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| Mapped with Hexographer |
I ran the numbers for Ambur (see my previous post about Ambur.) I posted the updated summary below, which should be a lot easier to read. It certainly makes my job easier posting the data here. Since I may be developing a lot of other areas in and around Alphatia, the new format was a must. Some of the numbers may still shift as I refine the old worksheet. Let me know if you find anything that looks bogus.
The glitch affecting the price of bread has been fixed.
I must admit, my first impression is, Wow, are there really that many people in Ambur?!?
ReplyDeleteBut to be fair you would have to redo all the stats for the existing Gazetteer countries in order to properly compare.
It's possible I've been a bit too liberal with population (although it follows my initial parameters.) The actual number of inhabitants depends on the number of hexes tagged as settled vs. borderland (or wilderness). There's plenty of settled lands along the Amber River and the eastern coast, and even some rating as "suburban" near Starpoint.
DeleteI can tone that down easily. Right now, Ambur's got the population density of modern Sudan, which may be a bit high since this is a faraway northern province in Alphatia. These stats are a bit of a shot in the dark right now, since that's the first mainland Alphatia province I run through the worksheet.
I can easily cut the population (and the army) in half by knocking down settled lands to borderland status, and the few "suburban" areas to merely settled... Am I making any sense?
I don't know enough to say whether this is too many or too few. What I can say is that if Ambur has half a million people, the previous figure of five million for the population of Alphatia is going to be way off - as are all the rest of the Known World countries.
ReplyDeleteBut as it happens that's not necessarily a bad thing. The Italian Mystara community has done a lot of work on Mystara's demographics, and there has been discussion in the English community too, and the general consensus seems to be that the original numbers were off - especially if you use a nice consistent system such as your dominion spreadsheet. Am I right in saying that you came up with the original demographics anyway? It seems to me that if you're happy with your current system we should just go with it, and accept whatever consequences that may entail - even if that means eventually reworking the figures for the whole world, because such a thing would actually be rather fun, especially if the whole community got involved and helped out.
Five million for such a large piece of land seems a bit low. Yes, I could see much of the forested, mountainous, or inner regions of mainland Alphatia being very sparsely populated. At a glance, there are about 12 provinces. With .5 million pop each, they'd add up (already) to 6 million. Hmmm...
DeleteThe absolute minimum would be 1.5 million people, based on the current number of towns and cities (and assuming: 1. rural population is at least 5 times the urban population; 2. towns average 5,000 ppl, and cities 20,000). A few mega-cities of 100,000+, let alone 1M.+, would play havoc with that last quote).
Ultimately, I can eventually tone down Ambur, but my guess is I'll probably end up with more than 5 million inhabitants, especially with the more-densely populated southern provinces, their temperate climate, and huge rivers.
As I said, it's somewhat of a shot in the dark for now.
The best answer seems to be to continue as is for now, and see what happens. What fun!
DeleteIt's one of those situations when we have to wait for the smoke to clear to see if everything blew up or if the flag is still standing.
DeleteIncidentally, another thing I'm interested in doing is maps showing land distribution, with coloured overlays showing what parts of each country are wilderness, borderland, urban, etc. Aside from being fun and quite easy to do just by adapting my existing maps, it also allows us to make the demographics more visual and more transparent - if you can see on the map what hexes are what type, it's easy to check the demographics in your spreadsheet without having to guess.
ReplyDeleteThat sounds like a great idea. I'd better save my "work-maps." As a process, I mark each hex with a colored dot as I go through the process of counting the various terrain symbols. This could be useful in compiling such maps. I'm working on Trollhattan right now. I'll see if I can come up with a standard color code. We'll have to test that system to find what works best.
DeleteGreat! It's not at all important for the work-maps to be pretty - you can leave that to me. What I'll likely do is switch the map to black and white symbols and then put coloured overlays on top, sourcing the info from your work-maps. (It's very easy to switch symbols around on my maps, so this is pretty easy to do.)
DeleteLooking forward to seeing Trollhattan!
My work map isn't pretty. I just make colored marks directly on the map, as check points so I don't miss anything. I just posted the one I used for Trollhattan.
DeleteLooks great - I'll see what I can come up with once I get the Trollhattan map replica done.
DeleteI finally got the Starpoint Area map replica done.
ReplyDeletehttp://mystara.thorf.co.uk/wiki/index.php?title=File:Bh-starpoint-2.png&oldid=730
(There's a clickable link on Facebook.)
It took hours and hours to find free art to make up those animal resource symbols. But I have more than just those on this map, which should be useful in the future.
One discrepancy: the Ambur map has Starpoint in Skygard District, while this map has it in Skyreach - which is the northwestern province on the Ambur map. Which one is correct?
Regarding the Moon Stones, I tried to track down a source for the symbol but without any luck. I know I've seen it somewhere before, but I can't think where, and I can't find any trace of it on any Mystara maps. Is it perhaps a standard symbol for fantasy maps in general?
Looks great! The district should be Skyguard. Sorry, my bad. For the moon stones, use the three dots in a triangular pattern. We used that on some of the Gazetteer maps to denote areas of interest or monuments. Sorry for throwing curve-balls at you!
DeleteOne more question: your map has Skygard, which I misread as Skyguard. I've since corrected that back to Skygard. Skygard is the correct name, right?
DeleteSkyguard is fine. I don't mind either way. Don't bother changing it--it's fine the way you spelled it, and I'm using that spelling now myself anyway. :-)
ReplyDeleteAdded Starpoint's city summary at the bottom of the post.
ReplyDeleteMy astronomy geekery is the getting the better of me as I'm wondering just how large the telescopes are at "The Great Observatory."
ReplyDeleteThese are probably among the largest on Mystara. How large? Good question. One answer is: "large enough." But large enough for what? That's what I'd be more curious about. What are these guys watching besides stars and planets? Is there something else out there to draw the attention of wizards, and why should it matter as regards Mystara, or more specifically, Alphatia?
DeleteSorry about the anonymous response; Google isn't recognizing me for some reason.
DeleteBut there's definitely an adventure hook in there somewhere. I recall the Spillworld adventure in "Dawn of the Emperors" being discovered by Ambur astronomers. Could they detect energy fluctuations on the moon that would lead them to Pandius? Maybe one will spot a draeden getting dangerously close to Mystara. Would they see remnants of the Federation that sent the FSS Beagle? Not to mention how that universe's physics is different than our own (if it is, indeed different). While I doubt they have the equivalent of 21st century technology (heck, even the smallest telescope is 17th century which is notably after the general milieu of the world), they could make up for it through hand-wavy magic.
All of the above is good, of course. I was also thinking of some long-forgotten foe left behind somewhere in space, and still searching for Alphatians. Naturally, Ambur's astronomers might be keeping an eye open for them. How astral flares, arcane cosmic winds, and other "sidereal ley lines" convey magical energy from the stars would be interesting to study.
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