[maximara]

Originally Posted by DaltonS

I think what maximara is trying to say is that TL(6+1) is the manatech age (1945+) with TL(6+2) being the manatronic age (1978+) "when Sephiroth [Industries] developed the Conduct Power, Steal Power and Draw Power spells." [p.T117]. This an important breakpoint, since where before magic was either used to enhance technology or replace it, now technology could be used to enhance and support magic.

Something like that but it is important to realize that per Steampunk to realize that the first used of a new tech or concept will in genral use the old guidelines as per H.M.S. Dreadnought which by 3e standard was TL(5+1) and would likely be TL(6+1) under 4e.

Fantasy points out "Technology does not develop in rigid lockstep" (F65). As the movie Atomic Cafe and Time Machine's "Future that never Happened" our understanding of atomic energy for nearly of all the 1950's was basicly TL6 which was another reason that I felt that Technomancer would be at TL(6+x).

As I pointed out thile I like the idea of Technomancer the way it was done resulted in tons of logic holes.

1) Japan surrenders Sept 14, 1945 as it did in OTL. Given the Gadget was such a disaster and in OTL it took two atomic bombs for Hirohito to assert control and surrender even though his militarty commanders wanted to go down fighting USSR or no USSR how this happened is never explained.

2) after Trinity why on earth would Stalin want to test an atomic bomb and why in Antartica of all places? If he wanted the power the US now had Siberia would have made more sense.

3) After these two events you think anyone but a total nutcase would want to even go near a nuclear reactor much less develop one? Hardly.

4) In OTL Oppenheimer was religated to the fringes of the military establishment was his arguement against the Hydrogen bomb (he and his allies called it MegaDeath); the Hellstorms of 45 and 49 would have prevented Oppenheimer from being pushed out of the decision process as he was in our history. Yet Technomancer implies that as in OTL Oppenheimer was pushed to the fringes and again no reason is given.

5) Illusion and Creation spells would have changed the way people like Ray Harryhausen did things and Lucus' Industrial Light and Magic would have gone a very different path than in OTL (assuming it ever got created in the first place)

6) Resisting the use of Compel Truth in court is illegal (pg 100) ergo since MR cannot be turned of off any MR person called into court would be forced to break the law. This is entrapment and a violation of the persons' 5th admendment rights. Also with with this spell many of the wrongful convictions we are seeing even now would have likely never happened in the first place.

7) the Antiquities Act of 1906 which is baced on the 5th admendment (graves and the corpses in them are property of the native peoples) make the whole Louisiana undead chaingang thing ridiculous. It also ignores the fact that abuses like those documented in movie I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang (1932) and book it was based on I Am a Fugitive from a Georgia Chain Gang effectively ending their practice for almost 50 years. And what happens when DNA testing comes along and proves that zombie you have had working for 20 years was innocent? Mammoth lawsuit time.

8) The idea that demons would attack John Wayne and his fellow actors near St. George, UT hundreds of miles aways from the Trinity Site and yet leave Soccoro, NM a mear 25 miles away alone is totally idiocy. Why bother a bunch of actors when you have much jucier place like Alamogordo, Los Alamos, Sante Fe, Albuquerque, and Farmington to bedevil? Also if the demon activity was that high Hughes would have filmed the Conqueror elsewhere (the man was an egomanic not a meglomaniac). Then you have all the pictures Wayne made after 1956 not being made including The Longest Day which helped keep 20th century Fox from going bankrupt. And this is just Wayne - all the other actors with him did films afterwords and those film can't exist nor can the lives they influenced.

9) Magery 2 people with Enchant (which requires 10 spells from 10 different colleges) would be doing blue collar jobs. The whole purpose of the assembly line what that the majority of skills were in the machines not in the workers. "Industral Enchantment" is totally at odds with that consept.

10) Seemly every dictator getting Unaging as if it is a free sample.