Negav - Lower Tier

I announced it a while ago, but have been absent for private reasons for a while... However, finally here is my article for the reworked lower tier of Negav. Next up is the underground, then I will work on the medium and higher Tier description as well. So if you have any suggestion for those, please let me know, either here or via PM.

It has not been proofread or improved yet, so please point out any errors, or ideas to improve the following article. If you have any points of interest, you want to see added, please suggest them as well. ^_^


I kept the descriptions for the arena, the hydromancers, the neko tail and the citroise stands as they were in the wiki already, since I didnt know how to improve them, seeing I did not design them and they appeared specifically made around characters that I dont know anything about.
All else has been redone by me, though I want to remind everyone that credits are given to "Jaette-troll for the Adventurer Guild idea, the Neko's tail, Citroise Smoothie Stands, and Pileuda's Fried Glouteux, and for helping with the description of the Jaslow arena."

Also Archmage Bael helped with a few inputs and opinions. ^_^

Overview:

The lower tier of Negav can be considered Negavs' outer ring. It spans between the giant wall and the inner wall, which separates this tier from the middle tier region and in times of crisis may even somewhat serve as part of Negavs defense for the better situated people living deeper inside the city.
As the name suggests, the lower tier consists mostly of people of a low to medium class standing, though in felaryan terms, that is still a relatively good life. The outer walls and heavy defenses, not to mention the presence of the Isolon eye, that covers all of Negav and beyond, provide excellent protection against the dangers of the jungles, and grant what we would most consider a normal life.
Life quality is simple, yet sufficient. Most citizen live in houses built from clay and Takrit, a stone that is being mined deep underneath in the negavian quarries, and serves as negavs' main building material. It's a cheap and readily avaible, dense sedimentary stone, whose quality and properties mostly resemble that of sandstone. Even though brick buildings can frequently be seen, especially close to the inner wall, many more buildings of the poorest people are homes made of of less durable materials, such as wood, or even woven cloth. The poor district takes up the vast majority of official negavian citizens, but due to the fact most buildings are little more than being squeezed inbetween two others, streets are unorganized and buildings rarely have more than two floors, causing space to be a major problem, and homes to be relatively expensive, forcing many less fortunate people to live on the streets, or underground. Negavian middle tier merchants make a small fortune by buying houses and renting them to the poorer afterwards, leading to a hefty separation of luxury and income even in the outer ring, with parts of the city nearly falling apart with crime and neglection, while on the opposite side of the city hired guards patrol the street, checking on anyone that doesn't look like they belong to there.
Even though negav is pretty much overpopulated as it is, the lower tier is also frequently visited by virtually anyone who dares to set foot on this world via the dimentional portal just outside the city gates as well as travelling merchants and adventurers alike. Due to the fact, negavs lower tier stands open to anyone that is able to endure the isolon eyes warding powers, the lower tier is notorously overcrowded and busy during almost every time of day.


Quarters:

The lower tier can be divided into four general sections, though each section has their own districts and population and merely describe their functionality within the city.

The northern quarter is pretty much built around the victory gate and avenue of heroes, which leads to the middle- and higher tiers of negav. It is focused on economy and military, housing both the largest amount of military barracks, as well as guilds, taverns, inns and even a tourism center. It is relatively safe and peaceful, with most "crime" being tavern brawls and occasional theft, but nothing city guards can't get under control. Most buildings have some sort of function, with their owners usually living either in the floor above or the basement underneath.
During daytime, one may experience the thriving pulse of the city, merchants selling and buying everyday items alongside adventurer gear, survival packages and even some magical artifacts here and there. Smalltalk, laughter and appraising of wares is heard throughout the city landscape, an evernoisy place especially the likes of nekos have to get used to first.
During nighttime, the outer ring lies in darkness with only the major streets being illuminated by magitech lamp posts, and light that shines through the windows of the many taverns and Inns that are still open during the late hours. The streets lie in relative silence, even though still a constant noise of blabbering can still be heard around the main roads.

The western quarter is also known as the skyless city. It got nicknamed by its population for the constant fog of smoke above the streets, that always seems to cover the highest towers of the outer wall in a shady grey smog and during some really bad days, the sky is not visible at all.
The air reeks of molten metal, smoke and garbage and more sensitive noses might even pick up the distinct smell of heavy magic use. Due to the incredible regenerative aspects of the felaryan flora and fauna, as well as the fact that Felaryas sky does not work like a common planets atmosphere, there are far less worries about pollution and long term consequences to the stable ecosystem than on other worlds such as Delurah. This causes the factories to expel most of their gases and waste relatively unfiltered, but at the same time people and environment alike don't suffer from pollution as much. Naturally, the smoke and fog is not exactly a welcomed byproduct, and negavian rulers made it a point to keep most, if not all industry in this western district, because due to negavs geometric location the wind first and foremost blows from east to west, preventing the smoke to darken the skies above the better situated tiers of the city.
Even moreso than the nothern quarter, the western quarter is like the everbeating heart of negavs upkeep, never resting, never slacking off. This quarter houses most of negavs city-friendly industry and manufactorers: Magitech production, smitheries, stone fabrication, the mining entrance, but also leatherworking, clothiers, dyeworks and even some small scale animal breeding.
Other than that, there are simple worker barracks, them being their own districts near the edges of the quarter, and a surprisingly high amount of city guard stations, to protect the industry and workers from crime from outside, but also to ensure the workers do not try to make a living by supplying the towns many black markets. Work here is hard and divided into unforgiving shifts, and even though accidents happen on a semi-regular basis, there are enough human ressources to keep a constant supply of fresh working power. Still, payment is good and those who can afford it, soon move to a better situated area, with a decent income and a relatively secure life.

The southern quarter is notable for both featuring the only other entrance gate to Negav, and the poorest area to live in. Again, being another gateway to the perilous outside, military barracks are relatively common, though guarded off and isolated from the rest of the town. The streets are very dangerous and constant fights between gangs and law enforcers are a daily threat that has demanded countless victims on both sides and even more uninvolved. There are entire districts under the control of cartells and gangs, though officials naturally beg to differ and play down the loss of control as "minor crime that tends to happen like in any other city of this size and diversity". In reality, diversity is indeed much higher than usual, as many nonhuman groups are stuffed into this section of the lower tier. The difference between clans and gangs is fluid and its very hard to make a living with anything entirely legal. Black markets for all kinds of stuff can be found if you know the right person or building to go to and is considered the major source of income for the entire district. Crime rates are relatively high compared to other districts, especially in the sections trouble-zone, Gremona maze, but the city guards do what they can to uphold a basic minimum of safety, at least during the daytime. Unspoken pacts and invisible lines mark a diffuse system of times and places where no law enforcer is ever seen, and in return, the bands try not to cause too much uproar. A network of black money and twisted contracts has ensured a relative stalemate between the biggest clans, who marked their claims for now, though the entire area, with the poor life conditions and high amount of violence are still a melting pot that may explode anytime, should something go out of control, even though negavs supervisors far away in the high tier tend to talk down or are outright ignorant of the precarious situation.

The eastern sector of Negav is almost a pure living quarter where the better situated people live in. It looks very similar to the middle tier, even though it naturally isn't as well protected nor spacious, though people living here tend to have good chances of eventually moving into the next tier. This section mostly contains everyday shops such as bakeries and clothiers, with little to no other industry. People living here can be considered lower middle class, who can afford their own homes, even though some shacks can be seen here and there. Guards regularly patrol the streets, especially on the southern end that borders to the poorest districts. They are comparatively highly paid and usually live in this district as well, causing them to be motivated enough to keep their streets clean, though some gangs and cartells leaders also tend to have a decent living here. To most realistically thinking long term citizen, the eastern sector is what they want to call home eventually, and many of those that work in the western industrial complex sooner or later save up enough money to move to this place.


Points of Interest:

Asianas Bridge
Asianas Bridge, which connects the gate to the northern shore of Motamo River, is a huge and stable construction spanning over 60 meters in width and several hundred meters in length. Capable of withstanding the weight of even the largest amounts of people, animals and even some vehicles crossing it on a daily basis, it is most likely the most traversed structure made by human hands that's still in use. In fact, rumors say that the bridge has and will be able to endure even cannon fire from Negavs city walls, even though there are no visible signs of that actually ever having happened before. While the northern end leads to the dimensional gate, the Motamo docks, and the Inn of heroes, the southern end connects directly to the Victory Gate. Life here is everpresent, with some merchants even placing their wares on the bridge, trying to take advantage and a quick buck out of anyone too impatient or too suspicious to actually enter Negav itself.

Victory Gate
The victory gate is the main entrance to Negav. Towering high above Motamo river, its open gates are a symbol to Negav being the save haven, a bastion against the perilous nature of Felarya. It is also fortified like a bastion, with tremendous walls bearing massive cannons and ballistas to cope with anything that tries to enter negav without permission. Should the Isolon eye ever fail in its function, the victory gate would have enough firepower and resupply to defend the city for quite a few months, and even an army that miraculously managed to reach Negav through the jungle would struggle against its fortifications in vain. Each of the massive towers contains an entire batallion of soldiers that are trained to fight a vast amount of different foes and scenarios alike, capable of defending the gate with their lives, if necessary, and with Asianas Bridge creating a natural chokepoint against any foe that would rely on a numerical advantage.
The Gates usually stand open, to allow for quick entering and exiting the city, though a massive amount of soldiers and magic protections ensure everyones relative safety, even though smugglers dont have too much of a hard time to get their valuable goods into the city if they know the right people or hiding places.

Watchers Gate:
The Watchers Gate is the only other entrance to negavs lower Tier. It connects the southern quarter with the farmlands and jungles just southeast of Negav, and while being heavily armed and protected, it is more specialized in keeping the local wildlife at bay. The gate is much, much smaller than its big equivalent on the north side of Negav, and yet it is still secured with a well played array of trenches, fortifications and turrets, as well as huge calliber cannons in case the Isolon Eye should ever allow some giant predator to close in on the city. Like the victory gate, a whole batallion of troops is at arms and alerted at all times, ensuring the cities safety.

Negavian Central bank:
Naturally, the real bank of Negav is not located in the lower tier of Negav, however, there is a small installation of it right where the Victory Gate leads onto the Avenue of Adventurers. Security is extreme, with the building literally pulsating of defensive magic. All attempts of bank robbery have failed to this point, and even the most ruthless cartells and gangs refrain from attacking the bank by now, even though some voices wisper that the bank itself is run or ínfluenced by at least one such cartell.
Most notably known for allowing people to store their valuable goods inside transdimensional saves and archives, the bank also serves as a place to exchange any currency into skevols. Through a complicated process that's being kept a well hidden secret, bank accounters are capable of determining the exact value of any currency, no matter how akward or abstract it might be, and exchange it into a reasonable equivalent of skevols, allowing trade to happen with off-worlders or even travelling merchants in the first place, seeing how Skevols are mainly only used around Negav itself.

Adventurer Guild:
The Adventurer Guild is a famous and large building in the nothern section of negavs' outer ring. The rundown look with damaged walls, only two floors and a red peaked roof does fool the eye indeed, as the interior is surprisingly luxurious and speaks well of the glory and income of the guilds members. Several shops have settled here, that sell the most expensive, yet most valuable gear, often sold by retired or deceased adventurers. It is not unlikely to even have a tag tell of the former owner of a piece of gear, especially if that owner was a famous or high ranking guild member before, and many dubious merchants in the poor district come here to look for the newest "inspirations" for copying and labelling their own cheap gear, complete with a list of so-called famous previous owners.
Adventurers who join the guild are able to get tasks via a bulletin-board, as well as profit from advice, medical treatment, special protection and help by other guild members. Adventurers are categorized in ranks, with the higher ones often being worn as status symbols inside and outside the guild halls, gaining them the respect of fellow citizen and thugs alike, as well as granting friendly price reductions in some taverns, as they tend to attract less seasoned adventurers in hope for some valuable advice, story or simply recognition, as some adventurers are even considered small celebrities around town.

Jaslow Arena:
Once forbidden by the rulers of Negav, the Jaslow Arena's activity remained clandestine for years, under the command of the now defunct Amundis Jaslow, former head of one of the big criminal groups in Negav. The Arena started from a a hidden room with a pit under a tavern and thrived, growing bigger and bigger. It became popular to the point where the authorities thought closing it would cause too much of a backlash and decided to legalize its existence. Now directed by Amundis's daughter Faydea Jaslow, the arena is today one of the most popular venues in Negav. The Arena itself comprises a wide open-air circular fighting area, with walls all around. These "walls" are more series of arches, set in levels, stacked on top of each other, where the crowds sit to watch the spectacles. Aside from this, walkways connect to a smaller seating area with a glass floor that literally hangs over the arena - only the richest are able to get a seat in this observation deck. The arena also has an extensive underground area, with training rooms, a healing complex and a holding center for animals . There are many scheduled fights, though the arena is open to booking in off hours. It's the scheduled fights that really bring in the crowds. These are usually either ranked fights between the best arena fighter teams, or "novelty" matches that usually involve monsters or beasts of some kind. Some duels take place there as well, and when two people decide they want to publicly settle their score, they sometimes do it here. The spectacles the Jaslow Arena provides aren't nearly as violent and cruel as they used to be in the past, but the fight are still brutal, merciless and dangerous. During the novelty matches some inexperienced fighters occasionally get swallowed by the "beast of the day", and are only rescued by the beast handler if the crowd think they deserved it.
This habit has caused an uproar of those who fight for human rights within the city, who don't want Negav to be a society in which people are getting eaten alive for the entertainment of the audience, however, it seems the simple poor men still enjoy seeing blood in general, and it is a good opportunity for political leaders to display their power - another reason as to why the entrance to the arena is free. Magiocrats seem to believe the intense and sometimes gruesome spectacle provided is a good way to canalize the anger, agressivity and frustration of the Negavians people, and that the access to it should be encouraged, not hindered. More than the spectacle itself, Negavians are fond of all the characters involved, the personal drama, and challenges. Some famous names such as Vyand Nagaslayer, Stethros, Halig the bold etc.. make the heart of many negavians resonate with passion.

Hydromancer Guild:
As Negav grew in size, so did the danger of various hazards such as fires. Firefighters were, at first, a loosely assembled group, made up of volunteers. It was led by the now defunct Hortlin Fisk who, interestingly enough, was also a mob boss. Under his control, the firefighter guild progressively turned into a shady and thriving group, suspected of actually starting more fires than it extinguished them and blackmailing the population. The group was dissolved in 1970 A.U. by the Ps'isol magiocrats, who wanted to "modernize" it. They took advantage of the unpopularity of the organization to create their own, comprised of certified hydromancers coming directly from the Isolon University of Magic. At first, their Vishmital rivals challenged the notion that mages should be in charge of firefighting but, after a few years of its activity, they had to reluctantly recognize the hydromancers guild was extremely efficient at extinguishing fires in record time.
Hydromancer vigiles, as they are called, are mages specialized into manipulating and controlling water, using the nearby Motamo river to draw moisture from it that they turn into water above the fire. The process is quick and require no more than a small team of well trained professionals. They are often completed by a Telekinesis adept in order to sweep away debris or prevent a structure from collapsing. They form today a very effective and solid force, well respected by the citizens for their courage.

Felaryan Tourism Guild:
When the Felaryan Tourism Guild (FTG) was first founded, people considered the entire idea crazy, rather than anything closely resembling a profitable business model. However, the Felaryan Tourism Guild has developed into a comparatively successful organisation, which has its mainstay in Negavs middle Tier, but also a smaller installation in the lower Tier, due to the access restrictions that come to those foreign to the city. The FTG offers sightseeing tours to several felaryan locations, that are deemed both spectacular to see and relatively safe to traverse. Depending on ones pocket money, one may book a forest tour through the outskirts of the Isolon Eyes range, on well prepared paths where carnivorous plants and animals are mere attractions rather than a real threat to ones life, but there are also more costly, and dangerous tours possible, such as a visit to ascarlin mountains, the topazial coast, discovery of the still inhabitated ruins of Ur-Sagol or even an (heavily armed) airship flight around the giant tree and back to Negav. Naturally, those tours are rather expensive and become more pricey the more guards are hired to protect those courageous enough to book a more dangerous tour, but the guild tries its best to ensure the safety and enjoyal of its customers. To ensure that there will be no trouble from legal issues or surviving customers or their relatives, the guild has any participant sign a contract that would speak the guild free of any possible guilt in case of an accident, and that customers would always obey the safety rules and commands of their respective survival guides. However, accidents and deadly attacks do tend to happen from time to time, especially when customers underestimate the dangerous nature of Felarya even in the "safer" regions, or if some unexpected things happen and some predators were not where the guides anticipated them to be.


The Neko's Tail:
A small bar located right between the Low and Middle Tiers. Seemingly only memorable for the rather lewd sign and the frequent shows by neko dancers. However, the bar is known in the underworld as a meeting place of various neko gangs, who plot crimes here for profit or to strike back at their human oppressors. It's also rumored that the barkeep can get nekos in touch with the illegal tinies market... for a hefty price.

The Eat & Defeat:
A twin-business consisting of a tavern and an enchanting smithery of decent quality, that are both known to be run by a single person. Being located right at to the Victory Gate and next to the Negavian Central bank in a side alley, it can easily be considered the first opportunity for newly arrived adventurers to spend their money on food or improving their equipment.
However, the Eat & Defeat's owner Dalia is more memorable among tinies, as she is known to shelter an entire small village of tinies inside her basement, providing a safe haven as well as a comparatively decent food supply in exchange for occasional small favors, at least as long as they obey the rules.

Pileuda's Fried Glouteux
Rather than a single establishment, this name is known to be a whole chain of restaurants, commonly found in the lower Tier of Negav and even some upper levels of the underground. It's namegiver, Pileuda, is a mysterious person, however, in her name the restaurant chain made it a business to take advantage of the incredibly stupid nature of Glouteux. Employees dug spiked pit traps close to the outer edge of the Isolon eyes protective range, before they are tasked to lure in Glouteux by presenting themselves as easy meals, before running off to jump across the spike traps. This way, Glouteux are supposed to run straight into the pits, and thus into their doom, though accidents do tend to happen to employees in training who weren't fast or nimble enough. This mass hunting technique has led to a profitable industry as Glouteux is fried up and served speedily to hungry customers, even though eating at Pileuda's is known to not be the healthiest diet.

Citroise Smoothie Stands
Small and very common shops selling Citroise based-drinks. They are very popular across the city. Citroise smoothies are ever so refreshing and delicious!

Just a shameless plug, I did post a revised version of the main article in this here forum. Could use some feedback and pointers, that'd be very appreciated, especially since I worked on the thing for a while now.

The sticking points is that I reformed the Tourism Guild because the current Tourism Guild is just shit.  It enforces vore just for the sake of it and, by all rights, the place should have been burned to the ground.  The only reason it hasn't, like the Felarya Express, is because the author wills it.  Also, the banks are supposed to be in the Middle Tier.  It says so at the top of the Middle Tier's article.

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Slightly higher than the lower tier of Negav, the Middle Tier is where the majority of Negavians live. The market, banks, temples and most other such public buildings can be found in this tier, as well as many residential buildings. This is also where the public squares and parks are situated.

Also, the placement of the Skyless City bothers me.  There's a place called the Great Foundry, which seems to be Negav's only industry.  The problem is that it's located south-EAST, not west.  Wouldn't it make more sense for magitech production to be where the place with the name Foundry is located?  Also, isn't the Skyless City the nickname for The Pit, which is underground?

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The Pit is a good name - it is generally accepted to be the area where the poorest of the poor live and is often nicknamed the "Skyless city".

Either there is something we're missing, or Karbo was very, very confused when he drew that map.  Other than that, I don't have much else to comment on.  I like the placement of each sector, small inconsistencies notwithstanding.

Just a shameless reminder, this is my article, and I would like you to comment on it. I am aware that you wrote something as well, dont worry, you have not been forgotten, but I would appreciate it if you provided some feedback here as well, if you already post here.

Edit: Or at least contact me about collaboration where appropriate because I am going to revise middle, high and underground tier as well, so if we two work on negav like this, it should be consistent.

Ha ha ha the hydromancers guild, now that was a classic addition to a grand idea. Anyways i overall like the idea, It matches with the underground indefinitely, The only thing i'd like to mention is that i expect there to be a few more places as the years go by 192 square miles is a lot of cover, and i imagine more so in the underground so please leave some anonymous room for a little more creative freedom of building.

Also i don't get pollution in this place because there's no where it would stick. It's contaminated by magic particles (of an unknown sort) that cleans it indefinitely. Other than that, nice work here ama! Hope you and shady can work together to make this one of the best detailed articles on that wiki.

Just a little transcript of what has been happening behind the scenes.

Me wrote:

Sorry for being cranky and aggressive as usual. Lack of feedback on stuff I work on just irritates me to no end. But anyway, collab, I would be happy to do a collaboration with you. Lately I've been feeling like I was in an arms race of sort with you since I've rewritten three articles for now. I was wanting to contact you to see if you were okay with that I was rewriting so many articles, but I felt it wouldn't right because why should I need permission to do something I want?

But back to Negav, really, all I was really concerned about Negav right now was its main article. I wanted to consolidate its history; I wanted to be a little more clear on its geography and infrastructure, by that I mean establish that the city is built on a hill and has a tropical climate, I think; better establish its politics, its economy, and gather any relevant information is either missing or scattered to other corners of the wiki and consolidate it all in the main article.

There really isn't much input from the main article I wrote that would affect yours. I think you did a fantastic job establishing each sector, but like I said, I feel there are some inconsistencies. For starters, the Skyless City. I just can't see it happening because of two things. One is that "Skyless City" is the nickname of The Pit, which is the Underground slums. The map even has "The Pit" written right next to it. So I think there was some confusion there. The other thing is that the presence of air pollution in the west doesn't make sense to me because the Great Foundry is located south, very close to the Watcher's Gate in fact. If there should be smog around, it should be around there. Making the Foundry the place where Magitech is made would knock two birds in one stone. One, it would give the place a purpose, because we can't count on Karbo to write down important information right away when that would make most sense, and two, it would establish where Magitech is made. The other thing is the banks. I don't think putting the central bank in the Lower Tier is a good idea because there are more crimes happening there. I think the central bank should be located in the Middle Tier, with small institutions in the Lower Tier.

Lastly, and it's not an inconsistency, it's the Tourism Guild. Like I said, I hate the current Tourism Guild, the explanation why it's still standing is less than flimsy. It's not even a handwave. I figured tourism can be a legitimate business in Negav since there are a few places on interest in the city itself, and that it's wasted on an institution that enforces vore for the sake of vore just irks me. You can find more in my own article.

Anyway, does that all sound reasonable?

Amaroq wrote:

I dont have any problems collaborating with you, on the contrary, I meant it when I said its better we coordinate ourselves. :3 I do not like arms races either. Theyre annoying, stressful and unfun.

I want to focus on society and general locations, partially diving into politics and economy, so if we coordinate ourselves here it should be fine. Mostly I am going to cover society in the underground, with mafia gangs and how they influence politics and stuff. I will leave the main article, history and that stuff to you, but i would appreciate if I were to write the subsections, namely the tier articles, just like the one I wrote for lower Negav now. of course we can suggest changes or pointers to make both intertwine with each other more.

I also was a little sad about seeing the pit named in the poor district, seeing how its in reality a place underground. However, i tried to make the best of what was there on the map, i couldnt just ignore it. <.< I think having the skyless city as the industrial complex is allright, if you say it is an east wind zone (wind blowing from east to west most of the time). The one silly foundry however is completely off, that is correct. I feel karbo just didnt think too hard about it when making that map. He should just relocate that one letter on the map OR swap east and west on the map, placing the skyless city next to the foundry.

I mentioned magitech being made in the industrial complex as well. So here again we have merely the issue with that silly foundry. Maybe we can establish the foundry is an old, abandoned one that now serves as some highly important groups hideout - or a discotheque!? Those usually end up in the weirdest places Very Happy it would make sense since in my categorization, its in the best situated part of the town.

Misunderstanding. Central bank is in the middle or higher tier. but there are filiales in lower negav, mainly the one where new people can exchange their money. So basically what you feel should be right - is what I intended.

I didnt like [the Tourism Guild] that much either, but I tried to rewrite it somewhat, to make it more "legit". Again I had to work with what I had in the current article, thats why I even straight out copypasted two or three locations. *shrugs* We could ask Karbo to remove it, but with my changes, I dont find it THAT bad, because it is now called a super shady business.

Myself wrote:

I think I have another solution concerning our foundry problem. What if we relocated it to the western sector? That way we have all the smog in the western part of town and the seemingly only industry listed up and running. When you think about it, when it comes to building a city, isn't having the foundry so close to one of the main entrances a bad idea? The map would have to be adjusted a little bit, but that sounds like a minor edit in the grand scheme of things. At best you just redraw where that "v" is at.

A minor nitpick for one of the Lower Tier article would be how only some people are save from being eaten by monsters in the Jaslow Arena. Considering what Dark brought up in the predation thread, it doesn't make much sense considering the type of setting Negav is and how they toned down the blood sport element already, and it also feels like vore for the sake of vore. Not to the same extent as the tourism guild, but still. Also, this is just me and you don't have to add it to the article, but I like to imagine the Arena as a place where pit fighting meets professional wrestling, where pit fighters adopt a different names and persona, and there are on-going storylines and feuds. The biggest difference would be that matches are far less scripted. Again, don't have to add it, the article already mentions "drama" and "characters", I'm just throwing my two cents here.

Amaroq wrote:

Yeah i considered that too, to relocate the facility and be done with it. :3 I think thats the best thing to do as well.

I actually copy-pasted the entire arena part from the official wiki entry, so we can still make changes to that. at the time I did not know how to make this different since it seemed very much like a fanmade idea, so I didnt want to cripple it. Same goes for that citroise stand and the hydromage-thingy. All the other things i wrote by myself though.

I like it, Amaroq. It's short, brief, and to the point, without going into too much detail and still leaving enough to the imagination.



There's a few caveats you might want to reconsider, though, or offer Karbo for reconsideration.

"Most citizen live in houses built from clay and Takrit, a stone that is being mined deep underneath in the negavian mines, and serves as negavs' main building material."
I've got a problem with this sentence- if the Takrit doesn't have any special features of note, then the kind of stone is less relevant than its color.
Second, you cannot mine for rock. When mining, you're supposed to extract as little material as possible, and transporting it upwards is extremely energy-intensive.

"It got nicknamed by its population for the constant fog of smoke above the streets, that always seems to cover the highest towers of the outer wall in a shady grey smog and during some really bad days, the sky is not visible at all."
What are they burning? Can't be coal without a coal mine, can't be petrol without an oil well. Perhaps magitech fumes would be a better source of smokiness? We can have rainbow-colored smoke that way!

"minor crime that tends to happen like in any other city of this size and diversity".
That quote seems rather sterile. If they're natives, they've known no other city, let alone of this size, and Negav's diversity is supposed to be the greatest amongst the cities of the multiverse.

"the poor life conditions and high amount of violence are still a melting pot that may explode anytime"
I think you meant powder keg.


Shady can probably take care of the rest, he's more thorough about this stuff than I am.

Boy, Negav is alot more complex than I previously assumed. Here I thought it was just a slightly more arcane version of New Jersey, although considering the magiocrat corruption I keep hearing about, and the police who are "slow to respond" then I guess I'm not too far off, eh?

That's really a nice job here. I think you clarified a lot of things while adding substance to them

there is really one area though where I think there has been some misunderstanding like others mentioned, it's the Skyless city.  The name skyless comes from the fact the city is actually situated underground and it designs the Pit.

I also would rather avoid mention of voraphiles for the tourism guild, that's an heavy fourth wall breaker ^^;
And speaking of that I don't really see what the big deal with the tourism guild is for some here.

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The Felaryan tourist guild has been recently founded by a group of merchants with the desire to make Negav -and Felarya as a whole- looks more attractive to visitors in order to increase business. They are known for putting an outrageously positive spin on things, with double-meaning words and carefully crafted innuendos. Their various guides to Felarya are distributed in other worlds, depicting an almost heavenly world of "Savage and untamed beauties", and beckoning visitors to come here. Needless to say the guild have been attacked numerous times by angry visitors discovering a rather different reality after they arrived in Felarya. However, the leader of the guild and author of the main guides, Malki Greenbeard, is a true genius when it comes to manipulating, stretching and twisting words to their limits, and take extreme caution to never outright lies. His collaborators and friends say affectionately in private that he could beat a genie at their own game.

It's a measly 4 lines in the wiki and it just depict a practice that , while fun in an ironic and dark way, is also something that could actually happens. But we can indeed insist on how it's tight-roping legality and linked to shady business.

And thank you for the usual little jabs at me shady, I would feel strange without them...

The problem with the tourism guild is that, once you start picking it apart, you notice just how shoddily the idea is build and how shallow the premise.  What makes the guild itself flimsy is that it's impossible for the establishment to have remained standing for so long.  Sooner or later, people will notice its shady behavior.  Whether a survivor manages to return alive or someone who is related to whoever was tricked take notice of the unusually long absence, people will eventually notice.  Once they do, word of its business will come out and spread, leading to an investigation from the police.  This in turn will lead to protests, regardless or not Greenbeard manages to fool the police because you know the victims aren't going to take it, leading to the guild's reputation to start declining.

Furthermore, the idea that the guildmaster got away scot-free every time because he's just that good at negotiating and diplomacy just doesn't work.  Grief and anger are powerful emotions.  You can't negotiate with someone who has gone through hell and the only thing that's left in his head is to demand retribution.  At the absolute worse, this would lead the guild to be burned down and the staff members killed.  All it takes is one survivor, or one person to notice someone's absence and connect the dots, just one, for things to go downhill and snowball from there.

I can believe that there would be shady businesses like these, as I noted in the revision of the main article, but I cannot believe they would operate like a normal guild and stand right there in the open where they are very likely of getting caught.  It's not even implied that they're a big enough organization to have a credible front like a mafia.  The way that guild should operate should be secretive.  Maybe they have multiple guildhalls that make them hard to track down.

As it is now, the tourism guild operates on too many contrivances, that no one would notice its shady behavior, that no one who got duped ever returned alive, that no one who is affiliated with whoever got dupe would notice that they never returned from their trip would notice, and that if they did, that they would have taken no action, or that the police arbitrarily doesn't care to investigate or are apparently so easy to dupe themselves.  It's for the exact same reason I bash the Felarya Express all the time.  Once you start to pick it apart, you notice just how shoddily the idea is built and how shallow its premise is.

@Bluehorizon:
The hydromancer thingy was copied directly from the wiki as stated in my first post. I dont take credit for that one. ^^'

@ Stabs:
Takrit is a stone material Bael and I came up with to solve the question where all the building material for Negav came from. Its supposed to resemble sandstone in looks and everything else, though I admit i forgot to mention that in the article. :/

the diversity issue: I will rewrite that sentence then.

Powder Keg. Yes.


@Pendragon:
Personally I also view Felarya as somewhat of a Crapsack world, at least for the most part just not AS extreme. You'll see it a little more clearly once the other tiers are written as well. :3


@Karbo:
I noticed that the pit is actually an underground region, but I had to go with what you drew for the map, and your map implies that there are two districts named skyless city and the pit. it will be easy for me to change it, but personally, at least for the skyless city, I could actually get used to keeping it the way I wrote it, because it has a lot more flair than just calling an underground part of Negav skyless. It feels too obvious. Skyless because of cave, duh. So I recommend removing the mention of the pit, as that is clearly underground, but keep the skyless city as it is right now, and move the foundry on the map into that zone.
Under the assumption, that in Felarya, the sun rises in the east, and Negav lies in a tropical zone, the wind would have to mainly blow from east to west, making that section of the city the most ideal for any sort of industry.

@Karbo & Shady Knight:

Tourism guild:
Seeing how Shady knight has issues with it and I personally had slight trouble rewriting this as well, maybe we should keep it a tourism guild, but reduce the shady business aspects of it greatly and just have it take care of tourists that want to explore felarya with offering rather safe explorations? It can be kept being mentioned but not as... the main focus.

Stabs wrote:

"Most citizen live in houses built from clay and Takrit, a stone that is being mined deep underneath in the negavian mines, and serves as negavs' main building material."
I've got a problem with this sentence- if the Takrit doesn't have any special features of note, then the kind of stone is less relevant than its color.
Second, you cannot mine for rock. When mining, you're supposed to extract as little material as possible, and transporting it upwards is extremely energy-intensive.

Let me address this a little. Only this and just a little mostly because I just got home from work and I'm lazy.

The problem with how Negav is built, is that it appears to have a sandstone like quality to its buildings. All except for one picture, the material is always a sand-like hue, but the problem is that the closest reliable source of sand is like measured at several thousand miles away - and importing sandstone would be nonsensical. So where would they get it?

That's just where Takrit came from. The details themselves didn't seem to make it in, but its less important. Another post will be made regarding Takrit itself as its own mineral, but you're right. It would be a Quarry, not a Mine to get this. Anyway, so many different types of rocks are retrieved from quarries.

Its hard because igneous is more mineral based, which sounds appropriate, but there's no way a volcano is in the area. Its deep within the earth though, so I was thinking of either Sedimentary or Metamorphic. Metamorphic rocks are some of the toughest in the world, but it would incorporate various simplistic properties, be relatively sturdy naturally blah blah blah...

As I said, we need to make an official post about it still.

Or, you know, it could be the work of mages. I did mention earthshapers in my revision of Negav's main article that this was how the original great wall was built. Have mages that specialize in earth magic do their thing, rise huge walls of earth from the ground, probably uses some transmutation to turn it from sand or dirt to stone.

It seems to me that the more time passes, the more people forget that Felarya is built around the premise that it's supposed to be very rich in magic and that magic has a ton of very mundane applications.

if you explained buildings made with magic, why would there be a difference in lower and higher tier and why would there be a space problem in Negav in the first place? If magic did all the building, then we would have large towers everywhere, rather than merely in the better situated districts. Thats why I think, it is better to keep this mostly manmade, with magic being an aid, but not the main construction idea.

Making buildings this size, not to mention the great wall, isn't something any run-of-the-mill earth mage is going to be able to do alone.  To make the bigger buildings, they're going to need more experienced mages who have more powerful magic.  You can argue that the most talented earth mages stuck to making the higher and middle tier, while less skilled ones made the lower tier.  Alternatively, the lower tier seems to be the most recent tier since Negav could only have gotten such a big influx of adventurers once the gate was made, so the lower tier was made on the cheap.  And the space problem is simply because the buildings are built so close together while still being inside the wall, which is a result of their location being sandwiched between a big river on the north and west and a jungle to the south.  Even if you use magic, you're still messing with the terrain big time, so one mistake can have catastrophic results, so you can't just telekinetically push the wall away.

Alternatively, mages were mostly used for transmutation.  You don't have the proper material on hand but you have something relatively similar close by?  Transmute it.  You'd be amazed how handy transmutation can be when you put your mind to it.

Shady Knight are you trying to handwave something? That really doesn't sound like you.

"I'm building Negav with Magic."

Say that to yourself a few times out loud and don't tell me that doesn't sound funny. I don't even know where to start critiquing that idea, to be entirely honest. There's just so many more issues and problems that arise from that issue. To be more kind though, honestly, I just don't see mages building such a crazy amount of buildings and locations and walls to be too tiring, taxing, and requiring enough people to know enough magic to do that properly - if it could even be done, is just so much more problematic.

---

I want to comment on the Tourism Guild. I'm with Shady Knight here. It shouldn't exist, I don't know why it does, Felarya isn't even a place you'd go to for a vacation. Think about that - Tourism. Vacation. Who goes to Felarya on vacation? You're in Felarya for one of two reasons:

1) You're trapped there due to dimensional circumstance or a vanishing land.
2) Greed. You're connected to Felarya through another world, like Balfrezzag, but Balfrezzag isn't a place you visit from either.

The other problem is because Negav isn't set up to  be tourism Friendly - the Eladrine Hills (or whatever the upper tier garden district is) is meant for the Rich Only you cannot get access to that place if you're poor. Therefore, why should you get access if you're a "tourist" anybody could then claim to be a tourist, and you'd have way too many security issues for the rich who want to just enjoy their lofty lobbyist lifestyle.

Also, that would mean you could just tour the elven district, and I can imagine doing that either without getting hate from the Elves. I cant imagine them as a society not being snobby and looking down at you. They want to live amongst themselves after all, as far as I recall they even have their own mini government/society within Negav. I could go on, but basically Negav isn't a tourism friendly place. Its sectioned and cordoned off and limited based on who you are and such. Not to mention its way to dangerous. You could tour the motamo docks I suppose, but what would you go to see there? Its not like we're talking about Paris - where we have the Tour Eiffel, L'Arc de Triumph, Louvre, etc, where there's lots of history, art, and old, old buildings. Not to mention countryside, like touring Champagne, for example. There's a huge difference here. Negav is a place where people live to survive on a day to day basis, the only Historical parts of Negav that would be tour friendly were all destroyed during the Great Destruction, with the exception perhaps of the Tunnels built by King Kerume some 3000 years prior.

Hi there.

I rewrote the article in some questionable areas.

Changelog:
- I clarified Takrit to be a dense, sedimentary stome mined from quarries below Negav that resembles sandstone in looks and property. Reason is that Felarya is a very very alive world that is constantly in a state of growth and decay. Plants are everywhere (at least on the main continent around negav) and theres tons of poop and other biological material, burying more and more underneath, pressing it together under its weight, causing... sediments to spawn. Thus, it is a cheap yet effective way to gain building materials, rather than using sand, wood or get rocks all the way from ascarlin mountains.


- I rewrote the western quarter of the town. I kept the skyless city for its flair, but removed the mentioning of the pit. I moved the living barracks to the outskirts of that quarter, and wrote the reasoning as to why there is fog and smoke and why the industry is located at the western end rather than somewhere else.


- I rewrote the tourism guild ENTIRELY, seeing how it was critized by nearly everyone. It is now actually a legit business and I took away all the shady kn- ... aspects of it. ( ^^ ) If somebody still dislikes it, ask yourself this: IF JURASSIC PARK EXISTED, WOULD YOU VISIT IT? (PRovided you have the funds and there are no sudden power outages, of course!) Felarya may be a death world, but the tourism guild can still make that a feature and an attraction, rather than it being a reason not to go there. For anything else, please read the articles section before you comment.

Bael, saying that you made buildings with magic is a handwave.  Explaining HOW you made buildings using magic, is not.  Here's an example.  Instead of snapping your fingers and then POOF, instant building, earth mages instead use their magic to shape the materials to make the workers' job easier.  They still need the help of architects so that they have an idea of what the finished building should look like, and they also need the help of engineers so that the house is structurally sound and doesn't crumble by just blowing real hard on it.  Earth mages can also transmute material so that they're fit for construction, making finding materials easier, but they also need a good idea of what the desired material is like so they can properly transmute a more common material.  Furthermore, mages can use spells like levitation to more easily transport material up to the workers on higher floors. When you explain it like that, it's far less of a handwave, ain't it?

And Bael, are you saying that people wouldn't want to see some pit fighting at Jaslow Arena? That nobody would want to see performances at Dayama Theater? The not a soul would want to have fun at the Street of the Red Flower?

i forgot to mention that I slightly changed jaslow arena as well, and made a more precise description about the whole eating thing. its not a big adjustment, but it has been made.