Subject: MYSTARA-L Digest - 11 Feb 2006 to 12 Feb 2006 (#2006-25) From: MYSTARA-L automatic digest system Date: 13/02/2006, 19:00 To: MYSTARA-L@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM Reply-to: Mystara RPG Discussion There is 1 message totalling 71 lines in this issue. Topics of the day: 1. Alphaks (was: Flaems...) ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2006 11:31:44 -0400 From: Steve Carter Subject: Re: Alphaks (was: Flaems...) I've always assumed that the upper classes, the nobility and royalty, had lots of leisure time because they held a middle-class hostage through an arcane professionalism. The only way out of serfdom was to have magical ability. That could only be fostered through arcane instruction. And that was the domain of the upper classes. Thus the middle class was controlled by the upper and the lower classes of labourers provided the bulk of real labour. I suppose it's possible that there were lots of constructs such as golems, that Eberron Construct PC class, juggernauts and semi-intelligent aberrations to do work as well. However, I don't think any of that would be possible (or at least easy) without an integration of elemental magics. And the highest wizards were lazy so why would they go to the trouble of creating a lot of mechanisms and creatures to do the work when lots of commoners would be available to do the work? Which isn't to say that there wouldn't be lots of ambitious wizards, alchemists, enchanters, etc, who would do that, but I don't think that a planet (a star system) would be mechanized. But that's me. As to the pointlessness of the philosophical debates, I'm sure it was as pointless to them as say, Creationism taught in schools as fact versus the "theory" of Evolution. ;) Such pointless matters of the basic nature of the universe tend to have a trickled down economic that affects the reality of every day living. > I think Old Alphatia was a sort of high-tech world where everything were > done with magic and magical servants, and the wizards had more or less > nothing to do, so the zzonga and the pointless philosophical debates. Maybe > they had a sort of elemental class of servants, that could have survived > somewhere in the universe. I plan to draw a map of Old Alphatia since many > years, I'll try to summon the will (and the time) to do it now :-) > bye > Francesco > > > > > > > ___________________________________ Yahoo! Mail: gratis 1GB per i messaggi e allegati da 10MB http://mail.yahoo.it > > > ******************************************************************** > The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp > The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com > To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM > with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. > > ******************************************************************** The Other Worlds Homepage: http://www.wizards.com/dnd/OtherWorlds.asp The Mystara Homepage: http://www.pandius.com To unsubscribe, send email to LISTSERV@ORACLE.WIZARDS.COM with UNSUB MYSTARA-L in the body of the message. ------------------------------ End of MYSTARA-L Digest - 11 Feb 2006 to 12 Feb 2006 (#2006-25) ***************************************************************