Dungeon World: Setak—more random thoughts

After a couple people mistook "Setak" for "steak", I'm now thinking about changing the spelling to "Cetak". I like that it looks related to "cetacean", so I can claim the name is related to the ancient word for whales and thus the city is named for the orcas that populate the Sound.

I haven't really spent much more time developing ideas on the city, just walking around with a few further vague thoughts and mostly with the desire to do more with it.

I'm thinking that the area around the Needle may be known as the Halls of the Ancients. Definitely want dungeons there, probably something ready by Go Play NW. The Needle may be the home of the wizard Adkiss, or maybe has unknown inhabitants and functions as a dungeon. I'm not sure yet.

What's prevented the local populace from plundering these dungeons already? Aside from the fact that they're not the player characters, and therefore aren't the heroes—is that enough? Seems like there should be some plausible in-setting explanation—and it has to account both for the fact of the locals not plundering but also whatever dangerous creatures dwell there not sacking the surrounding settlements. That's kind of true for any dungeon, of course, but here with the dungeons and settlements entwined, it's more of an issue.

I think I want rat-men in the setting, whether more like Talislanta's ferrans or more like D&D's wererats, I'm not sure. If more on the wererat side, I don't think I'd have them capable of passing on "lycanthropy", as they do in standard D&D. I'm also thinking about replacing the standard halflings with the rat-men.

I'm very likely going to mix in some Talislanta monsters and some of the beasts from Shadowrun's Paranormal Animals of North America, as well as both typical and unusual D&D monsters. I know I've got a few favorites I'm looking forward to tossing in.

And still not ready with that Dungeon World class, I didn't spend any time on it yet today, after all. Maybe after I post this…