Are there any guidelines, like in 3.5, for this kind of things? My players sometime theorize around situation, where their current characters (party of 5 characters of 9th level) sack a small town or other settlement.
i dont think there is a chart, but usually only people or repute actually have class levels.
the differance between a warrior and a fighter is what? and im not talking mechanically but in the spirit of the characters
a warrior views fighting as a 9-5 thing and goes home to forget about it at the end of the day, a fighter has combat running in his blood, even if he isnt thinking about it he is just naturally better at it and driven to that field.
one could easily put in a split of what percentage of npc classes there are in a settlement, as for PC classes i think thats more to the GM's perview
Depends what kind of world you want to run your game in.
Some game worlds, class levels are everywhere, and being a 9th level wizard doesn't make you anything special. In others, having PC class levels at all puts you in the top 5% of humanoids, power-level wise.
Some DMs like having an entire world mapped out before the game even starts, and some will like the ability to make up NPCs as the story goes.
All depends.
By the way, does the level of spells, from category of spellcasting in settlement description, apply to all classes that are able to cast spells, or only to sorcerers/wizards for arcane and clerics for divine?
By the way, does the level of spells, from category of spellcasting in settlement description, apply to all classes that are able to cast spells, or only to sorcerers/wizards for arcane and clerics for divine?
You can say whatever classes are there that you want. One town might be supplied by alchemists for all their magical needs, or maybe the church there dislikes arcane casters. Depends on the setting.
so the answer we have for you is, we dont know of a chart, this is mostly a GM thing that they make up hoow they please
Depends what kind of world you want to run your game in.
In the world of Golarion, of course. That's why I'm seeking some advice or answer here.)
I do understand that as GM I can pull anything I want. But I'd rather not add a band of high-level NPCs in a small town, just for the purpose of stopping PC. If they (suddenly) go mad and bloodthirsty, I'll send it after theirs heads. After they sack the settlement. It's more question of what kind of resistance the settlement could offer on the spot.so the answer we have for you is, we dont know of a chart, this is mostly a GM thing that they make up hoow they please
Still, feedback is valuable, and do appreciate it.
|
The NPC codex is a decent place to look for Paizo's "standard" level assumptions, though some of them are a bit odd and there's no sense of distribution or demographics. The PC classes are presented as exceptional, but many ordinary people are represented as high-level NPC classes.
A pig farmer is a commoner 2.
The average guard is a warrior 3. An experienced mercenary is level 6.
Master crafters, sages, and military and political leaders of a town or city are mostly in the level 6-8 range (experts, warriors, and aristocrats).
The average barmaid is a commoner 5, probably because of all the adventurers tearing the place up.
A party of 9th level PCs could probably sack a small town but a large city should have a good population of knights and seasoned warriors at least (level 8-9 warrior or aristocrat) and probably a few PC classes of comparable level. And of course any party that does sack a town should expect to become wanted outlaws quickly, drawing the attention of whatever other high level PC classes are around (which in Golarion is enough to make the party's life very difficult).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Dungeon Master's Guide (v.3.5) page 138 "Generating Towns: Total Characters of Each Class". It has charts and everything.
Dungeon Master's Guide (v.3.5) page 138 "Generating Towns: Total Characters of Each Class". It has charts and everything.
Em, I know about this part (in fact, the guidelines that I mentioned, from 3.5, are this "charts and everything"). It's that I asked about something similar in pathfinder "game mechanic". And the only thing vaguely similar, which I've found, was the descriptor for the maximum level of spells, that can be casted in settlements by its spellcasters. From it, it's possible to derive the minimum levels of spellcasters in a particular settlement(if we assume, that it appeals to all of them, of course).
I should also point out that the 3.5 guidelines don't work well. It makes little sense that there should be more wizards per capita the smaller the town.
.. where their current characters (party of 5 characters of 9th level) sack a small town or other settlement.
As soon as a heavy attack at the town starts a mage, cleric or someone with UMD casts a 'sending', 'wishering wind' or something similiar to inform the next city. One minute later a SWAT team teleports to the town and kills the attacker.
As long as a raid on a town is not part of the plot the players should not do it. There is always someone stronger out there ..
|
Dungeon Master's Guide (v.3.5) page 138 "Generating Towns: Total Characters of Each Class". It has charts and everything.Em, I know about this part (in fact, the guidelines that I mentioned, from 3.5, are this "charts and everything"). It's that I asked about something similar in pathfinder "game mechanic". And the only thing vaguely similar, which I've found, was the descriptor for the maximum level of spells, that can be casted in settlements by its spellcasters. From it, it's possible to derive the minimum levels of spellcasters in a particular settlement(if we assume, that it appeals to all of them, of course).
Your first sentence was ambiguous enough that it could have easily been interpreted as "Are there any charts, even if the charts come from a 3.5 source, for this kind of thing?" Hence his answer.
Just to set some baseline assumptions, the standard for Golarion is that characters above 12th level should be very rare. There is no objective breakdown of percentages, though a few people on the boards have come up with some decent suggestions.
The other thing is that only important NPCs should have anything other than NPC classes. That means most characters that exist the world, all your unnamed wandering faceless NPCs, should be adepts, aristocrats, commoners, experts, and warriors.
Now these are just general guidelines. If you have specific ideas about a city, such as one that is dependent on alchemists for something. Or if there is a reason for people of a certain class to really be some place specific this can obviously be thrown out the window.
I mean, if you were in the holy city of some god you would probably expect to find several clerics of higher than average level and large numbers of clerics and adepts of low level too.
Generally speaking I'd expect to find a single 10th level character in every group of 1000 people.
For each time you cut the settlement size in half, cut the level of those folks by 1. For every time you double the population, jack up those levels by 1.
So a town of 1000 people has a 10th level character, a pair of 9's, 4 level 8s, 8 level 7s, 16 level 6s and so on.... If you continue that trend all the way down to level 1 and add up all the people of each level you end up with a population of 1024. Its like counting in binary.
It then follows that a city of 32000 probably has a 15th level character, a pair of 14s, 4 13s, 8 level 12s, 16 level 11s and so on... adding up to a city size of 32768!
Its both pretty realistic and easy to remember.
I lol'd, and I do love the numeric coincidence of that guideline. However, 32k isn't an enormous city, and level 15 is pretty badass--Rome, Constantinople, and Xi'an, right around the first century, had something like 400k inhabitants. By the time of Renaissance, multiple cities had something approaching a million inhabitants. Does that mean their fantasy equivalents have a couple of level 18s, an adventuring party of level 17s, two adventuring parties of 16s, and so on, when that is about the experience level of people who start prepping to take on gods?
Its like counting in binary.
Well, if we are talking about the "fantasy equivalent" of Rome in the first century, I'd be pretty disappointed if the virtual center of the civilized world didn't attract ONE 18th level permanent resident.
Also, in all likelihood, these 'naturally occurring' folk, would be at odds with each other, or at least in competition. They would be the movers and shakers of their community; the leaders of the political, mercantile, religious, military, and criminal sub-communities.
These places would still be the rarest of rare, in terms of "realistic" populations. I would think there would be a few of the highest level people in them.
Generally speaking I'd expect to find a single 10th level character in every group of 1000 people.
For each time you cut the settlement size in half, cut the level of those folks by 1. For every time you double the population, jack up those levels by 1.
So a town of 1000 people has a 10th level character, a pair of 9's, 4 level 8s, 8 level 7s, 16 level 6s and so on.... If you continue that trend all the way down to level 1 and add up all the people of each level you end up with a population of 1024. Its like counting in binary.
It then follows that a city of 32000 probably has a 15th level character, a pair of 14s, 4 13s, 8 level 12s, 16 level 11s and so on... adding up to a city size of 32768!
Its both pretty realistic and easy to remember.
I think this is brilliant simplicity. It is reminiscent of my own "system" from several years ago, as far as the math. But mine was charted to insanity.
I would take a population number, cut it in half, and say these are 1st and 2nd level. Then halve it again for 3rd, etc. but, I would also subdivide by percentage in 'prime' classes. For instance, 65% Commoner, 15% Expert, 12% Warrior, 5% Aristocrat, 1% Acolyte (divine), 1% Magician (arcane), and 1% Wildcard (breathing room, as if a DM needs this, oh well).
Then, there would be an overall percentage of PC classes, set at 20%. Each level bracket would be broken down with deference to the higher percentages by class. So, of the 125 5th level NPCs in a sample settlement (population 1000), 81 would be Commoners, 18 Experts, 15 Warriors, 6 Aristocrats, 1 Acolyte, and 1 Magician. But of those 15 Warriors, 3 are Fighters (or something else in the same arena). And of the 18 Experts, 3 would be Rogues (or something more interesting). Of the Aristocrats, 1 would be a Cavalier (or perhaps a Bard, or Swashbuckling dandy). Not enough Acolytes of Magicians at this level to generate a PC version.
Anyway, as you can see, it was too complicated for anything but feverish, late night, machinations of building an ULTIMATE CAMPAIGN... you get the idea.
Vincent Takeda's version achieves pretty much the same results, in the broad strokes, with elegant simplicity. After all, what a frenzied GM really needs are sensible guidelines. The details should be up to them. The specificity of my system might make it a good guide (or not), but it is as much a curse as a blessing.
The 'average level' of pathfinder has traditionally been in the 3~5 range. The most that's been put out unofficially has been that 3~5 is the 'normal person' range with up through 9 being the 'players' and 12 being the general cap for 'big players and mover/shakers' -- above that is 'player character to big villains' range.
I did a thread on an 'average village' awhile back.
Glad you like it ^_^. This is the mechanic I've been using for decades. Of course that was in 2e when the assumption that all the bottom level npcs were 1st level rogues.
In pathfinder you now have commoner classes, so I guess technically you could adjust this by one level. a city of 1000 has 1 level 9, a pair of level 8's and so on until 'half the population of the city is commoners'
Thats sort of the beauty of the math. No matter what the population of your city is, you can always end up with 'half the population of the city is commoners'
|
|
I like that method, though it might be a good idea to adjust the numbers a bit depending on how big cities get in the setting. I like most people in the world to be fairly low-powered. While having a single 18th level character in first century Rome sounds OK, if the world has several settlements of a little over a million inhabitants (fantasy London, fantasy Paris, fantasy Moscow) and each such settlement has a 20th level character, two 19th, four 18th... down to 512 11th level characters, that's a bit much. 11th level characters are supposed to be legendary and they can't be if there are thousands of them at any given time. If you want to revise the idea that 11th level characters are legendary, that's fine, but having as many as 15 people in a capital city capable of casting 9th level spells is going to change the setting in significant ways.
I'd also suggest that some of the highest-level people in a world might not be permanent residents of particular cities - they might be hermits or wanderers, or have their own demiplanes.
.. where their current characters (party of 5 characters of 9th level) sack a small town or other settlement.As soon as a heavy attack at the town starts a mage, cleric or someone with UMD casts a 'sending', 'wishering wind' or something similiar to inform the next city. One minute later a SWAT team teleports to the town and kills the attacker.
That might be realistic depending on the class and level distribution of the setting, but it would make it hard to get excited about lower-level "save the town" scenarios if the party knows that the instant the battle starts looking bad the town priest will call in some better heroes to save the day. As such, I recommend not assuming that every small town will be able to call for immediate assistance.
As long as a raid on a town is not part of the plot the players should not do it. There is always someone stronger out there ..
I agree, but the someone stronger doesn't need to respond immediately.
Does it make sense to look at the Leadership table for level distribution?
Not sure how relevant it is, but the general rule for followers seems to be 10x as many 1st level characters as 2nd level, and then for each level beyond 2nd there are half as many characters as of the previous level.
Not really -- granting PC's npcs that will do what they say of any significant level is extremely powerful. So you don't want to regularly give them access (read control) of people of higher power regardless of you really have to.
I like that method, though it might be a good idea to adjust the numbers a bit depending on how big cities get in the setting. I like most people in the world to be fairly low-powered. While having a single 18th level character in first century Rome sounds OK, if the world has several settlements of a little over a million inhabitants (fantasy London, fantasy Paris, fantasy Moscow) and each such settlement has a 20th level character, two 19th, four 18th... down to 512 11th level characters, that's a bit much. 11th level characters are supposed to be legendary and they can't be if there are thousands of them at any given time. If you want to revise the idea that 11th level characters are legendary, that's fine, but having as many as 15 people in a capital city capable of casting 9th level spells is going to change the setting in significant ways.
Those are adjustments that each GM is going to have to figure out for their campaign. I don't play in any worlds that have that many megalopoli. If you do, I'd definitely put the breaks on the level count as you say.
In my personal system, that one 18th level character in fantasy Rome wouldn't even be a PC class (or not all PC anyway). Even if you don't go for the 18th level Commoner, maybe the most experienced and powerful Senator in Rome is an 18 level Aristocrat. Likewise, those 512 11th levels you are concerned about would be mostly Commoners, Experts, etc. Only about 100 would be PC caliber in my book. I don't think it looks so bad if you don't assume all high level NPCs are Full Casters.
Another way to approach "naturally occurring" NPC levels, is to limit them to 10th. It is a good threshold between Normal and Heroic (in a standard PF campaign), and allows plenty of breathing room for fairly capable run-of-the-mill NPCs. Everything above that is placed by the GM as needed.
But then, everything is anyway. This idea is only a guide for throwing out NPC levels on the fly. To each his own consternation.
-Cheers
|
Lets test that calculation out with an in-canon Golarion example. Sadly, the NPCs in canon aren't statted out that often, but I did find this:
Khemet III
He's listed as a level 15 character. He's ruler of Osirion and presumably lives in Sothis, the capital and being the ruler would be near the top end of the power scale.
Sothis has a population of 111000(Sothis)
which by the calculations should have 1 level 17, a pair of 16s, 4 15s, etc.
Yeah, I can buy that. The ruler isn't automatically the most powerful character.
Sandpoint's population of just over 1200 should by all rights have a 10 somewhere, but of course the mayor is a 7 and niska is an 8, so its pretty close. If you count 'commoner 1' as level zero and start the mechanic at a single 9th level person per 1000, sandpoint's published characters are just shy of that 9th level character, so it works out pretty good...
We'd expect a 14 and a pair of 13's in Korvosa's 18400 population, and indeed we know at least a pair of 13s by name... Darb Tuttle and Keppira d'Bear.
Port Peril's 43000 population would call for a single level 15, so Kerdak being an 18 means he's got quite tight control over his domain with such a lofty advantage over the expectation of his region, which he very well should have since its such a nefarious community on the whole.
Riddleport's 13300 calls for a single 13th level character and Gaston is a 12.
Harthwik Barzoni's 15 puts him slightly above the 12 expected in bloodcove... but again.. Pirate neighborhood.
Mechitar in Geb has a population of 42000. so expect a 15. who's in charge? Marden Gilpher. Level 15.
Expect a 16 in Sothis with a population of 112000, sure enough Khemet III is level 15.
The deeper I look the more the math plays out.
It's almost as if the designers used the 3.5 demographics as a loose guideline...
Yeah. Effectively my technique makes 87% of the population level 3 or lower, while any sizable contingent of people has a 'significant power presence' to back them up.
|
|
You're right, it looks like a decent rule of thumb for Golarion, at least for the highest-level characters in a settlement. Though having at least two level 13s in a city of 18400 - one of six such cities in a frontierland - doesn't sound like characters over level 12 are "very rare" as the devs have otherwise indicated.
In my personal system, that one 18th level character in fantasy Rome wouldn't even be a PC class (or not all PC anyway). Even if you don't go for the 18th level Commoner, maybe the most experienced and powerful Senator in Rome is an 18 level Aristocrat. Likewise, those 512 11th levels you are concerned about would be mostly Commoners, Experts, etc. Only about 100 would be PC caliber in my book. I don't think it looks so bad if you don't assume all high level NPCs are Full Casters.
I don't see all high level NPCs as full casters, but I'd expect the overwhelming majority of characters of level 11+ to be PC classes. If you're talented and driven enough to achieve that level of success (again, legendary) then you're exactly the kind of exceptional individual that PC classes are meant for. There might be one or two very high-level aristocrats or experts, or a 20th level commoner for giggles, but the most powerful senator in Rome is probably going to be a bard-orator or retired general (fighter or cavalier), not an aristocrat class. And if we assume that 90% of 11+ characters are PC classes and 25% are full casters*, then a city with 15 people of level 17+ has 3-4 people who can cast 9th level spells: Wish, Miracle, Teleportation Circle (on its own huge), Greater Create Demiplane, Gate, True Resurrection (bring back someone 170 years dead, without a body). And while the non-casters and part-casters aren't capable of quite as much reality-bending they are also going to have a powerful effect on the world.
*36% of CRB classes and 27% of all classes are full casters so this seems a reasonable assumption.
Another way to approach "naturally occurring" NPC levels, is to limit them to 10th. It is a good threshold between Normal and Heroic (in a standard PF campaign), and allows plenty of breathing room for fairly capable run-of-the-mill NPCs. Everything above that is placed by the GM as needed.
That's what I'm doing now, but it leaves me trying to figure out how many higher-level characters there should be in the world, which is less than ideal.
It's almost as if the designers used the 3.5 demographics as a loose guideline...
Except the rules we are discussing are not the 3.5 demographics...
You're right, it looks like a decent rule of thumb for Golarion, at least for the highest-level characters in a settlement. Though having at least two level 13s in a city of 18400 - one of six such cities in a frontierland - doesn't sound like characters over level 12 are "very rare" as the devs have otherwise indicated.
As I said before, 'to each his own'. So I'm not saying you are wrong, but trying to help you feel better about it(??).
What I'm talking about is the rarity of 13+ level characters. Per your example, it seems to me that about 12(?) 13's out of around 120,000 people is very rare. Those numbers equate to 1 in 10,000 (well the mechanic is 1 in 8000 for 13th), or 1/100 of a percentage point. That's better than the survival rate for well proven reliable medical treatments!