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What’s in a Name?: Alphabet

Posted on 15 January 2010 | Leave a comment

Here it is — the final post of our What’s in a Name? series. Today we’re talking about alphabets.

alphabet spiralWell, actually not about alphabets. While you can create a whole new alphabet for your language, it’s a lot of work to do just to create names. Especially since unless you’re writing out all of your game materials by hand, you’ve got to create either a true font or a set of dingbats to represent your new alphabet.

You can actually create something unique by using Roman letters. After all, most languages in Europe and the Americas all use some variation of Roman letters and they all manage to look different.

(Photo courtesy of: http://www.flickr.com/photos/fdecomite/ / CC BY 2.0)

Go Back to Your Sounds

Remember the list of sounds we made back on the Day 2? It’s time to pull that out. What you want to do is assign one letter or letter combination to every sound you have. What you’re creating here is actually called an orthography.

Now, you can mix up the letters and sounds — but I wouldn’t recommend it. What I mean by that is, you can assign the “sh” sound to the letter “a”. I wouldn’t recommend it because it’ll be a constant headache for you and your players. You’ll constantly have to look back and forth between your  names and your “alphabet” and I’d be very surprised if your players didn’t revolt by the second game session as they try to remember that “Shewsberry” is actually pronounced “thantcamms”.

What you do want to do though, is settle on one way of writing each phoneme you have. Even though in English (for example) “c” can make an “s” or a “k” sound and more than one letter in the alphabet can make the same sound, for simplicity’s sake, I’d recommend one sound, one letter combinations.  That way, you know that “Cebunclane” is always pronounced “ke-bunk-la-ne” and not “see-boon-clain”.

A Note About Diacritics

One obvious way to make your language look different is by using a lot of diacritics. But this can also create a huge headache as you have to remember how to type them or pause frequently while writing to use the “insert special character” (or equivalent) function of your computer. And if you ever want to post your names online, keep in mind that HTML has a very limited set of special characters it supports.

You can actually get a very different look to your names just by using combinations of letters not normally found in English and peppered with a few very common diacritics. Here’s some examples:

  • Nord-Pas-de-Calais (French)
  • Lübeck (German)
  • Zaragoza (Spanish)
  • Algyógy (Hungarian)
  • Bizusa-Bâi (Romanian)

Have fun with this. It can be some work, initially, but once you’ve created it, it really does help give your world a unique flavor. Then, if you decide you do want to create a full language for your world at a later date, you’ve already laid some of the foundation work.

This article series was inspired by Mark Rosenfelder’s Language Construction Kit and I’ve drawn on it heavily as a resource. If you’re interested in a creating a language of your own, his site is a great place to start.

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What’s in a Name? Stress is Good

Posted on 30 December 2009 | Leave a comment
Stress the right syllable
Image by quinn.anya via Flickr

It’s day 3 of our series on creating a naming language and today we’re talking about stress. Not that kind of stress — this is the emphasis we place on one syllable over the others within a word or name. Setting a set stress pattern for names can help keep your language from sounding like English with funny pronunciations.

In English, we learn which syllables to stress on a word-by-word basis. Indeed, different regions of the English speaking world can stress different syllables of the same word and names are no exception. Changing the stress pattern of word or name can change it’s pronunciation. For example, most non-natives will pronounce my home region of Oregon’s Willamette valley as WILL-a-met or-EE-gone, when it’s actuality pronounced will-A-met (to rhyme with “damn it”) OR-e-gun. Another example is the word “laboratory”. In American English, the stress is on the first syllable (LAB-or-a-tory) while in England, the stress is on the second syllable (lab-OR-a-tory).

Other languages are more regular. Hungarian stresses the first syllable, while Polish stresses the second-to-last syllable. Other languages can have more complex stress rules, depending on vowel placement within a syllable or length of syllable. My language slightly stresses the last syllable of a word.

You certainly don’t need to set a fixed stress pattern, but it can help make your language sound distinct

Next time: Pitch

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What’s in a Name? The Music of Language

Posted on 14 December 2009 | Leave a comment

Welcome to Day 2 of our series on creating a naming language."I love you" in several languages

Every language has its own particular sound. Japanese sounds different from Spanish and few people would mistake guttural German for tonal Chinese. Frequently, with just a little education, we can tell which language is being spoken, even if we don’t we don’t know a word of it. To me, each language has its own particular music and once I figure out the music, it’s easier for me to learn or create a new language.

Step to Your Music

Our naming language should also have it’s own music. What do you want your language to sound like, overall? Is it lilting and musical, straight-forward and down to earth, or harsh and demanding? What kind of people live in this area? Are they extremely poetic, which could lead to a fluid-sounding language. Or are they “salt of the Earth” farmers, who are more likely to create names that are practical and straight-forward?

The Beginning of Language

Your next step is to find out what letters give you that sound when spoken together. For example, Tolkein’s Elvish has a lot of l’s and vowel sounds, making it sound fluid and musical, while his Orcish is harsh and gutteral. Think about the languages you speak and find the phonemes1 that will give you the sounds you’re looking for.  If you’re still needing inspiration, check out some language learning sites on-line that have examples of spoken languages. I’d actually recommend listening to languages you don’t understand, so you can focus on the music of a language and not get bogged own in the words. What sounds do you hear that you’d like to use? Write them down phonetically in a way that makes sense to you.

The Sounds Take Care of Themselves

Every language has some phonemes or sounds (letters) that are more common than others. This is a large part of what gives each language its own sound. For English e, t, r, and a are among the most common letters used. In a language I’m currently creating, the most common sounds in the language are hard k, ts (like the Russian ‘tsar’), short a, long e, and m. Take your phonetic list and rank the phonemes in order of frequency. I usually go most frequent to least frequent, but you can use any method that works for you. Separate out the vowels and consonants into their own lists and rank them individually.

That’s it for today. Next time we’ll cover the importance of stress.

1pho.neme (n). any of the abstract units of the phonetic system of a language that correspond to a set of similar speech sounds (as the velar \k\ of cool and the palatal \k\ of keel) which are perceived to be a single distinctive sound in the language.
— Meirram-Webster Online Dictionary

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What’s in a Name? Language!

Posted on 11 December 2009 | 1 comment

Creating names can be one of the most challenging parts of creating a game setting. Sure, you can name things whatever happens to come to mind, but that can create names from all over the map (literally, if you’re borrowing names from the real world). You can end up with the Boxboggle river in the city of Sparrow Hill in the country of Wwoauntyz on Planet Q. While that kind of naming is common in the modern US, it doesn’t really help give players the feeling that your setting could be a real place.

street signs(Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/philliecasablanca/ / CC BY 2.0)

Another option is to use words that describe something about the area. For example, Meadowbrook or Razorback Wallow. This is often a good choice. Because you’re using names from one language (usually the language your group speaks), these names often have a more unified field. They feel as if they come from the same culture and they can give your players an idea of the culture of an area.

There’s a third option, though. You can create a naming language.

What’s a naming language?

Unlike creating a full speaking language (which can be fun, but takes a lot of time and energy investment), naming languages have a few simple rules and can be created in an evening. Your goal here isn’t to create  an in-depth grammer and lexicon; it’s to create some rules about letter and sound patterns so that your names feel as if they all came from the same culture.

How to Create a Naming Language

Naming languages can be very simple to create. Creating full languages can involve creating new consonant and vowel sounds, as well as pronouns, grammar, sentence structure, standard word order … whew! Before you feel overwhelmed, remember that your sole purpose here is to create names. That’s it. You don’t need a complicated grammar or set of pronouns or whatnot. The names you’re creating don’t even have to mean anything (though they can, if you wish). You’re just looking for something that sounds internally consistent.

I’ve broken the process down into a series of steps, which I’ll cover next week over the course of several blog entries. These steps are:

  1. Decide what your language sounds like.
  2. Choose the most common sounds.
  3. Figure out the stress patterns of your names.
  4. Create tones.
  5. Determine sound constraints.
  6. Create an “alphabet” and pronunciation guide.

Other Sources

There are some excellent resources on line for creating languages, if you’d like more in-depth information. Here’s some of my favorites:

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“Where are we again?”: Creating Unique Fantasy Cities and Towns

Posted on 24 July 2009 | 5 comments

Sometimes creating a believable city or town is one of the hardest parts of building an adventure or campaign. You don’t want all your towns to look the same and you definitely don’t want to get stuck in the generic “fantasy town”, consisting of a tavern/bar, inn or other lodgings, magic shoppe, etc.

Below I’ve gathered a list of web resources to help provide city building know-how and inspiration. Enjoy!

Here’s some listing of world-building sites who’s information can be adapted for city creation:

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City Creation: Kael Pathfinder Stoutpoppy, Swordsmith

Posted on 1 July 2009 | Leave a comment

Since the PCs aren’t likely to interact with Meadowbrook’s blacksmiths other than to have items repaired or commission new ones, I’m not going to spend much time detailing them.

Most Meadowbrook’s blacksmiths focus on creating practical items — horseshoes, plows and farming implements, iron nails and building tools, etc. Kael Pathfinder Stoutpoppy is the exception to the rule: he’s only swordsmith in Meadowbrook. While he can and does do other types of blacksmithing to pay the bills, his primary love is creating strong, beautiful blades.

Kael Pathfinder Stoutpoppy

Kael is a former ranger who settled down in Meadowbrook. While his home and shop are actually outside of the city proper, he and his wife, Janna, are frequent faces in town, especially at The Butter Churn tavern. While adventuring, Kael met and fell in love with Janna Stoutpoppy, a skilled fighter in the group he traveled with. When the two of them decided to retire and settle down, they chose Meadowbrook — Janna’s home town.

While Kael and Janna aren’t the only human-halfling couple Meadowbrook’s history, the match is unusual enough to raise eyebrows and start gossip tongues wagging. The Stoutpoppys had some difficulty accepting an human son-in-law, but Kael’s friendly, outgoing personality finally won over Janna’s parents. The rest of the Stoutpoppy clan, including Janna’s two sisters and her brother aren’t so generous of spirit and the divide has split appart the clan. Janna’s siblings have not spoken to her for the last three years. The couple are very much in love, but the situation has put a strain on their marriage; currently, the two of them are discussing plans to move to a larger city where they won’t stand out so much.

A skilled storyteller, Kael can frequently be found at The Butter Churn when not working. He’s frequently pressed to tell stories of his and Janna’s younger, wilder days.

Janna Stoutpoppy

Janna herself is much quieter than her husband. She’s friendly enough, but much more reserved and usually content to let her more outgoing half speak for both of them.

Her split with her family weighs heavily on her, though she does her best not to show it. She’s glad her parents have come around about Kael, but the fact that her siblings and most of her clan refuse to speak to her saddens her greatly. She also experiences some discrimination in the town; a few of the merchants, both human and halfling, refuse to serve her or Kael. She loves Kael deeply, but the situation is putting a lot of strain on her. She and Kael have begun to talk about moving to an area where there are more couples like them, something she’s not sure she wants to do. She feels torn by her love for Kael and her love for her family.

For her own part, Janna is an excellent fighter, extremely skilled at taking down opponents several times her size. She’s agile and intelligent, though very shy without a sword in her hand. Her shyness can come off as cold or haughty to those meeting her for the first time.

  • Kael Pathfinder Stoutpoppy, human ranger (AD&D terms: 10th level ranger).
  • Janna Stoutpoppy, halfling fighter/warrior (AD&D terms: 11th level fighter)

Note about halfling names in Meadowbrook’s world: Among halflings, property is passed down matriliniarly, from mother to daughter. Consequently, most husbands take their wife’s surname after marriage, adding it after their own. Kael and Janna followed this tradition, hoping that would help them gain more acceptence in Janna’s home town. Unfortunately, this hasn’t had the effect they’d desired.

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City Creation: Hospitality

Posted on 29 June 2009 | Leave a comment

According to our demographics , Meadowbrook has two inns and ten restaurants/taverns/pubs and one of the innkeepers is a retired adventurer.

Let’s start with our inns.

The Inns

The most obvious choice would be to place one inn in Littletun and one in Bigtun. But since inns generally aren’t used by locals, and the river docks are in Bigtun, it makes sense that both inns would be located near the trade route. And rather than having one in cater to “littles” (halflings, gnomes, dwarves, etc.) and other to “bigs” (humans, elves, etc.), lets make both inns cater to both types of clientele equally.  Instead, we can have each of the inns cater to different income levels. So, our two inns are:

Marketstreet Inn

Catering to the working classes, Marketstreet Inn is run by Ellie Haymaker, a widow with two grown children — a son and a daughter — both of whom help run the inn. Marketstreet offers clean rooms for a fair price. The rooms are small and washrooms are limited to one per floor, but the beds are clean, if not the most comfortable. Ellie’s capable daughter, Maree, heads up the kitchen. The food choices are limited — stew, brown bread and cheese — but it’s warm, tasty, and there’s usually plenty of it. Ellie is the daughter of a traveling tinkerer, so she knows the kind of place working folk need when they’re away from home. She has an equal number of rooms for “bigs” and “littles”. Prices are by the bed, rather than the room, so frequently guests end up bunking with people they don’t know.

  • Ellie Haymaker — halfling innkeeper, proprietor.
  • Maree Haymaker — halfling head cook for Marketstreet Inn. Ellie’s daughter and her eldest child.
  • Norvin Haymaker — halfling stablemaster, handyman and bellhop. Basically, whatever odd jobs Ellie requires, Norvin does. Ellie’s son and her youngest child. Ellie still has a tendency to baby him even though he’s a grown man.

Ellie also employs a couple of housekeepers, a stableboy and a cook, all of them “bigs”.

The Golden Slipper

The Golden Slipper caters to more monied class of travelers than Marketstreet Inn. Run by an ex-paladin/knight named Piers Caldwell, The Golden Slipper offers quality service, rooms, meals — and charges accordingly. Much smaller than Marketstreet Inn, The Golden Slipper charges by the room and offers one washroom for every two sleeping rooms. Meals are cooked to order and often contain imported delicacies.

Piers is an honest, trustworthy and reliable man, who found the conduct code of a holy warrior too restrictive — wealth and the opposite sex proved to be too much temptation for him. After a highly lucrative career as a sword for hire (i.e., adventurer), he decided to retire to quieter surroundings. The Golden Slipper doesn’t bring in enough money to cover all of its expenses; Piers hopes this will change as Meadowbrook’s trade continues to expand. Meanwhile, he’s supporting the inn out of his own savings, which don’t look as if they’re going to run short anytime in the next couple of decades. He employs a large staff, including a “companion service” and a couple of low-level spellcasters; Piers uses magical cleaning methods to make sure the Slipper is spotless at all times.

Piers and Ellie’s mutual dislike of each other is well-known and frequently causes conflict within their guild.

  • Piers Caldwell, human fighter/warrior (AD&D 3.x: ex 10th-level paladin).

Pubs/Taverns/Restaurants

Meadowbrook’s ten eateries aren’t as differentiated as modern ones. They’re a cross between a pub/tavern and a modern restaurant. Six of the establishments are in Bigtun, with four (including The Butter Churn) in Littletun. Most cater to travelers and locals alike, but three remain local hot spots and two focus on the trader business. I’m only going to detail the most popular places.

The Butter Churn

The Butter Churn is the favorite spot for local residents. Located in Littletun, it’s run by Kari Tallfellow who inherited the business from her father. It’s been in her family for seven generations and she’s training her own son, Martin, to take over when she retires. It’s widely recognized as having the best food in all of Meadowbrook and the surrounding villages. It’s a family-friendly atmosphere and many of the locals gather here when they’re not working.  On Saturday nights, the Churn (as its known locally) hosts music and dancing.

  • Kari Tallfellow, halfling owner and proprietor
  • Martin Tallfellow, halfling, 14 years own. Kari’s son and assistant.

Wind on the Docks

In contrast to The Butter Churn, Wind on the Docks caters to an older, more transient crowd. Wind on the Docks is the front face for Madam Lillington’s brothel. Though it draws mostly from traders and other travelers just passing through, Madam Lillington’s is also a time-honored tradition for local adolescents seeking their first sexual experience. [I had originally stated that Meadowbrook didn’t have an actual brothel, just independent streetwalkers. I changed my mind because I wanted to set up the contrast between The Butter Churn’s wholesome, family focus and a more “adult” and less reputable establishment].

Madam Lillington employs both humans and halflings, though she does insist they be over the age of majority, which in this area is 14. Compared to some establishments in larger cities, the Docks (as the locals call it) is quite tame in the pleasures it offers. Most of her “staff” are out-of-towners escaping bad situations in their home ports, but some are locals. She employs both “bigs” and “littles”, mostly humans and halflings.

  • Madam Lillington, human proprietor and madam of Wind on the Docks.

Gorseberry Blue

Not all traders and travelers are lone adults who might seek companionship for a night. Sometimes whole families work the trade routes and there are always a few devoted clerics, paladins, and other travelers who really are just looking for a hot meal. The best location for that is Gorseberry Blue, which serves good food at reasonable prices. What it lacks in menu diversity, it makes up for in both quality and quantity. Of all the food places in Meadowbrook, Gorseberry offers the best combination good food, quiet atmosphere, and friendly staff and is the most popular spot for those just passing through Meadowbrook.

  • Samar Tanton, human proprietor and owner of Gorseberry Blue

Grapeleaf Inn (The Rats’ Nest)

Not actually an inn at all, the Grapeleaf Inn (known locally as the Rats’ Nest) has only one thing going for it — the food is cheap. Frequented by those at the bottom rung of the economic ladder, locals and out-of-towners alike, the Rats’s Nest definitely lives down to its very poor reputation. Still, if you’ve only go a few coppers to your name, you can get a hot meal here, as long as you’re not too picky about its contents.

  • Bear Strongarm, human owner and propriator.

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City Creation: The Town Guard

Posted on 22 June 2009 | Leave a comment

Town Guard are not employees of Meadowbrook. A guild in their own right, they’re employed by the town council. Each guild tithes a small percentage of their annual income directly to the Town Guard, in return the Guard protects the other guilds from dangers local and foreign. But how many town guard members are there? The 3.5 Dungeon Master’s Guide gives a figure of 1 full-time guard for every 100 people, meaning Meadowbrook would have 40 guards, which seems like a reasonable number.

Unlike most guilds, the town guard is actually two separate guilds of 20 members each: the Littletun Guard, who police the halfling areas and the Bigtun Guard, who police the human areas. As you might expect, it would be extremely unusual for the Littletun Guard to have a human member and vice-versa, thought it has occasionally happened. This arrangement has caused some racial tensions, since the dock areas and most stores are located in Bigtun; rumors abound that the best imported goods get diverted away from the docks before they can reach Littletun markets. I’ll leave each GM to determine the truth of these rumors on their own.

Each Tun Guild (as the two “subguilds” are known) has their own guild leader who reports to the Captain of the Guard, the head of the combined guild. These are:

  • Captain of the Guard: Bryan Hartman, human fighter [10th level]*
  • Littletun Captain: Piper Hillbottom, halfling fighter [8th level]
  • Bigtun Captain: Robert Roark, human fighter [6th level]

Guild Structure

As mentioned above, each Tun Guild has it’s own captain, with each captain having two assistant captains. The two assistants supervise the “patrols” — teams of four guild members who monitor the streets of the Tuns.  Guildmembers are skilled warriors/fighters, but not as skilled as your average PC warrior/fighter (in AD&D 3.x terms, guild captains are fighters, but average guild members are warriors). Additionally, each adult citizen of Meadowbrook is required to donate time to the town guard as part of their civic duty.

Each citizen is required to serve two days every three months and is also expected to attend a two-hour weapons/training session once every two weeks, as this citizen force also functions as the town’s defensive militia. Last year, Meadowbrook’s town council passed a law allowing property owners to hire someone else to serve their “civic” time. Officially, the law requires the “stand-ins” to be citizens, but in truth, no one checks papers as long a capable, warm body reports for duty. This has caused resentment among the lower income residents, who see the rich being able to buy their way out of the obligation.

Captain of the Guard: Bryan Hartman

Bryan Hartman is a retired adventurer. Born and bred in Meadowbrook, he wandered distant lands for many years, believing there had to be someplace better out there, someplace he could make a name and a fortune for himself. Instead, he found the longer he was gone, the more he missed his home town. After losing his left hand in a war fought to protect a kingdom he didn’t care about for another bag of money he didn’t really need, Bryan returned to Meadowbrook, bought a large farm just outside of town, married a local girl, and settled down to raise a family. He’s a devoted father and husband who honestly cares about the wellbeing of his home town. He has four children — three daughters and a son — and the eldest daughter seems determined to follow in her father’s footsteps. Like many Meadowbrook natives, he views his town’s recent growth with worry, believing the new-comers will be here only as long as Meadowbrook’s new-found prosperity lasts.

———————

*All levels given are for 3.5 AD&D and are intended to be used as guildelines. If you’re using Meadowbrook with another games system, assume 20th level is the PC maximum, then scale accordingly. So 10th level would be a fighter/warrior/knight who’s about halfway to maximum skill level, etc. For the purposes of creating Meadowbrook, I’m ignoring Epic Level characters – they’re too powerful for inclusion into an “average” town.

You can find a very helpful article about town militias at The Round Table of Bretonnia.

Next time: Tammi Ravenswing and the thieves’ guild.

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City Creation: The Fix-it Guild

Posted on 18 June 2009 | Leave a comment

Continuing our description of Meadowbrook’s notable citizens, we come to Barsus Tinner, the head of the fix-it guild.

The Fix-It Guild

First off, let’s give the fix-it guild an official name. As low-level arcanists, I can see the guild trying to give themselves a greater sense of status with a lofty-sounding name, something like: “The Noble Brotherhood of Magical Repair Workers”. That being such a mouthful, most of Meadowbrook’s citizens call them “the fix-its”.

The fix-its are low-level wizards and sorcerers who focus on mending inanimate objects. The guild does employ some non-spellcaster repair people, but they can’t become actual guild members until they’ve developed some rudimentary spell-casting ability (in 3.x AD&D, this would mean gaining at least one level of wizard or sorcerer). Since Meadowbrook isn’t a large city, there are only five actual  guild members (as stated in the previous post on Business Demographics). In addition to full guild members, Meadowbrook has three apprentice fix-its and six regular non-magical repair people.

Spellcasters (full guild members):

  • Barsus Tinner, guild head. An halfling wizard of mid-to-low ability (in AD&D terms, 6th level). Like most fix-its, Barsus focuses on repair magic, but with a particular talent for reparing metal items (in Ars Magica terms, Muto Terram specialist).  Apprentice: Tommy Tinthorn.
  • Kerwi Sorrell, assistant guild head. Human, mid-to-low level sorcerer (AD&D: 5th level). Her main talent is fixing wooden items (Ars: Muto Herbam). Apprentice: Brand Jolan.
  • Lyza Marybelle, halfling  wizard, low level (AD&D: 4th level). Especially talented at repairing leather and hide goods (Ars: Muto Animal).
  • Ace Ackerly, human sorcerer, low level (AD&D: 4th level). General, all-around fix-it, no particular focus. Apprentice: Tabina Tallflower.
  • Aerinlie Mouse Taitewyncoddle, gnome wizard, low level (AD&D 3rd). Very good with creating replacement parts for an item, especially metal parts (Ars: Creo Terram). Mouse especially enjoys fixing complex machinery. He is the newest full member of the guild, having just been granted full status after being Barsus’ apprentice for six years. Aerin likes to experiement and try new combinations and unusual applications of spells. He loves researching new ways of doing things, which has set him at odd with his former master, who believes in using methods and approaches that have stood the test of time. [Here’s our theme again — new growth vs. stagnation].

Each full guild member owns and operates their own shop and is responsible for the employees and appretices who work there.

Non-Spellcasters (Guild Employees):

  • Barret Dione. Human, employed by Barsus. Specialty: metal items
  • Lenah Maylinn. Human, employed by Barsus. Specialty: fabric items
  • Brandiwyn Fairweather. Halfling, employed by Kerwi. Specialty: wooden items. Brandi (as most folks call her), can also perform some minor magics (0-level spells), but didn’t have enough magical talent to progress beyond that. She was Kerwi’s apprentice for a short time, before concentrating on non-magical fixes. She is considered by many members (read: everyone by Barsus) as an unofficial guild member, but has no voting privledges or (officially) guild benefits. Kerwi makes sure she and her three children are well-cared for though and grants Brandi as many of the guild “perks” as she’s able.
  • Silas Strongbarrell. Halfling, employed by Lyza. Good all-around fix-it.
  • Meredith Danelyn. Human, employed by Ace. Especially good with children’s toys.
  • Langdon Roundcopper. Halfling, employed by Mouse. Very talented at fixing clocks and clockwork items.

Apprentices

  • Tommy Tinthorn. Halfling, apprenticed to Barsus. Strong potential with metal repairs.
  • Brand Jolan. Human, apprenticed to Kerwi. Strong potential with wood and other items derived from plants.
  • Tabina Tallflower. Halfling, apprenticed to Ace. Shows a talent for working with stone items.

Each apprentice is assessed by the guild as a whole, before being assigned to a specific guildmember for training. In general, the guild tries to match an apprentice’s potential with a fix-it’s particular specialty, though politics and bribery are not unheard of influences on placement.

All full guild members are also skilled at non-magical repairs. The guild charges more for magical repairs than non-magical ones, but in either case, the guild requires all fix-its to stand behind their work: if a problem reoccurs within a specified period of time (which varies, depending on the nature of the specific repair), guild members are required to fix or replace the item at no cost to the customer.

Barsus Tinner

Barsus has been guild master for almost 20 years. He’s very much focused on traditions and long-established methods for doing things. He views new ideas and approaches with much suspicion, which frequently causes him to butt heads with his former apprentice, Mouse. Tinner believes in a solid days work, reliable and timely repairs and frowns on guild members making “improvements” to a customer’s item — he believes that the item should be made as much like new as possible, but shouldn’t be given more features, functionality,  or capability than the item originally had — unless the customer wants to pay for improvements and “upgrades”, of course.

A widower after 40 years of marriage, Barsus frequently works 10-hour days. No one in town works harder at anything than Barsus does at his repairs. “Hard-working”, “predictable”, and “reliable” are three words he consideres compliments. Which isn’t to say he can’t relax and enjoy himself; after-hours will frequently find him at The Butter Churn, sharing a half-pint and a smoke with other locals.

Next time: Bryan Hartman and the town guard.

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City Creation: Character Class Demographics

Posted on 15 June 2009 | Leave a comment

Generally, I don’t detail numbers for the NPCs of my games. Unless I expect the PCs to pick a fight with one of them, I don’t even created stat blocks. I look at the NPC’s history, role in the game, personality and profession to decide what they can do, which is generally I need them to do in a particular situation. If the players start to interact extensively with an NPC, then I’ll create a character sheet for them.

It saves me work, as I only end up detailing the NPCs that need it: Joe, the butcher — who the PCs only see once when they beat him at a card game in the tavern — doesn’t need any details. Even critical or important NPCs don’t usually get more than the very cursory stat treatment, though I’m likely to have several pages of history, background notes, political ties, etc. written out for them. If I need stats, I tend to make them up on the spot, noting them down for future reference. In particular, I don’t sit down and figure out how many levels of Noble or Commoner a particular NPC has.

That being said, I do keep some notes of characters with PC class levels. Most residents of Meadowbrook won’t have PC classes and if they do, they’re not likely to be very high level. The most likely candidates for PC class levels are:

  • Our half-elf magic shop shopkeeper
  • The head of the fix-it guild
  • Head of the town guard
  • Head of the thieves’ guild
  • Clerics of the local shrines

Just for fun, let’s add some retired adventurers to the town residents:

  • The owner of one of the inns
  • One of the blacksmiths
  • The head of the dockworkers guild

A note about retired adventurers: I’ve never liked the profession of “adventurer”. To me, adventuring is something a character does, not something they are. So, in Meadowbrook, a retired adventurer is someone who went on adventures in their younger days, but has gotten the restlessness out of their blood and settled down. No one advertises for adventurers in my world; instead, you’ll see requests for “hardy souls” or “brave youths”.

That gives us some characters with PC class levels. To that, we can add “notable citizens” who, even without PC class levels, are important to Meadowbrook, to wit:

  • The mayor
  • The magistrates

Notable Citizens

Let’s create a brief background for each of our “notables”:

Darius Sunrunner
Darius is the only actual resident of Meadowbrook with any elven blood. While elves may stop occasionally for a night or two, they don’t generally like to live within towns; they prefer their own settlements, which they call “groves”. Born of a human mother and an elven father, Darius was raised outside of both cultures. Showing an early talent for music and a prodigious memory, he became a bard, spending almost 20 years as an itinerant musician and “troubleshooter for hire”. Eventually tired of travel, he settled down in Meadowbrook five years ago, just as the town became a trade stop. He opened a magic and “what-not” store he named “Darius’ Doodads”.

More gregarious than many “half-bloods” (who usually inherit their elven parent’s aloofness), Darius enjoys chatting with anyone who comes into his shop. He can frequently be found after hours at The Butter Churn — the favorite watering hole for the town’s residents — trading his songs and stories for dinner or drinks (though never to the point of becoming drunk). He’s free with information and will happily share what he knows with anyone who asks, provided they share their own adventures and stories. He likes Meadowbrook’s quiet and strong sense of community; he has made many friends in both Littletun and Bigtun, making him welcome wherever he goes in town.

Darius’ Doodads (called “Doodles” by the locals) sells magic items, paper goods, antiques, knickknacks and anything unusual that strikes Darius’ fancy. The magic items tend to the practical, as most of his business comes from the local populace, but occasionally he has a magic weapon or “adventuring” item.

Stats: (AD&D 3.5 ed): Male, half-elf, 10th level Bard. Neutral good. Very high charisma-type scores, high intelligence and wisdom scores, average everything else. Darius’ spell list covers a wide variety of spells, with no real focus in any one type. I’m not going to detail out his stat numbers or his spell list for two reasons:

  1. I can give him whatever I need him to have when I need it.
  2. I want to make these characters transferable to other fantasy games than D&D.

Magic and portability
Whenever Darius uses a spell, I’ll make a note of it, building his spell list as I go along. That way, he doesn’t end up with “useless” spells taking up slots and the spell list is appropriate to the game system being used.

As an example of portability, in 4th ed Ars Magica Darius’ magical arts might look something like this:

Cr 3, In 4, Mu 4, Pe 1, Re4
An 2, Aq 3, Au 3, Co 3, He 1, Ig 2, Im 3, Me 5, Te 2, Vi 4

and might include the following spells:

  • Discern Images of Truth and Falsehood
  • Frosty Breath of the Spoken Lie
  • Veil of Invisibility
  • The Chiurgeon’s Healing Touch
  • Eyes of the Cat
  • The Gentle Beast
  • Rise of the Feathery Body

And, of course, he’d have the virtue Fairie Blood

[Note: these are just off the top of my head — I haven’t sat down to balance them out according to mechanics rules and the spell list is certainly not exhaustive].

Next time: Notable character continued — Barsus Tinner, the head of the fix-it guild.

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