The Campaign Builder's Guild

I'm sure many of you have played around with Medieval Demographics Made Easy, but it's missing something. It's designed around humans, and our fantasy worlds have more races than that. So, some time ago, I emailed the author and asked if it would be okay for me to expand the original article. I got the thumbs up, and I have been slowly working on making an expansion to include other races. As a starting point, I'm using D&D 3E's races, as my group can all agree upon that as a rather basic fantasy ensemble.

At the moment, I'm looking at food. Using the height and weight tables from the D&D 3E, I have determined basic calorie needs for each race:

Humans: 2000 kcal
Dwarves: 1800 kcal (weighing in the same as humans, their shorter stature lowers their caloric requirements a bit)
Elves: 1400 kcal (shorter and lighter than humans, their needs are lower)
Orcs: 2300 kcal (taller and heavier than humans, their needs are higher)
Gnomes: 1400 kcal (based on adult human formula, they clock in at 700 calories, but based upon the higher metabolism of smaller animals, I've added a x2 modifier for small creatures; this was based on a 20 pound cat having a 500 calorie a day requirement)
Halflings: 1200 kcal (again, x2 of a 600 base).

For humans, kingdom population density is 30 to 120 people per square mile. One square mile of settled land supports 180 people, meaning maximum population density ends up netting 66% of land as arable land (the rest is hills and woods). I was having difficulty wrapping my head around these numbers to play with them, but then I played too much Civilizations and it hit me. At medieval technology level (and ignoring resource bonus), the maximum amount of food you can get out of a tile in Civ V is 4 (this is farmed, irrigated, grassland). Using this as a baseline, human population density is 45/food (180/4).

Using this as a guideline, I came up with these population density guidelines:

Humans: 2000 calories: 45/food (average 75/square mile) - (6d4x5, average 1.66 food)
   Humans do best in flat-lands with plenty of irrigation. They will operate like standard Civilizations countries.

Dwarves: 1800 calories: 50 people/food (2d4+8*5, average 65/square mile)
   Dwarves prefer hills. Irrigated Hills can provide as much as 2 food with Civil Service. Terrace farms mean they don't require irrigation for 2 food. Due to their favortism of hilly terrain, I'd say 1 square mile of dwarven territory will support 100 dwarves, but since they get 1-3 food from hills, their population density will not fall as low: lets say 80 to 50 dwarves per square mile (2d4+8*5); dwarves can always get at least 1 food from hills, though they do like their mines.
   Dwarves are city builders, so they will have a larger population of urban dwellers.

Elves: 1400 calories: 65 people/food (3d4+10*5, average 87.5/square mile)
   Elves live in the forests. The creation of an "orchard" improvement that grants +1 food (upgraded to +1 food/+1 production later) would allow them to grow at a steady rate, yet still not eclipse humans. This would allow each hex of forest to create 2 food, supporting up to 130 elves. Hills do not affect their food production, so their population is little affected by terrain: 110 to 65 feels right (3d4+10*5); this is based on whether they are using land for food or production.
   Elves are significantly less urban than other races. They should have fewer cities, and even fewer towns.

Gnomes: 1400 calories: 65/food (3d4+5*5, average 60/square mile)
   Gnomes live in the forests and the hills. They do not create orchards; instead, they use their land for it's industrious ability and rely upon their lower needs to provide steady growth. If each hex of forest provides 1 food, and farmed irrigated hills provide 2. Since, like humans, they can't get food from raw hills, their max population and actual max should have a similar ratio: 260 would be allowed by hills with 2 food, so 170 is their actual max. Their minimum shouldn't drop off as far as humans, so 85 to 35 gnomes per square mile seems good (2d6+5*5).
   Gnomes live in many, but small, settlements. They have less cities than humans, but significantly more towns.

Orcs: 2300 calories: 40/food (3d4*5, average 37.5/square mile)
   Orcs live whereever they can. Because they do not improve their land, their food range goes from human's 0 to 4 to a natural 0 to 2. They're also generally pushed into the wilderness, leaving forests as their best source of food (putting them at odds with elves, which makes sense in the stereotypical sense). So their maximum should be significantly lower than humans. In all grassland, their max would be 80 per square mile; a ratio from 60 to 15 works (3d4*5)
   Orcs do not build cities. Their largest settlements could barely be called villages.

Halflings: 1200 calories: 75/food (10d4*5, average 125/square mile)
   Halflings are like little humans. Their maximum would be 300, giving them a standard 200 to 50 ratio (average 125).
   Halflings do not build cities. Their number of towns and villages is significantly higher.

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Are there any initial thoughts to this project?

Should Dwarves and perhaps Orcs not live underground much of the time?  The text seems to suggest that Dwarves live mostly in hills and Orcs in forests, rather than in underground cities and caves, respectively, which is sort of how I see the fantasy stereotype (Dwarrodelf, Goblin Town).

This also assumes that every race has the same metabolism as humans and that it scales linearly with height/weight. Maybe elves need to eat a lot less (they only "trance" 4 hours a day).

There's some studies that indicate that Neanderthals (who were on average shorter than humans) had significantly higher daily caloric intake needs.

Just some food for though.

One of the unexpected/interesting things these demographics suggest is that unless Orcs are a lot friendlier in the implied setting than they usually are, then they're probably a marginalized race likely being hunted to extinction, forced into the forests by the far more populous humans (forests inhabited by Elves and Gnomes who probably aren't too friendly towards them either).  They're probably sort of bandit-bogeyman types, perhaps similar to the Wild Men of medieval legend.

For Dwarves and Orcs, living underground severely hampers their ability to get food. I'm going to be assuming that dwarven cities are underground, with terrace farms on the surface (in my own setting, where dwarves are carnivores, they grow grain on the surface to feed their livestock). For simplicity, I'm using surface dwelling for the first version; my intention (partially from the early responses) will be to have a "fantasy dial" for turning up the assumed fantasy/magic in a setting that would be required for certain things (like a fully subterranean race of city builders).

I did increase the metabolic rate (by x2) for the small races, but yes, I used human caloric calculators. Again, that was for simplicity and for workable numbers. Once the numbers are workable, certain dials can be turned. I do believe, though, that the caloric requirement calculator I used was not linear with height and weight; two people with the same weight do have different intakes based on height, and there is a muliplicative function in the equation if my memory of my nutrition class serves me correctly.

And Steerpike, I'm actually down with that implication. I've always understood Orcs to be not a unified threat unless they came under the banner of some great warlord. Their lack of commanding their terrain, such as building farms, does severely limit their growth, but it also means they can crop up anywhere. Think of the randomly spawning barbarians in Civilizations games. For a more civilized evil race, I assume Hobgoblins will pretty much use human numbers.

I prefer a more folk tale like approach to fantasy beings. For example, underground-dwelling dwarves that subsist on root vegetables such as carrots, onions and turnips - collecting the roots from below by digging upwards to them, without ever setting foot on the surface. Or even more fantastically, dwarves or gnomes that eat rocks! Of course, that kind of stuff tends to follow fairy tale logic which may be awkward to couple with the more scientific logic of demographics.

Good point on underground cities.  Food is always the sticking point.

Quote from: XeviatAnd Steerpike, I'm actually down with that implication. I've always understood Orcs to be not a unified threat unless they came under the banner of some great warlord. Their lack of commanding their terrain, such as building farms, does severely limit their growth, but it also means they can crop up anywhere. Think of the randomly spawning barbarians in Civilizations games. For a more civilized evil race, I assume Hobgoblins will pretty much use human numbers.

Yeah, I thought it was a pretty cool take, actually!

Hobgoblins could be interesting... I always picture them kinda like Mongol warriors, a big semi-nomadic horde.