since trees aren't the most efficient food producers I should think...

Oh right, they have a magical source of water, who also makes things incredible fertile and the trees do provide enough food.

On the down side, trying to farm anything is hard because the soil (despite the fertility) is too hard to work with and other plants usually take over quickly

They also raise some small animals in the fart left corner (they even have fish, in desert!).

But I will probably add some are to be farmed =P.

How big is supposed to be?

[Abjurer]

The bigger the farmland, the more food you can produce.
It would make sense that if the city has been there for a while, at least a good bit of the forest has been cut down. What else are the buildings and stuff made out of? You could turn some of that into farmland...
or it could just stretch out into the desert.

[DracoDei]

Buildings would probably be stone...
Very efficient with the dwarves underneath maybe... using the stone from digging the tunnels as the building material for the above ground dwellings.

[Bluelantern]

The bigger the farmland, the more food you can produce.
It would make sense that if the city has been there for a while, at least a good bit of the forest has been cut down. What else are the buildings and stuff made out of? You could turn some of that into farmland...
or it could just stretch out into the desert.

Buildings would probably be stone...
Very efficient with the dwarves underneath maybe... using the stone from digging the tunnels as the building material for the above ground dwellings.

Most of the buildings that you see here are made by the giants, the people just adapted the ruins to fit better human size, but still they would need rocks to do the changes and there is people who would like to have new houses. So great sugestions :smallwink:

Any sugestions where the farmland should be? I wanted to keep the piece of florest at right side. So maybe the portion above town?

Also, I added the history of the place and more info :smalltongue:

EDIT:

hey, what do you guys think?

farmland or no farmland?

http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a5/th_ar_al/Monteverde/CpiadeMapaMonteverdecopy.gif

[AjaxTorbin]

well, i tent to take a realistic bent on things, what i would do (if that were a real city) is to irragate the moutain side with that lake, like the stepp farms in South Amercian Andies
if you want a controled enviroment, i would place this moutain in the middle of a dune sea. add some exteral enemies for population control and an antaginast.

[Bluelantern]

well, i tent to take a realistic bent on things, what i would do (if that were a real city) is to irragate the moutain side with that lake, like the stepp farms in South Amercian Andies
if you want a controled enviroment, i would place this moutain in the middle of a dune sea. add some exteral enemies for population control and an antaginast.

the idea was to have the thing in the middle of desert, how that is different from a dune sea I don't know =P

a "villain" from the outside good work too.

[Maldraugedhen]

Lack of food and room to expand is an excellent form of population control on its own, and can serve as its own conflict for PCs (find us places to build / find us food). Not every conflict has to be with a thinking or feeling opponent.

Irrigating outside of the mountain with water from the mountain lake as AjaxTorbin suggested is a good idea. It's naturally lower than the mountainside, and so, once the tunnels are built, you don't need any pumps--magical or otherwise--to get the water to the site. However, if you're starting with desert, it takes quite a few years of constant exposure to water to make desert fertile (unless, of course, it's magical life-giving water, as is the case here). The issues this would create: you've got farmers outside the walls in case of a siege. Which, you know, did happen with man-made defensive fortresses. You'd also have to make sure your irrigation tunnels were too small to climb through--not too hard to do, especially for dwarven stonemasons.

What about maintenance of the enchantments binding the Source to the planes of Water and Good? Do they need it, or is it simply inherent in the location now, as the binding to Fire and Evil was?

Also, when you've got something bound to ANY other plane--elemental or otherwise--you're going to get wizards, clerics, and anybody interested in other planes of existence coming to research. Now, I can see that making the residents of the Source nervous--as far as they know, all it takes is a curious wizard who doesn't quite know what he's doing to sever the link with the planes of Water and Good, stranding the entire city in the desert without a source of water. But, if they don't let ANY wizards in, they'd make some powerful enemies. Therefore, the most likely result is red tape. A research organization dedicated to investigating the nature of the Source's bind to the planes of Water and Good, that wizards curious about the planar bind must join in order to investigate it. That organization would also be closely overseen by the city's leaders--I don't know what kind of government system you were thinking about putting into place, but suffice it to say that the research institute would definitely have to answer to it.

Alright, next--when you've got a stable source of water like an oasis in a desert, you're going to get every traveler that knows about it stopping there on their way through (if the locals let them). This means that the Source is going to be a prime trading hub, and can explain how they end up with extra food and rare resources.

There's plenty that can be done with either of those little details. Stuff to throw out there. Also: Adobe Illustrator?

[Bluelantern]

Mald, you really raised some points, and I will likely to change sometimes because of your sugestions. One point, that is important and you "missed", is that despite the pros to go there, the city still is in the middle of desert, and possible in a point where no one would visit, even if you are going to travel from A to B, would be better avoid this desert than go in a straight line. However this can be changed. Also, the primary "locals" in the surround would be monsters.


Lack of food and room to expand is an excellent form of population control on its own, and can serve as its own conflict for PCs (find us places to build / find us food). Not every conflict has to be with a thinking or feeling opponent.

Great sugestion, until now, I was thinking in ignore this problem but, it is a great idea for adventure hooks, maybe the people from the city want to expand or leave the desert... or want to solve the population problem in a drastic manner.


Irrigating outside of the mountain with water from the mountain lake as AjaxTorbin suggested is a good idea. It's naturally lower than the mountainside, and so, once the tunnels are built, you don't need any pumps--magical or otherwise--to get the water to the site. However, if you're starting with desert, it takes quite a few years of constant exposure to water to make desert fertile (unless, of course, it's magical life-giving water, as is the case here). The issues this would create: you've got farmers outside the walls in case of a siege. Which, you know, did happen with man-made defensive fortresses. You'd also have to make sure your irrigation tunnels were too small to climb through--not too hard to do, especially for dwarven stonemasons.

I was thinking that outside the walls would be too dangerous, they could have tried, but in a world where lizards breath fire and things can move in the ground like if it was water... you can see a problem...


What about maintenance of the enchantments binding the Source to the planes of Water and Good? Do they need it, or is it simply inherent in the location now, as the binding to Fire and Evil was?

I would say it is inherent, but it does get stronger or weaker sometimes (resulting and stronger and weaker effects like water production and fertility too).


Also, when you've got something bound to ANY other plane--elemental or otherwise--you're going to get wizards, clerics, and anybody interested in other planes of existence coming to research. Now, I can see that making the residents of the Source nervous--as far as they know, all it takes is a curious wizard who doesn't quite know what he's doing to sever the link with the planes of Water and Good, stranding the entire city in the desert without a source of water. But, if they don't let ANY wizards in, they'd make some powerful enemies. Therefore, the most likely result is red tape. A research organization dedicated to investigating the nature of the Source's bind to the planes of Water and Good, that wizards curious about the planar bind must join in order to investigate it. That organization would also be closely overseen by the city's leaders--I don't know what kind of government system you were thinking about putting into place, but suffice it to say that the research institute would definitely have to answer to it.

Great Idea... Mostly I think that the Source is protected by clerics/druids, but it is likely that wizards would be curious about it, the research organization could be a important faction... I would put that is controled both by the government and the clergy, outside wizards are allowed but only with supervision and after a probation period, additionally the wizard must teach any spells that he knows. Of course, the wizard must first "hear the legend of the incredible paradise in the heart of the desert" to try to reach the place.


Alright, next--when you've got a stable source of water like an oasis in a desert, you're going to get every traveler that knows about it stopping there on their way through (if the locals let them). This means that the Source is going to be a prime trading hub, and can explain how they end up with extra food and rare resources.
Like I said above, the place is really far from everywhere. I was thinking that most locals who aren't monsters would rather try to take the source by force... but you are starting to convincing me about the importance of this trading in a level or other.


There's plenty that can be done with either of those little details. Stuff to throw out there. Also: Adobe Illustrator?

I use Hand illustrator :smallbiggrin:, combined with photoshop to paint the colors.

Well, a idea that you gave me:

How about the source having "seasons", when more water is created and the people is able to farm the desert?

[Maldraugedhen]

Cup of Light
Light that shines into this cup becomes a clear, shimmering liquid and slowly fills the cup (and will keep spilling out if the cup is left in the light). If the cup is carried into darkness, the liquid inside it begins to evapourate: it produces the same light as a torch for about the same amount of time. Spilling the liquid doubles the light radius for 10 minutes; then the light all evapourates and is gone.


I was wondering if you had seen this. Maybe the result of some research into the nature of the planar bindings to the planes of Water and Good? Seems like it would fit in well.

[DracoDei]

I was wondering if you had seen this. Maybe the result of some research into the nature of the planar bindings to the planes of Water and Good? Seems like it would fit in well.

As I said in the other thread remember it says "liquid" not "water"... I WOULD NOT recommend trying to drink it...