Greetings everyone!
I ama newcomer to ACKs and so far, Ilove it. The detail, the custom class and monster toolkits for GMs, its the best I've seen!
But I am a bit stuck. I am trying to map out a world that a friend and I have been conceptually developing for about a year now. In trying to map out a large human Empire, I've butted up against a few questions when it come to actually drawing it out, counting hexes and placing borders and towns:
1) is it necessary or even helpful, to map out the internal borders of a Realm?
E.G., I have the external borders for the empire drawn, and I mathematically know how many 6- and 24-mile hexes are in each Realm down to the County level (though i haven't done Marches and Baronies for the most part). But actually mapping them all out seems to make the map quite cluttered, and I noticed that the ACKs published adventures don't seem to have them mapped out in the sourcebooks either. So how necessary or helpful is it to know exactly where every Kingdom, Principality etc. starts and ends? Is it a waste of time to map out each County and March?
2) The largest settlement at the Empire Level is a Metropolis. Presumably, that Metropolis is situated in a specific Barony of a specific March ... of a specific Kingdom. Does it then automatically occupy the role of "Largest Settlement" for each of those Domain levels in which it is located? Or do you generate a second "Largest Settlment" for each level as you go down, so that e.g. the County Clark has the Imperial metropolis but also its own Class IV Town as well as the Class III Large City for the Kingdom level sitting in the County as well.
3) How do y'all count coastal (partial land, partial water) hexes on the 24-mile map? I know of Alex's "Littoral Hex" rule for 6 mile hexes, but expanding that the the 24 mile scale seems to stretch it too far.
Many many thanks in advance to anyone who takes the time to answer.
I put Class I, II and III cities on my 24mi hex maps. The main area I'm planning to start with is a bunch of Principalities, which basically means one Class II per nation, occasionally some Class IIIs.
When zooming down to 6mi hexes for local maps, I add Class IV and V. For any given nation, it's normally a small number of IVs or a larger number of Vs, depending on how the domains break down.
Class VI and VI+ aren't ever on the map unless they have some direct relevance.
I defined my Principalities by counting 24mi hexes. I think every nation was constituted mostly of whole or half hexes, so counting was relatively easy. I placed smaller settlements with a rough eye for spacing, then later went back and defined the internally borders. At this stage, I've only done down to this level for the main starting play area.
I generated a largest settlement for each vassal domain, down the line.
Where necessary, I count part hexes by checking the number of 6 mile hexes it contains.
My final numbers aren't going to be exact, but I see no reason why they need to be. The margin of error should be small enough to be more than adequate for game purposes, and variations can be explained by any number of real-world factors.
Hello! I apologize for the delay in responding to this. We were in the middle of revising our forum software.
- is it necessary or even helpful, to map out the internal borders of a Realm?
E.G., I have the external borders for the empire drawn, and I mathematically know how many 6- and 24-mile hexes are in each Realm down to the County level (though i haven’t done Marches and Baronies for the most part). But actually mapping them all out seems to make the map quite cluttered, and I noticed that the ACKs published adventures don’t seem to have them mapped out in the sourcebooks either. So how necessary or helpful is it to know exactly where every Kingdom, Principality etc. starts and ends? Is it a waste of time to map out each County and March?
I almost never map them out, no. IF it becomes relevant, then I draw them, but in most cases it’s not relevant to adventurers. Having looked at real-world maps of Medieval England and the Holy Roman Empire, I suspect that half the time the inhabitants weren’t entirely sure who ruled what outside of their local area. It was just bafflingly complex and confusing.
- The largest settlement at the Empire Level is a Metropolis. Presumably, that Metropolis is situated in a specific Barony of a specific March … of a specific Kingdom. Does it then automatically occupy the role of “Largest Settlement” for each of those Domain levels in which it is located? Or do you generate a second “Largest Settlment” for each level as you go down, so that e.g. the County Clark has the Imperial metropolis but also its own Class IV Town as well as the Class III Large City for the Kingdom level sitting in the County as well.
The key is to remember at each level of the realm that tier will have a personal domain. So the Emperor of an Empire has his personal domain, each King has his personal domain, etc. The Metropolis of an Empire would typically be situated in the personal Domain of the Emperor. E.g. Augustus ruled Rome from Rome.
- How do y’all count coastal (partial land, partial water) hexes on the 24-mile map? I know of Alex’s “Littoral Hex” rule for 6 mile hexes, but expanding that the the 24 mile scale seems to stretch it too far.
I generally just count them as a full land hex at that scale.