Expanding on Hommlet again

As much as adventuring is the obvious heart of D&D and other RPGs, sometimes my mind just wants to take it slow and settle down for a while.  Sticking to my current study of the old T1 Village of Hommlet over in the Greyhawk setting, it clearly focuses on the things you need to know for the encounters facing you.  And after those quests are done, you are expected to move on to other towns in other modules.  But what if you stick around?  What if you want to just follow some of the NPCs through their lives?  Can the town itself evolve over time?

First, the NPCs listed in the module are all living in moderate luxury with no mention of clutter or mess or farm animals, each with about a hundred GP tucked away.  Their little treasures sound so out of place.  I suppose they were just added to boost the treasure-to-xp total you can get while in town.  The goal of the module is to get 3 or 4 players from level 1 up to level 2 or 3.  So I guess you have to break into every house, steal everything that you can get your hands on, and fence it at the shop where the boss is an agent of the evil temple?  Yeah, I'm not going to be doing that.

I liked the level of detail where each NPC is given a faction (St. Cuthbert or the Druid's "old ways") and a few are specific agents of outside influences (Temple of Evil or the Viscount).  A lot of NPCs are listed as being in the city guard, but this is not a city (duh) and there is no mention of the guard actually doing anything.  I suppose if some ogres came raiding, we could call up all of the guard and hope the F8 and C6 from those towers are not off adventuring.  For a village that has been in the path of the spread of evil, I figure there would be ruins of old walls or palisades around the outskirts, more than just the Moat House.  If it felt like the dark forces were gaining in stregth, I would feel much better with a proper wall and some professional troops on regular watches.

A lot of local campaigns come to mind after my guys cleared the Moat House and looked around.  The Druid is stuck in a tiny grove downtown ... so I assume his main domain is one of the woods nearby and this is just his "grove away from grove".  Even so, I could run some errands for Cuthbert or help the Druid patrol the dark woods that surround the town.  Maybe build some outposts, hire some scouts, run some missions for them.

What's up with the sorry attempt at building that new fort?  There is a carpenter and a stonemason and 6 laborers who live in an undrawn shack in that patch of trees, and they expect to get the thing built some day?  Maybe work with those high level NPCs to bring in a real team of 50 workers and get it done, and while they labor is available, I could have them build a proper base for my guys just up the road a bit.  Or right across the street, just to be a thorn in their side...

Where does all that food come from on the Inn's menu?  You would be hard pressed to find all those fine meats and ingredients in a big city, much less this little frontier hamlet.  The map shows a few tiny "fields", but there must be a wider infrastructure to support the villagers' way of life here.  I'm not saying every little farm needs to be laid out in detail, but I'm tempted to expand those houses where they supposedly do things into proper business setups.  There needs to be at least an acre of crops per villager and some storage for food during the off-season.  That cheesemaker must either have some dairy cows or access to a proper dairy on the outskirts of town -- the cheese isn't going to come from thin air.  For the out-of-town goods, there must be merchants coming and going, and each of those trips might need protection.  

For other resources, there must be hunters going into the woods with chances of finding certain game or encountering other people and things.  And trappers walking their routes, bringing back furs and bush meat, and once in a while not coming home at all.  Fishermen would be working the river.  All the wood is coming from somewhere.  Are the forges and
hearths burning wood, charcoal, coal, or something else?

That's just the food.  Where does the blacksmith get his metals?  There must be some mines in the area, and people working those mines, and trips to and from those mines bringing the goods.  And yes, considering the tone of the game back in the 80's, there is probably all kinds of worker abuse going on, even slave gangs that need liberating.  Could you imagine a fantasy world where the miners are paid a fair wage?

The artisans in town probably band together to go a fair at a bigger town a few times per year to sell their goods. Anything could happen to them along the way.

Becoming part of the community might not be as exciting as slaying trolls, but it's not without interest.  Especially for players like myself who like to add extra notes and tables to simulate all the processes that go on behind the scenes.