Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Sliversun 12-12-06, 10:43 PM	I was just wondering, now that Cityscape is out in stores, do you think it could be possible to use the info in that book to create a ecumenopolis or world-spanning city (see link). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecumenopolis This would make a very unique campagin setting, and it would also mean the creation of not only new classes and spells, but new creatures and prehaps new races. So if you have any ideas, then please share them with us. Just try to think of it as a DnD version of Ravnica or what would happen if Sharn covered Eberron.
Return of the Flumph 12-12-06, 10:48 PM	I'm thinking about Coruscant now. I'm not sure if that would be feasible. Cities need large areas of farmland to support them, as well as timber, ore, and other natural resources unobtainable inside of the city itself. I suppose you could just say that gates to the outer planes or magic replicators make these things in abundance, but that would make for a rather cheesily high magic setting.
Tevish Szat 12-12-06, 10:50 PM	there are some people on these boards attempting to make a Ravnica setting... Ravnica being a Ecumenopolis from Magic: The Gathering. I don;t knwo how much thy;re gettign into the rules of the city and city life though
Sliversun 12-13-06, 02:44 AM	I'm thinking about Coruscant now. I'm not sure if that would be feasible. Cities need large areas of farmland to support them, as well as timber, ore, and other natural resources unobtainable inside of the city itself. I suppose you could just say that gates to the outer planes or magic replicators make these things in abundance, but that would make for a rather cheesily high magic setting. Yeah, but DnD is generally high magic. Plus, as for natural resources, horticulture can provide food, parks and tamed forests can provide the wood, and stone and metal can be recycled or mined like in the Ravnica books.
Kori 12-13-06, 02:51 AM	What about a world in decay where people survive by foraging through the ruins and recovers magical artifacts from dangerous parts of the city-world. They could just be recycyling the enviroment around them.
Darth Sephiroth 12-13-06, 08:44 AM	Well, some of the spells could cover a lot of things that normally cause problems. A cleric may earn his keep with repeated castings of Create Water or the like
elondir 12-13-06, 08:48 AM	I figure if there are enough portals, an ecumenopolis is entirely feasible, especially with the genesis spell making room for private estates, farmland, and extra city blocks. More likely though, the cities will be in their own demiplanes, and not covering the whole world.
WotC_Huscarl 12-13-06, 12:49 PM	This is fantasy. A city can cover the entire surface of the world, have suburbs that float on the oceans, palaces that drift in the sky, and slums that extend miles below the surface. Who cares where the food comes from? Say that in the distant past, mages created artifacts that spew forth food 24/7. Of more concern is, why? Is a world-spanning city functionally any different from one that covers, say, 1/3 of the world's surface? Either one is too big for a group of PCs to explore in a lifetime but plenty big enough to include any sort of urban terrain you can imagine. Steve
Pyrocidius 12-13-06, 02:14 PM	It is completely possible to make a city span an entire globe. between the decanter of endless water, that spoon that can produce soup (don't have books with me; excuse the seeming lack of int.) urban druids casting plant growth in specially sectioned argiculturial fields, any class with access to the create water spells, ect ect, it's all too easy to make it work. on a note of what you should include, i'd give some small variations for a few classes. there could be an urban ranger, which would be the same as a normal one, except with some flavour of a city. perhaps bonuses on tracking through streets, using gather information intead of survival? druid's ability to walk through natural landscapes with ease translate to walking through crowded/debris-filled streets and alleyways. the neat thing is how different races' usually have their own sections of a city, much like chinatown or little havana. These portions of the city will span thousands of miles. you could literally be so deep in your own racial terriotory you might not even know of life outside your section. the elven district might be just a bunch of tree houses, high above what they thought was the ground, only to really be filled by a large gnomish society. the only problem i see with such a world is encouters. sure, you might can find a theives guild and rout them, or go through an adventure through the sewers, but i can't really see an entire campaign running in one. especially at high levels, you and your characters will be hard pressed to make sure not to pick area effect spells that could potentially damage nearby structures. Then you have the local authorities breathing down your neck at every encounter. I'd say the best option is to have one massive city. spans maybe half the globe. the rest of the world is either ruins from when the world lived in different countries, or untamed wilderness. either of which could make for some great adventuring. The untaimed wilderness option also gives enough ecology for a terrasque to be a viable option. now that would be a good campaign. "Terrasque mauls a huge hole in the city, killing thousands (most of which were eaten by him) before returning back into the wild. Crazy/Advernturous charcaters go to chase him down and make him pay. fun stuff.
ewancummins 12-13-06, 02:39 PM	Murlynd's Spoon is the item that magically creates tasteless gruel[actually flavored like cardboard, IIRC]. Decanter of Endlass Water is very useful, and not just for drinking water. How common are these items? Who knows how to make them? How many have been made? Are the techniques needed to create them lost?
MagicMouth 12-13-06, 02:45 PM	The Urbis Campaign Setting (http://juergen.the-huberts.net/dnd/urbis/index.html) may give you some inspiration, I think.
thasis 12-13-06, 05:40 PM	In my campaign I have a city (Deathport) which is an encumenopolis of sorts. It's supposedly infinite in size, but finite on one plane of existance at time. Since the city expanded so much they started to create pocket-demi-planes that seeminglsly connect (through very extensive echantment, conjuration, and illusion magic). Also many lairs of under-cities exist underneath the sewers, also taking the concept of using demi-planes and connections to other planes. So it is ever encompasing, just takes up finite space in one spot.
DragonLich 12-13-06, 07:21 PM	I think that this is totally possible. Floating islands and other interesting places to grow and make ordinary items. Plus then whe you think about it...places like the Underdark need to import food stuffs more often then not so switch it up. Make it a place were there are a lot more edible plants that grow in the dark then in the light. Thus the Underdark could support life. I myself have never heard of a place like this yet I totally think it could work in a campaign. Really when you think about it if you slowly expand a map and populate it here and there it is in itself a huge city. Thus just like the map, you could have huge ponds and little subcommunities that progressivly got tougher in challenge.
AdventChild 12-16-06, 02:17 AM	the only problem i see with such a world is encouters. sure, you might can find a theives guild and rout them, or go through an adventure through the sewers, but i can't really see an entire campaign running in one. especially at high levels, you and your characters will be hard pressed to make sure not to pick area effect spells that could potentially damage nearby structures. Then you have the local authorities breathing down your neck at every encounter. Well i am currently working on the ravnica campaign, i also thought of that, but for example in ravnica everything melds in together, forest, water, mountains etc etc you could walk a large area of plain forest and not see a single building giving you the feeling you are actually in a forest in the wild yet when you reach a clearing and look up ahead you might see some buildings in the great distance. It is possible to adapt everything from, ruins, forests, dungeons into a Megalopolis (Ravnica is not an Ecumenopolis but a Megalopolis since it covers most of the planet not all of it, and ravnica is not the only city as hinted in its flavor "Nothing ever changes in Ravnica. For countless millennia, cities have covered the entire plane. Eventually, they ran together into one vast megalopolis -- a patchwork of grand halls, decrepit slums, ancient ruins, and layer upon layer of stonework Of the world's countless civic centers, one looms above all others: the City of Ravnica, a metropolis so vast that its name has become synonymous with the world itself.")
JulesCARV 12-16-06, 02:31 AM	What about making it an Outer Plane, or a layer of an outer plane? Then you could have a city that's infinite in size if you wanted, or smaller if you'd prefer (like Sigil). It seems like the idea/concept of urbanism could have representation in the manifestation of mortal belief that is the outer planes.
Return of the Flumph 12-16-06, 03:13 PM	I think that this is totally possible. Floating islands and other interesting places to grow and make ordinary items. Plus then whe you think about it...places like the Underdark need to import food stuffs more often then not so switch it up. Make it a place were there are a lot more edible plants that grow in the dark then in the light. Thus the Underdark could support life. That is a good idea. Right now, I'm thinking of those big, underdark fungi that the drow harvest for food. Maybe we should include a level beneath the sewers where there are huge, subterranean farms for growing this and similar underground crops.
Sliversun 12-17-06, 01:44 AM	If your looking for more insperation, then chech out this link: Ravnica d20 http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=576276
DragonLich 12-17-06, 08:44 PM	That is a good idea. Right now, I'm thinking of those big, underdark fungi that the drow harvest for food. Maybe we should include a level beneath the sewers where there are huge, subterranean farms for growing this and similar underground crops. Thus the more evil of the monsters have been shunted away to both the far corners of the above and below world. They must fight more readily with the City and seeing how it is indeed one huge place news would travel fast. Whether for good or ill more larger battles would tkae place in this situation.
wrecan 12-18-06, 04:12 PM	Murlynd's Spoon is the item that magically creates tasteless gruel[actually flavored like cardboard, IIRC]. Decanter of Endlass Water is very useful, and not just for drinking water. How common are these items? Who knows how to make them? How many have been made? Are the techniques needed to create them lost? Any 7th level druid or priest, and any 11th level wizard with the Craft Wondrous Item Feat should be able to make a Decanter. In a City, I imagine a lesser item could be made with the Craft Wondrous Item Feat and Create Water (cleric 0, druid 0, paladin 1). Call it the Endless Well, which, for 450 gp, can create water, as per the create water spell, whenever a command is uttered. Food is a bit harder to come by. Murlynd's spoon feeds four people a day, and costs 5,400 gp. That's 1,350 gp per person, well out of reach of most people. What if you make Janni (LA+5) a common race (perhaps even enslaved)? They can feed up to 18 people per day. Perhaps every family is expected to have their own Janni servant, with some sort of restraint that prevents ethereal jaunts and invisibility. Adult and older bronze dragons can create food and water 3/day as well and can feed around 200 people with that power. Or have another race, one that is physically weak, but happens to have the ability to create food and water at will.
DragonLich 12-18-06, 07:14 PM	Or because, as mentioned alot here, it is a magical world. Food is not suppose to get thought about that hard. Maybe everyone is totally self-sufficient and has their own little garden in their house. Maybe because of the large forests hunting is prohibited and only those who bear a special mark may hunt the animals in there to be latter sold. Maybe there is a magical stone every so few hundred miles that gives everyone the ability to not need to eat. The only real problem I see about a whole world city is that both good and evil are mixed together. How would that work? Would the fights be kept to a minimal using gaurds who are lawful nuetral and epic in level or are the fights more numerous and few people have chosen a side. It could work if it was on one plane, be it lower or upper, and thus wold be the same alignment but as it is a place for the party to grow you need both good and bad. Unless the party is the only good people. Tha would be quite a scary place.
ewancummins 12-18-06, 11:55 PM	I don't see alignment as being much of an issue. Good and evil people live mixed in together most everyhwre, don't they? It's not as if most people have access to magic that let's them know alignment. Even if you know someone is evil, why would you automatically attack him? Not trust him, sure. Most good characters are probably just decent people who care about others, not crsuaders against evil. Likewise, only really crazy evil types would go around attacking '' all that is good''. Most are probably just selfish and ruthless in the pursuit of their own petty agendas. That's just how I see it. Stongly aligned factions? They would fight, I'm sure. Maybe the city is plagued by evil cults and ruthless crime families, who are opposed by rival leagues of crime fighters[the good guys] ,and the balance of power is held by [mostly neutral aligned] merchants in league with mercenary toughs[the city guard ].
Sliversun 12-19-06, 02:16 AM	I don't see alignment as being much of an issue. Good and evil people live mixed in together most everyhwre, don't they? It's not as if most people have access to magic that let's them know alignment. Even if you know someone is evil, why would you automatically attack him? Not trust him, sure. Most good characters are probably just decent people who care about others, not crsuaders against evil. Likewise, only really crazy evil types would go around attacking '' all that is good''. Most are probably just selfish and ruthless in the pursuit of their own petty agendas. That's just how I see it. Stongly aligned factions? They would fight, I'm sure. Maybe the city is plagued by evil cults and ruthless crime families, who are opposed by rival leagues of crime fighters[the good guys] ,and the balance of power is held by [mostly neutral aligned] merchants in league with mercenary toughs[the city guard ]. Yeah, and I think in this campagin the races would follow the "Eberron-style" of alginment. In other words, some members of a 'Good' race are bad, like elves, and some members of a 'Bad' race are good, such as Bugbears. What do you think?
DragonLich 12-19-06, 05:20 PM	Yes I agree with that, then you can not get any into any racial fights becasue you never know whose who, unless you see a duel wielding scimitar dark elf, then he's on his own.
ewancummins 12-21-06, 02:37 AM	I think all civilized folk agree that dual scimitar wielding drow must be stopped. Do it for the children, people!;)
Sliversun 12-22-06, 01:02 AM	So, we'll probably use the standered D&D races, but what about races from settings such as Spelljammer, Planescape, Eberron, Dark Sun ect? Also, we could use races from Magic: The Gathering, Star Wars, Star Trek, Farscape and similar settings. How would a city be designed to accomondate them all? What would the architecture be like? More importantly, what would life be like with so many differnt races living in such close quarters?
Sliversun 12-23-06, 05:12 AM	Also, here is a list of some standered D&D creatures that can be used in this setting. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Dungeons_%26_Dragons_standard_c reatures And here is a list of fictional speices: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_species_in_fantasy_fiction
krichaiushii 12-23-06, 12:30 PM	Years back, the comic book GrimJack (http://www.grimjack.com/) took place in a city called Cynosure (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynosure); this pandimensional city constantly had other cities from other planes phasing in and out of existence with it. Some of the phases were long-term; others were short-term. Some planes could control the phasing, others popped in and out at random. Magic worked here, technology worked there, and swords worked everywhere. A city along these lines could explain the wide variety of races and monsters in D&D.
Sliversun 12-26-06, 09:45 PM	Yeah, but this isn't really a planar city or anything. But Cynosure does look good though.
Sliversun 01-04-07, 08:36 PM	Bump.
Kurikin 01-04-07, 09:56 PM	Reading this stuff also reminded me of KOTOR. Mabye try having the slums and such be the lower parts of the buildings and the very tops being the "rich" areas. How I think they have it set up is that there are multiple levels that span across the city. I'm talking about the city in KOTOR where you start, I havn't played it in quite some time so I might be talking about KOTOR 2.
Sliversun 01-07-07, 02:35 AM	Reading this stuff also reminded me of KOTOR. Mabye try having the slums and such be the lower parts of the buildings and the very tops being the "rich" areas. How I think they have it set up is that there are multiple levels that span across the city. I'm talking about the city in KOTOR where you start, I havn't played it in quite some time so I might be talking about KOTOR 2. Sounds like Sharn to me. Also, do have any links to this KOTOR?
Sliversun 01-27-07, 03:16 AM	Bump.
Hochiu 01-27-07, 12:00 PM	He meant Knights of the Old Republic computer/video game.
Xylem 01-27-07, 09:36 PM	Encounters? Simplicity itself! Here are some places where, or things with which you could have encounters in a world-spanning city: In the sewers; In catacombs; In ruined sections; In haunted buildings; At sea in surrounded seas; In bad parts of town; In forbidden zones; When robbing houses; When sneaking into the Wizard's guild; During riots; With criminal gangs; In cemeteries; With private armies; With religious fanatics; Near dangerous portals to other planes; With assassins hired to kill people you've been hired to protect; Etc, etc. The setting is immense, after all, and anything and everything could be there somewhere. For inspiration I recommend the Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fafhrd_and_the_Gray_Mouser) stories by Fritz Leiber (particularly the stories set in Lankhmar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lankhmar) and the Nightside (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_Green#The_Nightside) books by Simon Green. And, for the record, there's already an Urban Ranger (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#rangerVarian tUrbanRanger) in Unearthed Arcana.
Ayers 01-28-07, 12:58 AM	There's a commerical on television that I've seen several times now, for some brand of car or another, where the entire world is grass and natural landscape; the roads themselves are grass, and everything around is completely made of grass, dirt, and natural aspects of the world. There are, of course, buildings all around still made of concrete and what-not. I know it's a really far stretch, but it's definitely something that I think would make for an interesting campaign setting. If you want to have a city that is spread across the entire world, but do want to deal with farming and having natural obstacles, then maybe that's something you could look into. Maybe there are areas of high druidic magics of long past that keep the natural environments as they are. Of course, the mergance of nature and civilization together into a city that isn't living in trees, is something that I've always thought was kind of cool. But, anyways, to the original point: having an Ecumenopolis is fine. You should go for it. Some things that could be a bit of a problem though: are adventuring areas. If the world is a whole Ecumenopolis then the entire world must live in a city, meaning that it embraces the civilization that is put around it. Because of such, I imagine that it would be considered 'wrong' to go killing Orcs one day, because they're monsters. So really, I think you'd have to find some kind of subterranian cities or sewers, or some kind of abandoned areas where monsters are considered to be monsters. The only other way around this is to give your players the power to kill, either because they're law enforcement officials, or they're with some kind of army, or secret organization. Otherwise, getting over that little barrier of murder might be somewhat difficult. Unless they're evil. Essentially, if you want to go strictly roleplaying, then I think an Ecumenopolis is for you. If not, then you should probably leave some areas of the world untouched by civilization, or areas that need to be 'reclaimed' by civilization. Best of luck to you.
Sliversun 01-28-07, 02:36 AM	He meant Knights of the Old Republic computer/video game. Oh, thanks. BTW, I know we're using standered D&D races, but can we use races from settings such as Spelljammer, Planescape, Eberron, Dark Sun ect? Also, we could use races from Magic: The Gathering, Star Wars, Star Trek, Farscape ect. How would a city be designed to accomondate them all? What would the architecture be like? What kinds of religons would exist? What would the overall culture be like? More importantly, what would life be like with so many different races living in such close quarters? If you want some ideas, here's a list of some standered D&D critters that can be used in this setting. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Dungeons_%26_Dragons_standard_c reatures And here is a list of fictional speices: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_species_in_fantasy_fiction By the way Ayers, thanks for the feed back.
Sliversun 03-29-07, 02:58 AM	Bump.
Yakman 03-29-07, 02:30 PM	A ecumenopolis is so enormous that it's really much too large for any campaign's needs--do you really, truly need hundreds of billions of people? Certainly an impossibly huge, impossibly diverse city would make an excellent campaign setting, but it doesn't need to be world-spanning. Moreover, cities EVOLVE--parts of the city might be (almost) abandoned for hundreds of years due to internal movements of the population, so there's plenty of room for wilderness encounters within a city that spans hundreds of miles across. As for food, there's almost certainly going to be roof-top agriculture, plots within the city, and vast plantations outside of it. Look at third world cities today--much of the food that is consumed in cities in Latin America and Africa is produced within the urban areas--people grow corn in every available square foot in San Salvador for instance.
Araes 03-29-07, 07:02 PM	Well, part of the whole draw of the concept isn't that you Need the city. Its more the wonder of it and the mental thought excercise that goes into trying to surmount all the interesting problems of one. As far as your questions go Sliversun: How would a city be designed to accomondate them all? This totally depends on how the city came into being in the first place. Was it actually designed by an outside force. If so, to what goal. Do the people who are living inside of it get along, if so then it would probably be designed with a fairly open structure designed to help movement. Otherwise, it might be sectioned off into the various minorities, much like countries within the city itself. What would the architecture be like? Again, totally arbitrary and heavily based on how it was made. If it evolved from many seperate cities that eventually grew together, then it would probably have a crazy mix of buildings whose patterns would change and flow as you moved across the surface. If it was designed by a single will, then its possible that it would be more uniform and contain the architecture of whoever made it in the first place. What kinds of religons would exist? Umm, the same ones that exist in a normal campaign, but with the nature dieties being very weak compared to the dieties of more urban concerns. What would the overall culture be like? See responses 1 and 2 More importantly, what would life be like with so many different races living in such close quarters? See responses 1 and 2, but in general it would probably be a mess. If they didn't get along, then its quite possible it might be like balkanized states carved out of the city with no-man zones between them. If they did, then it could very well be a cacophany of sights and sounds as all the cultures collided.
Sliversun 04-19-07, 07:54 AM	Bump.
Sliversun 04-29-07, 02:55 AM	bump.
Sliversun 06-26-07, 05:50 AM	bump. Any more ideas?
Yakman 06-26-07, 11:54 AM	bump. Any more ideas? Plenty. What's important is that the ecumenopolis builds up and up and up--the bottom layers are older, mustier, more dangerous, and have their own power structures. This is clear from any sort of vertical rpg/fantasy world. However, it's important to do something to make it your own. A favorite ecumenopolis of mine is the Chung Kuo series--there's plenty of inspiration there. What might be interesting is what if the bottom layers start to collapse? What happens to a society that is literally standing on shaky ground? Do the rich upper worlders have to start confronting the demons below to re-inforce (literally) their position?
Alltat 06-26-07, 06:37 PM	Murlynd's Spoon is the item that magically creates tasteless gruel[actually flavored like cardboard, IIRC]. Make a pot version of it and add in a bit of prestidigitation to give it some flavor (or accept that it has none, or change how the spoon/pot works) and you've got a self-supplying tavern. Spread these out all over the city and you have no real need for growing food. The fact that 'real' food isn't needed will of course mean that it will be produced on a smaller scale, making it expensive, meaning people with money will want it just to show they have money, making it an even more expensive luxury. In a town where actual area is scarce, the high rooftops where there's enough to grow anything would probably be quite valuable. A simple apple could be worth a fortune. As for the value of meat... let's just say there are whole new career options here :devil: Or because, as mentioned alot here, it is a magical world. Food is not suppose to get thought about that hard. ... That's cheating! You can explain it using magic, but you can't use magic as an excuse to not explain it. Well, I suppose you could if you want a low-RP setting, but more often than not it's the explanations for these kinds of things that makes a setting stand out, and the process of explaining them leads to whole new and interesting ideas and adventure hooks. Or maybe that's just me? Stongly aligned factions? They would fight, I'm sure. Maybe the city is plagued by evil cults and ruthless crime families, who are opposed by rival leagues of crime fighters[the good guys] ,and the balance of power is held by [mostly neutral aligned] merchants in league with mercenary toughs[the city guard ]. Hell, there could even be open war between factions within the city from time to time. No real reason to assume that everyone gets along all the time. In fact, it's more fun if they don't ;)
Yakman 06-27-07, 11:17 AM	That's cheating! You can explain it using magic, but you can't use magic as an excuse to not explain it. Well, I suppose you could if you want a low-RP setting, but more often than not it's the explanations for these kinds of things that makes a setting stand out, and the process of explaining them leads to whole new and interesting ideas and adventure hooks. Or maybe that's just me? http://www.musicweb-international.com/film/2003/Jul03/soylent_green.jpg
Sliversun 07-02-07, 08:19 PM	If your looking for more ideas, then check out Ravnica d20 Update: http://boards1.wizards.com/showthread.php?t=640470
neilthrun 07-03-07, 01:34 PM	Cities in D&D do not need natural resources. They need spellcasters who can cast create food/water, plant growth, fabricate and polymorph any object.
Sliversun 08-12-07, 07:12 AM	Bump.