Wiki, December 27, 2010

More than half the reason I don't post more information to the Same Universe Wiki is because most of the information I have is in a non-formatted, not easily understood table, or consists of scattered information that needs gathering together.  It should be apparent to anyone who has seen a good deal of the Wiki that my world is in a constant state of creation, or flux.  So I post material as I format it, and I format as I gather that material together.

Such as it is with the Father's Table which I've posted.  The original is somewhere on my blog, though I can't find it without combing through it post by post it seems.  This table is marginally updated, with some new professions and some of the added abilities (now called 'legacies') cleaned up after running with them.  My players love this table, since it gives them a bonus ability, plus a sense of origin; it is seen as a kind of lottery which you win or don't win at.  Every profession is technically a 'winner,' but some are obviously much better than others.  Life isn't fair.

Some of the bonuses fit into house rules for my world, which I haven't gotten around to posting on the Wiki because I haven't worked out yet how to standardize the rule.  The worst of these is the "+1 weather grade" benefit, which refers to an individual's ability to live comfortably in weather conditions different from that of their birth ... someone from a desert climate finding themselves in sub-arctic surroundings would be much more uncomfortable than someone who originated in a temperate climate.  The table for this has been on hold for more than a year (puzzling it through in my head), but my players tolerate these things.  I hope to have something together for it soon.

I have added the standard maps: the West Mediterranean, which isn't much of anything yet; Italy, which the reader should compare with this image here, prior to my completing the Italy map (northern Italy is included on the Germany map); and Greece.  Believe you me, the islands on that last map were no picnic.  I trust the maps continue to impress my readers.  I have received lots of feedback for them.

This being Christmas, I haven't much more.  I've added two tables to my Cities page ... not the standard fare, I assure you.  If you will scroll down the page you will find a list of independent territories, all including the population of that territory and - in some cases - the area in hexes.  It should be obvious from the cities links I've been putting up for weeks (Poland, Sweden, etc.) that the population numbers are not generated out of my ass, but result from reading through material on individual cities, assigning a population to those cities based on an algorithm computed to their 1952 population, and that information used to determine the total population of the area.  Hex areas are computed according to population density and land use.  The numbers for area are, I'm afraid, inconclusive ... since in the case of many of these nations I have total population statistics but not total area.  Still calculating the latter out, province by province.

You will find a break-down of the World Population & Area table below (still on the cities table) as two jpegs, Provinces A-L and Provinces M-Z.  This shows which regions have had the area computed and which have not.  The Ottoman Empire, for instance, is much bigger than 397.4 hexes ... but if you scan down the page, you'll find that only parts of the European Empire are accounted for.

I hope this will feed the fascination of those gentle readers who adore statistics.

For the rest of you, I continue to encourage you to get involved in publishing your own material.  We are regularly getting more than 1,000 page views a week, so I can assure you that posting will drive eyes to your own website and it will get you attention.  Contact me at alexiss1@telus.net if you have anything you'd like to see on the Wiki.