By creating a world, with an eye toward it being part of a whole subsector!
Well, first we start with a name. I know, I know ~ it seems like I'm putting the warp nacelles ahead of the cargo bay, but I think figuring out a name first off gives you something you might work off, to establish themes, original colonizing culture, et cetera. And if you don't? Logically speaking, most stars won't be named by colonists anyway.
I like to keep as much randomness as possible, so I went to Wikipedia, hit “Random Article”, and got sent to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Sheumack. At the moment, we know nothing about the structure of the system, so I'll apply the name to the star itself ~ we're writing about the Bishop Sheumack system. I kinda like including the title in the sun's name; it gives a different feel than other settings.
Thinking about it, I can totally name the mainworld of the Bishop Sheumack system. Rolling the dWikipedia, I get https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Ishee. Ishee will be the name of the mainworld, and we'll place it in a random hex in the subsector. Oooh, but first, let's name that subsector, sector, and quadrant: Eau Pleine subsector (Alpha-3D or Greve-D) in Greve sector (Alpha-3) in Alpha Quadrant. Lets roll for the hex: 0704.
Anyway, Ishee needs some definition. I'm more of a social scifi/anthropological scifi kind of qween, so I like to start with the second half of the bUWP (Basic Universal World Profile). So, rolling 2d6-2, I find that Ishee has more people than the average planet: tens of millions of people live there (Pop digit 7: bUWP α-3D-0704-? (α Greve-Eau Pleine-Bishop Scheumack-Ishee)/????7??-?/?/??/Em).
But how many tens of millions? Using random.org to generate a random 8-digit number, I discover that 16,021,313 live on Ishee. That's about the size of Lagos, Nigeria (city proper) or the Moscow metropolitan area or the entire country of Cambodia!
Next, I roll 3d6 and get a 9, which is greater than the world's Pop digit of 7, so there are no cities of tens of millions on this planet. How about millions? Are there cities of that size? A 10 on 2d6 tells me that no, there are not (again, it's larger than 7). I don't have to roll for cities with hundreds of thousands of people ~ 1d6 will always roll less than 7! Another 1d6 roll gives me a 1, which will result in a very decentralized planet, as that means that there are only (16,021,313/107)*(1+9) cities of this size (the largest). That comes out to 16 of them. Assuming they have an average population of 500,000 for ease, that takes up 8,000,000 of our 16,021,313, leaving us with 8,021,313 people unaccounted for.
Rolling 1d6 again tells us that there are (8,021,313/107)*(4+9)*10 cities with tens of thousands of people. That works out to 104 of them. Of these 3d6-3% ( I rolled a 15, so 12%) will have populations of 90,000 or more. The math says that's 12.513 cities, so I will just barely round up ~ 13 cities of such size exist on Ishee. Overall, however, we again assume these cities average out to about 50,000 people each, accounting for another 5,200,000 of our people. We still need to account for the remaining 2,821,313.
Well, let's run through that formula again, rolling a 2, which gives us (2,821,313/107)*(2+9)*100. That's 310 cities averaging 5000 people each. Rolling 3d6 tlls us that (12-3)% of them have 9000 or more people ~ that's 28 such cities. That's another 1,550,000 people placed in cities, leaving 1,271,313. Let's do another quick run through for the small towns of hundreds of people, rolling a 3 on 1d6. (1,271,313/107)*(3+9)*1000 equals 1526 cities, of which (15-3)%, or 183, have populations of 900 or more. Averaging all those cities out to 500 people each, we realize that they hold a total of 763,000 people. Only 508,313 people remain homeless. Or, rather, they tend to live alone in isolated settlements of no more than maybe a few dozen people (2-4 families), or roam across the surface as traveling folk with no permanent residence.
For future consideration, we designate the ten largest of the cities as primary cities, the remaining 6 cities with hundreds of thousands of people as secondary cities, and all the rest as tertiary.
Now, let's define the planet's major cultural elements. Rolling 1d3, we discover that there are two big Cultural Differences. Rolling 2d66, we get 12 and 61. Let's see . . . looking at the chart . . . the planet is (or hosts) a Tourist Attraction of some sort which attracts Travellers from at least the subsector if not further afield and is Progressive, with an expanding and vibrant culture full of optimism and hope. I'm kind of taken with the idea, at first blush, that this tourist attraction isn't a thing or a place, but a seasonal or annual festival that people come to the planet to see ~ maybe like a futuristic Burning man or a Cherry Blossom Festival or election hoopla . . . .
In addition, there is but a single local custom of note (I rolled a 1 on 1d6). Another 1d6 roll gives me a 5, which tells me that is single local custom of note is something from the “Miscellaneous Customs 1” table . . . That's a 1d66 roll, which gives me a 56, so high tech is allowed for . . . some group of people. Let's head on over to that table, which is another 1d66. But first! I roll a 1d6 and get a 2, s I don't have to roll on the bigger table. A roll of 1-3 tells me that the entire culture practices this custom. Hmmmm, “High tech allowed for everyone”. That sounds to me like a culture that is fiercely protective of access to high technology and deeply distrustful of any attempt to limit it. Think of, say, the NRA's take on the 2nd Amendment, or even more extreme. Maybe mixed in with what are currently more leftist ideals (or non-political and seen as a charity) of removing societal and economic barriers to access.
Maybe that festival I mentioned above, the tourist attraction, is a high tech playground/conference/chance to show off? Depending on how capitalist (ugh!) this world or this subsector turn out, it can be something like a Maker Fair mixed with Burning Man kind of thing or a massive corporate marketing scheme (like, say, E3 or Comic-Con) . . .
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