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Message: <blockquote data-quote="MoogleEmpMog" data-source="post: 3561159" data-attributes="member: 22882">I wouldn't say any one era fits it exactly, but if I had to pick one, it would be 'later than 1750.'  Since that's lumped in with 'other,' I didn't even have to choose. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" />In a 'typical' campaign of mine, you've got:Large-scale airships - Greatly exceeding what was produced at any time in Earth's history in size, quantity and quality.  Airships are the primary mode of travel; the large military models have armored bags and are equipped with the heaviest cannon they can carry, and operate much like real-world naval vessels of the Age of Exploration.  Indeed, although the actual tech required for these is at least 19th century and arguably 20th or 21st century, their role is much more Age of Exploration, complete with air pirates.  Heavier-than-air aircraft (like one-man fighters) are nonexistent or new, and serve as secret weapons.Reasonably reliable personal firearms - Rifles, pistols and early shotguns are in use, with muskets perhaps just on the way out or considered last-generation technology.  Bullets are in use rather than balls.  Machine guns or gatling guns are just around the corner, if not already in service as 'secret weapons,' but man-portable fully automatic weapons are out of the question.Railroads - Railroads exist, but are mostly used by people too poor to use airships or to carry goods too heavy for an airship to handle.  Steam engines are put to other civilian purposes, but in limited quantities.  Internal combustion engines are either unavailable or new and fall under the 'secret weapons' category.Pirates, cowboys and indians - As mentioned above, air pirates fill the role sea pirates do in Age of Exploration stories.  However, the natural 'frontier' nature of the classic D&D campaign is also represented by the presence of a, well, frontier area where there's little or no law and plenty of dangerous (but sometimes noble) savages.  This is a campaign where "a ghost dancer, a pirate and a gunslinger walk into a bar" is as likely to be the PCs' introduction as the start of a joke.Large, centralized monarchies - Most of the governments are centralized monarchies like those common in Europe in the 17th, 18th, 19th and pre-WW1 20th centuries.  They're more likely to err on the side of feudalism than republic.  Usually there's one relatively new, up-and-coming country with the best technology, an obsession with 'progress' and a somewhat fascistic or communistic stance, which serves as the source of baddies; the other countries are sufficiently busy fighting amonst themselves that it falls to high-level PCs to defeat this menace or at least foil its more pulpy schemes.Electricity - Is used in limited amounts, its full potential as yet untapped.  Most of the things it will prove useful for, such as lighting, radio and general infrastructure, have not yet caught up to its discovery in usable form.  For now, it's the province of:Mad science - Pulp/steampunk superscience is fairly common in the wild and crazy lives of PCs, though not in the wider world.  A Tesla-tech device like that in the movie The Prestige, Frankenstein's monster-like mad science constructs, difference engine-based artificial intelligences, clockwork cybernetic limbs and lightning guns are all within the range of things a PC or BBEG might meet, have or be.  On the other hand, in the wider world, these are simply too expensive or impractical to see widespread use, which is why rifles, not lightning guns, are the staple of armies.</blockquote>

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