Re: [ItV] Spelljamming and Technology - article

----- Original Message -----
From: "Dreamer" <dreamer@??????.?????.??.uk>
Subject: [SPELLJAMMER] [ItV] Spelljamming and Technology - article

> If DMs consider that the history of spelljamming goes back
> thousands or tens of thousands of years, and even further if you
> talk to the elves or dragons, they may wish to ask why it has
> been reasonably stable.  They may care to say that, just as in
> the 'real world', all sorts of discoveries have been made over
> the ages.  These would include the inventions of ancient Greece,
> or China, or Arabia.  However, the right combination of
> circumstances never quite arose so these gave rise to a
> technological civilisation.  And, that the situation is the same
> in the Spelljamming setting.  Or, they may want there to be some
> sort of stabilising force, which works secretly, behind the
> scenes, gradually smoothing out any disruptions, that would cause
> radical changes to the Spelljamming meta-culture.  If so, then
> any contact with a high tech civilisation might be the trigger
> for this stabilising force to go into action.  Possibly foiling,
> if not completely resisting, any attempts by PCs or others to
> 'upgrade' the Spelljamming meta-culture with high tech.

I would have thought that the stabilising force, of which you speak, is the Imperial Elven
Navy.

They have the most powerful fleet in wildspace and are the most organised society. Despite
their losses in the two Unhuman Wars, they almost certainly possess a lot of detailed
records of many societies in hundreds if not thousands of crystal spheres. If the
technical devices that you speak of are randomly coming in and out of use over time, the
probability is that the IEN would stumble onto some of these inventions.

The feeling I get about the IEN is that, just like groundling elves, they have an affinity
for nature. However, unlike grounding elves, they seem willing to sacrifice their own
connection to nature in order to protect the greater good for the majority of elves. An
example of this would be Bionoids. The way Bionoids are portrayed in The Cloakmaster
Novels, leads me to believe that most Elves find them disgusting. Yet despite their
apparent distaste the IEN were willing to convert some Elves into these sub-Elven
creatures, when they didn't have any other option.

(In our real history we have examples of weapons being designed to defeat particular
armour designs and armour being designed to defeat particular weapon designs.)

With a stable culture and long term knowledge of such things, I am sure that the Elves are
aware of previous arms races on planets that they have watched. They must be aware that if
they deploy advanced magic or technology, their enemies will get hold of it and work on
improvements.

I get the impression that the IEN know that they are getting more and more overstretched
and in some spheres have control, purely because they have the respect of the other
cultures in the sphere.

I would think that under the circumstances it would not be unreasonable for the IEN to
consider using spies to seek out the very people that you mention and find ways to slow
down their work as much as possible.

Alternatively the IEN could find an isolated sphere and locate disillusioned philosophers
and would be scientists to relocate there. These people could then be allowed to get their
experimentation out of their system in a controlled environment that would not pollute
their own cultures. Better still the IEN would always have the option for using some of
these secret inventions if they really got into trouble. I can imagine the IEN creating a
'Stepford Elves' style society, with for example a curious human with dangerous ideas that
his fellows laugh at, being invited into adventuring parties, expeditions and other events
that are all organised by undercover operatives. The eventual aim could be for them to
reject their own backward culture and break out with people they are convinced are a group
of likeminded friends to live on a new world where they can work in piece. Their colleges,
friends, mentor, and perhaps even their husband or wives could be IEN stooges.

Because Elves live a lot longer than other races an Elf that agreed to work on this sort
of project could spend hundreds of years interacting with a particular race in order to be
able to blend into the community and work effectively with their targets. If they worked
with someone over a period of years they could shoehorn that person out of their
environment so slowly that the person would never suspect anything. They might even
genuinely come to care for those people.

As long these people were allowed to continue with their work and got the right number of
challenges they might never realise what was happening. They could live out a happy full
life and never realise they were being conned. But if any of them decided to leave and go
back home they could be 'disposed' of if the IEN, thought it was dangerous for them to
leave.

I know some people object to the behaviour of some of the Elves in the Cloakmaster Novels,
but it is an option that some members of the IEN would probably consider at some point.
Even if 99 percent of Elves reject the idea out of hand, there might still be a tiny group
of Elves doing this in secret, in an attempt to minimise the risk that Elves will start
inventing things that put their society (and the societies of grounding Elves that I'm
sure the IEN feels they are single-handedly protecting) at risk.

There could even be an organisation doing this that the IEN leadership knows nothing
about. This theoretical organisation might even have held back technology in the two
Unhuman Wars in order to protect the secret of its existence. They may only reveal
themselves when they have totally overwhelming odds and can kill all of their opponents
and destroy all evidence that they had been there. Don't forget that with magic and the
ability to communicate with the dead this is a lot less likely to occur that you would
expect. For example: a secret force of Elven Technomancers that fought against a Scro ship
would have to be sure that they could disrupt all magical travel and communication, kill
everybody on board, utterly destroy the souls of all the dead and disintegrate every part
of the ship and the bodies before anyone found them. If they couldn't be totally sure that
they could do that they would have to steer clear of the ship and allow it to complete its
mission.

David "Big Mac" Shepheard
Virtual Eclipse Role Playing Club
http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/virtualeclipselrp/links/d20_system_001071937434/Spelljammer_001071430476
http://virtualeclipse.aboho.com/