Reply With QuoteAdded flat colors for the land and water and marked where I want some terrain features.
City of Eastport
I'm going to try and do a proper WIP thread for this map. The map will be in a similar, if not identical, style as my last town map: Here
I usually start by generating a layout that I like with Watabou's Generator. Then I sketched over it where I wanted the walls, roads, and any significant buildings.
Here's the sketch without the background
I sketched out the roads in more detail than I usually do since this is going to be a large town/small city with more infrastructure.
Added flat colors for the land and water and marked where I want some terrain features.
I think there are too many walls and each enclose only a small area.
it would make sense if it was to protect a castle/citadelle or something vital but petty people don't have that luxury.
I'm also not sure that building the city wall on the other side of the river a good idea. It would make more sense to have it on the same side as the rest of the city.
My Deviantart: https://vincent--l.deviantart.com/
Walled neighborhoods are not uncommon, but they don't really develop that way. More commonly they are a series of houses and buildings surrounding and opening up on a common courtyard and only one or two entrances from the street to that courtyard. Often they are neighborhoods built completely outside the city and then later the city slowly comes to envelop them. For a city that is just growing the walls would form more like tree rings being built to encompass the new areas and most often a fair amount of empty area for future growth. You may have other reasons for the walls but assuming no particular story or societal reason for them to development that is what I would say.
Green is possible suggestions and the question marks indicates walls that I don't really get.
Quite often, cities such as this develop to a point of having a large outer wall, but before this there is a castle with it's own walls and peasants outside of the castle, who, in the time of danger, would retreat to the inside of the castle. This means that the castle is always growing with the town, and should be (if you include the courtyard, keep and such) that the castle be much larger than shown.
Eventually, another wall would likely be developed inside the city to hold the nobles and richer folk, a wall which would likely be paid for by taxes and could only be afforded by these people stated above. This would be like an add on to the castle, which it would eventually mold into to become a part of, making the castle even larger and stronger. This proccess would repeat over and over until rings of walls would develop outside the center of the city, but growing smaller and thinner (walls take a massive amount of money to build, especially in that day and age and require a large population of taxpayers to create) which would make the whole city appear like an onion.
In other words, you can definitely have an outer wall of the city, but it will not encase the whole city because many people will have farmland outside the city or simply live outside for cheaper cause (it is undoubtedly more expensive than the interior of the city) and it is likely you will have a massive castle inside the city that people can retreat to in times of danger that would provide the majority of defense, which would be hard to do and, though useful, it is extremely expensive to create the complex network of walls you have inside the city. I mean no offense, but your castle is unfortunately far too small to adequately defend a city that large with an outer wall. At this point the outer and inner walls would be pointless without troops to defend them and large developments of towers and a large castle and keep to retreat to. On another note, you also have the option (if you so choose) to add your church to the castle, as most castles had churches and temples and cathedrals inside of them, not only because it widened the castle and protected them, but often times because soldiers would rarely harm people inside the church, let alone priests.
Another option you may have, and this is simply a suggestion, is that you may not even need an outer wall (or at least a large one) if the people of the city siphoned off the river water to create a makeshift moat that would not only protect them but also provide water for any farms or gardens, assuming they have the knowledge and (rather simple) technology to do so. It would also allow you to build a wall not out of normal materials, but out of a cheaper fencing material; the earth itself, which you would only have to pile up from digging the trench inwhich you have your makeshift moat (probably giving a large about of clay at your disposal if it is so close to a river)
I say all this, although this is your map and your decision on how it came into creation. You simply need to know in advance how your city developed from the small settlement it most likely used to be, and this should influence the development of walls (most walls never started out as walls, but as trenches, rivers, buildings, roads, etc.)
Just a note for Jesterman: Moats don't act as walls, moats protect walls. A moat without a wall is simply another road. Furthermore filled with water are more expensive to make and maintain than walls are, even stone walls. Unless of course you find a natural feature that can be used as a moat.
Good points but the rich never pay for their walls.
Last edited by Azélor; 08-08-2018 at 03:07 PM.
My Deviantart: https://vincent--l.deviantart.com/
That is actually my point. You see, there is a very convienient river going through, and to create this 'moat' you would have to dig a large trench, most of the dirt and rocks likely to be piled up to create a makeshift wall of their own, or atleast the foundation of one
that's not the point (but yes, i made the mistake of saying such, though that's not quite what I meant) what I mean is that richer people often live closer to the center of a city (better protection, better marketing, etc.) and often times, two things happen. First, as rich people are very protective and build small fences around their property and rather large buildings, it almost makes a large wall of buildings and fence systems, and the buildings being so packed together makes defense on their own. Also, likely the king will likely have walls built closest to him (the center of a town) and often times this will cause, even if not on purpose, the richer folk to be protected more. Also, in several kingdoms, and even governments today, the leading figurehead will take extra action to protect their best tax payers.
The point is, you'll likely have an area of a city/kingdom that is extremely well protected near the center, and the farther out you get, the less money is spent on protection and defense (especially when people likely will retreat to the castle keep in a time of danger.
Another note is that with an outer wall, sometimes one will have long extended walls that go straight out from the center of the city like rays from a sun, which allows roads to move alongside it and hinders an enemy attack, but they are often very simple and straight walls because such is easier to create.
Thanks for all the advice!
I cleaned up the layout a bit, especially the walls. On the note of the castle being bigger, I guess it's my bad for using the term 'castle' in the first place when I intended for it to be a keep/fort. Also, not to sound lazy, but historical/functional accuracy wasn't really at the forefront of my mind when designing this (I guess I'll deal with the repercussions of that). I also labeled the neighborhoods.
Anyway, here's an updated layout:
