TOLARIA - TECHNOLOGY & CULTURE

(This was originally written as background for a fantasy campaign that never actually happened)

Tolaria’s technological level can best be described as “Late medieval”, circa about 1480 in our world – articulated plate armour is state of the art, while the biggest powered machines are water and windmills – though it is significantly more advanced in some areas.

Most industries are organised on a guild basis – a master takes an apprentice in his early teens. The apprentice usually lives in his masters’ house, and is taught the “mysteries of the craft” in return for his labour. For especially lucrative trades, the apprentices’ parents may need to pay the master a premium, on top.

Once the apprentice has satisfied the guild council of his competence, he becomes a journeyman, able to practice the craft in his own name, but not sit on the council or take an apprentice.

After he has acquired sufficient experience, a jouneyman can submit his “masterpiece” (once a physical item, now more usually a portfolio of work) to the guild council, and petition for admission as a master.

Guilds regulate prices and quality, and deal with complaints against members. Many also operate as “friendly societies”, providing support for members who have fallen on hard times. In a few trades requiring substantial investment in tools, they may even act as rotating credit unions, to help journeymen set themselves up in trade. Guild dinners are often important events in the social calendar of small towns.

Steam power and gunpowder are NOT known in Tolaria, even to the extent that they were known in our middle ages. There is no obvious explanation for this lacunae of development, but it is absolute, and this will not change during the game; the technologies are simply not available.

The Dwarves make particularly extensive use of water power, however, and can create elaborate clockwork gadgets, albeit as one-of-a-kind luxuries.

Iron is the most common metal for tools. Steel is normal for weapons, armour and some tools, but it is still hand-made, and costs 2-3 times the price of iron; there is no equivalent of the Bessemer process to allow mass production.

Glass is cheap enough to be routine in middle-class dwellings, but technical limitations still restrict individual panes to less than a foot square. It is still expensive enough that glass bottles are used only for the most expensive liquors.

Optics are an established field of study, though still as much an art as a science. Telescopes, magnifying glasses etc are available, though expensive.

Distillation is known, and weak acids (usable for etching etc) can be produced.

Crop rotation techniques and selective breeding are used, giving yields not achieved in our world until the eighteenth-century “agricultural revolution” and creating a prosperous peasantry in civilized areas with good land.

Medicine is closely linked with magical healing. Non-magical healing is primarily first aid, or for circumstances where magic is not available – pioneer camps, or on a battlefield where the number of casualties may swamp the amount of mages available.

Techniques using magic to control pain, shock and blood loss have made surgery reasonably safe, though not risk-free. Attempting surgery without those magics available would only be done in a dire emergency.

Basic anatomy and medical theory are sound, and the circulation of blood is known. A theory linking dirt to disease is commonly accepted, leading to much cleaner streets than our middle ages, and a somewhat better child-mortality rate.

Literacy is unexceptional, but not universal; a good number of the lower classes could be fairly described as semi-literate, especially outside the core “civilized” areas. Written record keeping is normal for routine purposes, as well as important matters.

The printing press (with movable type) is in common use; the major constraint on book production is the relatively high cost of paper, and a cheap “yellow press” printing pamplets and “penny dreadful” novels exists in most cities.

Mathematics uses Arabic numerals, including zero. Geometric principles are well advanced, and an abacus is an essential tool for any merchant.

Architecture has tended to be quite solid and defensive, though surviving “first empire” pre-cataclysm architecture is often quite delicate. Elven architecture, particularly, often uses magical techniques to shape stone.

Sailing ships are quite advanced, to the point they reached in our world about 1700. Navigation is by the stars, but chronometers are neither reliable enough nor sufficiently advanced to determine longitude. Elven shipwrights are even more advanced, and their ships have reached the perfection of the nineteenth-century tea clippers. Without cannon, naval actions are often inconclusive and resolved by close action and boarding, making these ships less useful as a tool of power projection.

Perspective drawing has been developed, and there is a well-developed standard written musical notation.

The theatre is well-established, and most cities would have a permanenent theatre, though country villages and small towns will have to make do with travelling players.

STYLE & FEEL

Tolaria could be best described as “organized”, with reliable postal and coaching services between cities, organized government, and so forth, at least within the civilized areas. However, the effects of the cataclysm mean that population density is relatively low, and thee are pockets of wild country even within the core areas, as well as extensive recently-resettled “frontier” areas.

It is a money economy, with letters of credit used to transfer large amounts, rather than coin. Land ownership and social relationships are usually based on contracts and salaries, rather than feudal rights.

Much of the countryside has a rather “militarized” feel to it. Towns and cities are normally walled, while farmsteads are usually in the “central European defensible style” – blank loopholed outer walls, with windows and doors facing into a walled central courtyard. Most villages outside the more secure core areas have an organized militia, though quality and equipment will be variable. Towns will have a regular watch, as well.

Large standing armies are too expensive to maintain, but most nations maintain garrisons at key points, plus small reaction forces to deal with raiders etc, and troops normally rotate between the two.

Clothes follow medieval styles to an extent, but there are some notable differences. Cotton and silk are both more easily available than they were in our past, and trousers (belted or drawstring) were never replaced by hose. Some outer garments have simple patch pockets, but belt pouches are still the norm. Cloaks are the norm for cold/wet weather, but heavy woollen greatcoats are a more expensive alternative.

Carrying weapons is generally restricted in towns – heavily armed visitors will often be required to lodge weapons with the watch or militia armoury. Carrying a dagger is acceptable in most circumstances, and they are sometimes given decorative hilts.

Travelers would generally carry light weapons for their own defense, outside very safe core areas – usually a quarterstaff or short sword if not trained as fighters, but anything would be permissible for people with a reasonable need to carry it, and behaving reasonably. Most households outside the towns would be able to turn up two or three weapons without trouble, even if only a couple of spears and a wood axe.