If I’m going to give them agency, I need to know who they are. The real-world Kier has a (Wiki) population of 350. I’ve written “under 500”. That’s a lot of people. Some of them must be good for something (apparently, I’ve become a Utilitarian in my old age).
Who we have so far, in order of appearance (mostly):
- Sheriff Ken Corrigan. He’s part of the ensemble cast. He’s definitely single.
- Frank. He owns the bar on edge of town. Our intrepid werewolves keep bringing him meat. A widower with an adult child in town, still, I think.
- Jerry. He owns the brew pub near Frank’s. It’s not open, but he’s still brewing. He hasn’t actually appeared; just been mentioned by name. Girlfriend/fiancé, I think.
- Howard. He owns the hardware store. He needs a wife.
- Gerald Harrington. He owns the motel that becomes the pack base of operations. Unrelated to this post: That motel needs a name. He’s already a widower.
- Deputy Patrick “Reilly” O’Reilly. He’s the deputy who becomes a pack member. He even gets his own chapter. He’s single.
- Ezekiel “Zeke” Graham. He’s a disabled Iraq vet until he’s un-disabled by becoming a werewolf. He’s also single.
Seven (with one not seen wife), which is more than I thought before I made the list. Women are noticeably lacking. Zeke’s doctor is a woman, but she’s not named, yet.
Who we need to make the story work:
- Public works. Need to get the water system working, again. At least three: Water, Grain storage, and Livestock. Call it 5 for easy counting.
- Mages. Need a magic spinning thing that can drive the pumps. A decent sized group. Let’s say 10 organized with 5 not part of the group. This excludes Marcy, who has her own arc planned, already. (20 total)
- Militia. The “numbers go up” group that starts forming in chapter 21. In a small farming town of between 350 and 500 people, having 50 people, who have guns, willing to defend it, at least part-time, seems a low number; I’ll make it something around that, but not exactly 50. (70 total)
- Priest. They’re using the Catholic church’s bell tower as a lookout and the bell (they have a real one) as a warning signal. I want to stuff a G*d conversation in, mainly because religion is usually left out of LitRPG. I don’t expect him to be a recurring character, but he’s there. There will also be other denominations (Lutheran at the very least). Maybe 10 total tied to churches. (80 total)
- Town government. A few of these people have shown up, but they’re all unnamed, so far. Let’s call this 10 people, too. Another 20 in administration. (110 total)
- Healers. Zeke’s doctor will be one (at which point she gets a name). Not only generally useful, but also part of the militia’s training. I want a decent number of healers, but not too skewed. Let’s say 20. (130 total)
- Dissidents. Our intrepid hero is taking over the town. Some people will object. This is exclusive of the categories above because those are the helpful people in those categories. There may be some dissenting mages and healers, too. Let’s call this 70 to get a round total of 200. I think there are three categories:
- Loyal opposition. They like the ideas, just not Tom being in charge of it all. This will overlap with “town government”.
- Don’t want to be part of it. They don’t really care what Tom does with the town as long as they’re left alone. At least one of these people needs to be caught alone and die a horrible death to point out the advantages of group cohesion.
- Over my dead body. Hard core opponents. At least one of them needs to be fed to Bob for some dastardly deed. This may very well be book 2.
That’s 200 people.
So, 40% of the population accounted for. What am I going to do with the rest of them? Or, since this is about agency, what are they up to?
Kids will need to be dealt with. They are conspicuously absent, so far. They’re definitely in book 2. I need to setup novella spinoffs for kids adventures.
What is a “normal” population breakdown? Rapid City is definitely different – or at least differently distributed – than Denver. I see more kids in a week than I would see in Denver in a year.
Utah leads significantly with 51.7 marriages per 1,000 unmarried women, followed by Idaho at 45.2 and the Dakotas (N and S)at 42.8 and 41.5 respectively.
That seems incredibly low to me. 50 is 5% of 1,000. If the population is 500, we can round to 250 women. 5% is only 12.5. That can’t be right. 13 married couples in a population of 500? Give them all two kids and that’s still barely over 50 people. The other 450 are all single adults? No way.
I will admit that swapping the numbers seems too far in the other direction. Maybe the AI slipped a digit and it’s 51.7 marriages per 100 unmarried women. That would be a 1/3 married. That seems more reasonable.
I just found out that the statistic is tracked the other way: How many have never married?
According to a 2023 report from the Pew Research Center, in 1980 only 6% of 40-year-olds had never been married, but that jumped to nearly a quarter of 40-year-olds by 2021.
That would explain a lot. I grew up in the 1980s. 2/3 unmarried would be higher than that. If we go with 1/4 unmarried, that’s 125 unmarried and 375 married, which obviously needs to be rounded. Say 300. Give them all a kid (of any age) and the population hits 450. That seems a bit steep: Only 50 unmarried people in the town.
200 hundred married folk, for 100 couples. Give them each two kids (rural) and we’ve hit 400 (note that includes grandparents with children and children’s children still in town, which creates some double-counting). Add another 100 unmarried adults. That seems reasonable and it’s not that far off the 1/4 unmarried.
Now they need to be tossed in buckets.
- 10% militia (50) is pretty much already decided.
- 25% dissenters (125) of all three stripes seems a bit short, but a bit high for story purposes. I’ll skew it toward “loyal opposition”.
- support. There is so much stuff that needs to be done to keep things functioning, even badly. I really hope I don’t need a list. People will just show up when needed.
- A tanner already has (he has not been named, yet).
- We’ll need a mechanic (or five) for harvest.
- We’ll need gas station owners for arguments about who gets fuel.
- We need someone who knows how to raise a barn. Old guy #3 from the nursing home, probably.
- Which means we need lumberjacks (a tree service company will do fine) and sawmill operators (and a sawmill, which also needs the magic spinning device).
I think that’s a decent start on adding agency to the population of Kier.
Marked Up 