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Cab
Rules over Alphatia!
Joined: 07 Mar 2007
Posts: 125
Location: Cambridge
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 Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 10:03 am Post subject: |
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| alhoon wrote: | OK.... In case I'm not mistaken Alphatia has about 6-7 million people before it sank. 1000 36lvl archmages in the ruling council means:
1. About 1000 36th lvl mages locked in their towers, not giving a damn about the world. |
It simply isn't true that they don't give a damn about the world, its more the case that they care passionately about the bits they're interested in. Theres a good description of this mindset in DotE.
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2. About 1/3000 people in Alphatia is a 36th level magic user |
Dunno, I'd have to have a good look at the demographics pre-WotI. Remember that as well as Alphatia theres Bellisaria, Esterhold, Norwold, the Isle of Dawn, and the Grand Council is made up of people from all of those colonies and others too. Add to the fact that any great mage from the Empire is going to keep an estate on the mainland somewhere, and yes, you've got completely skewed demographics.
| Quote: | | 3. 2000 36th level mages mean at least 10000 26th-36th level magic users or thatat least 1/600 people in Alphatia is a master mage, commanding the forces of the world. |
Errm... Sort of. Remember, the trick to becoming a 36th level magic user is not dying. The lifespans of some of the example mages (look, for example, at the emperors) is in the hundreds of years. When that starts happening, all of the greatest mages get to very high level, whereas the others simply die at some point. That skews things more to the top level than I think you're looking at. But yes, greater than 1/600 people on mainland Alphatia would be powerful (name level ish or above) mages.
| Quote: | | 4. The PCs get to 30 level after saving the world a couple of times, battling dragons the size of a castle etc... and they're weaker than every and all of 1000 people in the ruling council, and countless other nobles/scholars around the land. |
And the PCs get to do it in 15-20 years of adventuring, wheras a bookish (rich) archmage does it after 200 years or more of research, and after spending millions (or at the very least many hundreds of thousands) of GP in the process.
| Quote: | If I was a player, I would have been frustrated that I would be so... unimportant after so much work.
Even gathering money from a county has its challenges (wars, raids, disasters, crazed people using artifacts that could sink a continent etc.) |
The thing is, the PCs are in principle less 'powerful', but a concerted effort from a bunch of 25th level PCs is something to be feared even by the greatest arch mages on the planet, and the PCs have something that most of the grand council never have; worldly experience. They're tough and resourceful in ways that most arch mages aren't.
And remember, a PCs rise to prominence is meteoric in comparison with that of a stay at home mage. That makes them dangerous and unpredictable; a party of PCs will have abilities, weapons and spells available that make them impossible to predict, whereas a stay at home specialised mage has few surprises up his sleeve.
But all of that said, yes, theres a heck of a lot of raw power in Alphatia.
| Quote: | | I certainly won't tell anyone how to run his/her campaign, but I just note that I respectfully disagree with these figures. |
Thats up to you. By the book, theres a council of 1000 36th level mages, and they're only part of the magical talent that Alphatia has. That stat was first introduced in CM1, and remained canon until Alphatia sank (and the setting then went 2nd ed). But you're certainly not the first person to see problems with that.
| Quote: | I believe that a ruling council of 100 21-36th level mages for Alphatia is good enough. Along with 500-600 more high level noble mages or crazed guys locked in their tower around the land.
I believe that Thyatis should have... 1/5th of the mages Alphatia has so about 60-70 magic users of levels 21-36th. But that's just me. |
That hugely, hugely changes Mystara. It means that Alphatiaha has to be interested in the outside world to survive. In my opinion, it makes the Empire of Alphatia much more dangerous. I'll go looking for an article I saw over at Pandius that explains that.
Last edited by Cab on Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:02 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Cab
Rules over Alphatia!
Joined: 07 Mar 2007
Posts: 125
Location: Cambridge
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:01 am Post subject: |
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Theres a lovely sumary of what is wrong with Alphatia, why this nation of potent mages never conquered the world, here:
http://www.pandius.com/truthalp.html
Add to that the prevailent pacifistic philisophy of Mylertendal, and it all starts to make more sense.
Alphatia is alien and quite nasty in many ways; that makes the Alphatian colonies very interesting places for adventuring, and it makes their interference in global politics really very fraught. |
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alhoon
Frequent Tentacle Issues
Joined: 10 Mar 2007
Posts: 96
Location: Chania, Greece.
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:37 am Post subject: |
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Oh, I just don't like extrememely high levels, that's all. And yes, I know. When I used to play Mystara Alphatia was a strange land of powerful mages (That is name level and above) that was interested in the world beyond. Internal politics, usual magic user indeference for the world etc prevented Alphatia to take over the world, but they had a strong interest in expansion... and frankly of keeping Thyatis from becoming the dominant world power.
As for your interesting remarks:
For mainland Alphatia 1/500 - 1/1000 people being 9th+ magic user is... acceptable I guess. For some magic-heavy colonies the figure would be around 1/1500 - 1/2000. But that is 9th+ not 26th+.
NOTE: I never used the rule that gold gathered by your dominion give you XP BTW. Challenges in your rule on the other hand, give XP so many counts and nobles are 15th+.
Good resource for Alphatia that. I kindly envisioned Alphatia that way. Although I disagree with some points and generally believe that the whole thing is an overstatement. Yes, in Alphatia you're nothing if not a mage, but that's better than in many other lands.
And for every magic user working to perform a vile experiment that would bring him power there is another one that works to twart the scemes of his evil neighbor.
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Cab
Rules over Alphatia!
Joined: 07 Mar 2007
Posts: 125
Location: Cambridge
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| Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2007 12:11 pm Post subject: |
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| alhoon wrote: | Oh, I just don't like extrememely high levels, that's all. And yes, I know. When I used to play Mystara Alphatia was a strange land of powerful mages (That is name level and above) that was interested in the world beyond. Internal politics, usual magic user indeference for the world etc prevented Alphatia to take over the world, but they had a strong interest in expansion... and frankly of keeping Thyatis from becoming the dominant world power.
As for your interesting remarks:
For mainland Alphatia 1/500 - 1/1000 people being 9th+ magic user is... acceptable I guess. For some magic-heavy colonies the figure would be around 1/1500 - 1/2000. But that is 9th+ not 26th+. |
Such detailed demographics on RPG worlds never really interested me. To be honest, I don't think that matters as much as the actual scale; 1000 36th level mages as a ruling council is a gobsmacking number whether the population is a little over 7 million or whether its 70 million.
I also tend to think that the population densities of rural areas on Mystara are underestimated (certainly early renaissance Britain had more people in its countryside per unit area than there are in, say Bellisaria), but thats a side issue unrelated here.
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NOTE: I never used the rule that gold gathered by your dominion give you XP BTW. Challenges in your rule on the other hand, give XP so many counts and nobles are 15th+.
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Remember that according to the RC and also the extra rules on research in the Gaz series, you get XP for that too. A wizard who has researched for three normal lifetimes length will be pretty handy.
| Quote: | | Good resource for Alphatia that. I kindly envisioned Alphatia that way. Although I disagree with some points and generally believe that the whole thing is an overstatement. Yes, in Alphatia you're nothing if not a mage, but that's better than in many other lands. |
Indeed, its a little over the top, but only a little. Alphatia is wonderful if you're a mage (or rich enough and powerful enough to shrug off the fact that you're not an aristoctrat). But otherwise, it can be rather unpleasant. I like to play on that when adventurers based in the outskirts of the empire end up on the mainland, its good to shock them with, to make them reconsider their allegiances.
| Quote: | | And for every magic user working to perform a vile experiment that would bring him power there is another one that works to twart the scemes of his evil neighbor. |
Indeed, although whether he's actually 'good' himself is another matter  |
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