My answer: Lots.
That is clearly wrong. There are definitely lots of lots.
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That is clearly wrong. There are definitely lots of lots.My answer: Lots.
One, two...tree...I think you right. ;)
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Pathfinder is fundamentally a game about fun and adventure. To some of us staffers, massive population figures are not fun. In fact, they're the sort of thing that (in my personal opinion) hamstrings a campaign setting, precisely because it reduces a GM's ability to hand-wave. If we--or a GM--want to introduce a new faction, or nation, or whatever, and realize we can't because it wouldn't make sense given the population figures we've listed... that sucks. We also don't get too technical about physics, or the mechanics of magical practitionership, or rainfall, or tax codes, or any other ephemera along those lines for much the same reason. Yes, we could provide that information. But we don't think it's fun.
You're welcome to disagree and decide those matters for yourself. And because we haven't published an official figure, there's no way for anyone to contradict you.
With all of our books, the goal is not to create an encyclopedia of Golarion--it's to provide a fun, exciting introduction to those aspects which adventurers are most likely to interact with.
But I hate people who think that five acres is enough to feed 500 people. Demographics in fantasy is important because it validates the fantasy. Sure you all like go bad biblical and put meal time down as manna from heaven...but it cuts no ice.
Civilizations went to war because they ran out of firewood...Its time cheliax invaded the elf forests with an army of woodsmen and clearfelled a half acre per citizen per year.
Creative Director
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But I hate people who think that five acres is enough to feed 500 people. Demographics in fantasy is important because it validates the fantasy. Sure you all like go bad biblical and put meal time down as manna from heaven...but it cuts no ice.
Civilizations went to war because they ran out of firewood...Its time cheliax invaded the elf forests with an army of woodsmen and clearfelled a half acre per citizen per year.
When it comes time for us to do an adventure about a nation going to war because they ran out of firewood... we'll cover what we need to cover when we do that adventure.
It turns out that we can't cover every possible thing in Golarion at once in one fell swoop. Humanity hasn't managed to cover that for Earth yet, even!
Our only option is to focus on certain topics at a time, and we choose the topics that we find the most interesting and the topics that are the most necessary to have everyone (us, our freelancers, our customers) starting out on the same page. And so far, publishing census information hasn't risen high on that to-do list. Especially since it's a HIDEOUS amount of work for something that, in the end, is not really all that necessary to tell stories about fighting dragons and looting treasure.
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But I hate people who think that five acres is enough to feed 500 people. Demographics in fantasy is important because it validates the fantasy. Sure you all like go bad biblical and put meal time down as manna from heaven...but it cuts no ice.
Civilizations went to war because they ran out of firewood...Its time cheliax invaded the elf forests with an army of woodsmen and clearfelled a half acre per citizen per year.
When it comes time for us to do an adventure about a nation going to war because they ran out of firewood... we'll cover what we need to cover when we do that adventure.
It turns out that we can't cover every possible thing in Golarion at once in one fell swoop. Humanity hasn't managed to cover that for Earth yet, even!
Our only option is to focus on certain topics at a time, and we choose the topics that we find the most interesting and the topics that are the most necessary to have everyone (us, our freelancers, our customers) starting out on the same page. And so far, publishing census information hasn't risen high on that to-do list. Especially since it's a HIDEOUS amount of work for something that, in the end, is not really all that necessary to tell stories about fighting dragons and looting treasure.
They Cant eat coins...and i'm yet to see dragons slaughtered for their meat.
World Population should never exceed 1 square mile per family. Thats the limit on growing everything you will ever need from firewood to flax and wool, to Turnips, wheat and lambchops.
They Cant eat coins...and i'm yet to see dragons slaughtered for their meat.
World Population should never exceed 1 square mile per family. Thats the limit on growing everything you will ever need from firewood to flax and wool, to Turnips, wheat and lambchops.
You are missing the point about dragon slaying. Dragon slaying is part of the game because adventuring is fun. Not whether or not the economics of dragon slaying make sense.
Besides, did you look at any of the estimates up-thread? Based on city populations, the Golarion seems underpopulated as it is compared to pre-plague medieval Europe.
They Cant eat coins...and i'm yet to see dragons slaughtered for their meat.
World Population should never exceed 1 square mile per family. Thats the limit on growing everything you will ever need from firewood to flax and wool, to Turnips, wheat and lambchops.
Such considerations are indeed important, and I agree with you and Jacobs that they should appear when they add to the fun (such as when we're establishing the background for why Person A wants to go to war with Person B).
Of course, even if we *were* experts in the relevant fields, magic adds a lot of trickiness to conventional estimates for things. :-P
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An additional point, as all these real world figures are given for ancient times on Earth; people of those times didn't know those figures. The Roman Empire did a Census, and perhaps the Chinese, but most nations probably never had anywhere near the information on their populations that we have.
That lack of hard numbers allowed for the belief in many mythical lands and lost continents. It encouraged a belief that elves lived in the deeper forests or trolls underground or dragons in the mountains. In Golarion, they do!
Of course, taxes are collected and borders more or less defined, so there is at least an estimate of populations within the civilized regions. But how accurate are those tax figures and how recognizable those borders?
I personally like a fantasy world where there are vast areas of dangerous and unexplored regions even within great nations, where nobody can say with certainty how many people there are in the world, much less elves and dwarves, and where far off lands are just "that way, somewhere."
Or as Lord Dunsany once said, the most intriguing phrase in the English language is "Over the hills and far away".
My question is whether the Census numbers for Geb are the Living, the Undead, the Sentient, or the Corporeal. Having a large group of human thralls and zombies for your plantation gives you impressive numbers but not of voters.
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They Cant eat coins...and i'm yet to see dragons slaughtered for their meat.
World Population should never exceed 1 square mile per family. Thats the limit on growing everything you will ever need from firewood to flax and wool, to Turnips, wheat and lambchops.
I recall a fantasy novel where the farmer owning the terrain where a knight killed a dragon started selling the dragon meat and ended with a fast food chain selling dragon hamburgers. ;)
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Ok, the Romans were cool. That page doesn't actually explain what those numbers mean, but it looks like (from other web pages talking about the Roman Census) men aged 17 or older in the empire. So probably double those figures when we include women. Maybe even triple it to account for women, slaves, and children.
And of course, their methods of data collection were probably inaccurate, so the margin for error is likely quite high.
I really need to read more Chinese history. So around 2 A.D. when the Romans had roughly ~4.5 million male citizens in the empire, China's census counts 57.67 million. Even if you triple the Roman estimate to account for the uncounted population, the Han's Empire was enormous.
I also need to stop looking up random information on ancient history and do some real work.
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Will the population of Golarian go up when the Races book is released?
One of the only things I dislke about the golarian setting is that it is to human centric. I like a more cosmopolitan setting with more races but that just me.
No.
While all the races mentioned in the Advanced Race Guide are assumed to have a presence somewhere in Golarion... Golarion's a big planet, and the races are already there even before Advanced Race Guide comes out.
Golarion's "humanocentricity" will not be changing, in any event—that's actually one of the core defining qualities of Golarion, after all.
Golarion's "humanocentricity" will not be changing, in any event—that's actually one of the core defining qualities of Golarion, after all.
And some of us at least, are very thankful for that. I rather like a setting where the big movers and shakers are primarily humans.
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Besides, did you look at any of the estimates up-thread? Based on city populations, the Golarion seems underpopulated as it is compared to pre-plague medieval Europe.
Actually I remember examining Pre plague Europe - The Population of Paris required the importation of Grain from upriver nations like Hungary (eastern European) just to feed it.
So all that starvation in the east was because Paris was devouring the Grain output of Europe and Princes and Dukes were selling off every ounce of Grain they could get their peasants to grow for gold - and its not as if they went hungry.
Besides, did you look at any of the estimates up-thread? Based on city populations, the Golarion seems underpopulated as it is compared to pre-plague medieval Europe.Actually I remember examining Pre plague Europe - The Population of Paris required the importation of Grain from upriver nations like Hungary (eastern European) just to feed it.
So all that starvation in the east was because Paris was devouring the Grain output of Europe and Princes and Dukes were selling off every ounce of Grain they could get their peasants to grow for gold - and its not as if they went hungry.
That's basically the rise and fall of every empire known to man. The Assyrians overtaxed their empire until the starving (and angry) provinces rebelled and destroyed their capital, Nineveh. Same thing happened to the Roman Empire, etc.
A city will grow until the resources it controls cannot support it anymore, and then it crashes.
The biggest problem I have with a snapshot setting like Golarion is that there isn't an expanding empire and a bunch of wars going on. The borders feel far more static than they should. I know this is so GMs can decide what sort of conflicts they have in their game. But I'd still love to see an AP that dealt with an actual invasion of another country. Kingmaker came the closest, but something grander like the Alexander the Great, the Punic wars, or the Greek-Persian wars would be awesome.
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I just use Firewood to test sustainability and resource flow.
Yield: 20,000lb firewood per acre of light forest.
Support: 10,000lb firewood per person per year.
Regrowth: 50 years for forest to regrow.
Labour: one Woodsman per acre to chop down an acre of light forest in one day.
Shipping: 10 Wagonloads per acre 5 miles there and five miles back per day.
So a town of 10,000 requires 100 million pounds of firewood per year or 390.625 square miles of light forest for sustainable firewood.
Sickly Population%=100-((Forest Available/Forest required)x100)
44,643 Wagon Loads per year or 859 wagonloads per week.
I just use Firewood to test sustainability and resource flow.
Sustainability is a modern concept. Half the reason for the Romans to conquer Gaul was they'd cut down all the firewood in Italia. If you don't have enough resources to sustain your great city, conquer someone who does. Humans have always built beyond the limits of sustainability. The fertile crescent isn't very fertile anymore due to over farming three thousand years ago.
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You know, ultimately Paizo has three choices here....
1) Spend extra production time and money coming up with some numbers that will have armchair economists frothing at the mouth.
2) Pay some professional economist and his team of collage interns to create a well-researched and logical demographic model for Golarion that will have armchair economists frothing at the mouth.
3) Say "screw it", let the GM's create whatever models work for their particular game, and largely ignore all the armchair economists frothing at the mouth.
Let's hear it for door number three. :P
I just use Firewood to test sustainability and resource flow.Sustainability is a modern concept.
But Golarion has druids, and actual gods of both nature and civilization to advise their priests who can then pass on the advice to rulers: "Here is the best way to sustain the population of Absalom without utterly denuding the Isle and nearby mainland, as received from the holy wisdom of Abadar, Gozreh, and Erastil." (Of course, Absalom has twelve giant magical cornucopias of nigh-infinite food to back up their trade ships.)
But Golarion has druids, and actual gods of both nature and civilization to advise their priests who can then pass on the advice to rulers: "Here is the best way to sustain the population of Absalom without utterly denuding the Isle and nearby mainland, as received from the holy wisdom of Abadar, Gozreh, and Erastil." (Of course, Absalom has twelve giant magical cornucopias of nigh-infinite food to back up their trade ships.)I just use Firewood to test sustainability and resource flow.Sustainability is a modern concept.
and, as always, the experts will say "Stop having so many kids" . to which the people will respond "No way, having kids is fun!"
and, as always, the experts will say "Stop having so many kids" . to which the people will respond "No way, having kids is fun!"
Well, practicing for having kids is fun. :) Note the existence of bachelor snuff and night tea, reliable birth control medications.
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I just use Firewood to test sustainability and resource flow.
Yield: 20,000lb firewood per acre of light forest.
Support: 10,000lb firewood per person per year.
Regrowth: 50 years for forest to regrow.
Labour: one Woodsman per acre to chop down an acre of light forest in one day.
Shipping: 10 Wagonloads per acre 5 miles there and five miles back per day.So a town of 10,000 requires 100 million pounds of firewood per year or 390.625 square miles of light forest for sustainable firewood.
Sickly Population%=100-((Forest Available/Forest required)x100)
44,643 Wagon Loads per year or 859 wagonloads per week.
Mmmmh, where are you getting the number about wood consumption? Modern times, Renaissance, Middle Ages, Ancient times?
Notth Europe, central, south, China, India?In different ages and locations what was indoor heating changed a lot.
Till recent times peasants in Italy had what is called the "legnatico" (wood gathering?) right.
The were allowed to gather the branches fallen from trees even if the wood were they gathered them were private property. Most of the indoor heating was done with that kind of wood, not with chopped down trees.
Similarly the cobs of the maize were one of the good heating sources, and they were a by-product of farming maize, not the primary product.
50 years to grow a forest? Yes, especially if you want construction timber or wood for shipbuilding.
But poplars planted to produce wood for heating and paper production grow way faster. Less than 10 years in my experience.
I suppose you are including all other uses of wood in your number, but still I would like to know on what area it is based.
Pathfinder is fundamentally a game about fun
I agree - and if this were true, then you would publish general population figures.
(Oh wait, you mean "fun" varies for everyone? Yeah, it does - you probably shouldn't have included that in your post, because it's not very meaningful. It's just not very "fun" for you [fair enough] - but it has zero to do with Pathfinder being "fundamentally a game about fun".)
I just use Firewood to test sustainability and resource flow.
Yield: 20,000lb firewood per acre of light forest.
Support: 10,000lb firewood per person per year.
Regrowth: 50 years for forest to regrow.
Labour: one Woodsman per acre to chop down an acre of light forest in one day.
Shipping: 10 Wagonloads per acre 5 miles there and five miles back per day.So a town of 10,000 requires 100 million pounds of firewood per year or 390.625 square miles of light forest for sustainable firewood.
Sickly Population%=100-((Forest Available/Forest required)x100)
44,643 Wagon Loads per year or 859 wagonloads per week.
Mmmmh, where are you getting the number about wood consumption? Modern times, Renaissance, Middle Ages, Ancient times?
Notth Europe, central, south, China, India?In different ages and locations what was indoor heating changed a lot.
Till recent times peasants in Italy had what is called the "legnatico" (wood gathering?) right.
The were allowed to gather the branches fallen from trees even if the wood were they gathered them were private property. Most of the indoor heating was done with that kind of wood, not with chopped down trees.Similarly the cobs of the maize were one of the good heating sources, and they were a by-product of farming maize, not the primary product.
50 years to grow a forest? Yes, especially if you want construction timber or wood for shipbuilding.
But poplars planted to produce wood for heating and paper production grow way faster. Less than 10 years in my experience.I suppose you are including all other uses of wood in your number, but still I would like to know on what area it is based.
Don't forget about peat, it's still used in areas where it's found.
Well, practicing for having kids is fun. :) Note the existence of bachelor snuff and night tea, reliable birth control medications.
Oh? Where are those out of?
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and, as always, the experts will say "Stop having so many kids" . to which the people will respond "No way, having kids is fun!"Well, practicing for having kids is fun. :) Note the existence of bachelor snuff and night tea, reliable birth control medications.
In Dangerous Journey Gary Gygax had a interesting idea that explained why magic using populations weren't dominating the world and barbarian populations were viable in a his world.
Exposure to magic reduce fertility. Even the simple contact with magic reduce the chance to conceive a child. Being a magic user reduce it even further and someone capable of the greatest magic has a low change to conceive one.So high magic kingdoms have a tendency to have a low population with a long lifespan while barbarian populations will have a high birth rate but a shorter average lifespan.
It was a neat idea.
Well, practicing for having kids is fun. :) Note the existence of bachelor snuff and night tea, reliable birth control medications.Oh? Where are those out of?
Adventurer's Armory, the "black market" section.
Reaper Miniatures
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Pathfinder is fundamentally a game about funI agree - and if this were true, then you would publish general population figures.
(Oh wait, you mean "fun" varies for everyone? Yeah, it does - you probably shouldn't have included that in your post, because it's not very meaningful. It's just not very "fun" for you [fair enough] - but it has zero to do with Pathfinder being "fundamentally a game about fun".)
Because NOTHING is more fun than statistics!
Seriously, I know you want those numbers - you have access to formulae you can use to estimate. This thread alone guesses that the inner sea region alone is about 38 million. If you need a number, that's one.
If you hate that number, come up with your own formula based on the numbers the devs have given.
We all want different things from our games, but I think that asking the devs to study socioeconomics and create a 100% accurate census of all of Avistan and Garund is far less popular an idea than asking the devs to finish Jade Regent, Skull & Shackles, Shattered Star, Their Pre-Painted minis, the Runelords Hardcover, The Tian Xia guide, Advanced Race Guide, Bestiary 3, Ultimate Equipment, Ruby Phoenix Tournament, Midnight Mirror....etc.
I think I'd rather have rulebooks and modules and APs than a treatise on the statistics and logistics of firewood and hops...
but I think that asking the devs to study socioeconomics and create a 100% accurate census of all of Avistan and Garund is far less popular an idea than asking the devs to finish Jade Regent, Skull & Shackles, Shattered Star, Their Pre-Painted minis, the Runelords Hardcover, The Tian Xia guide, Advanced Race Guide, Bestiary 3, Ultimate Equipment, Ruby Phoenix Tournament, Midnight Mirror....etc.
I think I'd rather have rulebooks and modules and APs than a treatise on the statistics and logistics of firewood and hops...
Did anyone ask for that? *rolleyes*
I don't subscribe to your ridiculous false dichotomy. My statement that you decided to quote was abundantly clear.
(I get that Paizo doesn't want to do that - fair enough, that's their decision. Done and done. Just don't load it up with crap about "this is a game about fun", "100% accurate census", and "logistics of firewood and hops". Because no one appreciates a strawman, much less an incredibly lazy strawman. The answer along the lines of "we're pretty lousy at that sort of stuff" and "we're not comfortable with that area of work so we'll likely royally screw it up" is the most we need to hear.)
Adventurer's Armory, the "black market" section.Well, practicing for having kids is fun. :) Note the existence of bachelor snuff and night tea, reliable birth control medications.Oh? Where are those out of?
Check out the prices. If condoms cost an entire day's salary for an untrained worker the population would be booming :)
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Its all well and great suggesting that knowing how much firewood is needed for a town is irrelevent but if i tell you that a town of ten thousand people requires 100,000,000lb fire wood per year, but it makes a hell of a difference to the description. That is 10 Wagonloads of fire wood every hour of every day of every week of the year. So within a day's wagonride there will be 120 wagons coming into town 'loaded' with logwood and 120 wagons going out 'empty'. And that is just for firewood.
That is going to be a very different Town to a fantasy town where you have been passed by one or two wagons who give you directions and the roads are otherwise naked of merchant/resource traffic.
It certainly puts a new spin on the economics of Greyhawk where Veluna must buy firewood from Ket (Located up River and they have a forest) to supply its capital city - Which means there must be huge riverboat traffic comming down to Lawful Good/Lawful neutral Veluna from Lawful Neutral/lawful Evil Ket. That means that Veluna cant afford to go to war with Ket because Ket puts firewood in Velunan Fireplaces. A year without firewood will push Veluna into disease and inequality of resource share.
If Ket ever cut off Veluna, Veluna might be forced to shed that Lawful Good alignment and invade Ket for its Strategically Vital fuel reserves (Velunan peasants will die in their thousands forcing the state to crack down on protesting poor making the lawful Good State look as Evil as the next Monarchy).
How many Golarion States are a fuel shortage away from an alignment shift?
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That's presuming that firewood is the only source for heating. Coal and heating oil have been around for a long time. Also, where did you get that figure? Is that for a town on the North Sea, or the Mediterranean?
But you are right, a shortage of resources was a cause for most of the wars in the ancient world.
Its all well and great suggesting that knowing how much firewood is needed for a town is irrelevent but if i tell you that a town of ten thousand people requires 100,000,000lb fire wood per year, but it makes a hell of a difference to the description.
According to Money, Markets and Trade in Late Medieval Europe the average English town consumed 4 kilos of firewood per person per day. That comes out to ~32,200,000 lbs of fire wood per year for your 10k population town. 1/3 of your figure above. Places like Norway use double that, but I suspect warmer climates could cut that figure in half. In fact, here in California, I've never bothered to heat my apartment.
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That's presuming that firewood is the only source for heating. Coal and heating oil have been around for a long time. Also, where did you get that figure? Is that for a town on the North Sea, or the Mediterranean?
But you are right, a shortage of resources was a cause for most of the wars in the ancient world.
If I'm right why isnt Cheliax knee deep in the forests of Andoria with an army of undead axemen?
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Its all well and great suggesting that knowing how much firewood is needed for a town is irrelevent but if i tell you that a town of ten thousand people requires 100,000,000lb fire wood per year, but it makes a hell of a difference to the description.According to Money, Markets and Trade in Late Medieval Europe the average English town consumed 4 kilos of firewood per person per day. That comes out to ~32,200,000 lbs of fire wood per year for your 10k population town. 1/3 of your figure above. Places like Norway use double that, but I suspect warmer climates could cut that figure in half. In fact, here in California, I've never bothered to heat my apartment.
My figures are based on the more primitive type of fireplace. The More primitive and lacking in heat storage and reflection a fireplace is the more firewood it needs to do the same work.
My figures are based on the more primitive type of fireplace. The more primitive and lacking in heat storage and reflection a fireplace is the more firewood it needs to do the same work.
More primitive than 1300 England? You really think people in Golarion can't build a brick fireplace? But they've got the printing press?
If I'm right why isnt Cheliax knee deep in the forests of Andoria with an army of undead axemen?
Because Cheliax is an empire in decline? They certainly want to, but they've lost their former territories. That's like asking why the Romans weren't chopping down French forests in 500 AD. Also, I could be wrong, but I'm fairly certain necromancy is frowned upon even in Cheliax.
But a Cheliax invasion of Varisia or Andor would be a great backdrop for a campaign.
If I'm right why isnt Cheliax knee deep in the forests of Andoria with an army of undead axemen?
Because slaves need neither warmth nor cooked food. You just keep giving them gruel and they ask "please sir may i have another" in the cutest accent.