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Thread: Steam...

  1. #1
    Saberdrake@aol.co
    Guest

    Steam...

    I would agree with you if this was the FR or Greyhawk or any other magic rich
    realm. But BR is very low magic and therefore, more prone to technilogical
    advancement from their craftsmen. Humans in the real world have always tried
    to improve life with new gadgets and gizmos that do things to make life
    easier. Why wouldn't it be different in BR? They just don't have magic to fall
    back on as much. Just think, only blooded people can be wizards and even then
    do you think those blooded mages are going to spend time making items that
    replace technology? I think that technilogical advancements in BR is only
    common sence since magic is so scarce. However, this is only my opinion.

    Saberdrake

  2. #2
    Gary V. Foss
    Guest

    Steam...

    Saberdrake@aol.com wrote:

    > I would agree with you if this was the FR or Greyhawk or any other magic rich
    > realm. But BR is very low magic and therefore, more prone to technilogical
    > advancement from their craftsmen. Humans in the real world have always tried
    > to improve life with new gadgets and gizmos that do things to make life
    > easier. Why wouldn't it be different in BR? They just don't have magic to fall
    > back on as much. Just think, only blooded people can be wizards and even then
    > do you think those blooded mages are going to spend time making items that
    > replace technology? I think that technilogical advancements in BR is only
    > common sence since magic is so scarce. However, this is only my opinion.

    I know a lot of folks feel this way and maybe I'm just a nutjob for going against
    the will of the majority, but I really see magic as the trump card here. Magic is
    just THAT impressive, and THAT much easier to use than technology, even in the BR
    setting. To me, magic is several steps ahead of technology. Doing a lot of
    purely technological research without including magic would be like designing a
    coal burning car today. OK, that's an exaggeration, but the basic premise is the
    same. You don't waste time researching alternate methods of doing what you can
    already do more easily using an existing process. Especially when the guys you
    are trying to research out of existence are the primary guys able to do research.

    The other issue about magic is that the only magic that is under represented in BR
    is wizardly magic. There should be just as many clerics/priests/druids running
    around on Cerilia and the rest of the planet as on any other gaming world. Maybe
    more, as the scarcity of wizards makes for a demand in the spell-casting market
    that clerics can attempt to fill. Actually, that they would have to fill.

    Lastly, the ability score requirements of magicians are higher than that of
    wizards, but not incredibly so. I'm not at all up on doing the kind of
    statistical analysis that would determine the likelihood of rolling those stats or
    better (maybe somebody out there with less calculator-phobia could come up with
    those numbers?) but there should be probably around a 50:1 to 100:1 ratio of
    magicians to wizards.

    That is, if 5-10% of the population is of class and level and 10% of those NPCs
    are magicians, magicians represent 1/200th-1/100th of the population. Blooded
    mages according to the figures I've used are 1/10,000th of the population. (I
    think that number should be higher, personally. I mean, wizards should represent
    a more typical percentage of the blooded population, which would be 25% but I kept
    the 10% so as not to freak everybody out.)

    Somebody out there came up with the figure 8,000,000 for the total population of
    Cerilia (I think it's closer to 10,000,000 but I won't sweat the difference) which
    according to my numbers would make for 800 blooded mages (please, no one quote
    that "seven score mages in all of Cerilia" line again, I beg you!) but between
    40,000 and 80,000 magicians. Even if you think 1% of the NPCs would become
    magicians, in defiance of any logic that I can see, that's still 4,000 to 8,000
    magicians.

    I think at least 25% of the NPCs of class and level should be priests. That's
    100,000 to 200,000 priests. Those are some pretty big numbers. Big enough to
    make most people out there go NO WAY! This is a pretty long-running argument,
    however, so I don't think I'm going to change many minds here...

    The long and short of this is that I think BR is misrepresented as a "low-magic"
    setting. Oh, it is when compared to FR, but that's not really fair is it? BR is
    really a "lower-magic" setting.

    Gary

  3. #3
    Gary V. Foss
    Guest

    Steam...

    Lyndon Baugh wrote:

    > Gary,
    >
    > How many "they" can research magic items, compared to how many "they"
    > can research technological items?
    > In even the most high magic TSR worlds spellcasters are a
    > minority of the population, in Cerillia this is even more clear.
    > Last month I finally got a good enough computer to play the
    > Birthright computer game, and am having fun with the Transport realm
    > spell, which can do things railroads can't ... but I would be
    > surprised if 20 people on the continent could cast Transport.

    Hmmm. Interesting. Since I am the self-appointed census taker of Cerilia let's just
    see what I can come up with, eh?

    Blooded characters are 1/1000th of the population. These are basically the nobles,
    right? There are other, lower level (in the sense of feudal hierarchy) nobles, but
    blooded guys are basically the folks at the upper end of the social strata and would
    have the leisure/resources to engage in serious research, right? I'm sure a farmer
    might spend a few summer nights thinking up how to make a better plow, but that's not
    really the kind of thing we're talking about is it? We're talking about serious
    Research. Like a capital A Action in the domain rules. If we use those domain rules
    as the basis of research, then it costs 1GB to do the action. Very few people have
    access to that kind of coin.

    If we don't assume it costs anything to do research (which is kind of hard to believe
    when it comes to things like researching gun powder or steam engines which would
    require a lot of craftsmen and materials to create) don't we run into a brain drain? I
    mean, the guys of intelligence in the world would tend to be magic users. Even the
    non-blooded ones. I know, they have higher ability score requirements than standard
    wizards, but are two 12's really that unassailable? Wouldn't the guys doing the
    research tend to be magicians? Of those who weren't magicians, wouldn't they be just
    as likely to be priests as fighters or thieves?

    > Some of the 99.99% of the population that can't cast magic would be
    > interested in non-magical transportation improvement.

    True. But how many of them would have the time/resources to actually do the research?
    We live in a world where we have scads of leisure time by comparison a relatively easy
    access to materials, not to mention no magical alternative....

    Let's say 10% of the population is of class and level, and 20% of those folks are of
    high enough intelligence, education or have the inclination to do research, but half of
    those guys have become magicians, leaving 10% possible to research technology. Of
    those 1% have the money and time to do some research. (Remember only 1 in 1,000
    Cerilians is a blooded noble, and even fewer are regents with access to GBs, so 1%
    seems pretty generous to me.) That's 0.01% of the population. Blooded wizards
    represent 0.01% of the population, so we get the EXACT same number!

    Actually, I'm inclined to think it would be even lower than this. Far lower. Mostly
    because of the money factor, but I think the brain drain part would be even higher....

    Gary

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