Updates of the swords and sorcery old-school ancient cities of myth, adventure and eldritch peril !

Or somesuch.

Thanks for the comments on the previews, especially Greg. Part of the problems is just the difficulty of getting tables to format correctly when moving from word to blogger to the readers browser, (and I'm working on that), and some from bloggers odd decision to truncate at least one post (thus the duplicates); but the other part are some omissions by me.

 So, here's some corrected text:

Ruler

None	Might makes right; the strong do as they will, and the weak do as they must.
Family	Rule  and law applied on a family by family basis
Tribal	Clan based, families have common rule and decision making
Council	A small group of rulers make laws and policy.  Membership is generally quite open,  and terms limited.
Oligarchy	As Council but membership is limited to a small subgroup  of the demos.  Entry into the subgroup is possible, but limited or difficult. May be obvious or covert, defined by law or custom.
Autocracy	As Oligarchy, but the subgroup is generally small, socially  defined, and closed to new members; Terms are often defined by the members. Invariably obvious, generally legally defined
Factional	No one authority controls the polis.
Conquered	The Polis is a conquered possession of another; rule is imposed by the conqueror with little input locally.
Dictator	Rule by a single person, generally chosen to deal with a crisis, with limited term but unquestioned power and support. Ruler type should be rerolled at +2 once term ends.
Dynastic	As dictator, but it has become inherited, either thru families (as with a king)  or institutionally (as with a theocracy), and potentially of unlimited term.
Tyrant	As dictator, but with unlimited term, and support is irrelevant; often replacing a Dynasty, and/or the start of a new one.

Polis is the city (or town) Demos is the population of the Polis. Term is the time any one member can expect to remain in power.

Secondary characteristics are always rolled with an unmodified D6, and represent ways the primary characteristic can be expressed.  These should only be used when one does not have a clear idea of the characteristic in question, AND have a need for its expression in the game.  If needed, each primary characteristic has several additional descriptors, with each having a range of values; for example, Population can have the additional descriptor of Morale: defeated vs jingoistic.  If this is needed, simply roll a d6 to determine where on the range the city is for that secondary characteristic. A roll of 2might indicate a sullen, pessimistic general mood, whereas a 5 might indicate extreme patriotism and belief in their citries superiority.   Optionally, if this is not granular enough, roll 2d6-2; this gives a more detailed range, but also usually produces middle values, which, while likely more realistic, for me isn't very helpful, nor in keeping with the goal, which is generating cities for adventure, not sociological description.

Primary	Secondary(roll 1d6 for range)
Population	Openness vs. Insularity
	Religion: Few vs. Many
	Morale: defeated vs jingoistic
Wealth	Source: Trade vs. Treasury (wealth is mobile/situational vs. hoarded)
	Military quality: Poor vs. elite
Size	changes in size: Declining vs. Expanding
	Age: Ancient vs. new
Ruler	Complacency vs. Aggression
	Allegiance: local vs. distant
Law	Ruler: stability vs. instability
	Consistency: arbitrary vs absolutely codified and inflexible
Influence	Diplomacy vs. Military means of control of neighbors

Adventurer:terrain and cities

Some peeks at the sandbox generation rules: Cities.
Cities
A key element in any tale of adventure is the city. Exotic, decadent an corrupt, from glittering towers to pestilential slums, the city is both a source of adventure and a base of operations.

Typically, the sword and sorcery campaign has human habitation much more tightly clustered than in actual history. Cities are larger, towns rarer and the areas between cities are often large and uninhabited, left to marauders and monsters. A somewhat more historical version would use a European medieval landscape of about 1000AD –smaller towns and villages abound, with most hexes having some human presence. Then, obviously, adding lots of evil lords, stalwart tribesmen or peasants, dragons, wizards, evil inquisitors, witchfinders, and noble bandits.

Two approaches are possible. One simply rolls for each hex, regardless of terrain, and makes up reasons for cities in mountain passes or deep swamps. Given the genre of the setting, this should not be seen as a hardship, nor unreasonable. Alternately, one may simply roll on only those hexes containing: Rough, Plains/Steppe Lake or Mixed wilderness.

For convenience as one rolls, mark cities with an open square, town/villages with an open circle, and sparse hexes with an open triangle. If the city town or hex is rolled with Pop>0, fill in the symbol. An open symbol indicates a ruin or wilderness that is no longer populated.

Any wilderness or plains hexes directly adjacent to a city are assumed to be pastoralized –in other words, containing farms, small settlements and outposts. Assume that any hex with a town or village is a pastoral hex itself.

Roll for each Hex

If Medieval style campaign
1 empty
2-3 sparsely inhabited: no major city or town: (total population of hex =1d6-1)
4-5 town or villages ( population 1d6-1)
6 standard city.

If a Literary/Epic style campaign
1-3 empty
4 sparsely inhabited (total population of hex =1d6-1)
5 towns or village( population 1d3 +2)
6 standard city.

Hexes keyed as “sparsely inhabited” will have some obvious human improvements, but will still be mainly the noted terrain.

More details than you probably need.
Sparsely inhabited hexes in Epic campaigns will have a number of inhabited forts or castles equal to the population roll.

These hexes will contain fortifications/castles built by the city equal to the cities population number, and at least one village or town equal to the cities population number-3 . Medieval settings will have a rig of outlying villages and hamlets, epic settings will not, but may have forts as noted for pastoral hexes equal to the size rating of the village.

The chance of encountering a patrol or other official group in a city adjacent hex is equal to the population number or less on 2d6.

Roads, trails and tracks.
Any Pastoral hex can be assumed to have a network of trails, tracks and poorly maintained roads linking the settlementys and forts, and at least one major (relatively) road leading out from the city to its trade partners. Historically, rivers were often the main communication routs although this seems to be often overlooked in literature. In this period or setting, roads mainly allow a constant pace to be kept and eliminates the change of getting lost or taking roundabout ways. Too, there are often convenient sources of food and drink, which eliminates hunting or whatnot when in trackless wilderness. Thus, roads enable rapid movement, more than they increase movement in general.

Moving through a settled hex, characters can gain a speed bonus by using the roads and trails, or keep to the countryside to avoid (much) attention. Actual roads also speed up travel, but make detection almost certain. Such hexes increase base movement afoot or mounted by 1, but mainly due to enabling rapid marches. Foot movement can be increased from M1 to M2, and mounted movement from M2 to M3, but at the cost of greater exhaustion.