I think I need to recalibrate my idea of "fun"
'cause I did math. On my summer break.
For fun.
Not even computer science. Math, actual math...
I wanted to figure out a sort-of reasonable population and population density for one of my DnD towns. After all, my party unexpectedly came upon a stupid amount of money, and is considering buying a house. Considering that space is tight and it's a booming economy, I imagine that houses cost a bit more than otherwise expected, but somehow that got me onto this:
The town's area is about 500 ft x 700 ft, but the river (with runs lengthwise) is about 100 ft wide, so there are 280,000 sq ft in town. About 50% of that goes to roads, markets, the inn, pasture, temples, etc. That leaves 140,000 sq ft for residential living.
Then I figured out density:
Space per person* (sq. ft.) Percent of population
20 70%
40 20%
80 9%
2000 1%
*The space per person is tinier than expected (a 4x5 foot square for 70% the population?), since I'm trying to account for multiple levels, which aren't represented in the total amount of square feet.
And decided that about half the population had shops (at about 40 sq ft per shop).
The resulting equation (where p equals population)
140,000 = (.7 x 20p) + (.2 x 40p) + (.09 x 80p) + (.01 x 2000p) + (40 x .5p)
The resulting population was about 2000.
I can't shake the feeling that there's something wrong with the world...
For fun.
Not even computer science. Math, actual math...
I wanted to figure out a sort-of reasonable population and population density for one of my DnD towns. After all, my party unexpectedly came upon a stupid amount of money, and is considering buying a house. Considering that space is tight and it's a booming economy, I imagine that houses cost a bit more than otherwise expected, but somehow that got me onto this:
The town's area is about 500 ft x 700 ft, but the river (with runs lengthwise) is about 100 ft wide, so there are 280,000 sq ft in town. About 50% of that goes to roads, markets, the inn, pasture, temples, etc. That leaves 140,000 sq ft for residential living.
Then I figured out density:
Space per person* (sq. ft.) Percent of population
20 70%
40 20%
80 9%
2000 1%
*The space per person is tinier than expected (a 4x5 foot square for 70% the population?), since I'm trying to account for multiple levels, which aren't represented in the total amount of square feet.
And decided that about half the population had shops (at about 40 sq ft per shop).
The resulting equation (where p equals population)
140,000 = (.7 x 20p) + (.2 x 40p) + (.09 x 80p) + (.01 x 2000p) + (40 x .5p)
The resulting population was about 2000.
I can't shake the feeling that there's something wrong with the world...