Building a city

[Redhood101]

I’m about to run a campaign that is set in a city state. The idea is that the campaign will be a series of smaller adventures (2-5 sessions) with time skips in between so the players can see the effects they have in the city (think dragon age 2). My issue is I never felt good at building large alive feeling cities. They’ve always just ended up being back drops.
Does anyone have advice on how to build a city that feels real and is fun. Ie done plenty of world building in the past and some towns as well but cities seam to be my kryptonite.

To add my skeleton is that it’s a city state with a ruler elected by the nobility from nobility. And it’s functions as a trade port. It’s a large city and seams to grow every day and when the game starts they’re half way through construction of the walls.

[Unoriginal]

I’m about to run a campaign that is set in a city state. The idea is that the campaign will be a series of smaller adventures (2-5 sessions) with time skips in between so the players can see the effects they have in the city (think dragon age 2). My issue is I never felt good at building large alive feeling cities. They’ve always just ended up being back drops.
Does anyone have advice on how to build a city that feels real and is fun. Ie done plenty of world building in the past and some towns as well but cities seam to be my kryptonite.

Personally I often (but not always) like to start by "what is the reason for a city in this specific place?", then "who would want to live there based on that specific reason?" and then I imagine the long (or short, for a new town) history that ended up shaping the urban landscape, then just add locations and characters I find neat based on the themes and history of the place.

Ex: a desert town which exists because the rulers of the land once made a pact with a fiend who lives in the acid lake nearby. One of its major sites is the Warlock Market, where it is possible to find different entities of varying power willing to become Patrons to mortals in exchange for various things.


Otherwise just starting with a look/aesthetic and fleshing things out by asking, "yes, but why is it like that?" might work for you.


Basically I think what's important is to start with an idea that really interests you and then keep building on it.

[Zhorn]

There's a worldbuilding method I got from MonarchsFactory (Dael Kingsmill)

Social
Political
Economic
Religious
Military

Spoiler: Dael Kingsmill

Show

I like this because you can avoid lot of heavy text blocks for a town's prep by just having an answer to each of those aspects of the town.
Most of the time just answering a couple of them will give you a reason/motivation behind how some of the others are set up.
Examples:
A silver mine makes for a wealthy import economy, and also raises the need for a powerful town guard presence (or maybe even an actual military), controlled by a key figure with a lot of influence in the region (will be a noble, not an elected official)

A farming village will be mostly self reliant, but mostly lower working class. There's a wider/thinner spread of the population, so there are fewer individuals in the town's guard/protection if any at all, maybe just a few hunters that while patrolling the outskirts of town for wild animals, doubles as the law enforcement. Small community often led by a town elder, mayor, or judge.

backing up Unoriginal's advice, pick a couple of details that makes sense for the region, ask 'why' the town/city is in that location, and then set up an answer to each of the 5 points listed in the principle. give each one a key location and an NPC and you have a pretty fleshed out town.

[Vegan Squirrel]

The others have already hit on some key things, so I'll skip right to my most recent approach. I've always started from some kind of checklist to build cities, but my results have been hit or miss. My current checklist aims to inspire something fun, fantastic, and interesting, highlighting the city's character.

One more note, I made this checklist assuming I was adding a city to an already partially-formed campaign world, but you can always start with the city and grow the world around it.

• Natural Geography: Where is the city, what is its environment like? Start with what’s already decided by the rest of the setting.
• Political Geography: What political jurisdiction lies over the city, or is it independent? Again, to the extent that the setting already dictates it.
• Cultural Basis: What is the prevailing culture of the region? Again, start with what’s already decided, but you can add something here if you’re inspired.
• Inspiration Cities: Look for a diverse set of two to four real-world or fictional cities to serve as an inspiration for your city. Use the geographical and cultural parameters you’ve already decided to help narrow down which cities to look at. Consider cities from different parts of the world and evocative works of fantasy.
• Mix, Match, and Make New: Now pull some details from the inspiration cities to lay the foundations of your new city. For instance, you might decide that the layout of the city takes a cue from one city, the architectural style borrows from another city, while the primary economic activity is drawn from yet another city. Look to the notable landmarks of your inspiration cities and use them as a guide to come up with suitable landmarks for your city. Consider the major factions of the cities: are they religious centers? trading powerhouses? famous for a monastery, university, or school of artists?
• Fold in Fantasy: Look again at the landmarks, factions, and details. Which of those could be expanded into something more fantastic? Maybe the artists are illusionists, or the architectural gargoyles are actually a magical part of the city’s guard, summoned to battle in dangerous times.
• Peril and Adventure: What’s threatening the city? What adventures lurk?
• Character Hooks: If you’re building the city with a particular party in mind, think of some interesting draws and dangers particular to each of the characters. Maybe the dwarf would be interested in the famous gems that come from the local dwarven mine, while the city may be home to a rival of the cleric.
• Cast and Crew: Finally, build up some important NPCs and locations that parties will frequent. You’ll want the ruler of the city and a few key advisors; a figure or two to represent the factions you’ve planned out; some shopkeepers, questgivers, and scholars to consult; and of course an inn or three and places to buy gear.

My next step, for a city that's meant to be the focus of a whole campaign, would be to divide the city into districts, organize them into some kind of map, and work out dynamic relationships between the factions and key NPCs. And then, as you see what the major events, changes, and developments are going to be in the city (especially due to the PCs' actions), go through your rosters of NPCs, factions, and locations and figure out what effects those developments are having on them (which could inspire you to create new connections, like a relative who's struggling to adapt).

Oh, and if you're feeling particularly creative, coming up with a memorable and unique festival that the city looks forward to every year could add another layer of character! If you're skipping enough time, you might even be able to visit the festival a couple different times, giving you a chance to highlight how the festivities have grown and changed over the years, while also seeing how much the city retains its heart.

[Stattick]

General Information on Premodern Cities

It's impossible to do justice to a fantasy city, when you compare it to a real world great city. Cities are a piece of living history, where the centuries and millennia echo down to us from the past. And they're fractal. The closer you zoom in, the more detail you find, until you're looking at the day in the life of one individual. You can zoom all the way out and summarize the rise and fall of a city that breathed for centuries in a paragraph or two, or make a city a footnote in a work about a larger geographical area, a time period, or a people.

Americans often fail to grasp the vast age of the great cities, because we're such a young nation. Tradition says that Rome was founded in 753 BC. So, it's been there for nearly 3,000 years. It's a young city compared to Thebes/Luxor/Waset, which has been continuously inhabited since 3200 BC, which puts the city at over 5,000 years old.

In the premodern real world, cities were always founded on rivers. Rivers were the railroads and freeways of the ancient world. And you NEEDED the vast traffic carrying capacity of a river to bring in enough food and goods to support a city. You'd usually have many square miles of nearby farmland too, bringing in foodstuffs to sell, often coming down river, but not always.

It was rarely planned at first settlement that a location would become a city. Usually, urbanization would spring up at the ideal spots for it: enough food could be brought in, it was wealthy enough, trade was easy, (usually) easy enough access to a great body of water (ocean, sea, a great lack, etc), and the resources available to start up industry. Most great cities are, in truth, a number of smaller communities that all grew outward until they merged with each other, to become one city.

Further, the premodern city was vampiric. Serfs, peasants, slaves, and so forth would manage to break away from the desperate and lean subsistence farming they were accustomed to, and move to the city to try for a better life. Most of them failed and died. Disease, crushing poverty, starvation, and unhealthful jobs did most of them in. But some survived and thrived.

Cities evolve over time too. Areas burn and are rebuilt. Other areas are torn down for revitalization. Areas become impoverished, or poor areas become wealthy. Bridges are built, canals cut, roads widened, areas get taken over by government to build new courts, palaces, mayoral halls, etc. Industry takes over areas to build docks, warehouses, slaughterhouses, tanneries (super stinky), etc. Cemeteries are built, filled up, then lay fallow and are left uncared for after no new bodies are interred there for a century.

There's the mark of history on cities. Destruction wrought by war, new religions bringing new temples, new settlers to the city bringing new ghettos. Ghettos, in the archaic sense, were where an ethnic group would live in a city. Ghettos were often walled, and controlled by the people that lived there. They're often called Quarters these days - the French Quarter for instance, or ethnicity is appended to the word town, such as China Town. Sometimes, other terms have been coined too: Little Italy, or a quarter or district named after a major city from the homeland of the immigrants.

Language evolves over time too. Most streets are unnamed in premodern cities, but districts will have a name, often a very plain descriptor: Green Hill, Temple Mound, Fort, etc. But maybe the language changes, or the demographics or government of the area changes enough to where a new language is used. Those old names are often kept, though the pronunciation may evolve. Green Hill or Fort might became Colina Verde or Presidio - exotic sounding names to those that don't speak the original tongue. The original names of the villages and communities that came together to form a large city might be kept too.

The oldest cities often aren't on a regular grid like a modern city. They have narrow, twisty streets, often of uneven elevation. But often times, when it's feasible, mayors, city planners, or whatnot, will rebuild an area into a grid to better support traffic.

Cities end up building a web of roads connecting them to other locales away from the city. In areas that aren't in a general decline, these roads have something of a tendency to improve over time. Few premodern civilizations have the engineering prowess, money, and anal retentiveness to build long roads that span miles that are straight as an arrow. The Romans were known to do that. As a matter of fact, Roman engineering was so fine, that many of the roads and canals are still in usage today. Most lengthy, premodern roads followed the lay of the land, and were pretty piss poor. But if you had a rich, powerful king, he might build a good road to connect the North and South parts of his kingdom, so he can march armies from one end of the kingdom to the other quickly in an emergency.

How to Use the Above to Construct a Gamable Fantasy City that has Verisimilitude?

First, I'd start with some blank hex or square grid maps. I like to use maps that are 17*17 hexes. I know, that sounds weird. Let's call them 1 mile hexes. That's an area that's 17 miles by 17 miles, or 289 square miles. Officially, New York City is 302 square miles. Unofficially, "the city" (there's a number of nebulously definitions of what a city is, with different groups using different definitions) of New York City, just the urbanized area around it, is about 4,600 square miles (about 68*68 1 mile hexes). But for most purposes, you're not going to want to deal with a modern sized mega metropolis.

Consider latitude and weather. If there's a lot of snowfall, you'll tend toward wider streets, which is needed for snow accumulation. A lot of rainfall means elevation and drainage is important. Map out your high and low points on the map - hills, marshy areas, etc. Draw in your river. It might only be on one side of the map, but it might also bisect your city. Your river might be complicated, like a delta, where the river meets the sea/ocean/giant lake (look at the map of New York City), and if so, draw in that great body of water (or if you're a bit upstream from a silty delta not very good for building, know how far off the coast you are and what direction the coast is).

If you need some help with this, grab some dice, toss them down on your map, and that's where your hills are. Or, grab a pair of d20's, roll them a few times, and that's where your hills are (or whatever other artifact you're putting down - if you roll an 18-20 on one of the dice, then it's a wild card, meaning you decide the location: if your first number is columns and the second is rows, and you roll a 7 and a 20, then you have the 7th column, but whatever row suits your fancy).

If you want to leave everything to chance, which is fine, make up some charts for weather, latitude, and random features for your map. So that way, you might end up with a city that's in an arid area, in the subtropics, that has monsoons that have summer monsoons that bring torrential rains and flooding. The mountains to the north are less arid and draw down moisture, leading to cloud forests and on the wet side of the mountains (further away from the city), a semitropical rain forest.

Northern Temperate region, near ocean, with warm currents that keep winter mild. Rarely snows, but fog is common.

Map, showing a singularly impressive, low mountain with a commanding view of the region, with cliffs overlooking the sea on one side of the river, with flatter lands on the opposite side of the river. The mountain is a few miles inland, on the high side of the river.

Make up some charts for the people in your area. I find monocultures boring, so if I have elves, I make more than one culture of elf. Humans, I want at least three or four different cultures.

Roll on your chart to decide who the first people were that settled this area. Roll again to decide who the first people were to settle where your city is (but probably give about a 75% chance that the first people to settle where the city is now, are the same as the first people in the area). If they're two different people, write a short explanation.

The Forest Giants were the First People here. Their ruins scatter the landscape. But they built no cities here. When the Dragons came to these shores, their first meeting with the Giants were peaceful. The Giants gifted this delta to the Dragons, who built upon it a temple to a lost, nearly forgotten Draconic God called Kajani. *

* Much of that information is false. Real story is that the region was given as a war concession to the dragons during the war with the giants. The giants in the area were forced to accept a draconic queen; it didn't suit them, and over the centuries, many of them quietly slipped away from the area. The dragon, who's name has been forgotten, was greatly injured much later, and crawled deep into the earth, and never reemerged. It's thought she died. Her hoard was never found. Kajani is a bastardization of the word khajaana, which means "gold" in my version of Draconic (I just use Hindi for Draconic).

Roll who your next people are into the area. Don't feel shackled to these charts you're making though. If something jumps out at you as being the "Right Answer", just go with it.

Next people in the area were Wild Elves. They were mostly living with and learning from the remaining Forest Giants. Our Dragon Queen took some of these elves and settled them nearby, in the flatter area across the river from her. Some of the other dragons in her court took a liking to these Punies (as the Giants called them), and were quite enamored with the idea of keeping some as servants or slaves. Over time, the dragons both here and on the other side of the ocean, developed the Dragonborn and Kobolds from crossing their blood with the blood of the Punies. During this time, nearly all of the Dragonborn and Kobolds servants were winged. At this time, a great palace was carved into the mountain, and below, buildings were built up near the river and underground warrens dug out. On the flatter area on the other side of the river, the elves built a permanent settlement.

What remains of the original Elven Settlement is today known as The Old City - buildings sung from the stone itself, reinforced with magic, full of organic, curving shapes, incorporating hanging gardens and living trees as architectural elements. Only a few of those buildings today still have any living architectural elements. A quirk of thie Old City's architecture were the grand entrance halls built several stories above the street level - when your overlords are winged, they aren't likely to lower themselves to actually walk your streets or use a ground level entrance.

Parvus Mali (bastardization of the Hindi Parvat Mahal, meaning Mountain Palace - Elven influenced bastardizations often end in "i" or "us" for non-elven proper names) is the district that incorporates the mountain itself. Rebuilt several times, and redecorated innumerable times, little remains of the original, brutalistic and functional architecture of the original, dragon-sized, palace. The Mountain houses most of the present government, including palaces. It's also an imposing fortress casting a shadow over the city. Little remains visible of the mountain beneath, it has been so built over and walled up. Think Minas Tirith.

Now normally, I'd roll a few huge events to happen per century to a city. But when you're dealing with truly ancient cities, most of that is going to have been forgotten, and have so little impact on the current city as to make it just extra words. But sure, there'd have been some fires, floods, wars, plagues, etc in those first few centuries. Get more detailed as you get to the present. And try to make sure that the detail actually means or adds something that the players can interact with. Otherwise, it's just words in the way.

The technology was pretty simple at this time. Streets, where they existed on the plateau on the high side of the river, were lined with crushed gravel. On the low side, in the elven community, they were lined with crushed shells from clams and oysters.

The next group settled into the area, by the dragons, were a clan of Dwarven slaves stolen by Dragons. They were brought in after the second collapse of the great palace, when elven magics failed to hold the mountain up. No one of consequence was killed in the cave-in: all the dragons survived. The third palace was a marvel of Dwarven engineering. A few paintings remain, detailing some aspects of it.

Humans, uncivilized, unschooled yet in philosophy or the arcane, but fast breeding, were brought in as yet another slave race near the end of the Millennia War between the giants and dragons. (I know, the book says the war lasted 10,000 or 100,000 years or something. I don't care. I don't like my fantasy settings to have histories that go back 100,000 years. One thousand years sounds fine for the duration of the war, and we can even say that the exact number of years depends on which scholar you listen too, some putting at ~1,100 years including the first rumblings of war, and that last minor skirmishes, while others say it lasted ~850 years in the main.)

The humans were used as labor and cannon fodder at the end of the war. Great gladiatorial arenas were built to help train them. City is about 500 years old at this point. No bridges over the river, so it's more like two towns of around 8,000 demihumans each (not counting kobolds). Dwarven built sea wall built to keep the sea out during storm surges, along with fortifications against sea people raids (they were unhappy that the the land dwellers were over fishing). Dwarven rebuilt warrens in the plateau to keep the whole complex from collapsing in on itself.

About a hundred years later, near the end of the Millennia War, The Dragon Queen is severely injured in combat against some Giant King. She comes back to the city, and sends the rest of her draconic court out to avenge her. She deep into the most protected part of her mountain and curls up on her hoard to either sleep or die. The rest of the court away, her majesty in dire shape, the Dwarves revolt. They cut their way out of the mountain in a river of blood, and collapse the mountain down on the queen as they leave. The Revolt is common knowledge. Only the Dwarves know that they rebuilt the 3rd palace into a colossal trap. But they don't know whether she died, or whether she still slumbers beneath the mountain, and the 5th palace that rests above it today.

In the aftermath of the Dwarven Revolt, the weakened draconics, the Kobolds and Dragonborn, weren't successful in retaining power, as the humans and elves followed the Dwarven lead and threw off their chains. For their part, the Dwarves (Clan Mountain Breakers) just left, marching North until they found a range of mountains a few hundred miles north that their gods told them they could have, if they could take them from the weakened clans of Stone Giants.

1,000 years have passed. The city has grown huge in that time, with nearly half a million people. There's an aged Elven Queen, who's sat on the throne for 300 years. She's the head of the city (used to be head of state, but the city is no longer a city state), but holds little true power. The Lord Protector is the city's chief executive, elected by a parliamentarian assembly: each of the city's 13 noble families holds a seat in the House of Lords, while 12 commoners are elected by the populous to hold seats in the House of Commons.

Of that thousand years, I'd roll one event per hundred years that still echoes in the present over the first 300 years. A d4 events for each of the next 300 years, and then a d6 events for the final 400 years.

Then I'd make up a less impressive list of events that have happened, like guilds coming into prominence, noble families disgraced/honored, church rivalries, riots, famines, etc. I'd roll maybe a d10 for each century for the last 200 years on that list.

Then a list of even less impressive things. Personal squabbles, things having to do with individual businesses and/or districts of the city, and roll a d12 events that have happened over the course of the last, say, 30 years.

Going back to mapping, I'd map out things as they stood when the Dwarven Revolt happened. Then, as you roll events and decide that more populations move in, make an update to the map. Probably do things as a series individual communities. So the "Old City" where the Elves live is one community. Shellton is where the human fisherman lived, a mile or two down the road. And so forth. Dwarven areas, when some of them move back (for commerce - metals and gems aren't worth much if you don't trade some of them away for food and other supplies you don't make), have streets straight as an arrow, on strict grids, with paver stones roads. Elven area has roads that look like spaghetti. Halfling communities look like gently curving roads in a newish suburb. Grow these communities at each turn. Smash them into each other. Connect important buildings together with roads that cut straight through everything else at weird angles. Carve a few straight canals, or fill in gaps to join an island to the mainland. Build some bridges over to the plateau (where the rich sort live - high town, literally). Fancy bridges, with guard houses and such. Dredge out those natural harbors to make deep water ports capable of taking in tall ships. Some of those communities are still going to be insular, with their own walls and patrols.

As to the Dragonborn, they didn't all die, and they didn't leave (some would have left, but not all of them). Once leadership consolidated, the Dragonborn would have eventually sworn loyalty to the new leaders, and have kept their vows in the millennium since then. They'd have a seat in the House of Lords (just one). When the Mountain Breakers returned, they'd have been given the 13th seat in the House of Lords (important as a tie breaker).

And as a further bastardization of history, one of the prominent temples in the setting is the one to Kajani, the Draconic Goddess of Wealth. She is "the protector" of the city. In actuality, it's a religion that was made up by the Dragonborn, as a way of remembering their true queen, slumbering in the earth. Most of they myths about Kajani are entirely made up, but even most Dragonborn in the city don't know it. Most Dragonborn and Kobolds in the city worship Kajani. And someone or something is granting her clerics power.

Normally, I'd have made up a bunch of charts, and spent a few days procedurally generating this, and mapping everything out, instead of just my spare time at work, but eh. Hope this helps.

[Democratus]

If you are looking for published material to support your work:

Spectacular Settlements, by Nord Games
Strongholds & Followers, by MCDM Productions

I've found both of these books invaluable, and they have enriched my campaigns. In particular, Strongholds & Followers gives systems for creating headquarters for the party and gathering forces to conduct warfare.

[Kurt Kurageous]

My first thought goes to donjon.bin.sh

On the left side, click Fantasy and in the pulldown Medieval Demographics Calculator.

Also check out the random tavern (its nice for the menus and a quickie description of appearances, less for the NPCs and their hooks) and random town generator for a quick map with a bunch of customizations.

Just remember to screenshot, they don't save for you!

[KorvinStarmast]

Social
Political
Economic
Religious
Military

Spoiler: Dael Kingsmill

Show

Great link, and reminds me of the advice my professor from the course "economic geography" gave about understanding places you have never been.

[JellyPooga]

Good stone foundations and flexibility are definitely key. That way the people can proudly sing of the achievement of building a city on rock and roll....
...
...I'll let myself out.

[Aett_Thorn]

Good stone foundations and flexibility are definitely key. That way the people can proudly sing of the achievement of building a city on rock and roll....
...
...I'll let myself out.

GitP Forum takes 10d6 Psychic damage from that.


The only legitimate piece of advice I would add is that cities tended to become cities based on their economics and ability to support a population. So a lot of modern major cities started becoming that way during the major sailing trade routes. As such, they tended to be where there were both deep water ports, as well as a fresh water source such as a river. Farm goods can always be brought in, but people need fresh water to survive. Unless you construct things like aqueducts, you need a lake, river, or underground water source to be able to provide people with that.

So, let's say that most of your trade is over land instead of over water. Major cities would therefore probably spring up where both 1) major trade routes cross each other, and 2) be where there is a lake or a river. Places where trade routes meet, but don't have large water sources may be able to support some small-medium communities, but not large ones. Places that have fresh water but aren't one main trade routes might support farming communities, but not large cities that need funds to build walls and have guards for protection.

In a fantasy world, maybe your trade routes are airborne, using air ships. Then maybe your major cities are in places where winds are generally stable. Placing cities at the base of mountains or along the coast might be a bad idea here, since frequent wind changes could cause problems for merchants.


Also, something to keep in mind if you're looking at creating a world that has a bit of turmoil in it is to think of what would happen if your major trade mechanism was in the process of changing. If your world is switching from over land to over water trade, this means that towns along the coast in good positions might be starting to get bigger, while formerly great cities along trade routes inland would be losing influence. How would that affect politics and social views on cities?

[rel]

I find cities are fun and the players are actually invested if a settlement has a small stable of memorable major NPC's and a small stable of memorable locations that get reused.

The PC's don't care about my 20 page backstory of duke whatsit, or how many chickens I stoked the markets with. They just want their quest reward so they can go shopping.

On the other hand if my only notes are 'duke whatsit, always eating a pie, flavors vary, his hat's grow with his fortunes' You can bet the PC's will remember his name, ask about the pies he eats, the hats he wears and will genuinely care when he falls on hard times and comes begging for help.

Focus your prep on things the PC's will see and remember, reuse NPC's and locations as much as you can and use them to showcase changes to the city at large.

You don't need to tell the pc's 'the town has grown more prosperous thanks to your efforts' if they always go shopping in the midnight market and this month it's packed wall to wall with people and the din of commerce.

[AttilatheYeon]

As a bard player i believe you should "build this city on rock and roll" 😁

[Chugger]

What is your city's history? What is so cool about living here? Or horrible? Or both?

Is the city a cool place in a world of otherwise very nasty cities, but of course various forces threaten to ruin this city - and the chars need to fight to preserve it?

Or is this a fallen city, a horrible place to live - but thousands of people are stuck here and want better - so against the odds the party starts fixing things and at first makes life better in the poor neighborhood by going up against a corrupt minor city councilman. Scale it as they level.

[opaopajr]

The 3 'C's: Coherent yet Compelling Collection of Locations.

Coherency is whatever makes that locale have logical sense in your world.

Compelling is what makes them interesting for Players to engage with their PCs.

Collection is the tying thread, which is the organization thereof, such as City>District>Campus>Building, etc.

You have a lot of leeway and methods to structure, but the above is the simplest self-questions to answer to get you on your way. Most of this needs to be Player-facing and GM-time-saving content, so less overthinking is more. Can you answer: does it feel needed?; does it feel interesting?; does it feel related to other nearby places?

[Kurt Kurageous]

Good stone foundations and flexibility are definitely key. That way the people can proudly sing of the achievement of building a city on rock and roll....
...
...I'll let myself out.

GitP Forum takes 10d6 Psychic damage from that.

80s using characters are immune to Jefferson X damage. Don't make me quote Oingo Boingo on ya!

[Asisreo1]

I’m about to run a campaign that is set in a city state. The idea is that the campaign will be a series of smaller adventures (2-5 sessions) with time skips in between so the players can see the effects they have in the city (think dragon age 2). My issue is I never felt good at building large alive feeling cities. They’ve always just ended up being back drops.
Does anyone have advice on how to build a city that feels real and is fun. Ie done plenty of world building in the past and some towns as well but cities seam to be my kryptonite.

To add my skeleton is that it’s a city state with a ruler elected by the nobility from nobility. And it’s functions as a trade port. It’s a large city and seams to grow every day and when the game starts they’re half way through construction of the walls.

Want your city to feel alive? Add random encounter tables.

Um, no. Not combat encounters. I mean encounters like an out-of-control cart that rewards the players for stopping it. Bards that are singing tales that seem a little too on-the-nose about where the adventurers just been. A random mugging...on other NPC's. Duels between nobles. A creepy man shifting around and muttering to himself.

Make these encounters small but interactive and interesting.

They don't need to be random, but humans tend to form patterns that might become a bit too predictable. It's also fun to see what pops up for you too.

[poolio]

Just have a map with some general ideas for where the districts are located, trying to plan out a whole city like that is often a waste of time, players don't usually care about all the intricacies and most of the time all the political intrigue would have nothing to do with a random bunch of goobers, just have a couple random npc/shop name generators ready and take notes on what the players say or do with the locals, let them fabricate your world and then just add to it from there, it sounds a lot harder then it is, trust me.

[MinotaurWarrior]

Look to dragon age 2: have the players visit the same locations and characters over time.

Players don't really care about abstract elements of a city as a whole. If you did a perfect economic simulation of the city and gave them the resulting figures, it wouldn't make the city feel any more real. But show a refugee in act 1 get a job in the guard in act 2, rise to the top in act 3, and struggle against wicked political forces in act 4, and that means something.