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This is where I'll attempt to illustrate my method for setting creation, and the general background for the Countenance setting, which is a NWOD Vampire chronicle intended to be played by a single covenant PC party.

My first step in designing a city for Kindred was to decide how big it is, and find an acceptable ratio of kindred to mortals. The sourcebooks state that this ranges from 1:100,000 to 1:50000 or even more. I've always felt that clan or covenant meeting at which only four or five people are present does not fit very well with the broad theme of the game. There just really aren't enough vampires in a 40 vampire city to have a lot of intrigue. The figure I went with is 1:25,000, and the mundane human population of the city is around 2.8 million, so the kindred number a bit over 100. This figure gives enough room for, with an even distribution, 20 kindred in each of the five clans, and 20 kindred in each of the five covenants. This distribution would feel artificial, so I decided to allocate kindred to clans and covenants a bit more organically. Certain covenants would appeal more to neonates than to elders, certain elders would be more apt to keep their childer within their covenants, and, seeing as four out of five covenants proselytize, some recruiters may be more successful than others, and some kindred may inspire more loyalty than others. All in all, I felt that a clan membership of about 20 vampires, and a covenant strucsture involving about 20 members, each provided enough framework for sufficient intrigue and interplay.

The Origins of Kindred in the Setting

As important and mysterious as the origins of kindred amongst humans are, it should not be overlooked that the origins of kindred within a given setting should receive some treatment. It seems to me that at some point one or more vampires must have entered a given city or township and claimed domain over it. Though later another group could oust them, it should be observed who came when and what they did. For the City of Countenance, this origin stems back to a single vampire, whose servitors brought him to the city during it's founding, and whose presence was almost literally engineered into the settlement. He began to embrace vampires as the human population grew and became more successful, and his covenant became the way of un-life in the city. Later, kindred of his own clan and other clans would be invited, or would arrive and negotiate their presence in his domain. Eventually he would enter torpor, as is the way of the ancient, and his childer would take over for him. At some point his faction began to lose control of the city, and circumstances eventually came to be what they are, which I will address next. Important to note though, the majority of waking kindred within the city should be able to be traced back to one or two kindred of their clan that entered the city and made domain there. Of course, ancillae could have migrated in from time to time, and later earned enough prestige to embrace, so several outliers should exist, but at some point in the vampiric history of a city there should be an origin for each clan, how they got there, why they came, what they did, and who their allies and enemies are.

The Balance of Power
The main vampire sourcebook details various conventions of rulership of kindred that are the norm, insofar as there is one. One of the key aspects of kindred life is the existence of a Prince and a Primogen council. In some cities, say, a Carthian city, there may not be a Prince, or not a Prince per se. In most other cities a single kindred possesses or claims to possess executive authority over the domain. For this setting, I wanted to divide power up a bit more. I want the prince to be wise, powerful, but dependent on the primogen to maintain his position. The Regent solution presented itself to me as a good one for this. In this city, there are five Regents, one for each covenant, each of which rules absolute within his territory, according to the edicts of his covenant. Court is held by the prince to address kindred wide issues, attempt to mediate territory disputes, and to remedy breaches of the masquerade. The prince of the city has tremendous influence and status, and is very significantly powerful, but has to keep the covenants to which he does not belong on their toes, lest they unite and overwhelm him. The edicts of the Prince are limited to the traditions, and beyond their enforcement he exerts no further authority. Therefore, within each domain, the Regent and covenant authorities dictate the specifics of day to day life. I like this model particularly because it facilitates more intra-covenant interaction, and territory can be won or lost without the say so of the prince.

Territories

I felt like this city should be several 'cities within cities', and essentially the domain of each regent is a self sufficient microcosm. A great deal of territory is unclaimed by the covenants. Some of it is clan possessed hunting grounds, but much of it simply cannot be granted the designation 'undisputed claim'. A significant number of unbound live within 'No-man's land' and 'neutral territory'. Also, I felt like the unclaimed areas of town were a great place to start fleshing out characters that even a party of neonates would be likely to know of and possibly encounter and interact with. Enter "Madame Kim". Kim is a Daeva of asian origin who migrated into the city with the chinese population. She has maintained neutrality with most covenants and kindred, though she has a long standing feud with La Concha, the Brujah Elder and Latino crime boss. Kim maintains perhaps the most desirable herd within the city, and her vicarious control of the Triads through her ghoul "Grandfather Song", gives her control of all of chinatown. Her allegiance shifts frequently, though she will prefer whomever holds claim to territory including chinatown. Access to Madame Kim means access to her herd, which is in and of itself a status symbol amongst the kindred, even more so amongst the elders who may have once had a tryst with the madame herself.

So, the actual process of map making can wait till later, for this part of the creation process I decided to simply generate an idea of how the city is parceled out, and by whom. So, the city is parceled out into domains within tracts of unclaimed territory, and until or as long as an area is 'undisputed', it remains recognized by the prince as entitled territory.

I'm still in the process of illustrating a complete who's who of elders and their childer, but I have found it very important to examine each covenant for clues as to how they are set up, what 'feel' they come with, and which clans are most prominent in them, if any. Following these guides has led me to illustrate certain elders, such as Hazel, the Gangrel that brought both her clan and the Circle of the Crone to the city, and Father, the nosferatu that was the first of his kind to enter, but also who took the Lancea Sanctum from a curiosity to a political force within the city.

My next task is to illustrate a timeline for events within the city. I think Microsoft Excel will come to the rescue again. I think the best way to do it is to start with the founding of the city, and by year progress to the current day. Major events in Mortal and Supernatural societies should be appended, as well as introductions of new clans and covenants, and within each the rise and fall of power, embrace of new kindred, and a total of kindred within the city at any given time. Further background on the elders, such as their sires and cities of origin, should be illustrated with their own backgrounds.

Another approach I'm going to try in the task of fleshing out the city is to assign attributes to the city. I feel like a given city has properties, and these should define, to a certain degree, what is possible for the mortals and kindred living in that city. I think the way I want to do this is from the perspective of influences. The relative size of a sphere of activity and development within the city should determine how much influence there is to be had within it. Suppose I want to define the property of "Influence: Basketweaving". Well, the basketweaving industry is only moderately developed, so perhaps I'll give the property a value of 10. I'll use this number to function as a maximum total of dots of influence in this sphere that any combination of mortals and kindred can possess. Note that if a kindred ghouls a mortal, he gains that mortals influence vicariously, but a high powered rifle can remove that influence rather readily. So, perhaps a kindred has 4 dots of influence: basketweaving, another kindred has two dots, another kindred has one dot, a mortal professor has two dots, and a well known basket merchant has one dot. So, there are now all ten possible dots of influence, and they belong to characters that are defined. If an individual wants to gain or increase their Influence: Basketweaving, they must take it from someone who has it. For mortals, this could be done with blood, with dominate, or with anyone this could be done with guile, manipulation, leverage with other influences, status, or whatever can be thought of. Now, suppose that professor retires and leaves the city. Now only 8 out of 10 dots of this influence are possessed. At this point, the influence growth rules that cheyne developed would come into play, and whoever mobilized the most resources and influence actions the fastest would have the best chance at getting one or both of the remaining dots. Now, it should be noted that these influence parameters and other properties of the city are based upon the maximum size, function, and importance that a sphere can play within the city. By merely opening a university of basketweaving, a kindred does not increase the number of possible points of influence that can exist, basketweaving is still only moderately developed because it's still only moderately important. Now, as we know, influences can extend beyond five, mostly for elders. I think I'll rate each sphere of influence from 5 to 25, with a 25 being perhaps the most important sphere of activity within a city, that is staggeringly developed and perhaps exists as the definition of city in the minds of those who live there. Now, these properties do not change what activating an influence does, they merely define how many individuals can have influence over that area, which depends entirely on how much activity and development a sphere of influence has seen. Suppose a city is a paparazzi and sensationalist media mecca, and media influence property for the city is a full 25. Though a person with a five in that influence could without hesitation squash a story, there could be four other people with fives, or even someone with a six, who could counteract their action. This property also allows for players to know the balance of power. Suppose there are 20/25 influence dots possessed, a player character could snap up that remaining influence. As far as character creation is concerned, a player may buy influences during character creation that are either unoccupied, or are occupied by the players sire, grandsire, mentor, or some other person close to the character who might confer that power to them. The expenditure of points to remove influence from one's sire and confer it to the character should be explained in character background, either because the sire trusts the childe implicitly, or they rewarded the childe with a gift of influence, or maybe it was stripped from the sire, whatever, but choice of sire should include what influences and other attributes can be obtained from them.

The importance of mortals and ghouls

This is something that is almost chronicle specific, in some games, mortals, however vital to kindred existence, are all but invisible, and ghouls are servitors of importance but not vitally so. In this setting, I'd like to emphasize the mortal world and the world of ghouls, almost to the point of setting the scene for the whole game.

I'm considering an optional portion to the module, which would take the characters as mortals, promote them to ghouls, and eventually they would earn the privilege of embrace. Each covenant, clan, and sire might handle their ghouls differently, but as you can tell from my inclusion of mortals in accounting for influence totals, I am certainly giving them added importance. I'm sort of thinking of this as an 'advanced prelude', in which the players get the perhaps rare opportunity to play characters privy to the masquerade, and of value to their covenant, but capable of acting during the day and being involved in more mortal life specific plots. I think this idea has a lot of potential, but only if it is temporary, ghouls are very power limited both in the way of disciplines and also in matters of status. In old wod, a merit existed specifically for kindred that are embraced ghouls, demonstrating that they have established their trustworthiness and place in kindred society. I feel that for the setting I'm trying to develop, and the mood I want to establish, the practice of embracing a ghoul rather than a mundane ought to be the norm, rather than the exception. Opportunities to embrace happen once in a while, most often when kindred enter torpor, meet final death, emigrate out of the city, or when the mortal population expands such that more kindred can be supported. A mortal that has strong potential as a kindred might attract the attention of several sires, creating conflict as to who will be allowed to embrace him, and permission to embrace might come after that mortal has aged and lost some of his potential, therefore, it seems to me, that prudent kindred would ghoul potential childer for several reasons, to stake out their claim to the mortal, to preserve the mortals facilities, and to begin the process of integration with kindred society. A newly embraced kindred that has been a ghoul for many years might have a much shorter introductory period, as he has already studied the edicts of the covenent and clan, developed acumen with one or more disciplines, and learned the traditions by heart.

In considering the concept of a 'character sheet' for a city, I've realized that just like characters, cities grow in power. I'm going to try to translate the attributes of a city into a strikingly similar format to a character sheet. Kindred and mortals alike should be able to attempt to influence the growth of a city in one or more spheres of influence, in its size and total population, in the effectiveness of its industry, and in other aspects as well. A city has a level of importance to nearby cities, to the county its within, to the state, and even to the nation, and various aspects of the city also carry these attributes. The populace of a city often demonstrate a communal 'humanity level', taking bright and happy places like miami in contrast with dark and gothic cities like chicago. I think nearly every aspect of a character sheet should be capable of translation into a city attribute. Being 'from somewhere' is important to mortals in real life, cities have reputations that people take with them when they leave, and people come to cities because of those reputations. I think some guideline for improving a cities attributes should exist, and it won't be all that different from cheyne's influence growth system or the basic expenditure of experience points.

those would be interesting things to track.

one thing you might look at, though it doesn't quite cover everything you've mentioned, is the Damnation City stuff. covers locations, city construction, sites, and stats like security, access, and a bunch of others. worth a look if you are making cities.

I'll have to take a look at that. I like the potential that this has. For example, take the criminal element of my city. Countenance has a rating of 15 for crime. This is principally in the hands of La Concha (4), Madame Kim (4), the Sangiovanni (4), and a mortal group (3).

(The mortal group is a Jamaican syndicate that La Concha invited in, but later broke away from her. It has a supernatural leader of some kind, otherwise it's leader would have been ghouled or embraced to gain the influence, most likely a high or low mage, such that embracing him would kill him, and his successors would maintain his legacy.)

In order to gain influence over criminal organizations, a kindred would have to attempt to damage one of the other groups and take territory, members, and resources away from them. Also, anyone trying to use the black market who has a bad reputation with one of the above groups would have reduced die pools at the least. If someone had managed to piss off madame kim, la concha, the sangiovanni, and the rastas, they would be unable to use the black market, move stolen goods, acquire drugs, illegally gamble, use prostitutes, or any other use of the streetwise skill. I suppose with a disguise roll or enough persuasion, a die roll might be possible, but getting blacklisted by all of the powers that be within a sphere of influence should make it nearly impossible to move within it.

Note that I'm taking the usual meter of 1 to 5 and multiplying by 5. I'm not sure if I'll allow for fractions, that would make things messy.