When it comes to designing a town for your table top role playing game (TTRPG), there are some questions that will come up on a regular basis that -- if you haven't thought them through in advance -- could trip up the flow of your game as you fumble for the answers. In this article, I'd like to present the ten things you need to have in your fantasy village, town, or city design in order to make sure that the people who live there don't die a horrible death.
Each of these doesn't necessarily need to be flushed out to a level where there are quests and hidden dungeons under or near each, but you should have a good idea of a) where they are located on the map, and b) how the people who live in the village would respond to questions about these locations.
The List
- Source of Income
There is no such thing as a town that was erected for no reason. Why is it there? Why is it in that particular spot? Is it a fishing village -- thus it's near a river? Is it a trading town -- thus it's near a crossroads? Is it a city full of nobles and their servants -- thus it's near a 1st century antique whipping post? Understanding how people are making money (the mill, the farm, the river, the traffic) will inform the design of your town. - Bank
It doesn't have to be a physical brick-and-mortar bank per se, but the question you're looking to answer here is where do the people keep their money and the money coming into the village, town, or city via trade. Do they keep it underground in their houses? Is there a vault, temple, bank, or cache somewhere that's guarded and indexed? Do they feed it to a giant and then wait for money to fall from the sky? In games where stealing is a viable way to make a living (and that's all of them), you must know how businesspeople protect their nest eggs. - Graveyard
People die. More so when adventurers are in town, but even when things are quiet there are humans, elves, dwarfs, ferrets, and creatures of all types drop dead. We can't just leave them lying around stinking up the place and causing disease. So where do we put them? Are they buried? Are they stashed in a single building? Do they have religious rights? And who does the moving, the digging, and the burials? Your town will never attract those lucrative necromancer tourism dollars if you don't have these questions sorted out. - Jail
Sometimes, people are bad. When this happens, we put them away to protect the rest of the citizenry. Where does this happen? Where are they stored? Who does the arresting and what other positions do they hold in the community. The smaller the town, the more likely it is that the jail, courthouse, the bank, the bathhouse, the brothel, and the mayor's office are actually one and the same building. - Sewers
Waste water is a serious problem. How is that problem handled? Do people walk their sewage down to the river? If so, that dump spot is downstream. Do they have a sewage system full of pipes and underground tunnels. A convenient yet icky way to get around. While hidden infrastructure is rarely on peoples' minds and may never be seen, the answers to these questions influence the health of the citizenry and thus the smell-based adjectives that describe your town. - Walls
Most TTRPGs have a heavy focus on military strategy. After all, chances are that a party of "adventurers" would want to be near where the action is. Thus, to protect the town from invading armies (even if those armies are just local wildlife), where would the people build their walls? Not along the river, because that's a natural boundary. Extra thick walls near the woods to keep out the lumberjacks. Lighter walls near the mountains to keep out the goats. Guard towers here and there so the guards have a plausible place to fall asleep and ignore stealthy adventurers. - Tavern
Even if your town is full of teetotalers and your quest givers are spread out all over hell, there needs to be one place that your players can send their characters to dig up information. It may not be called a "tavern", but it should be centrally located and have a proprietor who is a named NPC. - Neighbors
In this case, I'm referring to the nearby towns -- not the jackasses throwing garbage in your yard. Which are the four nearest towns? What do they make? What do they sell? You don't need to build a street map for each of them, but knowing who your neighbors are can instantly answer questions that would normally take twenty minutes of your god-awful Christopher Walken impression ("All I'm sayin' -- is that -- over dair -- doze people -- day make the socks --" Stop that.). If the next town is full of fishermen, then maybe this town makes fishing boats. These relationships count and can even add some nice side quests. - Market
In any TTRPG, the first thing most adventurers are looking for when they arrive in town is a shop of some kind. They need to buy health potions, new weapons, and pornography not to mention sell all the crap you've rained down across your world. (Seriously, a ring that causes any equipped bow to sing harmonically when plucked thereby enchanting nearby monsters. Under what circumstances am I NOT selling that?) - Turn Down Service
Even adventurers can't go 24hrs a day without rest. A bed for rent with a nearby bathroom is usually something nobody thinks about until someone says, "So, is there a room for rent?" and then the response is usually, "You find a room in a tavern." Turn that bland afterthought into a win by giving the adventurers a room in Mrs. Lamodia's house. She's a 76 year old pie maker who worships the devil in her basement and is the one NPC in this entire village that can provide answers to all of these questions and more. And man... can that woman shuck a boysenberry.
Got a twist on my ideas or a question you'd like to ask? Have I offended you because your mother told you that your impression of Christopher Walken is flawless? There's a comments below. Use it. And, if you liked this post, share it with your friends on Twitter and Facebook and be sure to stop by again soon for more of the same.