Steve Jackson Games - Site Navigation
Home General Info Follow Us Search Illuminator Store Forums What's New Other Games Ogre GURPS Munchkin Our Games: Home

Go Back   Steve Jackson Games Forums > Roleplaying > GURPS

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
Old 10-18-2020, 08:22 AM   #1
FeiLin
 
Join Date: Aug 2018
Default Medieval "Volatile Fantasy" Societies

I have a fantasy world (TL3, mostly), which is what I'd like to call "volatile fantasy". By this I mean there is amazing magic, legendary heroes, terrible monsters, unspoken evils and looming gods, yet, life for the ordinary citizen is rather "grittily medieval" for the most part. This is especially true in remote and rural areas, proportionally so with distance to major population centers. Well, monsters and evils seem always to be lurking in the dark, but the apart from the occasional adventuring party or the effort to cleanse the realm of a particular evil, the smaller the settlement, the more mundane the life. Somewhat like the Wheel of Time.

The primary continent is divided by a mountain range, some semi-impenetrable forests/jungles, an ice covered sea route and a desert, most of which are also to various degrees monster infested. This has led to the development of two distinct societies, which have little (if any) direct contact, and any direct contact currently goes through intermediary free cities or small realms (duchies/baronies/etc).

On one side of the barrier lies a kingdom, held together by a collection of alliances and trade agreements, operating on a bottom-up principle. Lords and nobles play an important role of ruling and aggregate each level of society from the peasant to the king. Most levels also include some form of council, where issues are raised, discussed, and (as needed) escalated to the next level. In general, taxes are low and paid to the next level above, and anyone is allowed to sell or consume any surplus as they see fit, meaning that harvest festivals and standing markets are common. Central taxes mainly go to basic infrastructure as well as general peacekeeping forces (which have fallen into decay from decades if not centuries of actual use). This doesnt concern the realm too much, however, as there are no immediate threats and people can live (comparatively) comfortable lives. The royal elite have a fairly non-interventionist policy and hold fairly small real power. The pantheon incorporates both small local gods as well as nation wide saints and deities (similar to the greek/roman pantheon).

On the other side is an expansionary empire, constantly invading and assimilating neighboring independent states, operating on a top-down principle. Military and religious leaders struggle for the power of the throne. People are taxed directly by the state, and local nobles fight for prestigious yet few roles in the power structure. The population is controlled in various administrative areas, requiring a form of passport to travel around. Instead of allowing free trade, more taxes are levied on the population who have little to no possibility to object. Most population centers specialise in a single or a few areas of production to compete for state level resources. Power is absolute and unquestionable, and what isnt decided by the monotheistic church is decided by the military or not worth bothering with.

Now, I'm starting to flesh out these societies, and for the empire, I imagine having centralised courts in major cities/regional capitals, where any one is theoretically able to bring their case forward, but only wealthy nobles actually are in practice able to. Laws are produced in the national capital and carried out (sometimes even without trials) by magistrates of various degrees of importance. Most laws are either harsh or arbitrary, to support the rulers and their cronies. There are "traveling magistrates", whose profession is to make justice mobile, but their reputation is that they are some of the worst among the magistrates (a conscious strategy to reduce crime by discouraging it, yet ineffective, as both nobles and the people try to avoid them, which hides more problems than it solves).

In the kingdom, on the other hand, justice is handled more by local courts of different levels (depending on the crime). There are also "mediating knights" who patrol the country and act as keepers of the peace. Although they are quite few in numbers, their primary task is to encourage and conduct dialog between and with different parties as to preemptively reduce conflicts. Along the same lines as most other aspects if the society, the laws are fairly decentralised and local laws fill in the gaps left (sometimes intentionally) by the central lawmakers.

I wanna strike a balance between a medieval inspired gritty society and one with fantastical beasts and phenomena, and the law is more focused on the former (though not limited by historical examples). While magic is banned outside strictly controlled organisations in the empire, it is seem more as a tool or weapon like any other in the kingdom, but doesnt otherwise feature as a prominent separate element in the law. Similarly, monsters are not frequent enough to have separate clauses beyond a basic "[anyone killing a monster is doing the land a favor and gets to keep the spoils as reward]". Nor is neither magic nor monsters frequent enough to be a part of the judicial process. Basically, the law is fairly mundanely carried out over mostly mundane situations. While there are important magicians and other characters, these arent the primary subjects of the law.

I really want to tell players as little as possible of the above explicitly; my goal is to have them describe this to me after playing in this world for a while. In particular, I'm trying to come up with as many ways as possible (legal systems included) that may reflect and emphasise the two societies' differences. Also, any other comments are appreciated as well, of course.
FeiLin is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-18-2020, 08:26 AM   #2
DanHoward
 
DanHoward's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: Maitland, NSW, Australia
Default Re: Medieval "Volatile Fantasy" Societies

Having legal restrictions won't be enough. If you want this to work, you need to seriously restrict the number of people who have the capacity to use magic. Perhaps one in a hundred thousand people.
__________________
Compact Castles gives the gamer an instant portfolio of genuine, real-world castle floorplans to use in any historical, low-tech, or fantasy game setting.
DanHoward is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-18-2020, 09:21 AM   #3
Turhan's Bey Company
Aluminated
 
Turhan's Bey Company's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2005
Location: East of the moon, west of the stars, close to buses and shopping
Default Re: Medieval "Volatile Fantasy" Societies

Quote:
Originally Posted by FeiLin View Post
I have a fantasy world (TL3, mostly), which is what I'd like to call "volatile fantasy". By this I mean there is amazing magic, legendary heroes, terrible monsters, unspoken evils and looming gods, yet, life for the ordinary citizen is rather "grittily medieval" for the most part.
FWIW, this much is a bit like the "Wellsprings of Creation" setting outlined in the Pyramid Dungeon Collection. There are places where there's "normal" life, but there's also big magic which comes along every now and again to blow it all up. If you've got that book, you may want to look over it and see if anything is useful to you.

I agree with Dan that legal restrictions won't work, but I'd argue that that's a long-term problem, and in the long run, as Keynes observed, we are all dead. A generation ago, things may have been chaos in your well-ordered kingdom. A generation hence, the place might be overrun by fireball-slinging hordes of sparkle centaurs or something. Your campaign can be set in the brief interregnum of stability. Indeed, one theme for the campaign, if you're so inclined, might be seeing the cracks start to appear in the foundation.
__________________
I've been making pointlessly shiny things, and I've got some gaming-related stuff as well as 3d printing designs.

Buy my Warehouse 23 stuff, dammit!
Turhan's Bey Company is online now   Reply With Quote
Old 10-18-2020, 09:56 AM   #4
AlexanderHowl
 
Join Date: Feb 2016
Default Re: Medieval "Volatile Fantasy" Societies

Volatile fantasy settings are cinematic settings, so they are not necessarily going to have realistic consequences (Discworld did, but that was because magic was so dangerous). Now, if you want magic to tightly regulated, make the kingdom very high mana and then watch the fun, as anyone with Magery outside of strickly regulated professions would be hunted down like rabid dogs. Monsters would spontaneously arise due to magically induced mutations, which would afflict more animals than humans because there are lots more animals than humans. In addition, magical hybridization might occur, so beast people may result from certain sinful behaviors.

In such a setting, the authorities would be busy dealing with the consequences of hybridization and mutation. Dangerous monsters would be hunted down, harmless monsters might be sold as luxury pets, and useful monsters might be domesticated. In the case of sapient monsters like beast people, the authorities might enslave them (or they might just kill them with fire), though having a kingdom willing to give peaceful beast people a chance despite the sinfulness associated with their creation could also be quite fun.
AlexanderHowl is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 10-18-2020, 12:50 PM   #5
Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2
 
Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2's Avatar
 
Join Date: Mar 2005
Location: The deep dark haunted woods
Default Re: Medieval "Volatile Fantasy" Societies

What you've described is basically a fantasy-based superhero world - there are a small group that have amazing powers and epic adventures, while the bulk of the population are just ordinary background filler types. That's all there is to it.
__________________
"When you talk about damage radius, even atomic weapons pale before that of an unfettered idiot in a position of power."
- Sam Starfall from the webcomic Freefall
Mysterious Dark Lord v3.2 is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Tags
fantasy, legal system, tl3, world-building

Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Fnords are Off
[IMG] code is Off
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -6. The time now is 01:38 PM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.9
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.