Creative Director
|
We for sure should have made this more obvious, but the population totals listed for Willowshore in the adventure are what they are at AFTER the PCs deal with the events of chapter 1 and 2. At your option, if the PCs did a particularly miserable job and a LOT of people died on-screen, then feel free to reduce Willowshore's total populate by no more than 50, but the intent is that those who died in Chapters 1 & 2 are not included in the town's stat block.
|
Creative Director
|
Hello, thanks you for your answer.
In the player guide it's also 225 for the Population. What was the initiale population before the campaign if you have an idea ?
That's me trying to not spoil the big surprise in the adventure by saying something like "Population 300 (FOR NOW!)." It's the population that the PCs are meant to be prepared to interact with. If you as the GM feel like that's a bit too tricky and manipulative, then go ahead and reduce the town's population by the amount of NPCs that perish in chapters 1 and 2... but for most groups, I think that micromanaging population figures might get a bit too fiddly and add unneeded complexity.
Player's Guides have to navigate a tricky line when it comes to setting expectations and avoiding spoilers.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It's a very minor quibble, but 250 seems way too low given the infrastructure of the place. It seems more like a town (or a village very close to becoming a town).
My players won't notice, but it's just a minor quibble from me. It seems like the town would be closer to 1,000 people strong (or at least somewhere between 500-900).
YMMV.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
That reminds me that I've been meaning to ask. Is there are particular reason that the (post-festival) population numbers were set to just over 200? Whether for narrative or thematic purposes of achieving a certain 'feel' to the size of the remaining body, or even to facilitate the feeding logistics that come up in Book 2?
I've been thinking of increasing the initial population to account for the size of the town, but it occurs to me that perhaps "about 200 survivors" was chosen because it makes the PCs feel more isolated and vulnerable vs. say 300-400 survivors.
(I suppose one could also just increase the initial population and leave the surviving population alone, but one imagines the trauma of seeing literally half your neighbours die horribly might leave a darker mark on the town for a bit longer than if it were more like 1 in 5. Might start getting a bit hard to roleplay, whether you elide the trauma or not)
|
Creative Director
|
The number was chosen to give the town a feeling of a settlement that's on a decline, after a period of time when there's been a lot of folks leaving the area. In this particular case, it reflects the loss of a lot of the government infrastructure abandoning so many locations in Shenmen, WIllowshore included, in the aftermath of the empire's collapse.
That all said, the population number of a settlement has zero impact whatsoever on any rules—this number is 100% flavor. Population numbers of settlements have no bearing on that settlement's level or status as a village, town, city, metropolis, or whatever. We, and thus you, can set them at whatever total makes narrative sense without impacting anything else, so if this number feels low to you, feel free to increase it.
But keep in mind that the number's low to make Willowshore feel isolated and remote, a town heading more toward "ghost town" status than one whose fortunes are on the rise and has a lot of newcomers moving in.
Got it, thanks JJ.