Thanks guys, you've given me lots to think about ^^

I know that the castle city, which will be pretty central in the plains, and the areas near it, will be quite well protected with a good infrastructure, but beyond that, until you get to borders against monstrous humanoid races like orcs and goblinoids, probably little to no government influence. But there'll probably be a lot of border skirmishes with those usually evil races.

But, I think the main empire is gonna be on very good terms with the dwarven regions due to extensive trading, and good terms with the desert people because of some trade, and probably civil terms with the elven races. I'll probably have some sort of loose coalition between these races, and probably the much smaller gnome population, but I think if I have Raptorans they'll be isolated enough to not be involved in something like that.

But yeah, you guys brought up a good point which is that in that sort of time period, the civilized races wouldn't be in control of every inch of the continent, and that country borders are probably purely theoretical; the only claims to territory in more outlying regions would be the towns themselves, not the open countryside around them.

Anyway, thanks guys, I'll post again when I've made some progress ^^