Best laid out non-dungeon module?

[squeen]

Truly!

Is the procedure (setting prep + improvisational NPC interaction + background plots) for cities still "the standard method", or has the game moved on to something different? Something skill-check-y? Something Rrrooooll-Play-y?

As I described in nausiating detail here:

OK. The light is beginning to dawn on me.

 

[Beoric]

Picture like this: you have a list of interesting city scenes/scenarios/encounters/whatever, and they are linked in a flowchart whose movement is based on the results of saving throws/skill checks (or choices, really, if you're all about "muh agency!") - Activity A leads to Situation A if check A succeeds or Choice A is made, and Situation B if check A fails or Choice B is made.

I use the term "guided" in the sense that the players drive the outcomes based on their checks/choices - they "guide" the flow of the chart. "Pre-set" outcomes just means you have the outcomes made beforehand, so it's not invented on the fly.

I can live with that.

OK. The light is beginning to dawn on me.

You want something in between (a) total table abstraction, and (b) minute skill-checks or awkward conversions. Right?

This makes sense to me---although honestly I've never had this be an issue because I lack the tables for (a), and I don't let conversations get awkward or too fiddly (and I there is no 1e conversational skill checks, except a reaction role...which I often forget to use).

However, there is TONS of NPC conversation---but usually only on-topic based on player agenda.

Here's some examples (although this would never happen with my group).

PLAYER: I go up to the bar maid and proposition her.​

DM: She's not interested.​

See, we've abstracted the uncomfortable parts away.

Here's something that did just happen with my players that goes a bit deeper:

PLAYER 1 (disguised as Prince Lars): I look for a back door to the kitchen.​

DM (me): There's one open on the north side of the Inn.​

P1: I walk in.​

DM: The owner's sister-in-law is there. She asks if she can be of service.​

P1: I tell her I want a chunk of raw meat.​

DM (not doing a girl's voice to the best of my knowledge): "My lord? Wouldn't you rather I prepare you one of our finest steaks?"​

P1: "No. I..errr...need it to maintain my amazing constitution." (a silly and needless lie)​

DM (as cook): "A piece of raw meat? That's...unusual?"​

P1: "I have a piece every day---but I wouldn't recommend you do it. You'd get sick."​

DM (as cook): "Um. Maybe I should go get Gordy...I'm not sure I understand."​

P1: "No! I mean...don't bother him...he's very busy."​

DM (as cook): "My lord! Forgive me! I am not used to speaking with royalty! I fear I've offended you!". She knees in front of you.​

...(etc.)​

The point of all the back-and-forth in this example is the seamless transition between abstracted actions (She asks if she can be of service.) to actually verbal repartee when I (as DM) see an opening to twart/trip-up the player's intent---to add a small challenge to a simple abstracted act.

In this example, the player wants something (raw meat to give to a giant owl), and rather than just make it abstracted/easy on them ("OK. You go to the kitchen and get some".) I use knowledge of the NPC's I've populated the Roadhouse Inn with (e.g. the owner's sister-in-law who runs the kitchen and comes from a near-by farm) to try and add some complexity/challenge to the scenario. All this is complicated by the fact that the PC is masquerading as the crowned Prince is afraid of exposure by acting too suspiciously. When the whole situation starts to spiral out of control in a Marx Brothers-esque manner, that's when everyone at the gaming table has a good time (self included) and even players who aren't technically "present" in the conversation start chiming in on what to say and do.

One other "favorite" lines of NPC interactions include giving instructions to well-meaning-but-seriously-dense NPCs a la the castle guards in Python's Holy Grail. Again: my players want something and I decide it's an opportunity to make it slightly difficult. Challenge is at the heart of any game.

To me, this is a combination of two things:
(a) a well prepared "setting" (i.e. know your cast of actors and the environment)
(b) DM comfort-level with improvisational banter

The whole "plot" is something much larger in the campaign, e.g. we are heading out tomorrow to scout the road north to get to the Steadying.

Also note, I never made a roll. I would/could if I was uncertain of how the NPC would react and I didn't want to "rig" the result...but otherwise, I use my judgement based on my (pre)imagined backstory for the NPC.

This is typical of our civilized/city-stuff: 99% reactive to player-driven motives. In this case, the one player wanted to befriend a giant owl (familiar) of a dead wizard. That's not something I prepped...not a plot-line I put out there for "Tonight's Game"...instead it was just a small tertiary detail of the setting I sketched out almost 6 years ago that the party we just now fiddling with on their 5th visit to that particular podunk establishment.

You see, that's why I think prep (adding interesting, open-ended, and tertiary details) is so important---even if the players walk right past them. Those elements give depth to the world, and allow you to do improv that is not linear/obvious/predictable or arbitrary, but instead riffing off of a foundation that persists whether-or-not the players ever discover it. I'm not sure why this matters to me so much---but it does.

OK. I'm at the end of another long post where I've explained how I'm doing it...and inadvertently sounding like a lecture. That's a false impression. Our "system" works well enough in that I eventually have to coax the party to get moving because they want to repartee endlessly with NPCs and see what verbal hi-jinx result. This is fun, but not our best D&D. Also, as I mentioned before, it's TOO reactive. They get thwarted a bit by my homespun D&D approach, but it lacks the dynamic injection of (as John Lennon famously said) "[D&D] is what happens to you while you're making other plans."

So what I am VERY interested in others sharing (in the concrete) how they run City adventures, as I want "something more" to add to the approach I've already been using.

But I don't want a complex web of tables that just ultimately delivers content I'm going to have to "heavily improvise" anyway---because I feel like I've already got that base covered in a way I am far more comfortable with and I think is a step above either (a) pure randomness and/or (b) pure DM-fiat.

Long post. I know. Sorry. But I'm waiting for some work to get completed...

This is the direction I lean in, and I think falls into the "prep situations not plots" category. I don't think Hommlet is a good example though, because most of the NPC content isn't really gameable.

People have been sharing that information with you all along; you've just been waving it away saying "nah, not my style" or "nah, I'd prefer this". This is what frustrates me about you squeen (and many others round these parts) - you adamantly refuse to adapt anything you do unless it already aligns with what you've been doing.

Actually we've been talking about carousing; squeen is expanding the topic. Nobody has really talked about city crawls, and I don't think I've ever seen a good procedure for it, including the Alexandrian's. My thoughts on this have been developing, but I don't have time to lay them out just now. Maybe I will if the conversation doesn't move on before I get back to it.

 

[Beoric]

Truly!

Is the procedure (setting prep + improvisational NPC interaction + background plots) for cities still "the standard method", or has the game moved on to something different? Something skill-check-y? Something Rrrooooll-Play-y?

As I described in nausiating detail here:

I don't think the new editions push any procedures at all. 4e modules sometimes used skill challenges for specific tasks in city movement. There was one module that I think gave some thought to the issue; I'll look it up when I get a chance.

I note that the city table in Appendix C of the DMG were pretty high level and high combat, and contributed to my sense that movement in cities needs to not be a series of random encounter checks. I doubt 0 level peasants could survive in an by the book AD&D city.

 

[squeen]

@Beoric: Agreed. That's why I pushed my main city (Valgard) to be low-magic (wizards banned, magic item confenscated), very law & order (the majority are lawful, not neutral), and humancentric (with only a few dwarves+hobbits). It was not meant to be the rough & tumble arena of Lankhmar, CSIO, or the Free City of Greyhawk --- just a pocket of order in the wilds that the forces of Chaos were slowly eroding in key areas...as a prelude to invasion/collapse. It's very existence was an affront---something that (if not stamped out) would only grow in strength and drive out the exotic.

With regards to the survival of zero-level humans, Mr. John Byrne (Marvel Silver Age Artist/Writer) recently made the point on his board that there's an inherent paradox in the MCU: average people living in a world were Alien Invasions and Gods-walking-the-Earth are common place. D&D (especially modern D&D because of our built up cinematic tolerance over the past 50 years) has taken that ball and run with it.

The Sigil city T1T pointed me to seems to be an extrapolation of that fantastic-as-commonplace mentality. We are willing to entertain more and more without batting an eye. I'm not saying there is anything wrong with that. I'm just pointing out the trend---a fantasy-media feedback loop!

I'd made the personal decision to buck the trend and go smaller rather than bigger. (At least at the onset.) It's also why I put the dampers on level-advancement. I was reacting to my (out-of-touch) perception of where the hobby had gone. It's not that uncommon in artistic endeavors for someone to occasional reset the clock, get back-to-basics, and find themselves energize by returning to the artistic roots of a thing. It happens in music. It happens in theater/cinema. It had already happened (unbeknownst to me when I got back playing D&D) with the OSR---and then, as is typical, it took a great big weird artsy left turn (crashed and burned?). Nevertheless, return-to-basics is one of the great cycles of human existance.

 

[EOTB]

With regards to the survival of zero-level humans, Mr. John Byrne (Marvel Silver Age Artist/Writer) recently made the point on his board that there's an inherent paradox in the MCU: average people living in a world were Alien Invasions and Gods-walking-the-Earth are common place. D&D (especially modern D&D because of our built up cinematic tolerance over the past 50 years) has taken that ball and run with it.

This is true. It is the difference between a vehicle often used for personal daydreaming, and one that isn't.

D&D, Star Wars, Star Trek - all of them have collective trillions of man-hours invested in people imaging themselves as part of them, in a way the Fantastic Four has millions of man-hours. In comics, even if you imagine yourself in the Fantastic Four, human torch-you is othered in a way Han Solo is not. Instead of being at the top of a social pyramid, you're a force outside of the social pyramid; an orbit too far to be anything except a powerful freak. Comic book characters are rooted for by readers, used in competitive comparisons the way hunters argue ford v chevy, but not re-imagined, personally, as often or as deeply. So comic sins beyond the realism event horizon are much easier to accept as the walter mitty octane drops.

EDIT - this also may play in to why comics RPGs are praised but not played, comparatively, in the numbers of other RPG types.

 

[Beoric]

Comic book characters are rooted for by readers, used in competitive comparisons the way hunters argue ford v chevy, but not re-imagined, personally, as often or as deeply.

I doubt this assertion to be true, at least post-Spiderman. The success of Marvel was in no small part because Stan Lee wanted to make his characters relatable, with relatable problems.

I also don't know how it is possible to, on the one hand, lament the fact that new gamers want to play overpowered characters that are often referred to in the OSR as "superheroes" - and correct me if I am wrong but I believe you have made similar assertions in the past - and on the other hand, suggest that nobody wants to play superheroes.

I think any deficit in the popularity of superhero games results from the narrative and canon baggage associated with settings (or even the genre if there is no explicit setting) and the conventions of the genre that constrain the conduct of players and characters. Settingless, morally ambiguous D&D provides a lot more freedom for people to scratch their personal itches.

 

[EOTB]

I doubt this assertion to be true, at least post-Spiderman. The success of Marvel was in no small part because Stan Lee wanted to make his characters relatable, with relatable problems.

Your doubt doesn't surprise me. And yet,

Instead of being at the top of a social pyramid, you're a force outside of the social pyramid; an orbit too far to be anything except a powerful freak.

The Spider-Man series broke ground by featuring Peter Parker, a high school student from Queens behind Spider-Man's secret identity and with whose "self-obsessions with rejection, inadequacy, and loneliness" young readers could relate.[

I also don't know how it is possible to, on the one hand, lament the fact that new gamers want to play overpowered characters that are often referred to in the OSR as "superheroes" - and correct me if I am wrong but I believe you have made similar assertions in the past - and on the other hand, suggest that nobody wants to play superheroes.

Think about why people in D&D are called "heroes", and yet they needed to differentiate for tights-and-cape-man.

I think any deficit in the popularity of superhero games results from the narrative and canon baggage associated with settings (or even the genre if there is no explicit setting) and the conventions of the genre that constrain the conduct of players and characters. Settingless, morally ambiguous D&D provides a lot more freedom for people to scratch their personal itches.

Do tell! Doubt makes more sense when you don't spend the next several sentences restating me using other words, Beoric.

 

[The1True]

My thoughts on this have been developing, but I don't have time to lay them out just now. Maybe I will if the conversation doesn't move on before I get back to it.

I'm interested, but why would PC's be crawling a city? Don't PC's usually have objectives when in town and it's more a matter of throwing stuff at them while they Point or Path Crawl? Or is that kinda what you're already saying...

 

[The1True]

Dudes, I really fucking hate these point-by-point arguments. They're boring to read and rarely accomplish anything other than to turn interesting conversation into a series of personal attacks.

 

[DangerousPuhson]

Dudes, I really fucking hate these point-by-point arguments. They're boring to read and rarely accomplish anything other than to turn interesting conversation into a series of personal attacks.

Yeah, I haven't seen a best-laid-out module recommendation in the past few pages, that's for sure.

I'm interested, but why would PC's be crawling a city? Don't PC's usually have objectives when in town and it's more a matter of throwing stuff at them while they Point or Path Crawl? Or is that kinda what you're already saying...

I think the term "crawl" is commonly used synonymously with "travel", or perhaps "exploration" - a pushing out beyond the chores of the Point-A-to-Point-B stuff. In my experience, when a party finishes whatever they have to do in a city they poke around for a bit, at least in cities where the hooks seem plentiful and the party expects the DM to have lots in store for them.

 

[Beoric]

I'm interested, but why would PC's be crawling a city? Don't PC's usually have objectives when in town and it's more a matter of throwing stuff at them while they Point or Path Crawl? Or is that kinda what you're already saying...

I think DMs flounder when players enter an unfamiliar city and need to find stuff. A lot of people feel like they need to play that out - including me at one point in my DMing career, I must admit. The Alexandrian did a series on it.

A point crawl assumes either that you already know where stuff is, or that you are handwaiving the process of finding locations you are not familiar with. Since I'm not aware of any official guidelines for handling urban play, I think a lot of DMs don't clue in to the possibility of the latter, at least not right away. They also get used when DMs what to showcase their precious city, so that players get to "discover" it, or when when looking for things that are truly hidden, like for example an assassin's guild.

EDITED to correct typo.

 

[squeen]

I will admit I too was sometimes taken aback by Beoric's rapid dismissal of my points. I used to think he had it in for me because I maligned his paladin. Now I understand it's just how he communicates.

While Beoric's is correct that Marvel tried to explicitly humanize their characters by placing them in the real-world (even the FF was a "family unit"). However, it does not invalidate what EOTB said about otherness. While (no offense) Beoric's point is one I've heard many times before and is the party-line, knowing what Marvel tried to do and to what extent they succeeded to a horse of another color.

I find EOTB's take on the topic more fascinating because it was (to me) a new idea. I had not considered in the context of superhero comics the otherness-factor as a barrier to self-identification---nor how that relates to role-playing. To me that's food-for-thought and I don't think it should be casually swept aside.

Furthermore, I'm not sure why superhero RPGs are completely different---but they certainly are. More food for thought.

I'm interested, but why would PC's be crawling a city? Don't PC's usually have objectives when in town and it's more a matter of throwing stuff at them while they Point or Path Crawl? Or is that kinda what you're already saying...

This does bring up another point (and yes we have drift off a topic that had played itself out), which is why I got so explicit in how I run City adventures: what do y'all mean by point or path crawl?

I this is key to how you run cities. Does Point Crawl simply imply the players just state a destination as opposed to playing out the navigation to and from?

 

[squeen]

They also get used when DMs what to showcase their precious city, so that players get to "discover" it, when when looking for things that are truly hidden, like for example an assassin's guild.

Ah! You beat me to the reply.

From this statement, it seems like you are poo-poo-ing exploratory play in new citys. True?

I will say that forcing the players to wander around the maze-like corridors of an unfamiliar Palace in the city was a sort of AHA! moment for me, because it became dungeon-like and the pattern of play became familiar (and fun). They got lost. They ended up seeing more of the castle than otherwise, and the place came alive. I think there's an advantage to doing this in a city (or dungeon) the first time --- i.e. explict movement, but OK to hand-waive it away when it becomes routine. Furthermore, if there is at least some explict choice in Route-Taken, then the DM knows what sort of sights/distractions it's appropriate to throw at the players.

Another example from my campaign (imagines virtual groans across the globe): every time the players pass through the gates of the inner wall of the city, they (as obvious outsiders) have to state their name and business to the city guards. This can be very routine (especially mid-day), but allows a choke-point for role-playing and an opportunity for the DM to derail the player's intent. The city doesn't allow magic items, elves or wizards: my party has all of these. Each passage through the gates now becomes a risky venture. A "play-point", so to speak.

Like counting torches, rations, or any consumable --- the players always want to hand-waive this away as "not fun". That's what they say, but I sincerely belive that's BS---they just want a free hand to accomplish their will upon the imaginary universe. It the setting does not push back in some manageable ways, then there is truly NO FUN in the long term. If the goals are too accessable and all gamesmanship evaporates quickly. The game gets dull and we stop playing D&D---it literally happen to me as a player (twice!).

The trick is riding the fine line between difficulty/challenge and tedious/mundane. I think that's ultimately what we are discussion here for Cities. They are so huge and also SO familiar that a DM is unsure where to insert interesting content, and at what level to detail.

Like everything else, I think it's best to start small and work your way bigger. I prefer towns, to cities.

I don't think Hommlet is a good example though, because most of the NPC content isn't really gameable.

While I will say this does feels like just another one of Beoric's need to invalidate any praise leveled at anything 1e (sorry, I am being honest about how you come across to me and I tell you in case you are unware), in this case I also think it's 100% missing a crucial point.

In my long-winded example of here's-how-I-do-cities-now-please-tell-me-how-you-do-them post, I was very explicit that I felt it was key to the style I was using to have an established (detailed) setting with an interesting cast of extras and superfluous details that I can call upon to throw "under the party's bus". In the example posted, I used the sister-in-law/cook because it was the most recent I could recall. That Hommlet is rife with these which makes me suspect that's how Gygax DM'd too.

Here we have Beoric dismissing all of what I deem essential elements in Hommlet as non-gamable!

Let me be pedantically clear---if you truly don't need that, how the hell do you play D&D/cities?

Someone, please tell me. I am dying to know.

(So far all I keep getting is: "Yeah. I do something like that too." but the lack of detail or enthusiasm in the response has me skeptical.)

 

[DangerousPuhson]

Actually we've been talking about carousing; squeen is expanding the topic. Nobody has really talked about city crawls, and I don't think I've ever seen a good procedure for it, including the Alexandrian's.

Carousing and "city crawling" are virtually the same thing; the only difference is that carousing is intended to be semi-random "pick something interesting to do; ok, here are consequences", whereas city crawling is more deliberately-chosen "pick something interesting to interact with; ok here are consequences". They are both part of the same basic game cycle we use in D&D all the time: player choice > roll for outcome > deal with consequences. The amount of input the players make is entirely in the DM's hands in both cases - you can handwave a crazy drinking night just as easily as you can a research trip to the university library, or you can expand on both events just the same.

The real sticky point that everyone is dancing around is how do you present the options of a city crawl to the players so they can choose something to do/somewhere to go.

Mostly I set up the initial layout of the city to the players (describing the atmosphere and architecture of the place) and then ask them what they're trying to do in town - they give me their intent, we roll some dice to determine how well that goes for them, then I improvise outcomes and/or encounters based on those rolls. While all that is unfolding, I'll occasionally point out some interesting scene or site along the way, and players choose whether or not to detour to it.

Sometimes I slap down a map of the city with noted points of interest keyed into it, if I have one prepared (saves the party from just wandering the streets waiting for stuff to happen to them, and sets them up with some preliminary action choices). Yes, giving them the map detracts from the immersion of "exploring" a city that way, but it makes up for that by keeping the players from getting bored by the uncertainty of not having any options.

 

[Malrex]

I see carousing as random events that rumors or adventure hooks can be picked up.
I see city crawling as PCs following adventure hooks to get into the city 'dungeons'. 'Dungeons' here include warehouses, sewers, mansions, castles, prisons, bath houses, or other interesting places found in a city.

For Vermilion, I have about 3 major plots (a word I hesitate to use here) or activities going on that PCs can get involved in or completely ignore. Rumors and adventure hooks can lead PCs into these plots or lead to something completely different or mini-dungeons or they can create their own plots utilizing the different NPCs with their motivations. These plots are very loose...their purpose is not to make a railroad story, their purpose is to help make the city feel alive, with things changing or helping grease the cogs of movement for NPCs/factions and changes in motivation. Because a city should feel bustling, with all kinds of shit going on. It should be impossible for the PCs to do everything in a city...they must make a choice. The plots are their to make the PCs feel small...that there is other shit happening in the world that doesn't revolve around them. When PCs are in a dungeon, it can revolve around their actions...for cities it should be different in my opinion. Seeing the slack jawed expressions of your players when other 'heroes' do something major can help keep them engaged.

PCs can buy a map for 1 gp and even a few guides if they want...so if they buy the map, I can slap down a map like DP does. That's the main difference between a City and a Mega-dungeon in my opinion. PCs can have access to the full map rather than explore each nook and cranny. Because cities don't have trapped passages, trapped rooms, or rooms with monsters and treasures in them like a mega-dungeon...Instead the 'exploration' part for cities is getting to the points of interest and dealing with all the interactions along the way (rumors, adventure hooks, random encounters/situations) that may lead to "dungeons" (buildings, sewers, etc) or quests out into the wilderness.

I don't know if my way to run a city is the best way....but its the best way for me because city adventures always terrified me...and the way I'm creating mine makes me extremely comfortable to run it. But that's the problem or trick...I created it so it all makes sense...the trick is getting others to understand it so they can play it to their full potential as well.


Anyways, sounds like the only way to resolve all this discussion is for all of you to put your heads together and create a city filled with different adventures tied together with rumor tables and interesting NPCs....


*puts down the mic and backs away slowly...*

 

[The1True]

The real sticky point that everyone is dancing around is how do you present the options of a city crawl to the players so they can choose something to do/somewhere to go.

I agree, THIS should be the question. There's a ton of information and hooks available in the city, but the methods used to lob it at the PC's often feel inorganic.

@squeen asks what our procedures are and I think we've been trying to tell him with out writing a novel. I'll try to encapsulate my Sigil procedure:

I ran it like a Path Crawl. So the PC's would get a mission from whatever source (job board, old man in the bar, screams for help, assignment from the boss etc). Thanks to the various conflicting factions I'd usually throw in a couple of counter-missions to keep things spicy. There'd usually be a couple of avenues of investigation with varying travel times in between (very big city).

Along the Path to each node would be Random Encounters, but also scripted events triggered by the character movements and interactions with the factions AND I would point out sights along the way often with their own nested side-quests if PC's chose to investigate. Get to the Node, investigate/interrogate/fight rinse and repeat.

Rarely did the players ever just wander out at the start of the session, point at the map and say "I want to go there today".

One campaign, the PC's were non-native visitors to the city and that one, we did spend a session literally exploring like the city was an unknown wilderness, but I didn't stretch that out.

Yes, giving them the map detracts from the immersion of "exploring" a city

The nice thing about a big city, its maps rarely capture the tangle of medieval alleyways and byways. So even with a map, the PC's can still get lost allowing the DM to drill down to geomorphs or battlemat scale while they try to find their way out.

 

[squeen]

@The1True : Very informative and helpful! Many thanks (for the novel).

@Malrex : Sounds like you and I are on the same page on all counts. Vermillion should be great.

 

[Beoric]

From this statement, it seems like you are poo-poo-ing exploratory play in new citys. True?

Hmm, I'm honestly not sure. I certainly don't think anyone has come up with a good procedure for it, but I am unsure as to its utility as a goal for play. If we are talking about characters randomly wandering around finding things, my initial thought is that (a) sightseeing may be interesting to do, but is not interesting to play at doing, and on the other hand (b) if you treat exploring a city as though it was exploring a wilderness or dungeon ie. trying to find things to slay and loot to take, with commesurate danger levels, it doesn't quite feel like a city to me any more. I mean, you could maybe to that with part of a city, for example in a dangerous district at night, but I'm not sure the same assumptions and procedures should apply.

Maybe that's the problem, cities are so big and have some many possibilities, that we all make assumptions about the intended activity and purpose that are at odds with other people's assumptions. So to be clear (and bear with me, I'm spitballing here):

* I personally don't think that exploration, with the result that the DM gets to describe all the cool stuff that he put in it, but which isn't really gameable, isn't really all that interesting. I say this having made the mistake of doing this myself.

* I personally don't find the prospect of playing out the exploration of the city for the purposes of buying equipment or selling loot to be inherently interesting (although dealing with certain specialized equipment or loot with a backstory can make individual encounters interesting).

* I personally don't think that the act of travel in a city should be inherently dangerous. Using a Schedule C style random encounter mechanic for day-to-day movement in the city offends my sense of verisimilitude.

* The path crawl described by @The1True does not appear to involve exploration in the way I am discussing it here (at least between nodes), and so I am not thinking of this sort of mechanic when I refer to "exploratory play in cities".

* I also count exploration of sites within a city as a different category from exploration of a city. A site within a city is essentially a dungeon. A neighbourhood could also be a dungeon, but you would have to take the time to map it. I think by virtue of the vagueness of the map city exploration is more similar to wildnerness travel - but treating it like wilderness travel brings you back to the question of how dangerous should travel be within a city.

EDIT: I also see a typo in my original post, which likely makes my post make less sense. I will correct it in the original, which should have read (correction underlined):

They also get used when DMs what to showcase their precious city, so that players get to "discover" it, or when when looking for things that are truly hidden, like for example an assassin's guild.

RE Hommlet, I love Hommlet and keep coming back to it. But my problem is with entries like this (which was the first entry I turned to randomly):

17. MODEST COTTAGE: A potter is busily engaged in the manufacture of various sorts of dishes and vessels, although most of his work goes to passing merchants or the trader. He has a variety of earthenware bottles and flasks available for sale. The potter (0 level militiaman, padded armor, shield, glaive; 3 hit points), his wife and four children (two boys are 0 level militiamen, padded armor, crossbow, spear; 4 and 2 hit points respectively all work in the business. A crock in the well holds 27 g.p., 40 s.p., and 6 10 gp gems. They are of the faithful of St. Cuthbert.

None of that really fosters interaction with the potter. The potter doesn't want anything, other than to sell pots. Unless you want a pot, you don't really have anything to talk to the potter about. If you do want a pot, buying the pot is the extent of the conversation. He knows no rumors and has no leverageable connection to anything going on in the village: you know his religious affiliation, and that he sells stuff to the traders, but there is no information in respect of either of those loose connections to suggest that they can be used in any interesting fashion (for example, he has no particular influence with the priests, and doesn't owe the traders money, nor is he particularly suspicious of them). Sure, if you decide to rob the potter and meticulously search the property you know how much loot you will get, but does that happen often enough to deserve an entry.

Nor is that an isolated entry. For example, 16 & 18 include as little gameable content, and 19 is only barely better ("Black Jay" is friendly with the elves to the northwest and has a tragic but irrelevant backstory). In my opinion, the space these entries take up (almost half a page in these instances) is not worth including for the remote chance that any of the listed trivia will become relevant, and gets in the way of finding stuff that actually is relevant. It might be useful to know that there is a potter in the event that the PCs ever need a pot or flask; the necessary information could be conveyed by "17. POTTER: Can make any pot or flask."

That's what I was complaining about when I said that most of the NPC information didn't include gameable content.

It also bugs me that other, more important characters like the village elder, the miller and (I think) the captain of the militia don't even get names (although they might get them in ToEE). Like I said, I still love the module, I just don't think it is a good example of how to present a village for actual play.

I think a better example is present in the Ultimas that I have played, where villagers often have something the player wants, and something the players can give to them, all of which needs to be teased out and results in all manner of other social interactions, quests and puzzles. It gives you a reason to talk to people, a reason for them to talk to you, and interactions that lead to you doing things.

 

[EOTB]

Unlike lairs or even dungeons, cities move independently of the PCs. What’s going on in the city right now? If the DM wants to “play” a city they need the equivalent of a newspaper no one else ever gets to read, updated about as regularly.

Unlike adventure destinations, city destinations should be default passive. Lots going on, PCs see parts of that intersecting their lives, little obligation for them to jump in.

If they’re there for rest and business, ok. Abstract that, mostly. If what’s going on resulted in their jeweler being kidnapped a couple of days ago for ransom, and they want to go unload a couple of gems, roll a RE or two on the way there (most often color briskly summarized) and they show up to a ransacked shop.

They might just go to another jeweler. They might inquire and find out whatever others nearby know. They might get involved. It doesn’t really matter. A city does not depend on their participation. People who live there are the stars. But just this nugget makes it feel real to the players before leaving on their next expedition.

Cities are a DM self-game where the barest tip of the iceberg cracks the waterline

Maybe next time they come into town your newspaper over the past month they were gone says the jeweler was found murdered two weeks ago but the May Day festival is starting. Different descriptions, just as independent of whether they have a reason to care. They go back to their old jeweler and see the shop is boarded up and maybe find out the resolution. Or their happy with their new jeweler and never think twice.

Cities are fly fishing the players. Maybe they never bite. But they feel the river flowing.

Combat in cities is rough-and-tumble mostly. The watch doesn’t care about your missing tooth (or the concussion you gave the cutpurse on Penny Lane while out drinking). But if you leave a body and aren’t a member of a guild or have connections, you’re at risk unless nobody saw anything.

But if you make those sorts of connections, it’s harder to remain aloof when the news is happening. People who pull strings for you also pull strings on you.

IDK, there is no system other than making shit up continuously in a narrative players mostly ignore even if they enjoy it. They’ll start dipping into it eventually, if frequenting the place. And if just traveling through, they hear color, do business, and leave.

If they want to explore your city, ok, take them on a narrative tour of what they see walking around. If they desire adventure, they run into someone from your newspaper

 

[The1True]

Anyways, sounds like the only way to resolve all this discussion is for all of you to put your heads together and create a city filled with different adventures tied together with rumor tables and interesting NPCs....

That's your job buddy. Why we pay you the BIG bucks