heya, i'm preparing to run an urban fantasy dnd campaign where the main city the characters are based in is built on dragon skeletons and absolutely full of magic users. any ideas about how such a city could function? no pressure tho :)
Imo the main difference in high magic cities would be general infrastructure. Magic renders certain things useless or changed. I find you can break this down into three major areas of change.
Portals? Familiars? Arcane zip lines? What if some of the bones were embedded in the ground like a singular train rail and mages could tether to them and skate on them as if they were grinding on a skateboard? (With extra speed and momentum of course)
Every city needs to have business and dealings, but how would they be different with magic? Would the costs be low because itâs so easy to make with magic, or high because of the quality and precision? Are there highly efficient factories with nearly no human influence that no one really knows how they work?
The process of selling is what l is really interesting for me. Maybe instead of building multiple shops, one shop flickers throughout many locations until someone comes close to it. When approached, the shop solidifies until the the deals are finished.
Iâm just gonna list a whole lot of everyday things and some replacements
Post office - phone booth esq system where you have to get an operator to connect the portals
Trash - when burned, the magical essence travels into the air where it sustains a protective barrier around the city
Water - when turning on a sink or anything else that needs water, a portal is opened to a reservoir. Instead of going down the drain, it enters another portal where the water gets cleaned and poured back into the reservoir.
Inside a dragon, in the place where there used the heart, something starts âbeatingâ and siphoning nearby magic. Itâs influence is spreading.
A high ranking official is drilling into the bones and stealing the magic in an attempt to become a lich.
A foundry that has been running for eons broke down and no one remembers how it works.The owners manual has been lost in an library overtaken by knowledge hunting mushrooms.
I hope this sparks some ideas and you have a fun time with this city. Please tell me how it goes when you run it in game.
