Urbancrawls: wealth disparity

Here's something I came up when developing  Kaine - an industrial/Renaissance fusion metropolis using the Vornheim urbancrawl guidelines (SFW). Any city in even slightly self-conscious fantasy is a pretty neat place to live for those rich enough, and, well, sort of better than freezing to death for everyone else - and on top of that, Kaine (and the whole country it's in, Togarini) is noted for having an especially stratified class system.

This made me think I could do something slightly more interesting and appropriate than the suggested "roll d10 to determine location of shit" system. After all, there are neighbourhoods where you can typically find the classy stuff (like opera houses) and neighbourhoods where you only want to go to if you really have to and in broad sunlight (like the place your opium dealer lives, and he's never home during the day).

So, a Wealth Disparity map! We're taking social commentary on fantasy to the next level, you guys. First, procure a neighbourhood map as above. Now take 10 d10s, preferably of the same colour (I'm awfully OCD about this), and roll them. You should get several numbers once, a couple of them repeating twice or more and missing some numbers entirely (if you get some weird result like five doubles and five zeroes, or a perfect distribution of all 10 faces, consider rerolling).

Now write down the number of times that face was repeated next to the neighbourhood. The ones with 0s next to them are out of the process. They're good for inexpensive housing.

Roll 10 dice again. This time, set aside results that correspond to neighbourhoods with no wealth generated in the previous round and reroll them until all the results fit into your better neighbourhood range. If you want less inequality, reroll them only once, if you want more inequality only randomize between 2-3 currently wealthiest areas.

You can repeat the process some more times, and the results will consolidate only to richest neighbourhoods. I did it three times with the following breakdown:

• Seven - 10
• Four - 6
• Five - 6
• Ten - 3
• One - 2
• Three - 2
• Nine - 1
• Two - 0
• Six - 0
• Eight - 0

Since I don't have a d30, I'll put this into a percentage chart, multiplying all ranges by 3 and splitting the remainder 10% equally between all areas. It is possible to find an opera house in the slums, although it might not be working. If you need to find something classy and/or expensive in the city, roll on this chart.

Expensive Stuff Random Distribution Chart One

• 01 - 07 One
• 08 Two
• 09 - 15 Three
• 16 - 34 Four
• 35 - 53 Five
• 54 Six
• 55 - 85 Seven
• 86 Eight
• 87 - 90 Nine
• 91 - 100 Ten

And there you have it. You could also do the opposite thing and make a Poverty distribution chart instead.


I hope you found this useful. If you want me to explain the maths or have some remarks on methodology, feel free to comment.