TI Technology

[Kinaed]

When and why?

Here's our technology help file, as opposed to cultural mores, etc:

TI is technologically based in Europe's early 900s AD. Any advances
after this date may be considered witchcraft, and many educated advances
from before what we would consider the Dark Ages may be as well, for a great
deal of knowledge was lost during this time period.

Note: Technology refers to Urth's general sophistication on how to build new
devices, interpret natural laws, and manipulate their environment. It does
not refer to culture, mode of dress, general beliefs amongst the population,
etc. Ultimately, remember that this is Urth, not Earth, and thus the two
need not coincide.

[Anna]

1400s was when the Church really started too lose a lot of its influence kind of hard, skepticism was starting to take hold, etc. I know it's not exactly the same, but I feel that the game is supposed to be sort of an alternate reality version that kind of parallels what went on. In that case, the Church still has too strong a grip on society, and there hasn't been enough vast upheaval throughout the empire to justify it.

900 doesn't really fit either because that's more the Crusades rather than the Inquisition or burning witches left and right.

[Kinaed]

I'm not sure how much we're trying to mirror reality so much as provide a fun game environment. The original idea with the dark ages is that the church was so powerful and fighting against knowledge that it squelched invention. Investigating the natural world, etc, could quite well be viewed as heresy, especially if the observations countered the church's teachings.

I think historically, the height of the Inquisition was around the late 1200s, early 1300s, which would be appropriate period - however, we've always had some technologies in contention:

- printing press
- projectile weapons
- gun powder (someone did try to ICly invent this years ago)
- medical advances and modern knowledge of biology
- clock towers (my own faux pas, I didn't look up when they'd be available, just stuck on in without thinking for the Uni and got told off!) :)
- spectacles (two or three players have thrown fits about those)
- mode of dress, including Victorian or at least 'Early Modern Era' clothing like pillbox hats and bustles.

I'm sure there's a few I've forgotten. We also have a few other fallacies - like paper and whiskey!

Personally, I think it's a matter of what most people think is in theme, but I'm a striking example above of a layman "getting it wrong", and obviously some of those things are "harmless" like spectacles. It's when someone's developing nuclear warheads in their backyard that we need to wonder if players are 'out of theme' and be concerned.

[Jaeela]

Just a general outline on techs:


800 heavy plow
800 stirrups
900 soap
900 horseshoes

1000 use of hops in beer becomes widespread
1150 blast furnance
1180 mirrors
1185 windmills
1200 horozontal looms
1200 buttons
1200 hard soaps in general use
1200 paper
1200 chimneys
1285 spectacles

1295 glass making
1300 mechanical clocks
1300 spinning wheel
1300 long bow
1400 plate armour
1420 oil painting
1450 chess game
1487 bell chimes
1494 whiskey
1565 graphite pencil
1568 bottled beer

Above is just a rough estimate on times, there is some variance between invention time and actual wide spread use too. And sources do differ on the exact times but generally there isn't too much of a difference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_technology



I think we can ignore cannons, gunpowder, guns, printing presses etc, as they're out of theme, regardless of what general timezone is selected as a basis for tech.

[Geras]

Do we have to be hard and fast to one time period? I like the kind of mish-mash we have now.

[Kinaed]

It's not about a hard and fast time period for the culture, but technology is important for the theme because it can seem like magic, especially in the areas of biology and chemistry, though even physics has a few 'gotchas' that theoretically may get someone burned and definitely would raise brows if harnessed.

Giving people a pretty good idea of what they're likely to encounter on a day to day and what might get them into trouble mucking around with ultimately seems like a duty to me as a staff member.

[Kinaed]

Anyway, with a 50-50 split, any tie breaker people who haven't voted?

[wimple]

Geras is right, current technology -is- a mishmash. Look at the previous timeline - whiskey was created in the late 1400s, spectacles in the late 1200s. Yet whiskey is in game and spectacles, for whatever reason, aren't. We have plate armor, another late period addition, but not mechanical clocks, which came earlier.

I'm not sure setting a year is going to be any more specific for anyone, because there's too much 'this is okay, but this is not'. It's still going to generally be confusing and a bone of contention for certain players.