Seems like a nice small town. Though it lacks any way of defending itself... No Walls... No natural funnels or chokepoints... An invading army would have no problem ransacking this place D:

*chuckles* Well, it's on a cliff, surrounded by forest/swamp, and there's a friendly (I think) city on the other side of said forest - it's likely they weren't intended to really be able to defend themselves from an invading army aside from relying on the forest/swamp and nearby city :b I did think of it, though, and had to resist the urge to put in city walls/gates (which wasn't part of my requested assignment, so...)

Ah now I understand... I guess that's just my inner commander thinking 'The people who built this city really are naive in times such as these' ... Though it would have been cool to see remnants of a city wall if the commissioner had assigned that instead; just to show that in the past it indeed had been sieged.

But the cliff and now the forest/swamp seem to help adding in some natural barriers, not to mention another city not too far away.

Stone walls are really too expensive for most towns to have and maintain. Not unless a vast amount of coin was moving through the town. It is easier for a town to build a wooden palisade wall during times of conflict, monster attacks and war. Most medieval towns would rather hire on more guardsmen before wanting to invest in a wall.

I could see this town having decent coin, since they're a trading hub, but they aren't exactly a metropolis with the money to burn and it seemed to me somewhat unnecessary, as you've explained. However, the art director is now convinced it needs a wall XD

But yeah, most towns don't have walls, even if it would make them more defensible, just because it was expensive and labor-intensive. I thought it was pretty good this town had paved streets :V but felt it made more immediate sense since it would make trading/traffic more efficient, and that's this town's Big Thing.

lol, although you might be satisfied to know the art director read your comment and now wants a full city wall added in :V

Oh god D: I'm sorry for causing a storm of change, I didn't mean for you to have more work thrown at you Jocarra D:

lol, it's all good ;)

Historically city walls were relatively rare, not just because they are expensive. In historic Europe there's the concept of "City Rights", the permission to call onesself a city and more importantly build a wall. A town without city rights wasn't even allowed to build walls even if they could afford it.

There's a simple political reason for why this is the case: They weren't supposed to defend themselves.

A town with city walls can declare independence and stand up to a siege. A town without can simply be subjugated by marching an army over. It was in the interest of the major powers of a region to make sure that they can maintain control over that region by force if needed. Too many city walls and that would become difficult. Also, it would make it difficult for an invading army to hold ground, they might be capable of taking the town but they would have to fight to defend all of their holdings. The rulers of the region have the natural advantage of being capable of striking out against invaders from their fortified cities or choosing to sit out a siege.

this is pretty well designed =o
what makes me say that is, whatever to the symmetry and setup of buildings at points which is nice but... there are dirt cut through paths!

curious to what three 4 things are though, the buildings on center bottom most part of image, a bright circle near that to the left, and the T shaped x set of buildings on the top of image, and if the right most squared off spot of buildings are included in the guarded storage.

I feel like the dirt paths helped ground the city in a more medieval setting :) and helps distinguish which parts of the town are more central and "nicer" than others :b Like, since it's a port town that does a lot of trading, I could see them investing in having their market district and high-traffic roads well-paved, and then the richer merchants that are living there wanting to pave the streets they live on out of pride/convenience, but otherwise making do with regular dirt paths.

Near the center-bottom is where I imagined people might have set up smokehouses or canneries to process fishing products or alternatively maybe there's a little hunting lodge or something down there, and it's also where I imagined there being tanneries - being closer to the wilderness and more out of the city proper, since tanning is so notoriously foul-smelling.

The bright circle to the left of that I imagined maybe being either a grainery or a water tower (since it's right near the barracks, and I could see the town guards being responsible for dealing with any fire emergencies aside from their normal duties).

The T-shaped X set of buildings near the top are more recent buildings as the town has expanded outward, and is, I imagine, a bit more of a ghetto, being smaller, cheaper buildings built in the outskirts than the more central ones.

Yeah, the walled off east part of town is all protected storage facilities, although some are inside the walls (and probably more expensive to keep) while the rest is not walled but still regularly guarded.

well the dirt paths seems like extras, but screamed "hey a thief would love these short cuts". x3

ah i figured the extra houses on top were slums because it was already gradually decreasing quality, but they were bright buildings so wasn't 100% on that guess.

Heheh, yeah, I was tempted to add more backalleys and short-cutty-type things but didn't want to clutter it up too much :b

Yup, slums :V I made them brighter yellow maybe 'cause they have more straw in their construction?

The scrollwork letters are somewhat cumbersome to decipher - the 'D' looks like either a zero or an O. The M and N look more like numbers than letters.
Beyond that, very good work. A town with lots of possibilities for many games.

Yeah, I wondered about that myself, although that's a pretty easy fix at least! Thanks a lot for the feedback :3

Love the layout!

Thanks so much!

Its a beautiful birdseye view of this port town.

Thank you kindly <3

Your welcome ^^