Recently there have been a number of threads (here and at nifty) about the way all that magic and it´s influence on society.
What I´d be interested in would be a way of building some resemblance of a working society that integrates all those broken spells. If the outcome is weird, let it be so !
IMHO it would revolve around some sort of source, sink system. One the Source side you have numerically bigger population of good people ranging from benevolent Wizards supporting farming communities to socialist style theocracies.
The sink side would obviously be populated by the Evil type stuff. Rangiong form orc hordes, cackling wizards, to all those monsters out there.
I´ll start this off with a quick cut and paste of the Earhtdawn concept of Kaers
Earthdawn Soucebook wrote:Dubbed kaers, these dwellings would protect their occupants against the Horrors on the theory that strong enough walls will keep out even the most physically powerful Horror. The natural, solid, earthen walls of the kaer would also provide protection against those Horrors that travel through astral space or by means as yet unknown. However, Navarim warned that an earthen barrier might not be enough to withstand every Horror.Navarim’s book also offered other means of protection. Cities couldbe shielded under domes woven of True Air. Kaers could be built beneath the sea and protected by True Water, and so on. Navarim believed that the underground kaer would offer the strongest defense,though even it might be breached.
Obviuosly some concepts don´t transfer do D&D, but I hope the concept is understandable.
So, basically civilization is restricted to heavily defended settlements. I´m not trying to push this concept but at the moment something along theose lines seems to me the only workable way. If you start to spread beyond a rather limited distance it becomes much to difficult to protect your borders.
Thoughts, Ideas, Flames ?
Sma