Population Density in Traveller

Poking through Classic Traveller Book 3, I found a section that has always kind of bothered me.  In discussing world generation, under population density it says "For comparison, the following population densities are common on twentieth century Earth.  Earth on the whole has a population of about three billion (population level 9), this is approximately 5 persons per square mile, or 16 persons per square mile of land area.  Europe is populated at about 151 person per square mile, the equivalent of population level 10.  The Netherlands contain 1500 persons per square mile, or about population level 11.  Hong Kong has 10,000 persons per square mile, the equivalent of population level 12."

Now, there are several reasons this bothers me.  First, imperial measurements don't really fit well with science fiction, in my opinion, unless we're talking about Victorian sci-fi, or Flash Gordon/Buck Rogers style pulp sci-fi.  All these measurements should be in metrics.  Second, population is determined by 2D-2, with no DMs, so there is no level 11 or 12.  But perhaps most importantly, the population score is represented elsewhere in Book 3, as well as later in Book 6, as a general population value and not a population density.  Therefore, a small planet would have a higher population density than a larger one with the same population score.  Furthermore, since people live primarily on land, planets with larger oceans will have higher population densities than desert planets, houseboats, platforms, and underwater domes notwithstanding.

So, in a fit of gamer ADD, I needed to do some fiddling around in general terms.  Nothing I've done here is really ground-breaking, but this kind of thing should be taken into account by Traveller GMs, or GMs of similar games like Stars Without Number.

First and foremost, on any planet where humans can't just hang out on the surface in street clothes, none of this applies.  If there's no atmosphere, not enough atmo, or a toxic atmo, all settlements will be built like space stations, with airlocks and air processing and not a whole lot of privacy.  In these situations, the economics of building safe habitations and providing appropriate life support will ensure relatively high population densities in settled areas, and wilderness everywhere else.  Similarly, on planets with 100% of the surface covered by water, settlements will be artificial structures, and economics will tend to ensure high population density (although if a water world has a nitrogen/oxygen atmosphere, a lot of people might opt to buy their own watercraft to live on and get away from the crush).  Those planets with breathable atmospheres have more options, though...high density city living, or a lonely cabin out in the sticks.

What I've done here is calculated out the approximate land area of different sized planets with different hydrographics ratings.  Since this is just a thumbnail sketch rather than a comprehensive rule system, I just went with default planet sizes (no variations from the standard) and default hydro ratings (ten percent increments).  I also did these calculations in square kilometers (!)

	hydrographic rating
world size	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
S	306K	na	na	na	na	na	na	na	na	na
1	7.65M	na	na	na	na	na	na	na	na	na
2	32.13M	28.92M	25.7M	22.49M	19.28M	16.07M	12.85M	9.64M	na	na
3	71.91M	64.72M	57.53M	50.34M	43.15M	35.96M	28.76M	21.57M	14.38M	na
4	127.5M	114.75M	102M	89.25M	76.5M	63.75M	51M	38.25M	25.5M	12.75M
5	199.41M	179.47M	159.53M	139.59M	119.65M	99.71M	79.76M	59.82M	39.88M	19.94M
6	287.13M	258.42M	229.7M	200.99M	172.28M	143.57M	114.85M	86.14M	57.43M	28.71M
7	390.66M	351.59M	312.53M	273.46M	234.4M	195.33M	156.26M	117.2M	78.13M	39.07M
8	510M	459M	408M	357M	306M	255M	204M	153M	102M	51M
9	645.66M	581.09M	516.53M	451.96M	387.4M	322.83M	258.26M	193.7M	129.13M	64.57M
A	797.13M	717.42M	637.7M	557.99M	478.28M	398.57M	318.85M	239.14M	159.42M	79.71M

This next table is barely of interest.  Just a rough estimate of people per square kilometer, based on population rating and a few benchmark planetary land areas.  Because population rating is just an estimate in the first place, I didn't bother getting into a whole lot of detail, and anyone who can divide by ten can easily recreate the table.  I also didn't bother working out numbers for less than 1 per sq km...it's basically all wilderness at that point.

	population rating
surface area	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	A
100K	0	0	0	0	0	1	10	100	1000	10K	100K
1M	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	10	100	1000	10K
10M	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	10	100	1000
100M	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	10	100
1G	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	10

So, finally, I looked up some representative countries with these approximate population densities.  At 0 (less than 1 really) we have Greenland...essentially small settlements in the most appropriate areas (most efficient resource exploitation, most comfortable weather, most scenic areas; you have a whole planet to pick from, so why not?) with the rest of the planet as uninhabited (possibly uninhabitable) wilderness.

At about 1 per square kilometer, there's Mongolia, with some decent sized cities and widespread, low-level habitation everywhere else (basically wilderness).

At about 10 per sq km is Russia; large cities and industrialized areas but still large unexploited wilderness areas.

At about 100 is Turkey (and most industrialized modern countries for that matter).  Cities, some sprawl, but still a lot of wild areas and low density agricultural areas as well.

At about 1000 people per square kilometer, we have Bangladesh.  Densely populated cities with some very tall buildings, cities and towns tend to blend seamlessly into each other, but there are still some rural areas punctuated by smaller cities and towns.  The Hawaiian island of Oahu has about this same level of density, if you've ever been there.

At about 10,000 people, our example is Singapore.  Once you start getting up this high, rural areas really get crowded out.  Lower levels of overall density have pockets of highly dense settlement, but it's getting pretty uncomfortable now; people spread out as much as possible.

The smallest planets with the highest populations can reach up to 100,000 people per square kilometer.  There are some places on Earth now with that level of population density, but they're not well known...basically some neighborhoods in some already densely populated cities.  I can only imagine a planet-wide version of this would be the Traveller equivalent of Coruscant, with city everywhere, and the only variation being how tall the buildings are.

And now that itch of mine is scratched.  More accurate population densities in Traveller's world generation.  I've been thinking about working up some system using Zipf's Law to figure out more detailed settlement patterns for science fiction games.  Whether I come up with anything worthwhile remains to be seen.  And of course, I can't seem to stay on task for almost anything anyway.  Today's post came about when I intended to work on another Patron for DCC.  We'll see what happens I guess.

DCC Patron: The Drownded Man

So here's that Patron I've been working on seemingly forever.  There's a part of me that feels on some level that there should be a more balanced system for making Patrons, but I guess I'll get over it.  Anyway, this guy comes from a frontier fantasy setting I put together for Hero System a few years ago, set in a faux North America, with pirates and vikings on the coasts and eagle-eyed woodsmen up in the hills, with some Salem style witchery scattered around.  The Drownded Man in that document had just a couple of sentences dedicated to him (he was really just a skin for a devil template), but he seemed flavorful enough to stretch out into a full fledged Patron, especially for a Shudder Mountains game.  Yeah, I stole a lot from Wellman in that setting too.  Here's hoping Blogger doesn't ass up my OpenOffice file too bad...

The Drownded Man, as he is called even by those who should realize the grammar is wrong, appears as his name suggests. He is bluish and sopping wet, and his eyes are clouded and roll about unfocused. He holds the secrets of sunken things, and will share with those willing to trade. What he really wants is company.

Invoke Patron check results:

12-13	The Drownded Man glances the caster's way. The air becomes dense, slightly impeding movement and breathing. The caster suffers a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. The nearest enemy (within 20') suffers double these penalties. Any allies of the caster between the two are affected the same as the caster. These effects last 1d4 rounds.
14-17	The Drownded Man briefly turns his attention to the caster. The air becomes dense, slightly impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. The caster and all allies within 20' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 20' suffer double these penalties. These effects last 1d4 rounds.
18-19	The Drownded Man rests his gaze on the caster. The air becomes dense, impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. Debris kicked up on the battlefield will also swirl around and take time to settle; this can make seeing extremely difficult. The caster and all allies within 20' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 20' suffer triple these penalties. These effects last 1d6 rounds.
20-23	The Drownded Man sends some minions to feed. The air becomes dense, impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. Debris kicked up on the battlefield will also swirl around and take time to settle; this can make seeing extremely difficult. Shadowy fish-shapes swim through the air and nip at anyone in the affected area. The caster and all allies within 20' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 20' suffer triple these penalties. In addition, the caster and all affected allies take 1 damage per round; affected enemies take 1d3 damage per round. These effects last 1d8 rounds.
24-27	The Drownded Man sends many minions to feed. The air becomes dense, impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. Debris kicked up on the battlefield will also swirl around and take time to settle; this can make seeing extremely difficult. Shadowy fish-shapes swim through the air and nip at anyone in the affected area. The caster and all allies within 20' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 20' suffer triple these penalties. In addition, the caster and all affected allies take 1 damage per round; affected enemies take 1d6 damage per round. These effects last 2d6 rounds.
28-29	The Drownded Man sends a bloated corpse to aid the caster. The air becomes dense, impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. Debris kicked up on the battlefield will also swirl around and take time to settle; this can make seeing extremely difficult. Shadowy fish-shapes swim through the air and nip at anyone in the affected area. The caster and all allies within 30' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 30' suffer triple these penalties. In addition, the caster and all affected allies take 1 damage per round; affected enemies take 1d6 damage per round. These effects last 2d6 rounds. Lastly, a bloated corpse swims into existence at the edge of the area of effect from the extraplanar realm of the Drownded Man. It fights and otherwise aids the caster for 2d6 turns. Bloated Corpse: Atk +4 (dmg d4+1/d4+1 punch); AC 12; HD 4d12; MV 20'; Act 2d20; SP sopping wet and immune to fire damage, grab if both fists hit; SV Fort +3 Ref +0 Will +3; AL C. Bloated Corpse demons of the Drownded Man appear to be undead and can be turned as such. They are fat with decomposition, crawling with crayfish and mayfly larvae, and saturated with foul water. If summoned to fight, they will attempt to grapple enemies (requires a successful hit with both fist attacks) and pull them into the area of drowning created by the Invoke Patron spell if they're not already there.
30-31	The Drownded Man sends a bog mummy to aid the caster. The air becomes dense, impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. Debris kicked up on the battlefield will also swirl around and take time to settle; this can make seeing extremely difficult. Shadowy fish-shapes swim through the air and nip at anyone in the affected area. The caster and all allies within 30' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 30' suffer triple these penalties. In addition, the caster and all affected allies take 1 damage per round; affected enemies take 1d6 damage per round. These effects last 2d6 rounds. Lastly, a bog mummy swims into existence at the edge of the area of effect from the extraplanar realm of the Drownded Man. It fights and otherwise aids the caster for 2d6 turns. Bog Mummy: Atk +8 (dmg d8/d8 punch); AC 15; HD 8d12; MV 30'; Act 2d20; SP sopping wet/immune to fire damage, boneless/immune to blunt trauma, grab if both fists hit; SV Fort +4 Ref +2 Will +4; AL C. Bog Mummy demons of the Drownded Man appear to be undead and can be turned as such. They have blackened skins, bright red hair, and a disquieting bonelessness to their movements. Like Bloated Corpses, they will grab enemies outside of the area of drowning and pull them in.
32+	An avatar of the Drownded Man appears. The air becomes dense, impeding movement and breathing. Clothing, hair, and similar items will swirl around as though underwater. Debris kicked up on the battlefield will also swirl around and take time to settle; this can make seeing extremely difficult. Shadowy fish-shapes swim through the air and nip at anyone in the affected area. The caster and all allies within 30' suffer a -1 penalty to saving throws and AC, as well as any attacks depending on swinging momentum (most bashing and cutting attacks). Stabbing and biting are not affected; other attacks are left to the GM's discretion. Enemies within 30' suffer triple these penalties. In addition, the caster and all affected allies take 1 damage per round; affected enemies take 1d6 damage per round. These effects last 2d6 rounds. Lastly, an avatar of the Drownded Man swims into existence at the edge of the area of effect from the extraplanar realm of the Drownded Man. It fights and otherwise aids the caster for 2d6 turns. Drownded Man Avatar: Atk +12 (dmg d10/d10 punch); AC 17; HD 12d12; MV 30'; Act 2d20; SP sopping wet/immune to fire damage; SV Fort +8 Ref +4 Will +8; AL C.

Patron Taint: The Drownded Man

Roll Result

1 The caster is always slightly damp, as though breaking a slight sweat. The second time this result is rolled, the caster exudes enough moisture to dampen his clothes. The third time this result is rolled, the caster is always dripping, sloppy wet, with all associated drawbacks insofar as paper goods, tinderboxes, and other things that should be kept dry go.

2 The caster is always slightly damp, as though breaking a slight sweat. If both result 1 and result 2 are rolled, they don't stack; the character is just slightly damp until the second time one of these results is rolled. The second time this result is rolled, greenish algae grows in the caster's hair. The caster's skin is also somewhat slippery, creating a -1 penalty to rolls requiring a firm grip (climbing or grappling, for example). The third time this is rolled, the caster becomes so slippery that his penalty increases to -2, but he receives a +2 bonus against grappling attacks and a +2 bonus to escape from manacles, bonds, etc.

3 The caster's complexion takes on an unhealthy pale hue. The second time this result is rolled, the caster's eyes cloud over, reducing his visual acuity. Ranged attack rolls and other rolls depending on vision suffer a -2 penalty. The third time this result is rolled, the caster's complexion becomes a deathly blue, making him look entirely corpse-like.

4 The caster develops a slight cough whenever he engages in strenuous activity. The second time this result is rolled, the caster's cough is always present; he also coughs up wads of foul smelling sputum when under physical stress. The third time this result is rolled, the caster must make a DC 10 Fortitude Save whenever engaged in strenuous activity or fall into a coughing fit for 1d4 rounds.

5 Something about the caster doesn't sit well with animals. Dogs, cats, and horses will try to avoid him, and may attack if his presence is forced on them. The second time this result is rolled, the problem becomes apparent: he stinks. All Personality based rolls suffer a -2 penalty when dealing with humans or creatures with similar smell senses, unless the smell is covered with perfumes. The third time this result is rolled, perfumes aren't enough. The caster smells like rot, mud, and dead things, suffering a -1d penalty to all Personality rolls.

6 Whenever the caster casts a spell, mayfly larvae and amphipods appear in the folds of the caster's clothes and scatter across the area. The second time this result is rolled, the critters are always present, scattering when a spell is cast. Their crawling around the ticklish spots of the caster's body can be distracting, resulting in a -2 penalty to rolls requiring concentration. The third time this result is rolled, mayfly larvae, amphipods, leeches and crayfish are constantly crawling around the caster's body and falling off, leaving a fairly easily followed trail wherever he goes.

Patron Spells: The Drownded Man

1. Breathless Tranquility

2. Sunken Secrets

3. Dry Drowning

Spellburn: The Drownded Man

Roll Spellburn Result

1 A hypothermic chill comes over the caster, whether a chill of deep water or the grave. All ability damage (rather than just one point) done by this spellburn will heal the next time the caster rests, as long as he stays warm and makes a DC 15 Fortitude save.

2 Spectral leeches appear on the caster's body, draining the spellburn as stat point loss.

3 The caster must cough foul smelling water out of his lungs. He must make a DC 15 Fortitude save or spend 1d6 rounds incapacitated by the coughing; a successful save reduces this to one round. The coughing fit leaves him drained of ability points equal to the points of spellburn.

4 The Drownded Man wants company. The caster must drown an intelligent creature within the next 24 hours. If he successfully does so, the spellburn costs him no stat point losses. Failure to do so will result in the Drownded Man pulling him out of the normal flow of time for a visit; the caster will lose twice the stat points used for spellburn, drowning in the Drownded Man's realm as he sits watching, grinning, and burbling. This may happen at a very inopportune time, and the caster will be returned to the normal flow of time as soon as he left, much worse for wear.

Breathless Tranquility

Level: 1 (The Drownded Man) Range: Varies Duration: Varies Casting Time: 1 action Save: None

General: Those of the Drownded Man's realm are at peace, and beyond the cares and worries of mortals. Neither drowning nor the creatures of the water hold any terrors for them any more. This spell gives some of that peace to the living adherents of the Drownded Man for a time.

Manifestation: Roll 1d4: (1) Caster and all affected turn bluish and glassy-eyed, like drowned corpses;

(2) Caster and all affected grow gills and scales, and eyes become wide and unblinking;

(3) Caster and all affected grow heavy scales and muzzles full of fangs; (4) Area of

effect is filled with tiny fizzy bubbles

12-13	The caster can breathe underwater for 1 turn per caster level.
14-17	The caster can breathe underwater for 1 turn per caster level. In addition, during this time he is ignored by water creatures of HD 1d4 or less, including small fish, snakes, frogs, aquatic insects and swarms thereof. This includes creatures with a strong affinity for water, such as mosquitoes and dragonflies. Attacking a water creature breaks the “truce” for that creature.
18-19	The caster and up to three additional creatures can breathe underwater for 1 turn per caster level. In addition, during this time they are ignored by water creatures of HD 1d4 or less, as above.
20-23	The caster and up to three additional creatures can breathe underwater for 1 turn per caster level. In addition, during this time they are ignored by water creatures of 1 HD or less, as above.
24-27	The caster and up to six additional creatures can breathe underwater for 1 turn per caster level. In addition, during this time they are ignored by water creatures of 2 HD or less, as above.
28-29	The caster and up to six additional creatures can breathe underwater for 1 turn per caster level. In addition, during this time they are ignored by water creatures of 3 HD or less, as above.
30-31	The caster and up to ten additional creatures can breathe underwater for 1 hour per caster level. In addition, during this time they are ignored by water creatures of 5 HD or less, as above.
32+	The caster and up to ten additional creatures can breathe underwater for 1 hour per caster level. In addition, during this time they are ignored by all water creatures, as above.

Sunken Secrets

Level: 2 (The Drownded Man) Range: Varies Duration: Varies Casting Time: 1 hour Save: None

General: The Drownded Man hides secrets of many sorts under his murky waters. He is willing

to share them with certain devotees. Note that a secret could be knowledge, an item or

items, or monetary treasure, and the secret or a clue to its location must be found in or

near the water.

Manifestation: Roll 1d3: (1) A globe of will-o-wisp light leads the caster out over the water, stopping

over the area holding the secret sought for; (2) Caster turns blue and falls into a

thrashing trance for 1 or more turns, during which time he sees a vision of the secret

sought for; (3) A drowned corpse pulls itself from the water to lead the character to the

secret sought for.

14-15	The caster learns knowledge common to all the locals of the area, finds some useful herb/mineral/substance common to the area, or finds 2d6 copper coins or equivalent treasure.
16-19	The caster learns information equivalent to a true roll on a rumor table, finds some useful item uncommon (but not out of place) to the area; or finds 2d20 copper coins or equivalent treasure.
20-21	The caster learns a minor secret of a minor character (useful in some way, but not life-altering blackmail material), finds a very useful non-magic item that you wouldn't think to find in the area, or finds 2d20 silver coins or equivalent treasure.
22-25	The caster learns a major secret of a minor character (potentially life-altering blackmail material), finds a one-use magic item (potion or scroll, for instance), or finds 2d20x5 silver coins or equivalent treasure.
26-29	The caster learns a minor secret of a major character (useful in some way, but not life-altering blackmail material), finds a charge using magic item (such as a wand), or finds 2d20 gold coins or equivalent treasure.
30-31	The caster learns a major secret of a major character (potentially life-altering blackmail material), finds a permanent magic item (like a ring), or finds 2d20x10 gold coins or equivalent treasure.
32-33	The caster learns a major secret of a cosmic character (patron level of power; probably not blackmail material, but invaluable to wizardly types), finds a powerful magic item (like a sword), or finds 2d20x100 gold coins or equivalent treasure.
34+	The caster learns a major secret relating to a major plot point in the campaign or a plot hook to a major adventure, finds a legendary magic item (like the One Ring), or finds a dragon hoard level of treasure.

Dry Drowning

Level: 3 (The Drownded Man) Range: 50' + 10' per CL Duration: Varies Casting Time: 1 round Save: Will vs spell check

General: The lungs or gills of the target(s) fill with foam, at once too liquid for air-breathers and too gassy for water-breathers.

Manifestation: Roll 1d3: (1) a stream of water shoots from caster's hands hitting the target in the face

(air bubbles vs water breathers); (2) a splash of water erupts from the ground at the

target's feet (huge air bubbles vs water breathers); (3) targets turn pale and their lips turn

blue.

16-17	Coughing and gagging causes a single target to suffer a -2 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d6 damage for 1d4 rounds.
18-21	Coughing and gagging causes up to three targets to suffer a -2 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d6 damage for 1d4 rounds.
22-23	Coughing and gagging causes a number of targets equal to the caster's level to suffer a -2 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d6 damage for 1d4+2 rounds. Additionally, affected targets must make a second saving throw or fall unconscious for one turn.
24-26	Coughing and gagging causes a number of targets equal to (CL +1d6) to suffer a -3 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d6 damage for 1d6+2 rounds. Additionally, affected targets must make a second saving throw or fall unconscious for one turn.
27-31	Coughing and gagging causes a number of targets equal to (CL +1d12) to suffer a -3 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d6 damage for 2d6 rounds. Additionally, affected targets must make a second saving throw or fall unconscious for 1d3 turns.
32-33	Coughing and gagging causes a number of targets equal to 2x(CL +1d12) to suffer a -4 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d8 damage for 2d6 rounds. Additionally, affected targets must make a second saving throw or fall unconscious for 1d6 turns (targets of level/HD lower than CL fall unconscious with no save).
34-35	Coughing and gagging causes a number of targets equal to 3x(CL +1d12) to suffer a -4 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 1d8 damage for 2d6+4 rounds. Additionally, affected targets must make a second saving throw or fall unconscious for 2d4 turns (targets of level/HD lower than CL fall unconscious with no save).
36+	Coughing and gagging causes a number of targets equal to 10xCL to suffer a -5 penalty on attack and damage rolls, and inflicts 2d6 damage for 2d8+4 rounds. Additionally, affected targets must make a second saving throw or fall unconscious for 2d6 turns (targets of level/HD lower than CL fall unconscious with no save).

Project over

I didn't get through all the first level DCC spells, but their Hero System costs were all over the place.  Partly, this is due to the Hero pricing attacks much higher than sense powers, and partly due to DCC spells (like their D&D forebears) being all over the place, power-level-wise, even though they're supposed to be balanced against each other.  So, I pretty much petered out on that, and let myself get distracted with other gamey stuff.

I will get back to working up my DCC Patrons later.  I suppose I could post them piecemeal, but to be honest, I prefer seeing the complete package when I'm reading about other people's Patron creations, so I won't inflict a partial writeup on anyone else.

Power Grid boardgame

So my youngest brother and my sister-in-law came to visit, and as usual when we get together, there were a lot of games played.  I introduced them to Dungeon Crawl Classics, running them through a fairly low-casualty Portal Under the Stars (last time I ran my kids through it, it was a TPK...this time they only lost about four out of twenty).  We combined our Red Dragon Inn characters and played a big seven player game.  But the surprise hit, in my book, was Power Grid.

          

I know power generation and distribution are incredibly important in modern life, but when I think of games, I tend to think of escapism...far away lands, more adventurous times, stuff like that.  Roman chariot races sound like a good game.  Asteroid mining sounds like a good game.  Power plants and high-tension lines don't sound like a good game.

Except that Power Grid totally is.

Now, I'll admit when I first looked at the rules, I was confused as hell.  Player order changes up every turn, sometimes you use normal player order and sometimes you go in reverse order, and there are turns, phases, and steps to deal with.  But going through line by line, we got set up and played through the first little bit, and it became very easy to follow.  And it was fun.

Each turn starts out refiguring the turn order (this is phase one, not to be confused with step one).  Turn order goes by whoever has the most cities in their distribution network, with ties broken by the highest rated power plant.  Basically, whoever's closest to winning goes first, except when they don't.

Phase two is the power plant auction.  The game is arranged so that the power plants available early in the game are less efficient than those available later, so even if every player doesn't want to buy a new power plant each turn, they will want to buy one at least every few turns.  The first player can pass (and then can't buy a plant this turn) or can choose a power plant from those available to auction.  Everyone bids on it until it is sold.  If the player who chose the plant didn't win the auction, he gets to choose again; if he did win, the next player chooses the next plant or passes.  The last guy to go can straight-up buy a power plant at the minimum listed price.  When everyone has bought a power plant or passed, phase two is over.

Phase three is the building phase, where each player can expand their distribution network to more cities.  Early in the game (step one), each city can only have one player supplying it.  In step two, after at least one player has seven cities in their network, each city can have two players supplying it, although the second player has to pay more to set up in that city.  In step three, towards the end of the game, each city can have three players, and again, the third player pays more to set up there.  Phase three is played in reverse turn order.

Phase four also runs in reverse order.  This is when everyone buys the resources they need to run their power plants (coal, oil, uranium, or garbage, although some plants run without fuel).  There is an interesting supply-and-demand mechanic here, where the resources that get used the most end up costing more, while those no one is interested in get cheaper.

Phase five is the bureaucracy phase.  Players get paid for the number of cities in their network that they supply power to, burning any appropriate resources.  The market for resources gets restocked, the amounts depending on the number of players and what step the game is in.  Some updates are made to the power plants available to buy, with the overall effect that cheaper, less efficient plants are available at the beginning of the game, with more efficient plants getting pushed to the end game.  After phase five, the next turn begins at phase one.

Strategy revolves around balancing power plants, networks, and fuel resources to maximize power sold, which maximizes your income and lets you expand and balance some more.  The win conditions are set when one player has at least 17 cities in their network; during phase five of the turn someone expands into at least 17 cities, whoever is able to generate power for the most cities wins. 

The game is well-balanced.  Running phase three in reverse turn order gives the people falling behind the chance to buy up some prime real estate and improve their position.  Phase four's reverse order gives the people falling behind a shot at buying the cheapest fuel, possibly stocking up.  Whoever's in first place needs to overcome some pretty steep disadvantages to stay there.  Rather than the horrible, soul-killing grind of Monopoly, where the winner becomes obvious long before the win, Power Grid feels like it's anyone's game right up til the last turn. 

New project: DCC spell analysis

Since I "finished" that last project with the swells (said with quotes because I do have a few small comments to make about waves and wave related things whenever I decide to try to organize it all), I've spent some time fiddling with a couple of ideas for Patrons from Dungeon Crawl Classics, and being sick, and having some real life happening.

DCC Patrons are pretty complicated bits of background material, generally involving the creation of four new spells in addition to any back story attached to the Patron, and since spells in DCC have eight levels of success, ranging from barely worthwhile up to much-more-impressive-than-RPGS-usually-allow, they're pretty fiddly. I've often had qualms about making new spells in D&D because of the concept of spell levels.  Is this spell really as powerful as a third level spell should be?  Is it too powerful for second level?  Stuff like that.  Now throw in these eight degrees of success, and someone like me ends up a quivering mess.  And being sick and having real life happening too, I had no chance.

TLDR: I haven't finished any Patrons.

I've seen over on Google+ that someone put together a sort of cheat sheet for DCC spells, listing in general terms the type of outcomes spells should have, based on the examples in the rulebook.  The version I saw only had the first three or four degrees of success listed out, though, and may have only included first level spells; higher level spells should have more impressive successes across the board, at least in my opinion.

And while I pondered (weak and weary) over how to solve this dilemma, inspiration struck.  The Hero System!  Hero has long been called a gamer's toolkit, allowing a GM to build whatever type of world he wished to game in, and players to build whatever type of character they wanted to game in it.  No classes, no set magic system, no set technologies, no limits.  Fifth Edition in particular was advertised as a toolkit for gaming in the sense that it could be applied to other games, not just Champions or Fantasy Hero, but as a way to help standardize new powers in other games too.  Build all the spells in D&D under the Hero System, and any new spells you come up with should go with the existing spells of similar point values.  Or so the idea goes...I'm pretty sure that a lot of D&D spells are of the right level if you analyze them this closely.  But the idea is still pretty sound.

And so, I will look at each degree of success of DCC spells in Hero terms, and hopefully an obvious pattern will emerge.  Then, all these Invoke Patron and other Patron spells will more or less fall into place for me.  And hopefully I won't be off line for a month or more in the process.

Random Swells

This could probably use a little more finessing to get it to work just right, but I think it's close enough to publish, and to be honest, I'm kind of getting tired of messing with it.  I've got a backlog of more immediately entertaining ideas I want to post about, so I'm going to kill this particular monster and fling him to the public.

OK, you've got players adventuring on the ocean somewhere and want to randomly determine a swell.  There's no compelling in-game reason to pick a very large swell or a very small one, or even a very medium sized one.  You're letting the dice decide whether it's safe to land the boats on this shore, or how dangerous it is to go into the sea cave at this time, or whatever.  So, the first thing you do is figure out what kind of sea or shoreline your characters are working from.  Constricted areas like the Mediterranean Sea or the Gulf of Mexico get smaller swells on average than the Atlantic, with the Pacific getting bigger swells yet.  This system measures out the ocean in 1200 mile hexes.  Here's an icosahedral world map template; for an Earth-sized planet, each hex is 1200 miles. If your world isn't more or less Earth-sized, you'll need a different number of hexes per triangle to come out to 1200 miles per hex.

For reference, here's a map of the Earth in this template.

To describe the sea in any given area, we'll use two variables which I'll call exposure and fetch.  Exposure is the number of hexsides of ocean a given area is exposed to, not counting the hex in question.  For example, in the following diagram, the western end of Australia is exposed to four hexsides of ocean. (The fourth hex is split into two halves in the template; the two hex halves that the number sits on in the picture don't exist.  Only the two hex halves within the triangles of the grid.  This should be obvious from the full diagram, but gets a little less obvious zoomed in like this.)

Fetch is the straight line distance out from the starting hex until land is hit.  For these purposes, small islands count as ocean, but large, thickly seeded archipelagoes count as land.  If there are enough islands to break up and diffuse waves at this scale, it's land.  Just kind of eyeball it.

By "straight line distance" I don't necessarily mean just the six lines of direct contact radiating out from the six hexsides of the original hex.  Any hex that isn't already counted is one higher than the lowest number touching it, as shown here:

Note that for Western Australia, the mass of Australia itself blocks fetch into the Pacific, Africa shadows the fetch into the Atlantic, and South America and Antarctica shadow fetch into the Pacific to the west.  We could conceivably extend the fetch in this direction further than 9 hexes, but I'm going to go ahead and rule that Cape Horn and the Antarctic Peninsula block off wave propagation to Western Australia except for that very small window immediately past them.

Ideally, this would give us a nice, unambiguous number to use for fetch, but in most cases it will be something like this, with a fetch of 5 being the single most common number, followed by 6, with a small but distinct extreme of 9.  Let's call this 7 in this case.

Now, exposure and fetch won't change very often (unless you have a very chaotic world map).  These numbers can be noted down in your world descriptions for any important or commonly visited areas, and you won't need to go back and recount every time.

Once, you have these numbers, you can roll 4d6 with an additional d6 of another color (to be read as a d2, d3, or d6 as indicated) and consult the following table, taking fetch adjustments into account:

Exposure (hexsides) →	1	2	3	4	5	6
4	0	0	0	0	D2-1	D2-1
5	0	0	0	D2-1	D2	D2
6	0	0	D2-1	D2	D3	D2+1
7	0	D2-1	D2	D2+1	D2+1	D3+1
8	0	D3-1	D3	D2+1	D3+1	D3+1
9	0	D2	D2+1	D3+1	D2+2	D3+2
10	D2-1	D2+1	D2+2	D6+2	D3+2	D3+4
11	D3-1	D3+1	D3+2	D3+5	D3+6	D6+6
12	D3-1	D3+2	D3+5	D3+7	D6+8	D6+8
13	D2	D3+5	D6+6	D6+8	D6+11	D6+11
14	D2+1	D3+7	D6+9	D6+12	D6+14	D6+14
15	D3+3	D6+8	D6+14	D6+16	D6+20	D6+20
16	D6+5	D6+12	D6+17	D6+20	D6+25	D6+25
17	D6+8	D6+18	D6+20	D6+25	D6+25	D6+25
18	D6+12	D6+21	D6+25	D6+28	D6+28	D6+28
19	D6+18	D6+24	D6+28	D6+28	D6+28	D6+32
20	D6+24	D6+30	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32
21	D6+30	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32
22	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32
23	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32
24	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32	D6+32

Fetch adjustment	die roll	steps
	4-12	-3 if fetch=2; -2 if fetch=3; -1 if fetch=4
	13-16	-2 if fetch=2; -1 if fetch=3-4
	17	-2 if fetch=2; -1 if fetch=3
	18-19	-1 if fetch=2
	20-24	no adjustment

 So, continuing with our Western Australia example, if we rolled an 18 on our 4d6 and a 6 on the other d6, we'd check the fetch adjustment for fetch of 7 and a roll of 18 (no adjustment here), then check the table (d6 + 28 = 6 +28 = 34 foot swell). 

Most ocean hexes or ocean shores will not really get a fetch adjustment.  Enclosed areas like the Gulf of Mexico tend to have exposure of 1 and fetch of about 2, and much smaller swells because of this.  With the same rolls as the last example, we would get a fetch adjustment of -1 (making the die roll 17 instead of 18), then check the table to find a swell of d6 + 8, for a total swell of 14 feet. 

The last thing we need to do to get a complete swell description is period.  I'll admit this isn't all that elegant, but like I said earlier, I was starting to get tired of messing with it.  Basically, once you have your swell height, you cross-reference it on this table against your fetch to find a minimum and maximum period.  I'll leave it up to you how you pick the value in between.  If you'd like, you can use the maximum fetch on this table, instead of the fudged number we used above.  

		Maximum period
wave height	minimum period	Fetch=2	Fetch=3	Fetch=4	Fetch=5	Fetch=6	Fetch=7	Fetch=8	Fetch=9	Fetch=14
2	2	7	11	12	13			14		15
3	2	9	11	12	13			14	15
4	3	10	11	13		14			15
5	3	10	12	13		14		15
6	3	10	12	13		14		15
7	4	11	12	13	14		15
8	4	11	12	13	14		15
9	4	11	12	13	14	15
10	4	11	13	14		15
11	5	11	13	14		15
12	5	12	13	14		15
13	5	12	13	14	15
14	5	12	13	14	15
15	5	12	14		15
16	5	12	14		15
17	6	12	14		15
18	6	12	14		15
19	6	12	14		15
20	6	13	14	15
21	7	13	14	15
22	7	13	14	15
23	7	13	14	15
24	7	13	14	15
25	7	13	14	15
26	7	14		15
27	7	14	15
28	8	14	15
29	8	14	15
30	8	14	15
31	8	14	15
32	8	14	15
33	8	14	15
34	8	14	15
35	9	14	15
36	9	14	15

For the Western Australia example, in this case, with a fetch of 7 and a wave height of 34 feet, we'd have a period somewhere between 8 and 15 (d8 + 7 possibly).  If we wanted to use the maximum fetch for W. Australia, we'd use 9 instead, although for waves this high, it makes no difference (waves this high are generated pretty close by and haven't had time to degrade).  The 14 foot swell from the Gulf of Mexico would come in with a period somewhere between 5 and 12 (d8 + 4 most likely). 

And that's about that.  Random swells with not a whole lot of screwing around to get them.  I think they come out a little higher on average than real world swells, but I think wind speeds are higher in the 2d6 wind speed table used in B/X and RC D&D than in the real world, and that (more or less) is what I started from.  High winds and waves provide adventure material though, and give spell users a reason to learn more than magical artillery spells.  I have a few more small things on waves and wave related topics that I think I'll stick all together in one miscellaneous post, and then move on to some new project.  Or probably post a bunch of standalone, unrelated posts on various topics, like DCC patrons or adventure ideas or what have you.  Hopefully I'll post a little more often since I don't have tables and tables of math to do first anymore.

PS:  Thanks to Daniel "Theophage" Clark and his In a Dark Cell blog for the icosahedral hex grid I used for this post.  He didn't post much, and hasn't updated for years, but he didn't nuke the blog when he gave it up.  I wish more people would leave their thoughts out there.  You never can tell what someone will find immensely useful.

Also, thanks to whoever made the mp_IcoSnyder_s82.45(yadayada, etc...it's a long string of numbers after this and you can search for it without them) icosahedral Earth map.  I don't remember where I snagged it, and when I search it none of the hits seem to be the original source.  It, obviously, was also immensely useful.

Coastline mapping

I haven't posted in a long while...I've been forcing myself to stick to the number crunching on that random swell generation system I was working on.  I've pretty much got it worked out, I think.  After crunching the numbers and figuring out the statistics for waves of various sizes based on the amount of ocean they could form in and the distance they'd have to propagate to get to the area in question, and making some simplifying assumptions along the way which turned out some fairly strange results, I smoothed over at least some of the strangeness by fitting the results to a 4d6 bell curve, and then compacting them down from 60 separate tables into 6 tables with some modifiers.  I just need to work out the possible periods for the waves and set up a randomizer for that.  I think in the final form, a DM could roll five or six dice all at once and then check the tables to find the day's swell and period.  And I probably could have pulled it all out of my ass and had numbers just as valid as what I have now, given the complexities of the subject matter, but it makes me feel better that it is based on "good science", even if I have "garbage in, garbage out" issues.

At any rate, I saw this article the other day and felt like musing a little on it.

http://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/why-its-impossible-to-know-a-coastlines-true-length


Whenever I draw a campaign map, I tend to start with the large areas...continents usually.  I draw more detailed maps of smaller areas as needed. One problem I've always had (at least from an aesthetic viewpoint, looking at the maps; I don't think players ever have an issue with it in-game, unless they see the map themselves) is overly smooth coasts.  It's not easy creating coastlines as randomly rugged as in real life.  This problem gets compounded when I zoom in from the continent scale map to the country scale, and from there to the county or whatever other subdivision you care to use; the smooth line ends up smoother if anything.

Trying to draw rugged lines instead of smooth ones doesn't really help much.  Humans don't do random all that well, and in trying to get less smooth coasts, I often veer into too random coasts.  They just don't look right.  In the past, I have used AutoRealm's fractal lines to make a decent looking coastline, although zooming in still had issues.  At best, I could start out with very zoomed in maps and scale up to keep coastlines looking good, but the file size got really unwieldy in a hurry, and the program spent ever increasing amounts of time re-rendering the map whenever I'd zoom or pan the view.

Reading the Atlas Obscura article got me thinking about this issue again, and I think I have a decent method of fractalizing coastlines that can be done with any graphics program or even paper and pencil.  In the past, I've generally started with a blank sheet of paper and gone to a finished product in one step, whether I was making maps or drawing a character or a scene.  Now, when drawing, I follow the advice we've all seen in every art book ever, where you sketch out the basics in light pencil and simple shapes, and then go back later to detail and shade in darker pencil or ink.  It's definitely a more professional look, moving me up from 3rd grade to about 6th grade art level.  More importantly for this post, it occurs to me that I can use it on maps too.

Simply put, if I start out with light pencil and sketch out my too-smooth continent shapes, I can go back over my map, following the lightly sketched line, and add some jitter.  The final result isn't unrealistically smooth, but by generally following a guide line, it isn't unrealistically jagged and crazy looking either. 

As a proof of concept, here's a simple sketch of a too-smooth small continent or large island.

And here is the same landform with a little added jitter.  Nothing fancy, just a human attempt at randomness with a guide for the overall shape.

A little bit better, I think.  Now, to scale it down, I can pick an area to zoom in on and sketch it out.  It will look pretty smooth when I do this.  Even a fairly sharp squiggle looks pretty gradual when you get real close, right, flat-earthers?

Here's a fairly rough stretch of coast just east of the south-west corner of the continent, scaled up 10x and with the color changed to grey.  If I was doing this by hand, it would be lightly sketched at this stage.

Now I go over it to add some jitter, just like with the continent scale map.

If I wanted to I could zoom in again at this point, maybe to make a city scale map, and add jitter again.  Zooming in and adding jitter at each step allows you to have coastlines of infinite length, just like in the real world.

While I'm on the subject of coastlines, I feel I should point out that areas of especially rugged coastlines tend to encourage seafaring cultures.  If all you have is a straight, smooth, flat coastline, with miles and miles of ocean beyond it, people build boats just big enough to go out and catch fish, and come home after a few hours.  Only fishermen ever go out, and they're not generally a large portion of the population.  If you have a really rugged coast, though, with inlets or fjords cutting into the land every so often, and the land hilly more often than not, things change pretty drastically.  Now, not only do more people live near the sea, but it becomes much more of a means of travel.  Fishermen, of course, will be out tooling around in boats, but if a farmer has a choice of a 20 mile journey over land to take his harvest to town or a 5 mile trip by boat, even farmers will become proficient boatmen.  When you have more people using a technology and experimenting with it, good ideas crop up more often and are shared across more people, and soon your boatmen are building ships and sailing over the horizon rather than sticking with small boats and heading for shore when the weather looks bad.  If you're world-building and want a nation of great sailors, for realism's sake, you need to provide them a Scandinavia, or a Greece, or a Polynesia, or a Caribbean to sail around in.