Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Al" data-source="post: 388167" data-attributes="member: 2486">Agreed, more or less; but I see the thread has moved on, so we'll leave it amicably here.Now onto the other point, of magic changing society.  I don't believe it would necessarily.1. Overestimation of Casters  Well, this is a false starting point.  Taking the DMG's advice that only one-tenth of the population lives in settlements larger than villages, we shall take the village.  With a community modifier of -1, we can calculate the following: 3.5 clerics, 3.5 druids, 3.5 adepts, 1.75 sorcerers and 1.75 wizards; no paladins or rangers of spellcasting level.  So, in a village of 650, only 14 people can cast spells; this is a fair compromise as the proportion will rise in larger settlements and fall in smaller settlements.  This is a mere 2%. Again, this does not correspond to the DMG standards, whereby a high level character generates twice as many of half his level, not his level-1. Wrong way round.  You start at the top then halve; so the highest level adept is (average roll) level 6/7.  Which means 2 level 3 adepts and the rest level 1.  This is turn means that only one person can cast 2nd level spells in the adept community.  Extend it to other spellcasters, and on average you get one caster of 4th level spells, 3 of 3rd level spells and a few more 2nd level spellcasters.  Nowhere near your professed totals.2. Lack of Organisation The assumption made here are that the caster goes all-out 'for the good of society'.  Whilst this may be true of good-aligned clerical orders, this is far from true of the general population of spellcasters.  They are not going to train for years in order to set around all day acting as water purifiers; at least, not in the quantity and at the price that has been asserted here.The notion cited that they would be coerced into doing so is even more ludicrous: if the local ruler tries to coerce them, he may at best face unrest and at worst face an outright spellcaster-led revolution.  Not to mention the fact that the notions of a permanent standing army and of a powerful central government are alien to the feudal period (both evolved in c. 15th century).3. Social Issues A few months ago I posted a satirical thread which detailed how one could bring about an Industrial Revolution by having all the high-level spellcasters in the world manufacture Murlynd's Spoons.  This would solve all food problems, release the general populace from agriculture, and cause an Industrial Revolution overnight.  Whilst from a rational, 21st century economic standpoint this is not only sensible but lucrative (as the wizard could make a fortune charging a pittance for their Murlynd's Meals with little running costs) it is clearly incredible.  No one here, I hope, would suggest that this is what high-level spellcasters would do.That's part of the problem.  Everyone here is assuming modern socioeconomic thinking.  In order to have an Industrial Revolution, there must be certain factors which are not present in the feudal set-up. <ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The concept of mass production</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">An effective banking sector</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Some ideas of modern capitalist thinking</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">The availability of technology at cheap prices, available to the masses</li> </ul>None of these are necessarily inherent to the 'magic revolution'.  Even the last point on the list is precluded by the generally held conception that, even if the wizard were to 'market' his powers, it would probably be to the wealthy few, not the impoverished multitude.All in all, magic cannot make an industrial revolution alone.  It may aid in that end, but until the correct social circumstances are met, I see little chance of magic on its own bringing a world out of the medieval era.</blockquote>

Verification