Hello, I'm new to being a DM and I need some advice on things. I'm making the town for my campaign and I need some help with things. I've tried researching but it doesn't always go to plan so far I have a blacksmith, arcanist and a herbalist though i'm not sure what else I add.
Add a town hall, and inn and a tavern, a general shop (the standard stuff).
Then add what the town is known for. Is it a mining town, or an agricultural one, or something else. For this I would look at the location of the town - you are not going to have a mine in an open field, and you wont be doing lots of agriculture on a mountain. Decide what the town is known for, it doesn't have to be an industry, but it does make it easier, and add what is needed for that thing.
Maybe if its an agricultural town add animal and food based shops or buildings, maybe add a small cooking school (people have to learn somehow). What might each industry or style of town need? But focus on one thing, what is that town known for? Why does it exist? Focus on that.
How much money does the town have? the more money the more fancy stuff, the more range is available.
Where is it? if its by a large river or ocean or something like that it might have a dock of some sorts. This can link to the money question, as a town with more money might allow more travel uses for the dock whereas a town with less money might only allow trade
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"The D&D rules help you and the other players have a good time, but the rules aren't in charge. You're the DM, and you are in charge of the game" - Dungeon Masters Guide
Hello, I'm new to being a DM and I need some advice on things. I'm making the town for my campaign and I need some help with things. I've tried researching but it doesn't always go to plan so far I have a blacksmith, arcanist and a herbalist though i'm not sure what else I add.
It's something of a question of what you need a town for. If you want something quasi-realistic, there's an old but well distributed article called 'Medieval Demographics Made Easy' (calculator here) that can give you simple distribution of likely jobs. On the other hand, you may just care about those aspects of the town that you actually need for your story, in which case the easiest solution is to not create everything ahead of time and introduce businesses and the like as needed.
Just saying, mountainside agriculture and terraced farming are things and not recent industrial innovations. On the more fantastic side, who's to say about your worlds geology, could be perfectly good reason to dig holes in perfectly good plains earth ... kinda like oil drilling, but for minerals.
To the broader question, town design often works best when you, the DM, have a few locales you'll know your game will need in terms of resources you want available to them and NPCs you'll want them to interact with. Beyond that, no need to catalog everything in town (less you got someone with the Alert of Keen Mind type feats). Rather, if the PCs have a "curve ball" need have them ask "Is there any place where I can...?" And adjudicate from there based on what you know or are more likely realizing about the setting you're largely drawing on the fly.
Of course if the town is "the adventure" that's different, you need to design that like you'd a dungeon or any other encounter.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Just saying, mountainside agriculture and terraced farming are things and not recent industrial innovations.
That’s very true, Empires had been built in the Americas based on the viability of terraced farming for hundreds of years before Europeans other than the Vikings found this whole hemisphere.
Hello, I'm new to being a DM and I need some advice on things. I'm making the town for my campaign and I need some help with things. I've tried researching but it doesn't always go to plan so far I have a blacksmith, arcanist and a herbalist though i'm not sure what else I add.
Best starting question, do you have a town map already to work from or are you building from scratch? Also, how big a town are you looking for? an adventure hamlet on the edge of the forest with less than like 15-20 buildings has a lot less infrastructure that a village of fifty or so buildings, which again is less equipped than a city of hundreds of houses and shops and assorted civic buildings.
EDIT: See the below town and what little you really "need" to populate with names NPCs.
I started with a couple of temples, a blacksmiths, magic shop (bbeg runs it), 4 inns, 3 brothels (one of the characters background was prostitute and I know my players), the town hall, treasury and Main guard house/jail.
Those are the things I named and then created NPC's for (a one line description). The rest I have come up with as players have asked about it.
In terms of maps I made a very rough drawing of the shape of the town and split it into quarters and placed those things I had named in the various quarters. But I have created towns with no map at all and been succesfull in running campaigns around them.
I did a quick google search for "Town Generator 5e" and I found this simple generator that includes randomly generated shops and a few NPCs as well https://www.kassoon.com/dnd/town-generator/
Most town generators I find tend to focus more on the maps, but this does more to fill out the specifics, even if it doesn't generate any visuals.
or the local Marshall (patrol an area surrounding town, out to say 15 miles radius).
Marshal. One way to IRL irk a Marshal is misspelling their office. It's almost as offensive to the modern public service iterations as confusing the one's on airplanes today to the one's based out of Courthouses. But yes, using the broader concept of a marshal, a town could have a locally or regionally appointed Marshal on hand depending on governance system. Or they could go the Ranger method, where there's a sort of roving authority that patrols much broader areas. The Town itself would have to be a bit self sufficient on the immediate defense and law and order front, but Rangers can be summoned out of their patrol cycle as well.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
When the PCs walk in, and they ask about a specific type of establishment, just decide on-the-fly if that sort of place would exist in the size of town they're in.
Tavern / Inn - pretty much essential for most games.
A bank - banks have been around for a long time and it might be fun to have a bank heist.
Houses for people to live in. Perhaps the party could rent one?
Some form of judicial building - town hall / jail / guild house / guard house.
Trade buildings - smithy / leatherworker / apothecary / general goods etc.
Shops for essential conssumables / foods / drinks / wood / coal / clothing etc.
Leisure activities - think casinos, gambling dens, brothels, fighting arenas (sometimes pits in inns), carnivals, festivals, parks.
Schools - if the town is particularly posh there might be some form of academy or school for the very rich or wealthy to send their children to. Things like fencing schools existed in medieval times for swordsmen to learn from masters, so perhaps have some buildings for people to learn skills whilst doing downtime.
Adding into the school theme - some kind of library, printing press or archive.
Some kind of religious building - church / temple etc for potential healing or those who are religious in the party. Include some sort of burial site too. This can function as a hospital for births and healing, a church for marriages and a place to respect the dead.
Have some aspect of transport links. This could be as simple as horses and carts but could range from portals, boats and even airships depending on the level of magic / technology.
It pretty much answers all of the exact quandaries you have.
I would add the following considerations:
How big is the “town” in question?
If it’s got a population under 100 souls, that’s more of a “villag” than a town. Villages would be very unlikely to have their own smith or arcanist. I village would likely have a dry goods retailer, a taproom, and that herbalist you mentioned but they would also end up being more than that (part people healer, part veterinarian, weather forecaster, reader of omens, and general all-around “wise person”). Otherwise they would likely be reliant or regular visits from a handful of carters/tinkers making their routes.
If it has a population over 1,000 souls, that would bump it to “small city,” and now your likely to start having all kinds of stuff: thatchers, smiths, carpenters, masons, etc., etc., etc.
What is the surrounding geography like? That tells you what kind of community it is.
Is it a community built near a significant body of water?
Was it built along a mighty river? It’s likely a trading post and/or crossways community, so it would likely have a docks for the riverboats, and/or a ferry for river crossings. And anywhere with significant watercraft traffic would need ancillary services: on/offloading of cargo takes stevedores and other dockworkers; porting/housing cargo obviously requires warehouses, but also wainwrights and coopers; repair services; and a higher than usual proportion of boarding houses* and drinking establishments for a community of that size since the town’s “permanent population” is likely only half of the total people in town at any given time. *(Sailors likely wouldn’t pay “inn prices” as that would cut into their… erm… “discretionary funds.” Ever heard of being “hung over” before? Sailors would legit rent a spot on a rope that hung across alleyways and when they were drunk they would be “hung over” the rope so they didn’t have to sleep on the ground in the ally. Remember, there were no such things as universal trash removal and functioning sewers. The streets and alleys were generally full of garbage and “slops” from people dumping out their chamber pots.)
Is it along a lake or sea? Perhaps it’s a fishing/port community. Again docks and ancillaries would be required, and a river port and a lake/sea port would have many of the same requirements. However, a fishing community might not need warehouse, they would need smokehouses and/or salthouses to preserve their catch for transport and storage, definitely a thatcher for net repairs/construction, and at least one shipwright would also be a necessity. Remember, the fishing crews actually live there year-round and need their boats and nets for their livelihood.
Is it a town near mountain country somewhere?
Perhaps it’s mining town?
If it’s actually in the mountains perhaps it sprung up along a mountain pass as a supply/news/trading/defensive community.
Is the surrounding countryside heavily forested?
Perhaps it’s a logging community?
Perhaps it started as a trapper/furrier outpost?
Plains country?
Farming community?
Border Outpost?
Swampland?
Whatever the heck reasons communities like Venice, Mexico City (or most of Florida) were founded (see below)
Wheat er by water, mountain, forest, flatland, or wetland, there are three (maybe four) major reasons communities tend to form in any given location:
Military
Religious
Economic
(Convenience)
is it perhaps a military outpost for defense of a border or location/resources of strategic importance with a community that kinda sprung up around the castle/fortress? (Like St. Augustine FL.)
Was the town founded where it is because of some divine/divine-adjacent prophecy, it purportedly being a “holy location,” or perhaps some celestial alignment changes hat might give it some particular religious significance? (Like Jerusalem or Mexico City.)
Is it along any major trade route, or did those route shift to take advantage of the comunity after it got founded? (Like too many towns and cities to list.)
Is it just in a super convenient spot due to either: abundant space and resources; proximity to other preexisting communities? (Like Venice or most of the rest of Florida.)
Answering those👆questions will inform as to what kinds of stuff that community would need, and therefore what makes sense.
Hello, I'm new to being a DM and I need some advice on things. I'm making the town for my campaign and I need some help with things. I've tried researching but it doesn't always go to plan so far I have a blacksmith, arcanist and a herbalist though i'm not sure what else I add.
Add a town hall, and inn and a tavern, a general shop (the standard stuff).
Then add what the town is known for. Is it a mining town, or an agricultural one, or something else. For this I would look at the location of the town - you are not going to have a mine in an open field, and you wont be doing lots of agriculture on a mountain. Decide what the town is known for, it doesn't have to be an industry, but it does make it easier, and add what is needed for that thing.
Maybe if its an agricultural town add animal and food based shops or buildings, maybe add a small cooking school (people have to learn somehow). What might each industry or style of town need? But focus on one thing, what is that town known for? Why does it exist? Focus on that.
How much money does the town have? the more money the more fancy stuff, the more range is available.
Where is it? if its by a large river or ocean or something like that it might have a dock of some sorts. This can link to the money question, as a town with more money might allow more travel uses for the dock whereas a town with less money might only allow trade
"The D&D rules help you and the other players have a good time, but the rules aren't in charge. You're the DM, and you are in charge of the game" - Dungeon Masters Guide
It's something of a question of what you need a town for. If you want something quasi-realistic, there's an old but well distributed article called 'Medieval Demographics Made Easy' (calculator here) that can give you simple distribution of likely jobs. On the other hand, you may just care about those aspects of the town that you actually need for your story, in which case the easiest solution is to not create everything ahead of time and introduce businesses and the like as needed.
Just saying, mountainside agriculture and terraced farming are things and not recent industrial innovations. On the more fantastic side, who's to say about your worlds geology, could be perfectly good reason to dig holes in perfectly good plains earth ... kinda like oil drilling, but for minerals.
To the broader question, town design often works best when you, the DM, have a few locales you'll know your game will need in terms of resources you want available to them and NPCs you'll want them to interact with. Beyond that, no need to catalog everything in town (less you got someone with the Alert of Keen Mind type feats). Rather, if the PCs have a "curve ball" need have them ask "Is there any place where I can...?" And adjudicate from there based on what you know or are more likely realizing about the setting you're largely drawing on the fly.
Of course if the town is "the adventure" that's different, you need to design that like you'd a dungeon or any other encounter.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
That’s very true, Empires had been built in the Americas based on the viability of terraced farming for hundreds of years before Europeans other than the Vikings found this whole hemisphere.
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Best starting question, do you have a town map already to work from or are you building from scratch? Also, how big a town are you looking for? an adventure hamlet on the edge of the forest with less than like 15-20 buildings has a lot less infrastructure that a village of fifty or so buildings, which again is less equipped than a city of hundreds of houses and shops and assorted civic buildings.
EDIT: See the below town and what little you really "need" to populate with names NPCs.
I started with a couple of temples, a blacksmiths, magic shop (bbeg runs it), 4 inns, 3 brothels (one of the characters background was prostitute and I know my players), the town hall, treasury and Main guard house/jail.
Those are the things I named and then created NPC's for (a one line description). The rest I have come up with as players have asked about it.
In terms of maps I made a very rough drawing of the shape of the town and split it into quarters and placed those things I had named in the various quarters. But I have created towns with no map at all and been succesfull in running campaigns around them.
I did a quick google search for "Town Generator 5e" and I found this simple generator that includes randomly generated shops and a few NPCs as well https://www.kassoon.com/dnd/town-generator/
Most town generators I find tend to focus more on the maps, but this does more to fill out the specifics, even if it doesn't generate any visuals.
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Marshal. One way to IRL irk a Marshal is misspelling their office. It's almost as offensive to the modern public service iterations as confusing the one's on airplanes today to the one's based out of Courthouses. But yes, using the broader concept of a marshal, a town could have a locally or regionally appointed Marshal on hand depending on governance system. Or they could go the Ranger method, where there's a sort of roving authority that patrols much broader areas. The Town itself would have to be a bit self sufficient on the immediate defense and law and order front, but Rangers can be summoned out of their patrol cycle as well.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Why not start with a simple town generated by https://donjon.bin.sh/fantasy/town/
When the PCs walk in, and they ask about a specific type of establishment, just decide on-the-fly if that sort of place would exist in the size of town they're in.
I'd suggest the following:
This video might be helpful to you:
Create a Fantasy Town
This might help:
It pretty much answers all of the exact quandaries you have.
I would add the following considerations:
How big is the “town” in question?
What is the surrounding geography like? That tells you what kind of community it is.
Is it a community built near a significant body of water?
*(Sailors likely wouldn’t pay “inn prices” as that would cut into their… erm… “discretionary funds.” Ever heard of being “hung over” before? Sailors would legit rent a spot on a rope that hung across alleyways and when they were drunk they would be “hung over” the rope so they didn’t have to sleep on the ground in the ally. Remember, there were no such things as universal trash removal and functioning sewers. The streets and alleys were generally full of garbage and “slops” from people dumping out their chamber pots.)
Is it a town near mountain country somewhere?
Is the surrounding countryside heavily forested?
Plains country?
Swampland?
Wheat er by water, mountain, forest, flatland, or wetland, there are three (maybe four) major reasons communities tend to form in any given location:
Answering those👆questions will inform as to what kinds of stuff that community would need, and therefore what makes sense.
I hope that helps.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting