Community Worldbuilding Project [Ishka: Urban and Urbane]

[BLiZme.2]

Generally I argee with everything you've got here and I think you hit most of the districts.....certainly the major ones. The only thing I wuold add is that The Necropilis and The Temple Disctrict should be on opposite sides of the canyon almost directly across from eachother.

Also I've always assumed The Market District is as close to the center of the city as it can be becaus enot only does it process goods coming in from The Port District but also coming in from the Skyport near Mithril Heights, across land from galdren and beyond, the gate to Aquarane in The Lake District, etc..

Re The Necropilis and The Temple Disctrict I had considered that to but thought it to brazen to just suggest myself,considering everything else I was asserting, i like it.

Re The Market District i see your point but i think we described it as being near the port and sky-port already and therefor near the coat you also have to remember the heart of the mages (edit) district is the Bazaar of the Bazaar a huge astral marketplace wit connections to the portal ports in the lake and a huge gate to the main market so we have one huge market at ether end of the city and they are connected.

I think someone mentioned a specialized steam works that proses semi raw materials to the forms they are received by craftsmen. That could go in the city center think combination lumberyard, stone quarry, wholesale grain market, gravel seller, cement outfitter, basically the craftsman's market not a retail market.

seeing as the map is going to also mark the major teliport stations i think we need to talk out the nature of the rough i like the idea that there are multiple lines. so an academy student could hop the main line(acadamy, primordium, mages, mitheral heights, marcket)(i like this order), to to Primordium Central Station. Then catch the black line(primordium, Ravenhome, Darkcity, necropolis,???) and go through Ravenhome and the Darkcity get out at the necropolis. Cross the gray bridge(main thoroughfare between the necropolis and temple district) then ride the white line (primordium, temple, mitheral heights, milenium grove, Galdren station #1,??? ) through mithral heights and the milenium grove, get out at one of several major grain collections along Galdren. all of this in like two or three hours tops. Then hop the green line(Galdren 1, Ungil,Galdren 2,millennium grove,Galdren 3,locked station (used to be tight next to the main gate of the hunting area now just part of the commons),Galdren 4,primordiom,???,Galdren ?,??? ) back to ungul and just walk to the The Collected Colleges and catch the yellow line (mages, academy, Collages, ???) right back to the academy.
other lines blue (port, lake, river, primordium,???) ???

[BRC]

Mithril Heights was described as being built above one of the biggest Steamworks. The Market district is described as being next to that steam works and the Port district.

I don't think the Station lines should go out to Galdren. They're meant for everyday travel for regular commuters, none of which would go to Galdren.

[BLiZme.2]

i kind of agree with you but i think there should be one branch line for the people of Galdren so they can get in to the city proper so basically the green line goes to several vastly different spots all over Galdren and then drops you straight into the city then out to the sticks then back to the city ect. the green line might even have slightly different stations so it can cray large grain bins.

as to mitheral height ect that just means that thigs get pushed closer to the port how about this

port
Market
The Steamworks
Customs and Immigrations
Mitheral hights

The Art Community
Primordium

... as before

where The Steamworks is right at the base of the tower and Customs and Immigrations is on the edge of the city at the end of a road leading right in to the official main gate of the city, just a title relay.

[Owrtho]

Ravenshome has from almost the beginning been described as being next to Necropolis. It also isn't in the caves. However, that doesn't mean it couldn't be near the entrance to Hedon, making most of the shortest routes there pass through it.

Owrtho

[BLiZme.2]

I never said Ravenhome was in the caves i said it was in a side canyon and i implied hedon was down a cave at the end of another side cavern. You may be right about it being by the necropolis, though something made me think that wasn't right, but i could easily have been wrong. That would make having hedon and the vault together and not over burdening the end of the city with the port hard.

also if it was ok withe everyone else i wold be ok moving Ravenhome away from the necropolis to spred the city out withtheese changes the city loks something like one of these

Spoiler

Show

Sunset Isle

port
Market
The Steamworks
Customs and Immigrations
Mitheral hights

The Art Community
Primordium

?1?The temple district?1?

Stadel

The Collected Colleges

Ungul


The Vault
Hedon
Ravenshome
?1?The temple district?1?
The Necropolis
?1?The temple district?1?
Everdark

academy

halfway mark of the canyon
possible raw materials plant steam-works

The Draconic Heritage Collective

other location of Ravenshome The Vault Hedon

/The Dark City: This feels right to me

Gulliver's Heights
Smallville

Gobin

mages distract
The "millennium" Grove District

Mere


other districts
Galdren: surond city
The Commons North and South: fills city split near DHC and Vault
Ether: overlaps much of the city on the etherial plain.
Terradome:gate in a cave somewhere.
Redmere:main gate in a steam works?
Aquarane:main gate in a steamworks or the lake?
Aerodyne:main gate in midair near mitheral tower.

Spoiler

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Sunset Isle

port
Market
The Steamworks
Customs and Immigrations
Mitheral hights

The Art Community
Primordium

?1?The temple district?1?

Stadel

The Collected Colleges

Ungul

?2?Hedon?2?
Ravenshome
?1?The temple district?1?
The Necropolis
?1?The temple district?1?
Everdark

academy

halfway mark of the canyon
possible raw materials plant steam-works

The Draconic Heritage Collective

The Vault
?2?Hedon?2?

/The Dark City: This feels right to me

Gulliver's Heights
Smallville

Gobin

mages distract
The "millennium" Grove District

Mere


other districts
Galdren: surond city
The Commons North and South: fills city split near DHC and Vault
Ether: overlaps much of the city on the etherial plain.
Terradome:gate in a cave somewhere.
Redmere:main gate in a steam works?
Aquarane:main gate in a steamworks or the lake?
Aerodyne:main gate in midair near mitheral tower.

which is markedly less spread out and more top heavy, both negatives in my opinion and saints forbid we move the necropolis ect all towards the coast, that area is cramped as is.
any other insights would be welcom though.

[Silverscale]

I think the best thing to do from here will be for me to draw out the map and see where things seem to want to fit.

[erictheredd]

a couple of comments about connections--- some places should be smack next to each other, while others have a small piece of commons in between. for example, the necropolis and Everdark should have an adjacent border, but I wouldn't have the two areas sandwiched between the vault and the academy. there should be some "commons" space in between them.
Also, I really don't see Guliver's heights actually being in the canyon, and would put them off to the side, perhaps near an area that wouldn't like sunlight-- like the necropolis.
I appreciate the effort on the map. keep going!

[BLiZme.2]

If you will notice in my rundown of the way the city lines up some of the districts have enters between them and some do not. That is intentional and represents areas of commons like you said, though that dose bear mention, also the ordering of most of the districts without enters is just me trying to get some idea of whic district likly starts first or end last or have to touch, even if some or all of two districts are parallel. like how the temple district and necropolis have ben proposed to be right across the river from one another. they are evan but i would still list them as ether

necropolase
tmple

or

temple
necropolas

i guess i should have explained that more clearly sooner sorry my bad.


as to Gulliver Heights. I mentioned that that district is-int actual in the cavern but siting on the edge of the cliff, withe sections suspended in the clouds. Though putting it near a dark loving district may be nice, do to the perpetual partly cloudiness, but i imagined the cloud houses were very sparse and connected by thin bridges and gates.

Proposed map sketch

Spoiler

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Blue means the shape of the canyon.
Blue means ocean.
Blue means lake.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~Sunset Isle~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
.....................................port \/port
.............................warehouses|warehouses
...................................Market|Market
...........................Steamworks |Steamworks Mitheral hights Customs and immigrations
..........................Steamworks | The Steamworks
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |The Art Community
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |Primordium
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.........?1?The temple district?1?|
.......................................... |
.......................................... | Stadel
.............The Collected Colleges|
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |Ungul
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
?? .......................................| Hedon..............??
??..........................The Vault K Ravenshome.....??
.......................................... |
.........?1?The temple district?1?| The Necropolis
.......................................... | Everdark
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
..............................academy |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.........................halfway mark | of the canyon
.............possible raw materials | plant steam-works
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
........................................... L The Draconic Heritage Collective
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... | Hedon..............??
??..........................The Vault K Ravenshome.....??
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
......................./The Dark City:| This feels right to me
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.....................Gulliver's Heights|
.................Gulliver's Smallville |
.....................Gulliver's Heights|
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... | Gobin
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
.......................................... |
..................................Grove |
...................... The "millennium"|mages distract
......................... Grove District|mages distract
.................................. Grove /\ lake port
........................................ /~~\
....................................... /.~~~\
....................................../~~~~~\
..................................../~~~~~~.\
....................................\.~~~~~~/
......................................\.~~~~./
........................................\~~~./
.................................. Mere \.~/
............................................\/

[TheLonelyScribe]

I have decided we should talk about stations.

Just talking about the public transport, I figure that there would probably be about 34992 stations in Ishka. This would be split down into chunks, nine 'fast circle' stations (taking 45 minutes per complete cycle, and visiting district groups), each connecting to 18 more stations (a couple in each district, taking 1.5 hours per complete cycle), each connecting to two sets of 36 more stations (almost two on each level, one cycle going one way, and one going the other, meaning it takes a maximum of 1.5 hours to get anywhere you want), each connecting to 3 more stations (each level of each district is split into 15 sections, each station covers 5 of these, and it takes 15 minutes per complete cycle).

This means you could get pretty much anywhere in the city within four hours.

O.K, let's split the stations into first cycle, 2nd cycle, 3rd cycle/reverse 3rd cycle and 4th cycle. Remember, although there is only one first cycle, the other cycles are split up and are not connected to each other (just so no-one makes that mistake)

A first cycle station would have: one first cycle chamber, one 2nd cycle chamber, two 3rd cycle chambers and one 4th cycle chamber (even the biggest stations have to be responsible for local travel). The smaller the cycle, the larger the chamber, but not so large that it couldn't easily fill up in 5 minutes. I would have a fair amount of shops that use magical counting systems to speed up transactions.

A second cycle station would have: one 2nd cycle chamber, two 3rd cycle chambers, and one 4th cycle chamber. It would have only slightly less shops than a first cycle station.

A 3rd cycle station would have: two 3rd cycle chambers and one 4th cycle chambers. It would still have some shops, as there is a fair chance that a traveller may be using only 3rd cycle stations on their way.

A 4th cycle station would be almost akin to a bus stop, just a little box tucked away or even just in the street. It would, most likely, have no specialised shops around it.

The first cycle is, of course called the main line. Each of their secondary cycles could be: Black, White, Brown, Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Purple. Most citizens would have good enough colour vision to tell those apart, especially if you put Red and Green far away from each other.

Beyond the nine secondary lines, I think it would simply be referred to by which station you switched cycles at, for instance: I took the main line to the Necropolis, the Black line to 'Upriver Necropolis', then changed to the tertiary line to go to 'Wombletown Grave' (16th level down), then I switched to the quandary line to get to section 5.

Also: I took the main line to the Market district, then switched straight to the tertiary line, and got off at 'The Quick Bend' (2nd level down). Didn't need to take the quandary line, Gordon was already there for me.

And so on, and so on. (I decided to put the 4th cycle as the quandary line as a bit of a laugh, if anyone objects, just say)

A map of the stations would rarely show all of them (that would just get confusing), instead, it would show a number of stations that usually have close ties, and a lot of people wanting to get between them. Travelling by station in Ishka is almost as confusing for a newcomer as just walking.

Now what we need to do is decide where each of the stations on the main cycle are (we know a few, but not all nine, and I don't think think mainline stations would be in the commons), and where the coloured lines go (secondary cycles). Once we've decided, I'll draw a tube/subway map-type thing.

[TheLonelyScribe]

Just thinking, I would quite like to create a base class for Ishka. I thought about it for a while, and this is what I got so far. If you don't like it, just say, if you think it could be improved just say, and if you want me to write it up, just say.

City Specialist:
He would have minimum BAB progression (but see later), and all high saves (overpowered?). He would have a very long list of class skills, and many skill points, a very skill-oriented class. d6 hit die I imagine.

So far this doesn't seem very interesting or anything that other classes can't do, but the way that I thought I could make her suit Ishka is this: City Tricks. At every level (except for 5th, 10th, 15th and 20th level where she gets abilities called Mind of the City, Body of the City, Soul of the City and One With the City) the City Specialist gains a city trick, a city related ability or bonus, power level akin to a feat. These allow for a huge amount of variation, and we would need at least forty I imagine. Some would have requirements (like being in a city, which shouldn't be a problem in this setting), and some could be taken several times. Examples include:

City-Fuelled Accuracy (Ex): Gain a +1 bonus to BAB when in an urban environment. This does count toward multiple attacks. You can take this City Trick at every odd level. Its effects stack. (If this seems overpowered, just remember that if you took this city trick at every odd level and a bonus feat every even level you would basically be a skilled, city-dependant fighter.)

City Fighter (Ex): Choose a fighter bonus feat that you meet the prerequisites for. You behave as if you had taken that feat when in an urban environment.

Gang Leader (Ex): You gain the leadership feat. You must have the Mind of the City class ability to take this City Trick.

Supernatural Savvy (Su): You can tell what time it is and what part of the city you are in at all times.

Street Savvy (Ex): Gain a +2 bonus on two of your class skills. You can take this City Trick multiple times. Its effects do not stack. Each time you take this City Trick you must choose a different pair of skills.

Vermin Master (Su): 4 times per day + your intelligence modifier you can summon a feindish or celstial (or similar non-CR affecting template) dire rat or small monstrous spider. This ability functions as the spell Summon Monster I, except that it always lasts 1 round.

Whadya guys think? I will take the creation of a City Trick as a go-ahead.

[Silverscale]

RE: City Specialist are you going for a kind of Urban Druid, a person who's just really familiar with Ishka, an Urban Fighter, what?

[BLiZme.2]

proposed first cycle stations in geographic and temporal order
down to up river

Spoiler

Show

market/steamworks(right on the border),
Customs and immigrations,
mitheral heights (great view),
primordium,
The Necropolis,
academy,
The Draconic Heritage Collective,
Smallville/Gulliver's Heights(in Gulliver's Heights, across the street from Smallville),
mages distract

also pleas explain the quandary stations better

equivalent description of the teliport line system

Spoiler

Show

there is one main line with nine stops

to explain the entire secondary line requires 9 main stations and 153 secondary stations that is 17 secondary stations per main station for a total of 18 chambers per secondary line. Of all of these stops only one is in a main line station per line.

also there are 5670 tertiary stations 35 for each first and secondary station connecting a total of 36 locations per tertiary line with 72 stops per line 36 up and 36 down cycle. Of all of these locations only one is in a main line or secondary station per line, no tertiary line connects to both a primary and secondary line.

unclear at this time?
for my analysis i assume nine stops per line

My analisis of station pathing

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{TABLE]Station Type|# of stations|# of lines|# of locations per line|total stops this line|line type|# stops per line|time between jumps |# minits per cycle|max wate |Max time to any other |in houres


1st cycle | 9| 1| 9|9| main line| 9| 5| 45| 40| 255| 4.25
2nd cycle| 153| 9| 18|162| color line| 18| 5| 90| 85| 340| 5.666666667
3rd per direction| 5670| 162| 36|5832| tertiary + |36| 5| 180| 90| 430| 7.166666667
3rd cycle total| 5670 | 324| 36|5832| tertiary - |36| 5| 180| 90| 430| 7.166666667
4th cycle |46656 |5832 |9|52488 |quandary |9 |5 |45| 40| 470| 7.833333333
total & formula| 52488=S total| 6166=SPL total |LPL=givin|TS=LPL*SPL |givin |#St=givin| MJ=MPC/#St| MPC=givin| MS=MP-MJ| MT=see below |MTH=MT/60
[/TABLE]

1st cycle MT= (the sum of the maximum times for each cycle level)
Nth cycle MT= (MT of n-1)+(max wate same line for n)

If we have a tiered network like this, which honestly makes the most sense, we will have an enormous amount of local stations and as you see the maximum wight time is more on the order of 8 hours not 4 it takes about 4 to get to the main line then about 4 to get back out to any branch mind you this is worst case scenario as in you have to go to the farthest station every time and don't use any short cuts like walking to a better station.

See also

Spoiler

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The stations moving every five minutes would work fine too if the shops are more generic; the only reason I suggested the half-hour time was for the sake of regulars who might have specific places they like to visit while at the stations. In that case, the theoretic maximum number of stations per line for an equitable number of stops is 145, with the other possible numbers being 72, 36, 18, and 9 stations. The table below shows how long it would take a station to get back to its stop #1, or, in other words, how long it would take to ride a station in a full loop around its line. It also shows how many shiftward and homeward loops the stations will make in a day. That means that if you could shiftward and homeward loops together, it makes twice as many loops; this shows how many it makes in one direction.

{TABLE]

Stations

|

Time

|

Number of Loops
9

|

45 min.

|

16
18

|

1.5 hr.

|

8
36

|

3 hr.

|

4
72

|

6 hr.

|

2
145

|

12 hr.

|

1

[/table]

I strongly urge there to be a balanced number of stops, otherwise shift workers at the station, be it in the shops or workers of the stations themselves, wouldn't be able to get off at the same stop at the same time every day. That would be a very bad thing, because it might leave a worker stranded three districts away from where they live. For the sake of the employees, it really needs to be one of the above setups.

Given the time involved and the number of districts we have, I would suggest either 18 or 36 hours. That leaves a very reasonable amount of time for a loop, and lets hit it a fair number of districts, not to mention the number of loops per 13 hour period it would have. I imagine that there would also be express stations which only have 9 stops and just get you to the general area you want to go.

[Admiral Squish]

I'd take a good long look at the urban soul PRC and steal a bunch of their ideas.

[Silverscale]

proposed first cycle stations in geographic and temporal order
down to up river

Spoiler

Show

market/steamworks(right on the border),
Customs and immigrations,
mitheral heights (great view),
primordium,
The Necropolis,
academy,
The Draconic Heritage Collective,
Smallville/Gulliver's Heights(in Gulliver's Heights, across the street from Smallville),
mages distract

also pleas explain the quandary stations better

equivalent description of the teliport line system

Spoiler

Show

there is one main line with nine stops

to explain the entire secondary line requires 9 main stations and 153 secondary stations that is 17 secondary stations per main station for a total of 18 chambers per secondary line. Of all of these stops only one is in a main line station per line.

also there are 5670 tertiary stations 35 for each first and secondary station connecting a total of 36 locations per tertiary line with 72 stops per line 36 up and 36 down cycle. Of all of these locations only one is in a main line or secondary station per line, no tertiary line connects to both a primary and secondary line.

unclear at this time?
for my analysis i assume nine stops per line

My analisis of station pathing

Spoiler

Show

"Station
Type" "# of
stations" "# of
lines" # of locations per line line type "# stops
per line" minits between jumps "# minits
per cycle" "max wate
same line" Max time to any other "in
houres"
1st cycle 9 1 9 main line 9 5 45 40 255 4.25
2nd cycle 153 9 18 color line 18 5 90 85 340 5 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting**************18 5 90 85 340 5******end_of_the_skype_highlighting begin_of_the_skype_highlighting**************18 5 90 85 340 5******end_of_the_skype_highlighting begin_of_the_skype_highlighting**************18 5 90 85 340 5******end_of_the_skype_highlighting begin_of_the_skype_highlighting**************18 5 90 85 340 5******end_of_the_skype_highlighting.666666667
3rd per direction 5670 162 36 tertiary + 36 5 180 90 430 7.166666667
3rd cycle total 5670 324 36 tertiary - 36 5 180 90 430 7.166666667
4th cycle 46656 5832 9 quandary 9 5 45 40 470 7.833333333
total 52488 6166

If we have a tiered network like this, which honestly makes the most sense, we will have an enormous amount of local stations and as you see the maximum wight time is more on the order of 8 hours not 4 it takes about 4 to get to the main line then about 4 to get back out to any branch mind you this is worst case scenario as in you have to go to the farthest station every time and don't use any short cuts like walking to a better station.

You're making this more complicated then it needs to be. Think of any major Earth City, I always like to use NYC because it's the one I'm most familiar with. There are about 50-80 subway stops. Roughly 10-20% of which are "Express Stops" the rest of them are "Local Stops"

However if we expand that out to Ishka, we've only accounted for the stop on one layer of one district.

So therefore the Primary Line is the one that will very quickly take you from The Port District to The Lake District with only 7 stops in between.

The Secondary Line is the one that connects all the Major areas of the city together grouped by places that are roughly similar.

The Third Cycle Lines take you up and down layers within the same general area.

And the Fourth Cycle Lines are the local stops that take you ever few blocks on same layer.

[TheLonelyScribe]

There are three stations for every quandary line, each visiting one of 15 sections in each area associated with a tertiary line (to clarify, these sections do not all have stops, only three).

The City Specialist is supposed to be a skilled all-rounder, with many different possible playing styles. Think factotum, but able to specialise. It would work for pretty much all urban adventurers. Other City Tricks I'm thinking of include 'Window Box', allowing them to grow enough food for one person in a very small space, and walking through walls type abilities for thieves and stuff.

[BLiZme.2]

@ Silverscale your critiq has a lot of merit and part of what o was geting at was the huge time investment of the system i have an alternative speed up proposal in the spoiler below but yours may be less confusing. All that being said i get the impression you are missing what i was going for withe the chart, probably do to my poor formatting (sorry about the format i went back and fixed it), i was explaining the worst possible travel scenario for the Scribe's network. which start at tear 4 on the node the tier 3 station drops to, where the tire three is in tern the farthest from that lines tier 2, which is the one the main line sends. You then need to go around the main line to the one that sends to you down to the node that drops into the main line to get to the one that drops to the secondary line and then to the other side of the tertiary and then to the quandary that feeds to that one.

As far as i can tell your proposal has a similar problem assuming no walking then yo enter the Fourth Cycle Line at the worst possible point for your goal
visit every station in that forth circle set travel all the way from the bottom or top of the canyon to wherever the next line is ride it around until the next stop is where you got on then do all that in revers the other way yes odds are there was some shortcut you could have taken but that is also true of the other proposal and if there are stops every couple of blocks on every level then we get something like (((400miles*50 miles) / blocks per square mile (guess 10) )*40 levels)= 80000 blocks if half had stations thats 40000 only counting the cycle 4 stations. any way you slice it the network is MASSIVE.

given all that maybe i missed something in any event im not sure what you are describing in your cycle 2 description, which may change the game.

it also seams like you are assuming that all the stations are on the same level i know when i imagined it the leval 3 and 4 stations all bounced up down and all around in the general area of the associated level 2 station, going from the top of the canyon to the bottom, and in to matching caves where appropriate, you just improved it by making the tier 3 primarily vertical and the tier 4 horizontal. ie even expected you could find say a tier 4 feeding the wight line like 2 blocks from a tertiary feeding the green. in fact i expected their would be a wight line and a green line station in the millennium grove unless the green line joins the main line at say millennium grove main line station one of them

the more i think about it i don't think you are relay describing a different system it seems like you are just improving the description of the other system hear let me brake it down

Spoiler

Show

tier one
Silver: Primary Line, Express Stops

"The Port District to The Lake District with only 7 stops in between"

Scribe:first cycle station ,main line

"'fast circle' stations (taking 45 minutes per complete cycle, and visiting district groups"

Spoiler

Show

market/steamworks(right on the border),
Customs and immigrations,
mitheral heights (great view),
primordium,
The Necropolis,
academy,
The Draconic Heritage Collective,
Smallville/Gulliver's Heights(in Gulliver's Heights, across the street from Smallville),
mages distract

Same: can go to major locations almost any ware in city
Differant:7 vs 8 stops max

tier two
Silver: The Secondary Line

connects all the Major areas of the city together grouped by places that are roughly similar.

Scribe:second cycle station , color lines

"each connecting to 18 more stations (a couple in each district, taking 1.5 hours per complete cycle)" it has been mentiond the color lines ar grouped by function ex yelow scholastic,blue water, black darkness, green nature...

Same: grouped by theme
Differant:Silverscale may emphasize geographic distance more and i may have missed something.

tier three
Silver: The Third Cycle Lines

take you up and down layers within the same general area.

Scribe:third cycle station , (double station, New Name Mine )

two sets of 36 more stations (almost two on each level, one cycle going one way, and one going the other, meaning it takes a maximum of 1.5 hours to get anywhere you want)

Same: expanding out around lv 2 associated station.
Differant:Silverscale speechifies relationship as vertical connection.

tier four
Silver: Fourth Cycle Lines

are the local stops that take you ever few blocks on same layer

Scribe:forth cycle station, quandary

each connecting to 3 more stations (each level of each district is split into 15 sections, each station covers 5 of these, and it takes 15 minutes per complete cycle).

Same: expanding out around lv 3 associated station.
Differant:Silverscale speechifies relationship as horizontal connection increases density of stations clearer and more practical description of relative placmint.

Overall
Same:growing levals of spasivic travle hight leval theme grouping top level rapid transit
Differant: Silverscale has clearer breakdown of the bottom tears and a grater focus on geographic grouping arguably better tier 4

from what i can tell we are essentially in agreement about how this should work and if TheLonelyScribe agrees we could just assume that the tie 3 and 4 follow your suggestions. I admit though if i grossly misunderstood your tie two we may not be as close as i think.



speaking more or less universally about the teliportation net.

Personally i advocate having the stations never reverse. Because that makes scheduling very confusing especially given the time it takes to traverse the network. Furthermore if we go withe the stations are buildings module this compliments the multiple tiered network and allows any shops to remain physically fixed in location, which is what generally makes the most sense, while the teliportation chaises are simply moved from station to station.

there are three changes i would make
1. the quandary stations should have no cost it is just not worth it to hire someone to sit at each of those little busstops and count tickets but they still seem like a necessary part of the network.

2. many of the quandary stations would have independant news stands placed next to them like the kind in Newyork thay would sell magazins, gum sigerets, newspapers that sort of thing they would probably be lisinced to be right next to the station but other than that independent unlike the shops in the stations which are ether owned by the station or pay rent to the station.

applies only in the lonely scribe's layout

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3. i dont have exact figurs but it is obvious that if you could get to the top of the network faster then you would be able to move around much faster so i suggest three alterations to the network itself.
1. i would Make the 18th stop, mesured from where it branches from its tier one or tire two root(this is the same stop in ether direction and taks 90
minutes to get to from there), on all of the tier 3 lines output into the same station on the main line IE Primordium Central Station.
2. Primordium Central Station should also be connection to each of the other stations on the main line by a set of eight express chaises one for each of the other stops on the main line. It would cost extra to ride the express chaises or by an express sticker for your pass, each express chaise would be about the size of a quandary chaise and would swap directly with its mate in the other main line station reducing max time between the main line to 10 minutes if you are willing to pay. People riding express always have there pass checked carefully but quickly.
3. lastly there should be two quandary lines running counter to each other like the tertiary lines and sharing there locations scatted through out Galdren and depositind one pair of stops in primordium sentral station.
all of this adds up to Primordium Central being probably the most confusing place in Ishka if not the multiverse.

Sorry for casting Wall of text all the time i just have a lot to say.

[TheLonelyScribe]

O.K. It seems that you clarified some stuff that was already there, and added in some new stuff that made a lot of sense. Sliverscale, I believe, was simplifying and clarifying the stuff I said (I had, from the beginning, meant for the whole vertical-horizontal thing). I put in the numbers, Silverscale interpreted them.

You've got the right idea, and perhaps it would be good to have 9 Quadrary stops as you suggested (changed the name, as quandary already means something, specifically: confusing). I think that is in order.

Do you mind if I tidy up your grammar and spelling, and then we can set it as the official station network compendium?

[TheLonelyScribe]

By the way, eight hours and a bit isn't bad for an area THE SIZE OF A STATE!

[BLiZme.2]

Clean ahead and i liked the pun from the beginning as they are vary confusing, just imagine if you got one wrong. Quaternary means by four if we want it to match tertiary. Also a quandary is more of a riddle or a puzzle.

Also what do you think about not reversing the flow and my other suggestions?
I can cross my state in four and it is much bigger but that's being smart which i assumed i wasn't in the example case, also in a car, so ya is OK i was just saying,

also there are only 46332 tier for stations if we take my Primordium Central Station ideas, it would have 172 more lines and a total 325 more charages for a total of 176 lines and 330 charges all in one building. all changing every 5 minutes.

[Silverscale]

I don't think there should be any one station that is connected to every single line, even Grand Central Station in Manhatten isn't connected to all the various lines that run throughout NYC......most of them but not all. That being said; Yes Primordium Central Station, which by the way should be on the Material Plane with a Gate to the pocket dimension that houses the district itself, is going to be the largest single station and possibly most confusing place in the multiverse, except the Elemental Plane of Chaos.

[BLiZme.2]

I get it now you mean a hub and spoke grid,where the spokes are rings, not a ring with radials, where the radials are also rings. that dose make a lot of sense i dont know if any changes beyond my sugjestid 3 are nesisary to get that kind of efficiency at least if you use the express lines to the rest of the main line or if connecting the tertiaries to one part of the primary is enough but it seams like it.

Time stops at Grand Central
Time stop+extend + widen+ epic archmage with mastery of shaping.

[BLiZme.2]

i only said the tier 3 lines were connection the tier two and four lines are not except the ones that run out of the station as there main conection and ther is only one of each of those.


any idea of how Primordium Central Station is laid out all i can think of is there is a large clock and holomap in the middle of a bid cubic atrium and the express lines ar all off in a large side room with multiple ticket check in gates and turnstile out gates of various sizes. also should fare be higher for large creatures? i think that maybe all the tertiary carriages are kept separate from the other (main line, color line and the primordium local tier 4 carriages) so people who don't want to figure out the tertiarys don't have to. Maybe they are all on ground level and all the tertiarys are stacked around the sides of the atrium. the express gallery would be on the first flour to as would the gate to the Primordium. Should that gate be the main gate to the primordium or should it be somewhere else. Primordium Central Station seems as good a place as any and better than most.

it may look somthing like this

Key

Spoiler

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where
% represent large ramps going up to the next level on the ground or first level and open space on odd levels

* represent noting on ground or even levals but represent large ramps going up to the next level on even levels.

+ represent banks of tier three lines with one numbered ticket collection path allowing accesses to both the up and down lines whit all of the ups to the right upon entering and all downs to the left. On the first flour these are banks of shops of various descriptions with many souvenirs and conveniences like rat on a stick stands, news stands ect on the uper flores there is a slot for a small stall shop resesed into the wall every third line or so.

1 1
1 1 represents the main line stop in Primordium Central Station

2 2
2 2 represents the color line station that feeds straight off of the primordium

4 represents the local tier four line off of Primordium Central

P P
P P represents the main line express terminal with its eight shortcut carriages.

((^)) represents the main doors out to the material plane where the Primordim was originally located in the oldest part of the city

((X)) represents the main gate to Teh Primordium

&&&
&H&
&&& represents the huge clock and holomao which sits on a large pillar the
map is at maximum extension and shows the whole city withe the main line marked as colored dots corresponding to the lines that station it feeds. the holomap sits on top of the clock which has four faces ole lined up with each wall. warped around the base of the pillar is the grand central information kiosk and ticket sails station.

g galidrin line stop right is up left is down from the perspective of someone entering the station.

#represent the open flour of the atrium

______ , | and - represent the stations outer walls

G on the first flour each one represents a gate large enough for the easy passage of a huge creature from the various elemental and other plains the city has major extensions on. otherwise see for levels higher than ground

___________________________
|++P P#1 1#((X))#2 2# 4#+++|
|+*P P#1 1#####2 2###%*+|
|+%################%+|
|G* ################ *G|
|+%################%+|
|G *######&&&#######* G|
|+%######&H&####### %+|
|G *######&&&#######* G|
|+%################%+|
|G*################* G|
|+%*%*##########*%*%+|
|+ +G++##g####g##++ G+ +|
-------------((^))------------|

the whole station is built to be easy to navigate for small to large creatures and is not very difficult for tiny and huge creatures. note huge creatures can only fit on the main and color line carriages. a gargantuan creature can fit through ether of the gates with out magical aid but can not fit most anywhere else except the atrium.
also there are several stands that will cast shrink person and shrink monster on a passenger for a modest fee half standard cost for min caster level actual caster level +1 GP per actual CL, caster level (1d4)d4.

also

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normal Main line

_________________
|#33 ##1 1##2 2#|
|#####1 1##2 2#|
|P ###########|
|$ ####&&#### $|
|$ ####&&#### $|
|$ ########## $|
|$ ########## $|
|$ #######4 ##$|
--------(^)---------


normal tier 2

&&
&& ticket sails and information

33 local tier three lines right(from the perspective of someone entering the station) carriage is up left is down
______________
|#33 #2 2##4#|
|####2 2####|
|$ ########$|
|$ ###&&###$|
|$ ###&&###$|
|$ ########$|
|$ ########$|
------(^)-------

normal tier 3 (shops added because i forgot the first time through)
________
|# 33#4#|
|######|
|## & ##|
|$ ####$|
|$ ####$|
----(^)---

normal tier 4

$ independent news stand
S posted station map listing the other tier four stations on this line this stations tier three line and color line as well as the main line.
___
|4S|__
|##|$|
---

[Silverscale]

If I've interpreted your drawings correctly then yes that's exactly what I'm talking about. The only difference between Primordium Central Station and the other 8 Central Stations on the Primary Line, is that it's connected to more than one Secondary Line.

[BLiZme.2]

Mot exactly correct the Central station is also connected to major thoroughfares on the elemental plains and such. Also the other primary's are not connected to all the tertiary as opposed to only the one they feed main station though i guess that second bit is optional it dose decreas minimum path distance though.
essentially Primordium station is tier 0 and has a main connection to one and from another tier 1 just like a tier one feeds one and receives another tier one. but the tier 0 has a dedicated one to tone to every tier one and then the Primordium is also connected to all the tier three stations and the others are not
i was just lazy and used + to represent both shops on the first level (with lines above in Primordium station only) and (just shops everywhere else). So i guess all the others + could be represented by $ and the 4th tier $ is just different fluff wise(edited to reflect) like i suggested earlier.

unless you were being imprecise in your agreement and implying all teh above which is cool.

[TheLonelyScribe]

OK, time for the Ultimate Station Writeup! (I'm even gonna say where the secondary stations go!)

Stations are building containing chambers that teleport between them. They are similar to Subways and Tubes, except for the fact that the order of stations need not make any geographical sense. Most stations are surrounded by snack stands and news shops.

List of Districts

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Academy
The Art Community
Aquarane
The Collected Colleges
Customs and Immigrations
The Dark City
The Draconic Heritage Collective
Ether
Everdark (stations only dimly lit)
Gobin
The Groves
Gulliver's Heights/Smallville (usually too small for the inhabitants, small ones welcome)
Hedon
The Mage's District
The Market District
Mere
Mithral Heights
The Necropolis
The Port District
Primordium (all lines lead to primordium)
Ravenshome (rules temporarily relaxed in the station)
Redmere
The Republic of Ishka
Stadel
Terradome
Temple District
Ungul

(left out Commons and Steamworks because they are not geographically distinct) (left out Sunset Islands and the vault because you don't use a station to go there)

No. of Districts: 27
No. of Main Line Stops: 9 (0.3 recurring per district) (1 line)
No. of Secondary Line Stops: 162 (6 per district) (9 lines) (18 stops per line)
No. of Tertiary Line Stops: 11664 (both ways) (432 per district, 216 each way) (324 lines) (36 stops per line)
No. of Quandary Line Stops: 46656 (1728 per district) (5832 lines) (9 stops per line)

Main Line Stops: Market (Brown), Customs and Immigrations (Yellow), Mithral Heights (Purple), Primordium (White), The Necropolis (Black), Academy (Blue), The Draconic Heritage Collective (Green), Smallville/Gulliver's Heights (Red), Mage's District (Orange)

Secondary Lines: Secondary lines only have 17 stations here. That is because the 18th station is always the Primordium.

White Line Stops:
Primordium: Central and Upriver,
Temple District Top, Upriver, Downriver, Upright, Bottom, Upleft
Ether: Gate 1, Gate 2
One each of: Mere, The Groves, DHC, Customs & Immigrations, The Groves
Two each of: The Mithral Heights

Black Line Stops:
Necropolis: Top, Upriver, Upleft, Upright
Everdark: Bottom, Downriver, Upleft
The Dark City: Top, Downriver
Various residential: 4 stations
One each of: Ravenshome, The Academy, Mage's District, DHC

Brown Line Stops:
The Market District: Top, Upleft, Upright
Terradome: Gate 1
Stadel: Downriver, Upriver
Steamworks: 2 stations
Various residential: 2 stations
One each of: The Mithral Tower, The Port District, Hedon, Mage's District, Customs and Immigrations, DHC

Red Line Stops:
Smallville/Gulliver's Heights: Upriver, Downriver, Top
Redmere: Gate 1, Gate 2
Gobin: Upriver, Upleft
Steamworks: 2 stations
Various residential: 2 stations
One each of: Ungul, The Groves, DHC, Stadel, The Republic of Ishka, Everdark

Yellow Line Stops:
Customs and Immigrations: Main Enterance
The Collected Colleges: Top, Downriver, Upriver, Upleft
The Republic of Ishka: Bottom, Upriver, Upleft, Upright
Steamworks:2 stations
Various residential: 3 stations
One each of: The Mithral Tower, The Port District, Hedon, Temple District

Orange Line Stops:
Mage's District: Top, Upleft, Upright, Upriver, Downriver
Hedon: Bottom, Upleft, Upright, Upriver, Downriver
The Art Community: Top, Upleft, Upright, Downriver
One each of: Mere, The Academy, DHC

Green Line Stops:
The DHC: Upleft, Upright, Top, Downriver
The Groves: Upleft, Top, Upriver, Downriver
Ungul: Top, Bottom, Upriver, Downriver
Various residential: 3 stations
One each of: Hedon, Smallville/Gulliver's Heights, Gobin, Temple District

Blue Line Stops:
The Academy: Upleft, Upright, Upriver, Downriver, Top, Bottom
Ravenshome: Top border, Bottom border, Upriver border, Downriver border
Aquarane: Gate 1, Gate 2
One each of: Mage's District, Mere, The Port District, The DHC, The Collected Colleges

Purple Line Stops:
The Mithral Tower: Top, Bottom, Middle, Airport
Mere: Upriver, Downriver, Upright, Upleft
The Port District: Top, Upright, Upriver
One each of: The Academy, DHC, The Art Community, Mage's District, Customs and Immigrations, The Market District


Chambers teleport around their respective cycles every 5 mins.
The Main Line takes 45 mins to complete a cycle. A Secondary Line takes 90 mins to complete a cycle. A Tertiary Line: 180 mins (but, because of the reverse version you can get anywhere in 90 mins). A Quandary Line: 45 mins.

Chambers on a secondary line do not connect to other secondary lines except for trough the primary line, just as tertiary lines do not connect to other tertiary lines (except for their reverse counter parts), and quandary lines do not connect to other quandary lines.

Although the Main Line and the Secondary Lines pay no heed to geography, Tertiary lines go up and down through layers (40 layers, 36 stops) and Quandary lines go around the area where the tertiary line takes you.

The maximum amount of time that it takes to get from any one point in the city to another is eight hours, about half of your average creature's waking day. However, most people work close to their homes, at least station-wise, so the longest anyone ever travels to work is usually 3 hours (usually not that long, but it happens).

A Main Line station will have one Main Line chamber, one Secondary Line chamber, one Tertiary Line chamber and one Quandary Line chamber, and will look somewhat like this from above:
_________________
|#33 ##1 1##2 2#|
|#####1 1##2 2#|
|P ###########|
|$ ####&&#### $|
|$ ####&&#### $|
|$ ########## $|
|$ ########## $|
|$ #######4 ##$|
--------(^)---------

Where (^) is an entrance, $ is a shop (for news and rat-on-a-stick), 1 is a Main Line Chamber, 2 is a Secondary Line Chamber, 3 is a Tertiary Line chamber, 4 is a Quandary Line chamber, & is ticket sales and information, and # is empty floor space.

Secondary Line Station:
______________
|#33 #2 2##4#|
|####2 2####|
|$ ########$|
|$ ###&&###$|
|$ ###&&###$|
|$ ########$|
|$ ########$|
------(^)-------

Tertiary Line Station:
_________
|# 33#4#|
|######|
|## & ##|
|$ ####$|
|$ ####$|
----(^)---

Quandary Line Station (where S is a station map):
___
|4S|__
|##|$|

Tickets cost:
OMG GUYZ!!1! How much do tickets cost? We need: day pass, week pass, month pass, year pass. Discounts for children and seniors? Or is there too much trouble with shapeshifters and such (and undead in perfect 'health' claiming to be seniors)

[Owrtho]

That mostly looks good, but I'd note the Ravenshome station would actualy be just outside the district. Mainly because as stated before, things can't be built in Ravenshome. Any buildings or other such things just show up (or vanish) when no one is looking.

Also, while building things is not believed to be against the rules (at least not that anyone has found), the problem exists that in order to build something numerous other rules would be broken (which could range from perceived littering if materials are left at the site, to vandalism for any magical marks that might be made, to destroying buildings to make room, as well as any number of other rules). Due to this no one has ever actually managed to construct something in Ravenshome (most either give up after getting a mark and try leaving before it gets to big, or try to finish and vanish, with their work being undone and things changed back to how they were before).

Owrtho

[TheLonelyScribe]

Actually, I was thinking that the stations would be one of the things that just 'turned up' in Ravenshome. It's not like the ravens would ban movement, and remember, a district is a very large place (about the size of a normal city) so just walking is out of the question.

If you feel strongly that there wouldn't be stations in Ravenshome we could just put some in the elemental air district. I had just thought that there wouldn't be much space to actually put the stations, and (for the sake of evenly divided and regular numbers) left it out.

By the way, am I the only one who slips into pronouncing Ravenshome raven-shome rather than ravens-home? I can imagine such a distorting effect could happen over time, unless there is a Rule about saying it right.

[BLiZme.2]

this looks prey good so far just a couple of nit picks
1 considering the size of the regions and the level detail of put in and number of stations (153) on the 2nt tier, many regions are going to have multiple stations in them. As are all the relay big steam-works even if we don't list them explicitly.

2. The wight line needs some major work. Only the station in Primordium central should be dedicated to the Primordium as the teliport network should be limited to the material plain and Primordium central has the main gate to the Primordium because primordium central is-int technically in the Primordium as much as it is the main gate. If the Temple district is across the river from the necropolis obviously at least one of those stops can't exist, as it would be in the wrong district for its name. Unless that were true for historic reasons. ie necropolis expansion.

3. in my opinion more than one color line could servase a major district just like you have several stops for the primordium and temple district maby each district color line has one main station and several minor stations poe servased district. and any semirelated line could only have one station in the tangential region and all of those stations are located in the same complex

kind of like this

Spoiler

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ware H is an express terminal (same extra ticket as the express terminals in Primordium central) to this regions color line's main station.
B and A meen this terminal is asosiated with another color line and whic ones match up.

a and b are the Quandarys tor A and B.

_________________
|#33 ##2 2# 4#H#|
|#####2 2#####|
|############|
|2 B###&&###2 A|
|2 2###&&###2 2|
|############|
|3########## 3|
|B##b####a## A|
--------(^)--------

or like this if they share the tertiary and quandary.
_________________
|#33 ##2 2# 4#H#|
|#####2 2#####|
|############|
|2 B###&&###2 A|
|2 2###&&###2 2|
|############|
|$ ##########$|
|$ $$######$$ $|
--------(^)--------

4.you forgot the bottom
___
|4S|__
|##|$|
---

as to ravin home i dont think there would be a second or main line station in Ravenhome unless the station is older then the district. I just dont see the Ravens inserting a station into the network, (they don't exert power outside there domain). Further unless they expanded around it they would never steal an existing one. though once they had one they would have no qualms about moving it. Though there is no question there are tertiary and quandary stations just maybe not a primary/secondary or the district has its own network of only tertiary and quandary otherwise you could just leave the district via teliporter.

as to pricing that an interesting question we want a price all but the porist can afford and major employers can hand out like candy but that a low level independent adventurer would not just scoff at. Lets try day pass 1sp, week pass 5sp, month pass 15sp, yearly pass 10gp, small passengers receive a 10% discount, incorporeal or tiny and smaller passengers get a 50% discount, large passengers pay double, gargantuan and colossal passengers by passes at quadruple (and still need to be shrunk to ride) unless they can shape change at will to another size then they just pay double. I think senior discount is 15% applied after size modifications if you are living and are in your old or older age category (or 5% for undead over 200 years or were formerly seniors) each ticket booth has a chart and if your species is-int on the chart you can send a letter to the station authority and receive a refund on twice your discount.

i miss type Ravinholm like that. ha ha iv been forgetting the s the whole time ha ha.

[TheLonelyScribe]

I'm afraid I don't quite understand what you're getting at. If you want to change the lines, just write out your version so I can understand what you're saying better. I also don't quite get what all your As and Bs and express chambers are.

The Main and Secondary Lines are supposed to be independent of geography, so I don't think it really matters where things are for them, if that's what you're getting at. They're really just positioned dependant on the kind of people who might want to be travelling on them.

The Quandary Line station was left open on purpose, it's more like a bus stop than an actual building.

Also, before anyone spoils all this by saying Ishka is too higgledy-piggledy for such an organised system, we can just say that the stations were built fairly recently, when Ishka had expanded as much as it was really going to on the material plain.

Also, I imagine Galdren has its own special system, so no need to worry about that.

[Silverscale]

The only nitpick I have with the system as currently written is that NO Primary station should be connected to all Third Cycle Lines as that would mean that there are hundreds of Third Cycle Chambers in Primordium Central. It should be connected to ALL Secondary Lines as there are only nine of those.

Here is exactly what I think should be found in Primordium Central Station other than the shops, ticket booth, etc.
--One Tier 1 Chamber (As there are only 9 stops on the whole line it just runs in a continuous cycle)
--18 Tier 2 Chambers (9 Lines cycling "Forward", 9 Lines cycling in "Reverse")
--Two Tier 3 Chambers (One cycling up the layers {when it gets to the top of the canyon, it cycles straight to the bottom to start the cycle over}. One cycling down the layers {when it gets to the bottom of the canyon, it cycles straight to the top to start the cycle over}
--Two Tier 4 Chambers (Similar to the way the Tier 3 work only this time cycling "left-right" and "right-left"