I am trying to create a home-brewed world but run into a problem when trying to create the map
Mostly I cannot figure out how towns and cities work as many worlds seem to have a lot of towns and cities but I can't seem to get how they come up with a high number that looks good on a map https://getappvalley.com/
hmmm... I would recommend perhaps making a list of what makes a town or vilalge special - a specific tradition, or a festival, or a particular crop, perhaps, and then making up towns from there - don't worry so much about where they are, and for that matter, don't assign them until your players get there! then you can have the players arrive at the town in the mountains called Jerrysburg and they see *checks for a village trait which matches mountains* vineyards on the slopes and a procession of giant wine barrels being pulled through town.
I would recommend putting villages in logical places on your map, which I assume you've got the natural outline of and now want to build settlements on, effectively? so put villages on rivers (for water mills), on hills (for defence), and on the coast & lakesides (for fishing), which will become your towns. Then link them with roads which follow landmarks, like following a river or a valley. Then put small villages at days rides along the paths. If there is a large enough gap, upgrade a village at the halfway mark to a town. Think - what makes it a town and not a village? It will have to be on a popular trade route, so the towns on major roads will be larger. Ports will be large towns or even cities swollen with the trade coming in and out. Where does the money come from? if the mountains have gold, then the route from port to mountain will be the most built-up from people seeking to squeeze money out of people passing each way.
Don't try to do it all at once, start with the obvious places people would build and work from there.
Remember to place your humanoid settlements as well. Where are the elves, dwarves, orcs, goblinoids, haflings etc. That will help set up. Have an idea how they interact with the human settlements or do not interact.
It might be easier to map out a local area to start in; a town, some wilderness to explore, a few dungeons in the wilderness, maybe some roving goblins to deal with. That way you can world-build as your players push out and explore, and you don't necessarily need a map because maps were actually fairly uncommon and most people don't need one to navigate their home town.
You can still have an idea for the basic structure of the politics or layout of your world, but the players interact with those things as "rumors from afar" that you can flesh out as you go.
Matt Coville has a good video about world building like this for beginner DM's if you care to give it a watch: https://youtu.be/2BqKCiJTWC0
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Hello
I am trying to create a home-brewed world but run into a problem when trying to create the map
Mostly I cannot figure out how towns and cities work as many worlds seem to have a lot of towns and cities but I can't seem to get how they come up with a high number that looks good on a map https://getappvalley.com/
Any advice
hmmm... I would recommend perhaps making a list of what makes a town or vilalge special - a specific tradition, or a festival, or a particular crop, perhaps, and then making up towns from there - don't worry so much about where they are, and for that matter, don't assign them until your players get there! then you can have the players arrive at the town in the mountains called Jerrysburg and they see *checks for a village trait which matches mountains* vineyards on the slopes and a procession of giant wine barrels being pulled through town.
I would recommend putting villages in logical places on your map, which I assume you've got the natural outline of and now want to build settlements on, effectively? so put villages on rivers (for water mills), on hills (for defence), and on the coast & lakesides (for fishing), which will become your towns. Then link them with roads which follow landmarks, like following a river or a valley. Then put small villages at days rides along the paths. If there is a large enough gap, upgrade a village at the halfway mark to a town. Think - what makes it a town and not a village? It will have to be on a popular trade route, so the towns on major roads will be larger. Ports will be large towns or even cities swollen with the trade coming in and out. Where does the money come from? if the mountains have gold, then the route from port to mountain will be the most built-up from people seeking to squeeze money out of people passing each way.
Don't try to do it all at once, start with the obvious places people would build and work from there.
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Remember to place your humanoid settlements as well. Where are the elves, dwarves, orcs, goblinoids, haflings etc. That will help set up. Have an idea how they interact with the human settlements or do not interact.
It might be easier to map out a local area to start in; a town, some wilderness to explore, a few dungeons in the wilderness, maybe some roving goblins to deal with. That way you can world-build as your players push out and explore, and you don't necessarily need a map because maps were actually fairly uncommon and most people don't need one to navigate their home town.
You can still have an idea for the basic structure of the politics or layout of your world, but the players interact with those things as "rumors from afar" that you can flesh out as you go.
Matt Coville has a good video about world building like this for beginner DM's if you care to give it a watch: https://youtu.be/2BqKCiJTWC0