WebDM: In Defense of the Guildmasters' Guide to Ravnica

[Havard]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPZ-iFmGpdA

I think this video is a good look at the book. The video is mainly positive and hightlights some things about the book that I overlooked originally. It also mentions how this book isn't really a good introduction to the Ravnica setting, which might be why I flipped through it and havent really looked at it that much since. This video made me want to take another look

-Havard

[Dragonhelm]

I think I will take another look as well. When I look at Ravnica, I think it would serve better as a city in a setting like Eberron.

The big problem I have with Ravnica is wondering where they get their food from. The whole world's a city? You have to have some farmers somewhere to grow your food.

I ran the adventure for Ravnica they had on DMs Guild (which is also in the book, IIRC) and I really saw little to set it apart.

Am I missing something here?

[shesheyan]

The big problem I have with Ravnica is wondering where they get their food from. The whole world's a city? You have to have some farmers somewhere to grow your food.

The Drow can survive and grow food underground in complete darkness.

I think surface dwellers can easily survive. Roof gardens are very fashionable these days in Cuba. Also many local parks were transformed into vegetable plantations after what they call the «Special Period» when they ran out of food because the soviets decided not to support them anymore.

Its a fantasy world anything is possible with druids.

[willpell]

The big problem I have with Ravnica is wondering where they get their food from. The whole world's a city? You have to have some farmers somewhere to grow your food.

I believe there are some rooftop gardens, mostly run by the Selesnya and Simic, which would provide most of the fancy expensive food for the rich influential people. But feeding the 99% is pretty much entirely the responsibility of the Golgari, having been codified as such in the Guildpact, and the fact that they do that is pretty much why the other guilds tolerate the Golgari, instead of treating them as just a creepier and grosser version of the Gruul. The Golgari feed the city's poor people all sorts of fungus and "recycled protein" and such, produced very cheaply and in mass quantities in the Undercity, and I'd imagine that even when they're at war with another guild, they still keep up this duty, at least in areas not controlled by their enemy. (As an aside, the Rakdos kind of do a similar thing to provide "spiritual nourishment", in the form of entertainment, to keep the people content; the Golgari are the bread, the Rakdos are the circuses, and the Azorius are the Roman authorities, who work with the despised Golgari and Rakdos because they keep the population in line.)

[Big Mac]

The big problem I have with Ravnica is wondering where they get their food from. The whole world's a city? You have to have some farmers somewhere to grow your food.

If you look at the Magic the Gathering cards, they always have land to power the magic. So there must be some sort of land connected to Ravnica.

Looking at the Return to Ravnica card list the lands are:

• Plains (cards 250-254)
• Islands (251-259)
• Swamp (260-264)
• Mountain (265-269)
• Forest (270-274)

So they are getting the land in there somewhere.

[willpell]

The big problem I have with Ravnica is wondering where they get their food from. The whole world's a city? You have to have some farmers somewhere to grow your food.

The Selesnya guild has a lot of rooftop gardens which produce the high-end food for the rich people; the poor people are mostly fed fungus grown in the Undercity by the Golgari, which is pretty much the one and only thing the Golgari do which justified their public membership in the Guildpact.