Nationality Table in the Players Guide (I have doubts)

[LucaCherstich]

I have doubts regarding the Nationality Table in the Players Guide. (Table 1a. Page 5).
I really do understand how the percentages were chosen.
You can get a Brythunian with rolls of 15-19 which means that you have 5% of possibilities of being Brythunian.
But why you can get a Corinthian on with a roll of 21? (1%)
Are Corinthians so less numerous?
Corinthia looks slightly smaller than Brythunia but I always thought Corinthia was a much more urbanized area, while Brythunia comprises mainly small villages.
Considering this, I have compared Corinthians with other entries...just to discover that you have basically the same possibilities of being Corinthian (1%) and of being a Zahemi Hillman (1%).
In other words, this table pretend that a small, minor Shemite tribe in Khoraja produces the same number of adventurers of the much bigger and populous Corinthia!!!

If we come back to the Brythunians (5%) and compare them with other nations we discover that even Nemedian (4%) are rarer than Brythunians and even Koth, Ophir, Zingara, Zamora and Argos which all look big and urbanized have only 3%!!!!
Brythunians beat them all!

And now focus your attention on Nemedia.
This country is supposed to be roughly almost as big and as popolous as Aquilonia (in fact it is the second Hyborean country for importance) .... but if you sum up all the central Aquilonians (5%) + the Gundermen (1%) + the Poitanians (2%) + the Tauran (2%) + the Westermarck (2%) you will get 12% of possibilities of being Aquilonian: 3 times more probable than being Nemedian (4%)!

There is something wrong in this table........

 

[VincentDarlage]

1. I figure few people will ever roll the random table. Most will choose their nationality, and I don't advocate using random rolls for that at all unless one really can't make up their mind.

2. Brythunians seem to be captured and enslaved more than Corinthians, increasing odds of having Brythunian blood (I guess).

3. I didn't create the table with any sort of statistical analysis, being that I was constrained in that I couldn't assign any percentages less than 1%. I assigned the percents based on what I perceived as "fun and useable." Since there is a sourcebook for Aquilonia and not for Corinthia, then having a higher percentage of Aquilonians makes the sourcebook more usable. In other words, the percents are based on my opinion of fun, not on any population statistics.

4. If you can come up with a table that makes more statistical sense, then go for it - but that wasn't the purpose of the table I put in at all.

5. I can't really even think of a reason to have made the table population- or size-related. The odds of a person being Aquilonian in Aquilonia is much more than 12%, but that would be the case if rolling on the table randomly. No matter which country one was in, rolling on this table randomly doesn't make sense. In Turan, the percentage likelihood of encountering a Zamorian is much, much higher than encountering a Pict, but one is more likely to encounter a Pict in the Bossonian marches than a Zamorian. I would have to make a table for each and every country! So I made the table "random" for the rare need for a random nationality, based on my opinion of interesting, fun, and useable.

The only thing "wrong" with the table is that I didn't intend it to reflect population statistics - so, as you can see, I succeeded admirably there, as the percentages do not, in fact, reflect population statistics.

 

[Spectator]

The only thing "wrong" with the table is that I didn't intend it to reflect population statistics - so, as you can see, I succeeded admirably there, as the percentages do not, in fact, reflect population statistics.

You should be a speechwriter for Obama.
I want to hear you talk about how the future is Hope and we require Change because the past is yesterday and you can't Hope for the past to come back, but need to make the change for the Future Hopes.

Or something like that, right?

 

[Hervé]

It's just those f.....g D20 books! What's the need in putting a table for everything? All d20 books share this flaw although the PGH is far from being the worse, as the book fortunately doesn't focus too much on the "technical" stuff.