Manic Typist

Isn't that sort of the definition of shrugging off an attack? Taking the hit and not really being negatively impacted by it?

I wondered the same thing. Either because the player envisions stone as being more resistant to Energy based attacks (which makes a kind of sense to me a lay geologist - that it would generally be easier to batter down a wall with force than to use electricity or heat). Or because the player wanted something that was slightly more effective against energy attacks likely to come from magic users.

Generally, anything that comes to mind from more experienced eyes. Two areas I can highlight- Magnus has both natural rDef and Combat Luck. I've flagged that for the player, explaining that the way I've always seen it/interpreted it is that Combat Luck doesn't stack with other forms of rDef, and asked what the player envisioned when buying both sets of defenses. Ixion has a Severe Transform that allows him to shrink people, which could in theory be built using Shrinking. I've never used either power so I'll have to review those sections but the player provides his reasoning on how he feels he built in safeguards against abuse/overly powerful synergies.

Personally, I love the character concepts and the overall builds, but it's also been over 6 years since I've played Hero. I have one or two points of concern, but I'd love other eyes to evaluate. These are not my IP but are two proposed characters from a player. This is for my gaslight fantasy game I'm hoping to get off the ground. His email is below:

I was originally thinking more like Switzerland but the comparison to Israel holds fairly true at well. Huma/Balancelandia is much smaller than its two superpower neighbors, and has survived through skillful geopolitics, the mutual fear of the superpowers attacking each other when one is distracted by a full scale invasion, and a better use of tech/magic. This situation I've set up is deliberately untenable- it's a short term equilibrium that cannot hold, much like Europe pre-WW1. Lucius- right now, it's just a name that's meant to sound ominous. However, I think I'll recycle an idea I never got to use in my homebrew fantasy setting, that involves a group of genocidal elves obsessed with either destroying humanity or "improving" it through eugenics in order to restore the purity of their sacred homeland. I'm thinking the Purity is the last of his kind, a survivor from the time of the Old Empire and the cataclysm that ultimately led to the current world order.

I should probably start a separate Campaign Thread, but I'm trying to get ideas out here for any feedback in my limited bandwidth during the week. Below represents I think what the core bones of the plot will look like, with adventures filling in the details, connecting acts, or just serving as red herrings to it. Plot idea: 1) Crisis: Obera and other states not aligned with Ultria a. The recent innovation in repeating weapons means that within the span of perhaps a decade Ultria will have overhauled its weapons and gained a massive edge 2) Grievance a. Ultria has a base leased in Huma (or near adventure setting) territory i. If in Huma, lease is for 50 years and came with a massive price tag in terms of money and technology b. Obera is furious about this strategic advantage c. Ultria is secretly tunneling out around the base and building extensive tunnels, bunkers, etc. and building up a military redoubt/force for future actions d. While doing so, they will discover the edges of a mysterious, highly advanced underground structure e. They will gain partial access (an antechamber that is blocked off from the rest of the facility) that promises immense knowledge/resources…after the lone maintenance bot in the area reactivates and kills a good chunk of the personnel at the site before being put down f. Then are looking around on the surface for another entrance as well as expanding their digs g. Obera gets some inklings of what’s going on (sketches or pieces of the bot, informants talking about the underground walls) and (with hidden Fae manipulation) realize that there’s something from the Old Empire buried in the area. i. The race is on! h. Unknown to both parties, the digging also releases The Purity…and it wants them to finish opening up the site so that it can use what’s inside to wipe out all of humanity i. PCs must stop it, and ideally activate the self-destruct feature of the old military base/prison 3) Flashpoint of crisis – all the spying, counterspying, and sabotage that is jockeying for influence will occur as the above events unfold and are geared towards each side gaining a relative advantage in this search. Obera wants to displace or destroy the base (even before this), both sides are looking for clues/to interfere with each others agents (plus their usual priorities), but then an important scion comes to visit the city (potential Archduke Ferdinand situation). a. Multiple factions have an interest in all of these but especially this event, and if the humans aren’t up to starting a war The Purity might try to nudge things along…

Ooohhhh... that gives a much more interesting backstory to a rare resource idea I had....

Well, message me if you are in town and like to special guest appearance. If I even get this thing off the ground, that is.

I'm considering starting another thread for adventure/campaign ideas within this setting, but for now I'll put some adventure seed ideas down here for feedback. Adventure Ideas 1) Assassinations a. Attempt by Obera to kill Ultrian ambassador 1. Embarrass Ultria in face of other nations 2. Provoke Ultria into overreacting against Huma by attempting to frame Huma via fabricated evidence or facilitating anti-Ultria factions within Huma w/weapons/training etc. 2) Illicit cargos a. Weapons shipment meant for 3rd party states being channeled through Huma b. Drugs, people, illegal weapons for resale in Huma c. State sponsored to destabilize other factions, or done to punish Huma/raise funds for other operations 3) State sponsored terrorism a. Obera/Ultria supporting insurgencies, rebellions, and sympathetic factions in Huma, each other, and allied and non-allied states i. Those factions have own agendas that can extend beyond their official sovereign territory to Huma 4) On the Run a. Foreign security forces trying to catch deserters/defectors b. High value individuals would be sought after for recapture/kidnapping/killing to prevent falling into wrong hands c. Huma has an interest in minimizing the risk to life and property within its lands, willing to shelter/ignore low level people and perhaps turn truly high value targets for themselves 5) Refugees a. Could be hiding HVIs, illicit cargo, enemy saboteurs, or simply just be victimized by foreign security forces/religious agents, bandits, etc. b. Tensions between local/refugee populations – blamed for rise and crime, but are a vulnerable population for predation of various kinds 6) Honeypots a. Attempt to ensnare an ambassador or other critical figure, tilt a relationship away from Huma to provacteur state 7) Industrial espionage a. Preventing foreign agents from stealing Huma’s secrets –tech, magic, destroying resources (people, places, material) 8) Serial killer a. Always a classic – red herring, incidental, or somehow tied in to the larger game of shadows? b. Pressure to solve quickly due to Obera/Ultira’s outrage at their expats dying in Huma 9) Spying – obvious plots abound, to be filled out later 10) Rogue Agents

Give Mistworld a try- you can get free Kindle demos via Amazon; might be able to find some copies (physical or electronic) in your local libraries.

Going in reverse order because it's easier. @Lucius- yes, of course, but I don't want to wiffle-waffe back and forth. So I thought of that and just said "Yes but they don't have enough labor to harvest it, and magical labor is cost-ineffective for the purpose." Because I am trying to create a plausible if precarious and ultimately unsustainable balance. In this setting, the future is somewhat written - the combination of magic and technology is too obvious and powerful a matchup to be stopped (short of a truly cataclysmic event that sets things back in which case you have new problems). What is going to be decided is the contours of what the world looks like - it's flavor, how smoothly the approaches are integrated, and the governing/moral framework surrounding that. I'm rooting for Balancelandia/Huma, personally. @Phydaux- Huh, I... didn't expect that comparison. But I guess it works in an incredibly loose sense (and I lost any potential interest in returning to GW's world/fiction after I found out they picked the incredibly boring path of "Chaos wins, blow it up, start over."). And yes, this will be a lot of espionage, as each side tries to entice defectors with critical knowledge/abilities/technologies to swap sides, assassinations, spying, etc. Schools WILL be primary targets, because they each build up how to DO things (you can't be a very good magic user if you don't study) and how to defeat them (here are the weaknesses of this vehicle/spell). Not to mention, targets for recruitment/assassination. Kill the next archmage before he ever finds his way out of his dorm, you know? @Cantriped- I hear you, I feel you, and in this case, I (mostly) disagree with you. First, for me, this is all about simplicity. Cutting out the hundreds of variations of fantasy lore out there to only one magic system with some guiding principles and built in vagueness will make my life much easier than trying to balance whatever school someone comes up with versus some other school. Druids are people who live in the woods and protect nature with whatever abilities they have, priests are spiritual leaders not alt-magic users, etc. I'm not going to make up all the ins-and-outs - that's what players are for! Generating good ideas for me to steal, asking questions that make me come up with answers and then following those answers to their inevitable conclusions. Here are 9 principles, 3 are mentalism themed, 3 are physical themed, 3 are energy themed, and they are aligned with these concepts individually. Go! A lot of my inspiration came from Brian Sanderson's Mistworld series. The magic is, for the most part, incredibly simple. There are something like, 8 "kinds" of caster, and one can ONLY push on metal (and if the metal outweighs them, the caster gets sent flying, leading to dramatic fight scenes of people jumping incredible heights and pushing coins at each other as fast as bullets), and another can only PULL metal (similar results but in reverse), etc. The creativity and engagement with the systems comes from when people get creative within the limitations. This is, for me, a change from the typical high fantasy pace where pretty much it's the standard "everything and the kitchen sink." No elves, no dwarves, no demons, no vampires/werewolves, and no dozens of magical caster types. I think it can be a lot more fun to play with hard limits, and see what the PCs do to think their way around those limits. So they get two major types of caster whose only real difference is what pre-fabbed Limitations are required/Advantages are allowed, and then are limited to picking a SFX and creating a narrative for a spell that flows with it. So lots of different spells will mechanically be the same but have very different narratives for why they work. And the concept of colors not blocking themselves is incredibly simple but leads to interesting conundrums - a Red Sorcerer is a great way to attack a Red Sorcerer, except that both are equally vulnerable to each other. The game becomes maneuver and fire rather than one of defenses. Yet throw a different color into the mix and while conceptually it isn't any more complicated, the tactical environment has drastically changed. So, in short, for me this is both cinematically more interesting and simpler than just saying "Yeah, go pick whatever kind of spellcaster you can think of." If I wanted that, I'd use my classic fantasy brew setting or grab a prebuilt system (I've always wanted to try Tuala Morn, for example). I'm torn on the "must be born with the talent of magic" thing but think I'm going to stick with it. I used to play much more "kitchen sink" style and now I'm much more interested in limitations, saying "no" and seeing what happens when the players have to come up with a new plan rather than "I'll just do what I've been doing for years with different PCs- I'll teleport." I'm almost tempted to cut out wizardry entirely, but figured I'd limit it instead to see how that goes.

I confess, I've struggled with finding the balance in the level of technology - too advanced, too ubiquitous, and the Obera doesn't stand a chance - unless I dialed the magic up to the point that it completely changed the flavor of the game/became an allternate form of advanced tech/ruined the feel I was going for. That's partly why I'm leaning towards American Civil War era tech for Ultria as a base - so most troops are armed with muzzle loaders, but some troops have repeating rifles, revolvers, and early automatic weapons (Gatling guns) exist. I'm thinking that these are new enough that they haven't been produced in enough quantity to replace the entire weapons inventory - plus it's expensive to buy enough weapons for an army of let's say.... a million troops, plus militia troops (but screw those guys- they can get secondhand weapons and be grateful for it, buncha farmers and factory workers...). The appearance of these weapons are a recent occurrence that hasn't yet, but certainly would given time, drastically upset the balance of power between the two states. The other advantage I see helping Ultria is food prodcution- industrialized societies generally far outproduce food compared to non-industrial, and that allows them to field much larger armies. Magic Of course, one of the players wants to play a caster, so now I have to develop this further. I want sorcerers and wizards to play very differently. I'm thinking sorcerers are fast, flashy, but relatively "unsophisticated." Most can only channel one kind of energy (see my earlier post in this thread about magic), although some are skilled/strong enough to be able to tap into multiple flows. They have to use personal endurance (it's exhausting to channel the energy) or very rare (and probably made by a wizard) prepared battery (mana pool essentially). Channeling more than one type of energy at the same time is EXTREMELY dangerous - if you mess it up, it could literally cause you to explode. The reason is that this matters is that the only thing that can defend against one kind of energy is another - a Life magic (call it Green) blast will pass straight through a Life magic (Green) shield. So you either need to buddy up with a sorcerer of another color/flow, or you need to be good enough (and willing) to channel multiple colors simultaneously. Most who can still don't take the gamble - they drop their defense to launch an attack, and then pull up a color to block the return fire. The best sorcerers though could pull up a shield of several colors at once - and attack the same way. So, for sorcerers, I see them as having the ability to use advantages that allow them to cast faster, without gestures or incantations, but LoS requirements, all spells must originate at the caster's location, etc. Wizards- classic fantasy stuff, but also Extra Time limitations, Gestures, Incantations, etc. They work by essentially finding a safe way to combine all the streams together through proper spellcasting - to create a Golem, one has to combine flows from all three Arts (probably Inception, Domination, Life, and Transformation. Oh, and Stasis so that it endures for any length of time). Thoughts?

Perhaps an Activation Roll/Side Effect to NOT Burn Out, but the roll gets negatives for every 10-20 AP/"mana" the character is channeling.

Tesla was more my shorthand way of describing overlarge devices that shoot off electricity, are used for power, and have improbably fantastic explanations for how they work. And you're right, of course - I combined two very different ideas in my notes that I was scribbling during a meeting and didn't research it after the fact. So the very advanced engines might be advanced magnets that "run silent" or somesuch against sorcerors trying to detect the power of a "Tesla" engine vessel, for instance, but it wouldn't be truly perpetual. Of course, the secret automata faction (who still needs a name), MIGHT actually have such a thing. It might even be their god. Edit: Perhaps that is the major motivating factor for the Automata animosity - their perpetual motion deity/creator (perhaps it originated off-world and has a long term agenda of getting off-world again to resume its original mission?) is being thrown off-kilter by the inherent unpredictability (at least as far as its concerned) of magic and the Fae - it doesn't know how to adapt its workings to account for the perturbations they represent. So as long as they exist, it has concluded, it cannot return to its optimal, perpetual state, but instead is slowly winding down (and even though it projects out continued operational functionality for several millennia, that's waaaaay short of infinity). Sort of classical mechanics meets quantum uncertainty, perhaps? Physics is far from my wheelhouse and it's late. Plus, this is fantasy. It has to be real enough to be engaging and entertaining, not perfectly simulate reality. If I wanted that, I'd buy a flight simulator.

An update with some basic outlines of the air and land forces : Brief Comparison of Air Forces Ultria · Combination of wooden vessels suspended by balloons, ironclads that have balloons pressed underneath them · Powered by steam/Tesla batteries (pre-charged) or engines powered by magnets (perpetual motion) · Medium, copper coiled boarding missiles that spin/bore into other vessels o Only fit on larger ships o Operating procedure is to self-destruct them if the boarding action looks like it will fail- responsibility of young sailors (tweens) o Can mount tethers to drag ship closer – reduces range, increases chance of success through more boarders o The copper shielding helps pierce magical barriers by channeling voltage – that’s the utility over easier/cheaper torpedoes that just blow up · Small hooks/missiles can also be used · On average slower but tougher o Some ships can use Tesla batteries/rockets to boost (externally attached, frame can drop it after use to reduce weight) · Firepower consists of cannons, experimental rockets (same as land forces), crew with rifles, etc. Obera · Primarily wood, bamboo/cloth etc. – easier to enchant to lift due to weight, repair, replace, carve runes into, etc. Makes them faster too · Gravity runes provide stability and a tactical advantage o No ones thought to apply these to land use – typical of Obera’s lack of cooperation/info sharing, experimenting with doctrine o Provide a prime target for Ultrian crews, who are used to/equipped to moving on ships without artificial gravity · Powered by magic flowing throughout runes running all over the ship- more energy efficient than ensorcerlling all parts of ship o A wizard’s flight spell works great for small things, not entire ships o Acts like a central nervous system/wiring system, degrades with damage o Power comes from magical batteries or a sorcerer actively putting power into them o Runes can be repaired by non-magical personnel o Best ships often cover the runes in panels to protect them, especially the central processing rune (CPR) · Sometimes augmented by flying magical creatures · Ships are ad-hoc, custom. Makes them slow to build/repair/replace o Plot point- one group of unusually forward thinking wizards/sorcerers set up a dedicated shipyard to crank out consistent ships faster. Prime target. · Ships tend to be faster, better climbers. Can ignore or create own winds to use with sails, wings, etc. · Enchanted gliders – can be used as boarders, or near ports as a local patrol/QRF, air assault, evac from a ship/area, etc. · Cheap, disposable feather fall rings o Lifejackets for the crew, highly sought after by Ultrian crews (parachutes not evented yet) · Firepower is mostly sorcerors supported by magic items (enchanted arrows, heatseekers, etc.). Brief Comparison of Land Forces, Some Tactics Ultria · Cannons, experimental rockets, tank sized mecha and clockwork golems · Line infantry, dragoons o Militia and standing army, commissions are bought o Armed with a mixture of rifles, muskets, etc. Obera · Typical fantasy ground forces of varying degrees of competence, deadliness · Enviro-control spells, magical darkness, storms, clouds to interfere w/sight and powder, nightvision paste o These are the strategies of smart Oberran casters/commanders · Noble leadership that is essentially a mirror of Ultria’s, but based on bloodline/station, peerage, etc. Naval forces exist, but I don't see a need to develop them just yet. The point of developing force concepts is to be able to get a feel for what the status quo is in terms of forces facing off against each other, potential sources of enemy combatants the PCs would face, and to answer common questions. Have some very loose thoughts down in terms of internal security forces and external agents (spies, assassins, special forces types). These are some of the more common threats I expect to the PCs to face, supplemented by the kinds of characters and settings the above tables suggest.

More please.

Interestingly, Falkenstein is exactly the reference that the player made when he expressed interest, and I had to go look it up. I might pick up the PDF if I can find it on the cheap. Also, another reading recommendation: The Powder Mage Trilogy. Gunpowder mages versus sorcerers, very good stuff.

I don't envision having a separate druidic magic, but perhaps there could be a faction of radical environmentalists who oppose the depravations of industry upon the environment. For magic, I'm envisioning a two-tier system. The first is fast and flashy - sorcery, channeling the fundamental forces. It consists of a trinity of trinities. The Living Streams 1) Life (Growth) 2) Stasis (Continuity/Inertia) 3) Death (Decay) The Material Arts 1) Destruction (Diminishment) 2) Preservation (Amplification) 3) Transformation (Alchemy/Alternation) The Thoughtful Disciplines 1) Domination (Imposition/Insertion) 2) Liberation (Truth/Lies/Halluciation/Disinhibition) 3) Inception (Creativity/Novelty) The second, in many ways more powerful tier, is true wizardry. These are the guys who can do things like teleportation, or create a spell that only allows people of the right bloodline to access a certain place, etc. They are the computer programers/engineers of magic, and the most deadly if given time to prepare - however this level of magic is mostly lost to humans. The Fae have spent centuries eliminating the art from human knowledge so that only they had access to it- and they grant it to select Oberran (Magistan) sorcerers sent to their "school" (think of a military academy meets Hogwarts) where they teach these advanced arts to humans, while simultaneously placing a geas upon them to ensure they can't share the knowledge and forces them to act as secret sleeper agents for the Fae. This gives the Fae access throughout the Oberran society, and keeps them dependent upon the Fae (who disguise themselves as a part of humanity, perhaps some kind of high church) for strength to resist their rivals. Ultrians face a similar invisible problem in that advanced automata have been hidden throughout their regular mechanical forces, acting compliant to regular authority until their secret orders are activated. So wizards capable of necromancy, etc. are incredibly rare, but yes, they would be useful. And yes, they would be hated by Ultrians (Techtopians). Dshomshak- your concepts of the kinds of countries is right on point with what I envisioned, but it gives me further ideas. Thanks. Cantriped- if you haven't already, I highly recommend that you check out Jim Butcher's Aeronaut's Windlass. Airships, magic, and a world covered in mist populated by animals that go berserk when they smell human blood - which has forced humanity to live in towers hundreds of stories tall.

Now I'm testing this on myself. Edit: I'm doing the same thing to the other posts as my above two posts, and it.... isn't doing the same thing. I blame the Illuminati.

.....ok, ^^^^^ is really annoying me. Test text 3.

Oh, espionage will be a major plot point from all sides. The major restrictions are that magic is something you have or you don't, so you have to encourage defectors (in the uprising, I'm imagining most native magical Ultrians were killed and that now presents a strategic problem they wish they didn't have), and industrial secrets are jealously guarded by both the originators and those who manage to steal them (Obera will be fracticious, as the king maintains a delicate balance of power by pitting different factions against each other). Huma would be expanding except it is playing a very careful balancing act- it is trying to secure allies to itself/build them up to the point where it is truly secure. If either Ultria or Obera focused their full resources on it, Huma would fall -but such an effort would deeply deplete the fighting power of the attacker and leave it exposed to its enemy. You've nailed the plot ideas perfectly - they will be protecting secrets, avoiding assassins, catching spies, and trying to prevent non-aligned nations from being forced into the spheres or the two superpowers and instead come toward Huma. Love it, stealing it, will probably name an NPC after you as a kudos. Thanks! I tried this! I call the button the "lightswitch" (because to me it looks like one), but I find that inserting a after the opening quote that contains the name information doesn't seem to close it out. I'll keep fidgeting with it.

Edit: Ugh, I'm used to the old boards where I could snip quotes to respond neatly. That method no longer seems to work here. Can someone please explain how I can break up a quote? I'm used to "quote||/quote" with brackets. Definitely "magitek"- the neutral nation that I describe above (let's call it Balancelandia manages to maintain its independence through a combination of economic and military might that lets it punch above its weight class through the combo of magic and technology. They use this to help support other smaller, weaker states that are also trying to maintain their independence. Machinations between the two empires abound in their efforts to destabilize the status quo in their own favor. All good points (some I had considered, some I had not), and I love the visual of arrows that become mortar rounds. Thank you! Couple of thoughts: 1) In my mind, the differing ideologies are a primary motivator for conflict, much as we saw with the Soviet Union and United States. Somewhat reasonably, mostly unreasonably, each views the others as an existential threat to their way of lives and values - divine right of kings versus a strong merchant class based democracy, religious differences (I'm thinking that Techtopia used to be part of a much larger, historical Magistan empire, but splintered off when the home empire went through a period of civil war and a cult arose that favored the use of scientific reasoning that can be used by everyone over deference to magic which is controlled by a select few). Your racism suggestion above fits perfectly with this, and I'm definitely stealing it. 2) Also, nationalism/people find stupid reasons to fight. 3) The resource aspect I something I've been struggling with, as it really should be a primary motivator. NATO and USSR largely had the same resources between them to my knowledge, so they competed for political and ideological reasons. However, I want there to be more than that here because NATO and USSR military forces and cities looked very similar- they were fundamentally using the same technology on each side, with different aesthetics/levels of access for citizenry. This is not the case here. I think that Techtopia has better access to certain minerals that are useful to making technologies such as steel, for instance, whereas Magistan has much more arable land (that it has to devote massive manual labor to versus Techtopia's smaller but more efficient farming environment that can barely keep up with its population (access to decent food in early industrial cities was a major sore point, historically). I definitely like the idea that Magistan has more mineral resources (that it doesn't know how to use), and perhaps I'll also flip the food situation- I feel that one side should have the strategic advantage of a larger population for conflict (the USSR's military was massive), whereas the other should have the advantage of superior access to quality fighting forces to offset that. So I'm thinking that while Magistan's shock troops are terrifying, ensorcelled warriors supported by magicians and levy troops, they are incredibly resource intensive and offset by the easier to train and equip forces of Techtopia. Way, way, WAAAY back behind the curtains, there are two other small (but powerful) factions I'm considering adding. Essentially there are hidden powers that are helping to drive the conflict from behind the scenes - on the magical side are the Faerie, whose world is actually dependent upon ambiguity and metaphor and all the classic tropes of the "fay." The act of measuring, defining, and being precise about the natural world actually decrease the size of the Faeries' home realm because it is antithetical to what allows them to exist. On the other side are a small group of intelligent automata (where they came from I'm not sure) who are terrified of the sheer irrationality and lack of predictability of magic. They are made of circuits and servos and view everything through logical lenses and cost-benefit calculations- a process which is completely upended when magic can make 2+2=5. I don't intend for the PCs to see any of this for a long time, but perhaps at the end of the first "season" they might encounter something fantastical (even for this setting!) and wonder just what the hell they stumbled into.

So, after a very long hiatus, it looks like I might be running a game again. Of course the potential players expressed interest in the one campaign idea that is least developed- a high fantasy/steampunk mashup that I've discovered could accurately be called arcanepunk. What I'm envisioning is a Cold War-esque scenario in which two large nations with disparate worldviews are competing for influence among smaller nations in an attempt to tip the scales of influence in their own favor. The two superpowers are at opposite ends of the high fantasy/steampunk spectrum that is arcanepunk. One (I'm calling it Techtopia until a real name emerges) has developed to an early industrial level of tech- trains, steam vessels, American Civil War firearms (a mixture of muskets, rifles, repeating weapons, cannons, etc.) - plus some airships. It has factories that build interchangeable parts, a parliamentary government that is only accessible to property owners (including intangible forms of property via banking, inventions, etc- you have to "buy in" to the system) that further disenfranchies the majority of citizens (many of whom have fled to cities for work in poor conditions- the evils of early industrialization). The secrets of technology and industry are jealously guarded - between guilds and government, engineers, technicians, and other skilled workers are closely monitored and not allowed to leave the country for fear of their arch-rivals catching up to them and neutralizing their technological advantage. That rival would be Magistan (again, a placeholder name). They are a feudal society dominated by magic- the noble families rose to power via carefully cultivating magical aptitude into their bloodlines via strategic marriages and forced acquisitions. They view magic as a gift from the gods, and advanced technology that imitates magic as man's usurpation of the divine prerogatives - plus wizards jealously guard their secrets, which makes for poor scientific advancement. Their population is roughly the same but they require more manual labor in the fields - so battle wizards supporting magically enchanted troops are how they hold out against firearms. A single wizard is capable of inflicting horrendous casualties if he or she is prepared, but there are relatively few such people (perhaps 1 in 1000 people have the gift of magic at all, and fewer still sufficient power to be useful on the battlefield itself instead of supporting the war effort in other ways). Stuck between them is a nation kind of like Switzerland that wants to remain neutral, and has successfully found a way to combine magic and technology far in advance of the others - basically it has used magic to jumpstart technology so that it doesn't need to burn coal at levels that pollute its cities, its airships can fly faster and higher due to the combo of resource efficient industry and reality cheating magic, etc. I imagine the PCs as being based out of this nation, helping to navigate the escalating tensions between shifting coalitions of power (worker's movements, anti-royalist conspiracies, religious schisms, etc.). Given this brief thumbnail sketch, what are your thoughts on how these nations might compete, what strategies and counterstrategies might they develop, what aspects do you think I need to consider without going off the deep end, etc.?

Unfortunately Laurel MD is a bit too far for me, but I'll keep referring people that live up that way to it.

Off to Google where Laurel is... (curse of not growing up in the area)