Author Topic: Wizard World-Building Help Needed  (Read 2341 times)

Offline adrunkenwizzard

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Wizard World-Building Help Needed
« on: October 21, 2017, 04:23:23 AM »
So I've been digging through the source books available to me (Your Story, Our World, and Accelerated, no Paranet Papers just yet) and I've found some information I thought useful for world-building as it pertained to the White Council was missing (and I couldn't find more than brief handling of the subject in the novels), for the purpose of running a campaign that hews reasonably close to the novels in larger-scope setting details.

In general, my questions deal with just how many wizards there are, and wardens in particular, and how they're dispersed.

Re: the Wardens
In the novels, although the Warden's overall strength is detailed a couple of times, and the spread of Harry and Ramirez's duties as regional commanders are mentioned once or twice, if I recall right, but it's never really gone into how many other US wardens there are, and what, if any, criteria are in place to decide whether or not a city gets a warden posted there.

Re: Wizards/The White Council in general
Other than saying that they're not very common, or even outright  rare, to my knowledge there's no rough estimate for how often practitioners of White Council-caliber/skill-level occur relative to the general populace. For instance, it seems like there are, at the least, several thousand Council-members, and yet Harry (and later, Molly) are the only Council-level practitioners we see residing in Chicagoland, which is one of the largest metropolitan areas in the US. To give some shape to the question, if I were building a campaign set in the DC-Baltimore metro area, and I want to keep the Montrose's as part of the local lore, I'm curious as to if it would be stretching credibility in-universe to then throw at least one more family of wizards on that, and probably another major magical talent coming from a non-practicing family.

On a related note, it's also unclear if White Council-level talents always have to be the offspring of other comparably strong-practitioners, or if it's possible for a child to be "a notch up" from their parents, born either to minor practitioners or entirely non-magical parents.

The Skinny
In light of the above problems, I've been rereading the series to see if there's additional information, but thus far I haven't found any. Is there any canon I'm missing or, failing that, reasonable work-arounds or setting background that you all have found useful and in-fitting with the larger Dresdenverse's themes?


Oh, also, hi, I'm new here. Good to meet you all!
« Last Edit: October 21, 2017, 04:25:39 AM by adrunkenwizzard »

Offline Sanctaphrax

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Re: Wizard World-Building Help Needed
« Reply #1 on: October 21, 2017, 08:36:20 AM »
Welcome to the board.

Re: the Wardens
In the novels, although the Warden's overall strength is detailed a couple of times, and the spread of Harry and Ramirez's duties as regional commanders are mentioned once or twice, if I recall right, but it's never really gone into how many other US wardens there are, and what, if any, criteria are in place to decide whether or not a city gets a warden posted there.

I would expect it to be pretty ad-hoc. I mean, Chicago had Harry posted there more or less purely because he already lived there. I doubt Wardens get posted places the way common soldiers do; if they want to stay somewhere, they probably can.

Not sure about the numbers.

Re: Wizards/The White Council in general
Other than saying that they're not very common, or even outright  rare, to my knowledge there's no rough estimate for how often practitioners of White Council-caliber/skill-level occur relative to the general populace. For instance, it seems like there are, at the least, several thousand Council-members, and yet Harry (and later, Molly) are the only Council-level practitioners we see residing in Chicagoland, which is one of the largest metropolitan areas in the US. To give some shape to the question, if I were building a campaign set in the DC-Baltimore metro area, and I want to keep the Montrose's as part of the local lore, I'm curious as to if it would be stretching credibility in-universe to then throw at least one more family of wizards on that, and probably another major magical talent coming from a non-practicing family.

That wouldn't strain plausibility at all.

My vague impression is that full wizards are about one in a million. So Baltimore could easily have none. But randomness is always clumpier than you'd expect, and wizards have every reason to clump together more than randomness would dictate. There's probably a small town somewhere that just happens to have two dozen wizards in it.

On a related note, it's also unclear if White Council-level talents always have to be the offspring of other comparably strong-practitioners, or if it's possible for a child to be "a notch up" from their parents, born either to minor practitioners or entirely non-magical parents.

They don't. Molly is far stronger than Charity was.

The Skinny
In light of the above problems, I've been rereading the series to see if there's additional information, but thus far I haven't found any. Is there any canon I'm missing or, failing that, reasonable work-arounds or setting background that you all have found useful and in-fitting with the larger Dresdenverse's themes?

Probably worth looking at the Word of Jim board; a quick glance led me to this, which might be useful. Might also be worth reading those short stories about training young Wardens and asking your questions on one of the non-RPG subforums here.

Offline adrunkenwizzard

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Re: Wizard World-Building Help Needed
« Reply #2 on: October 21, 2017, 02:15:53 PM »
Thank you for the help! (Also, I'm sorry, I read *after* I posted this that the forum is going to be closing in the near future; sorry to hear that, and in light of it, I appreciate the help even more).

This information will make for an excellent start on this. Much obliged.