Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

For 'verse proposals, random ideas, musings, and brainwaves.

Moderators: Invictus, speaker-to-trolls

User avatar
speaker-to-trolls
Posts: 766
Joined: Thu May 22, 2008 12:34 am
Location: The World of Men

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by speaker-to-trolls »

How unlucky and frequent would you imagine the unlucky years being? A tunguska event every twenty, thirty or fifty years, coming down on random locations with little that could be done to prevent or avoid it would make for a hell of a wildcard.
"Little monuments may be completed by their first architects, but great ones; true ones leave their copestones to posterity. God keep me from completing anything."
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

- redundant -
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Carrier Pigeon Faster Than Broadband Internet

In South Africa, a carrier pigeon carrying a 4GB memory stick proved to be faster than the ADSL service from the country's biggest web firm. Something something reality and fiction. In San Dorado, access to utilities and telecom is just as unevenly distributed as capital. Downtown it's - naturally - all fancy flatscreens and superfast broadband for high-speed trading. In East people are still on dial-up and bakelite telephone sets. And in the Sprawl people depend on carrier pigeons and improv networks in flawed electrical wiring. Something inbetween a telegraph and an impromptu Internet, maintained by self-trained savant McGuyvers.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Shroom Man 777
Global Mod
Posts: 4637
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:09 pm
Contact:

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

Had a similar idea for SOTS, but with synthetic avianoids or even bioclockwork ones to prevent nano-bio spore-hacks or whatever.

I wonder if in San Doradoverse, these birds could be trained to loiter in certain areas or go from point to point and not only bring USBs, but like crypto-net emitters or whatever, especially by less savory elements. Or have birds or dogs or whatever carry emissions-sniffing devices, especially birds that can perch on the higher levels of skyscrapers where the corporations do their sensitive stuff high above any potential threats or eavesdroppers... and then when SinTek or whatever realizes that pigeons are carrying ELINT gear, they'll hire falconers and deck their buildings in spikes like those anti-pigeon Orthodox Churches with spiked crosses.
Image

"Sometimes Shroomy I wonder if your imagination actually counts as some sort of war crime." - FROD
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Menasha

Image

At the heart of San Dorado’s southern sprawl lies the Menasha ghetto district. It stretches from the Blackwall Basin and the river Slate in the east to the Skelton Sink in the west. It’s estimated that nearly a sixth of San Dorado’s populace lives in the poverty and deprivation of Menasha.

In 810 the Nazhindri order of Sivas Manugh established a temple sanctuary here, on the ancient Samharm road between Seyon and Shan Dzovar. Around the religious enclave a settlement sprang up that was independent of San Dorado until the early 16th century. By that time San Dorado had filled the islands of Lake Ventura and Menasha had become an unofficial suburb. Located south of Kittim’s Habeck Gate and beyond official controls (such as they were) it attracted the less fragrant activities of the city such as tanneries, slaughterhouses, shipwreckers, ship chandlering and rope making.

Population shifts from rural areas to San Dorado from the 17th century to the mid-19th century resulted in great numbers of more or less destitute people taking up residence amidst the industries and mercantile interests that had attracted them. Problems of poverty, crime and overcrowding have persisted ever since.

Blackwall Basin The Blackwall Basin is the second-largest natural lake in San Dorado, after Lake Ventura. It is named after the fort established on its northern shore in the 15th century. The basin has three notable areas: the eastern Upper Basin where the Slate runs through; the Shalem Miles islands area; and Dead Dog's Hole, the northern pan of the basin where, due to a fluke of subsurface currents, bodies drowned on the Slate or in the basin tend to wash up.

All Hallows on the Pits Established in the 9th century by the order of Sivas Manugh, All Hallows on the Pits is the largest and most important Nazhindri temple in San Dorado. It was destroyed and rebuilt several times in its history. The most significant reconstruction took place in the 17th century after the storm known as Tyche’s Clarion collapsed large parts of the complex in 1674. It sits on a hilltop overlooking Blackwall Basin.

The temple complex is triangular in the historic Akkan style, representing the Nazhindri belief in cyclic time and the three essences of life. The tower and part of the attached monastery were demolished in 1862 so that Ropery Way could be widened to accommodate increasing traffic. A new tower was built on the east, facing After The Hallows and in the direction of the Marrowbones. Its steeple is built over an arched gateway, which forms the current entrance to the Nazhindri monastery. This is frequently where unwanted children are abandoned. All Hallows On The Pits is also the largest orphanage in the Sprawl.

Old Menasha The oldest settled area in the greater Menasha district, Old Menasha is the borough that arose around the original Nazhindri temple. While it lost its independence to City Hall centuries ago, Old Menasha remains predominantly Nazhindri to this day. While it too has known far better days it is still perceptibly cleaner and better maintained that the sprawl around it. Old Menasha encompasses several public parks and gardens, the largest of which - Sargis Grove - is the third largest in the entire city, after Slade Green and Grange Park, and includes the only remaining pear orchard in Menasha.

The city walls of Old Menasha ran along the Vassar Terrace neighborhood. Remnants of the walls are still standing, incorporated as outer walls of older tenement buildings. An unknown part of the hill on which the old settlement stands is part of the old Nazhindri necropolis, which rumor says is itself built on top of an even older and deeper set of tombs.

Hale House Founded in 1147 as Sarhayl House of Pity by the Sibilant of All Hallows on the Pits, Hale House is the oldest still existing hospital in San Dorado. It has specialized in the care for the insane for at least six centuries. Hale House has moved several times in its existence, oftentimes because it burned down, sometimes because it was stormed by fearful mobs. It was operated by the Nazhindri until 1492, when the Great Council of San Dorado’s patrician families took control.

The Councillors used the hospital first and foremost as means of profiting at the expense of the poor and mentally ill, but also as a handy means of disposing of rivals by locking them in the madhouse. In addition, every frightful treatment in the history of mental illness, from solitary confinement to bleeding and blistering, electroshocks and lobotomies was practiced at Hale House at some point. As a consequence, the sanatorium has accrued a grisly reputation and the nickname 'Hell House', both of which it retains to this day. Currently Hale House stands in Marshgate on the eastern bank of Blackwater Basin, looking out at the permanent fires of the Shalem Miles.

Shalem Miles A group of artificially expanded islands off the eastern coast of the Blackwall Basin. Settled by fishers in medieval times, today the Shalem Miles are a critical energy infrastructure hub. Ninety percent of the liquid fuel and chemical products exported to the southern markets flows through the Shalem Miles, which also houses everything from generating plants and pipelines to pumping stations and the Goodnight Point nuclear power and reprocessing plant.

Skelton Sink Formerly a small dale to the west of Menasha described as an open valley of exceptional beauty, now an extremely polluted artificial lake at the heart of the sprawl. In the late 18th century a canal was dug from Blackwall Basin to what would become the Sink in order to generate cheap hydropower for mills at Marshgate. But the Skelton Sink has no natural outlet and the hardpan soil beneath the sink proved largely impervious to water, leaving evaporation as the only way to deplete the lake. As a result, the Sink filled up with increasingly foul water.

Today the Skelton Sink is a foul seasonal lake full of pollutants and detritus at the heart of the Sprawl. In the summer most of the water evaporates, leaving a toxic cesspool morass behind, only to fill up again when the monsoon rains come and flood lowlying neighborhoods with a foul poison tide. The immediate surroundings of the Sink are some of the absolute worst places in the sprawl to live: Short Bluffs, Murk, Hollow and the Marrowbones. Sewage runs from these ghettos into the Sink, further exacerbating the situation.

Marshgate A swampy area directly south from historical Old Menasha, Marshgate became a significant river port when Menasha was incorporated into San Dorado in the 16th century. Although Abrisham, Shevirat and South Fork remained the most important city harbors, Marshgate became an important site for shipbuilders and accompanying trades such as rope and sailmakers, as well as other less savory industries the patricians would rather not have foul up their own neighborhoods. Paper mills, gunpowder mills, iron-slitting and brass mills, breweries and cotton mills were founded next to hundreds of smaller workshops making products ranging from clay pipes to clockworks. Marshgate was home to extensive docks and wharves where cargo was swapped between shallow draught river boats, and crews from all over Astrafica mingled in taverns and brothels here.

In the late 19th century with the rapid spread of industrialization many of the historic trades that made Marshgate prosperous either folded or moved to newly established industrial estates in the northern city wards, leaving Marshgate a hollow shell of its former self. Today the main draw to Marshgate is Blackhook Harbor, a notoriously seedy triangle of warehouses, docks, bordellos, bars and flophouses where smugglers from Tamdoult and the Grace mingle with PMCs on leave from the Miles. Coming from the south however Marshgate remains San Dorado’s first outpost on the Slate and as a result it is fairly well off by sprawl terms - which isn’t saying all that much.

Gunner’s Cut is an inlet south of Marshgate, named after the foundry for casting brass cannons that stood here in the 18th century. Part of the foundry blew up in 1855, resulting in a fire that burned down the entire southern part of Short Bluffs.

Triseraf Overpass The main elevated highway in Menasha cuts south-west from Habeck Gate on Kittim all the way through the Sprawl into the Catkins and the Grace beyond. It is a recent development, built only in the ‘70’s. Its construction displaced thousands as areas of the sprawl were flattened and bulldozed to make way for the twelve lane highway. Like all highways in San Dorado the Overpass is a toll road and access is tightly controlled. The Triseraf runs high above the surrounding slums and effectively divides Menasha into separate areas. To its west lie comparatively well off areas: Old Menasha and Marshgate to its south. To the east the urban blight of the sprawl begins in earnest, with first the bombed out craters of Short Bluffs, and the shanty towns of the Marrowbones beyond.

But the Overpass moves more than just traffic: underneath it run several major pipelines that connect east ward to the Shalem Miles. Although the Overpass is patrolled by paramilitary security, desperate sprawl-dwellers try to tap these pipelines for gasoline. Crude oil theft, pipeline sabotage and illegal refining contaminates land with oil and cancer-causing compounds, and occasionally lights entire areas of the sprawl and the Overpass on fire.

Short Bluffs In the 19th century San Dorado’s population ballooned as poor immigrants flooded in from the south, drawn by the promise of work in the city’s burgeoning industries. Those with some money or skills settled in the eastern wards close to the new factories; those without were relegated to the cheapest lodgings in the southern slums, packed close in decrepit housing along warrens of small dark streets. Intensive overcrowding soon spilled blindly out of Marshgate into a honeycomb of slums perforated by courts and blind alleys: Short Bluffs, on the edge of the Skelton Sink.

Known as a wretched slum rife with disease, child mortality, prostitution and violent crime as early as the 1850s, Short Bluffs has been the focal point of extreme brutal upheaval several times. A decade ago the anarchist Serapis Sevenray published his pamphlet ‘Atop the Altar of Greed’ in Short Bluffs. The subsequent violent uprising was the worst in the recent history of San Dorado, engulfing the sprawl and the lower east side, requiring a majority of forces from three major military contractors to put down, killing thousands of slum dwellers in the process and reducing much of Short Bluffs to bombed out craters. Sevenray himself was believed killed when the Rat's Castle burned down, but his body was never identified.

The Prayer Parlor Hiram-Rocca House, better known as the Prayer Parlor, is a poverty house built in the 1880s in the three bridges area on the border of Menasha, Marshgate and Short Bluffs. Now in the direct shadow of the Triseraf Overpass, this large and striking terra cotta brick building offers food, shelter, and basic education education to the poor, provided by virtue of charity on part of wealthy donors. Although denounced by many of San Dorado’s rich elite as insincere, a number of such establishments continue to operate in the sprawl. The Prayer Parlor is by far the largest in Menasha.

Behind its imposing walls the Prayer Parlor contains a homeless shelter, a theater, a health center, a soup kitchen and several lecture halls. Like most poverty houses it is bankrolled by by rich philanthropists. Unfortunately in recent times one of the largest donors to the Prayer Parlor has been Jackie Sabbadin, otherwise known as Diamond Jackie or Jackie the Saint. As a concession the P-Square Partnership, one of the many gangs sworn to San Dorado’s boss of bosses, now also operates - more or less discreetly - out of the Prayer Parlor.

Blackwall Keep A squat historic fort on the southern tip of the cape splitting the Slate from Dead Dog’s Hole, built in the 15th century to control access to Lake Ventura. Blackwall Keep derives its name from the ebony basalt stone in which it is clad; it has a twin in marble-clad Whitewall Keep on the northern tip of the Graves, which controlled access to Lake Ventura from the sea.

Blackwall was intermittently used as a fortification between the 15th and 19th centuries, typically in times of heightened tensions between the patricians of the Council and the Counts of the Grace. When it wasn’t used as a bulwark it was sometimes a prison and a dungeon; indeed to this day the phrase ‘taken to Blackwall’ is a colloquialism for punishment in San Dorado. But Blackwall Keep has also historically served as a mint, treasury, botanical garden, mayor’s office and stellar observatory. Today Blackwall is property of Helix Highpoint, who have built a helicopter deck on one of the fortress’ five heavy bastion towers. What exactly Helix is using the old fort for is strictly confidential, but may have to do with rival Coldstream Delta’s activities on the Miles just across the water.

Breaker Downs Just beyond of Gunner’s Cut on the southern shore of the Blackwall Basin are the Breaker Downs, an area that was used for ship breaking from the sixteenth century till today. Early on wooden-hulled ships were simply sunk or sailed on to the beach to rot away; later their timber was sometimes reused by the Marshgate wharves. Today, worn out steel canal barges and riverboats are run aground here at the end of their final journey, to be cut apart by shears, torches and a handful of cranes.

The work at Breaker Downs is rough, physically demanding and dangerous. The shipbreaking also takes its toll on the environment: the water at Breaker Downs runs coral red from metal corrosion, and the beach is equally ruddy from flakes and chips of rust. Debris floats on top of the water, where dozens of deteriorating ships wait their turn to be run onto the shore. The shipbreakers for the most part employ immigrants from the sprawl who will work under dangerous conditions for minimal compensation. Anything worth salvaging from the breakers is, ironically, loaded onto ships and ferried to the Helix smelters and SANDEX yards in north ward; everything considered waste is left to pile up on the beaches.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

The Fluster

Located along Rushlight Street and the Miracle Mile on Shevirat the Fluster ('the Courts', ‘the Tables’ or less favourably 'the Dead End') is the main financial district of the city and a notable centre for worldwide trade, both historically and in the present day. The Fluster is a warren of many buildings, some modern and some ancient, packed together in one of the city’s oldest districts. It is traditionally divided into two distinct areas, the Mezzo and the Inner Exchange. This division dates back to at least the 13th century, when patricians began to regularly meet to discuss commerce in Mirabel House, the mansion of Palo Belveer. This became the nexus of a rapidly evolving financial system that was only accessible to San Dorado’s moneyed aristocracy - the Inner Exchange.

Inevitably the vast sums changing hands in Mirabel House also drew in less savoury characters - merchants, moneylenders, cutpurses and lawyers, mercenaries, brokers, captains, pirates and killers. Anyone not reputable or rich enough to be accredited to the Inner Exchange met in its immediate environs, where taverns and coffee houses sprang up to accommodate them. This area became known as the Mezzo.

The stones of the Fluster are thick with history. Its confusing, labyrinthine layout first earned the district its name, not - as is commonly assumed - the arcane financial arts practiced within. Along its crooked winding alleys you find not just Mirabel House but also the High Bank of Loaning, Thanet Auction House, Lamb Gate, the Industria Lodge, a small green called The Lynch, the Low Temple and the Lords of Trade Building which houses the trade floors, clearing chambers and bond rooms of the SDSE. Just across the street from the Fluster the brooding Axum Obelisk stands at 610 Miracle Mile.

Every significant financier in the city’s impressive history had or has offices somewhere in this area. Every bank and financial institute is represented here. It is the beating heart of San Dorado's capitalist monster, a place of disconcerting complexity that has ruined millions, spawned a thousand superstitions, and lifted handfuls up to improbable riches. To any outsider the machinations of the Fluster will appear utterly chaotic and unpredictable, a bewilderingly colossal enterprise involving millions of miles of telegraph wires, arcane financial statutes, vastly powerful computers and millions of stockholder participants. But there is an underlying order, a theater to its working that abides by very strict rules, like a needle tracking along grooves etched by ritual habit, driven by the momentum of history, that has spawned its own curious patterns of social behaviors complete with customs, language, and predictable rhythm and response to given events. Predictable, at least, to institutions dedicated to understanding the complexities of its spasms and drift, staffed by people who have wholly dedicated themselves to reaping the reward promised to those that manage to ride the beast and not get mauled.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

There is no final draft of San Dorado. The city is as much a physical as it is a symbolic and mental construct. It is not so by accident.

The early foundations of San Dorado were based on the six principle sacred hills, the relationship between the hills and the geometric impressions that emerged between temples and holy paths.

Chainlines and steles in the guise of patterned streets and high-rises lock up the frantic energy of the city's teeming multitudes, a bottomless well of belief-shifting potence fueled by dreams and anxieties and the contingencies of chance.

To siphon and conduct the fate-shocking potential of San Dorado's deep topography is the deepest desire of every financier, kingmaker and longroller that has ever believed in it.

But it is a vast thing, this abyss of destiny. The stuff of centuries, millions of minds and billions of wants and desires, congealed into an incomprehensible godhead hovering just below the metropolis. What mortal individual could plumb its depths and return with their mind and beliefs their own? It is an impossibility.

Corporations: unbounded entities, fueled and driven by the ambitions of thousands, working toward singular purposes. Great machines of aspiration, marshaled through the grooves of history by counts and reckoners. Superstructors of the geoglyphs that corral the city and the forms of human society. Their quitessence is distinct enough to draw from the Cup of Tyche without incurring its mind-shattering potence.

Within the psychogeography of San Dorado there are cynosures, points of convergence and focus where intersecting chainlines are capped and bled. The Sanhedrin Building is paramount amongst these. Deep within its exclusive Club Perdition anoited representatives of the city's great syndicates drink the altar wine and shed their personalities to become inhabited by the totemic archetypes of their combines, metamorphosing fleetingly into creatures simultaneously greater and lesser than human in order to commune in the Circle of the Blind Angel.

With time and the city's changing topography its great dreaming tracks shift and so what once was the capstone at a junction may no longer offer access to the great well in the hollow, although inevitably the sense of it will still be there.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Shroom Man 777
Global Mod
Posts: 4637
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:09 pm
Contact:

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

These esoterics are applied in other lands and nations, with variations, I presume?

I've read Mieville's The Scar and because it's more digestible than Perdido Street Station yet somehow broader in scope and showing us more of Bas Lag, I can retroactively better appreciate what you've been doing here... it's a Mieville-esque take on the modern or modern-ish world, minus the overt fantasy elements... if Mieville did Tom Clancy or something... or a crossover between Mieville and Ace Combat-style "Strangereal."

Do you have developed tropical archipelago-nations?
Image

"Sometimes Shroomy I wonder if your imagination actually counts as some sort of war crime." - FROD
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Shroom Man 777 wrote: Mon Jul 09, 2018 5:50 pmThese esoterics are applied in other lands and nations, with variations, I presume?
That honestly remains to be resolved. San Dorado in many ways is distinct from its world, not least because it's been developing in my head for many years longer than much of the setting. The intention is to include the occult elsewhere also but it has to fit right first.

Do you have developed tropical archipelago-nations?
I have some elements and concepts but they are yet to be resolved to an acceptable degree of clarity.

One idea was for a culture that has a kind of symbiotic relationship with these semi-domesticated giant saltwater crocodiles. The crocodiles go out into the seas of the Caldera Archipelago and snack on Bashmu, known as Hydropteres in the Daedalean Empire (renamed Hydrazoans, 'cause I didn't like the original name), and so keep the sea clean for fishers. The oldest, biggest and most gnarly scarred crocodiles are venerated almost like deities and brought fish so they don't have to hunt in their old age, and maybe local priests ride around on them. You know, War Crocodiles, festooned with feathers and such.

There is a fairly sizeable power in the Caldera in the form of Ninkhursag, but it's not been developed to any significant extent. But I figure quite a lot of the archipelago cultures are sort of centered on the hyper-inimical nature of the local flora and fauna. In the southern reaches there are islands controlled by Iramkan cultist holdouts, there are floating islands, some of which have been taken over (their inhabitants included) by Wrack or other even less savory parasites.

Shoals of intelligent flying snake-fish that show people the way to newly formed islands. The Mother of Monsters, an ancient Hydroptere said to be many hundreds of years old and vast enough to pull a supertanker under. A very rare kind of stone that can ward off Wrack. Strange remote pyramids that no-one knows the origin off. You know, random ideas, not very focused yet.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Invictus
Posts: 1306
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:44 pm

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Invictus »

Siege wrote: Fri Jul 13, 2018 4:29 pm One idea was for a culture that has a kind of symbiotic relationship with these semi-domesticated giant saltwater crocodiles. The crocodiles go out into the seas of the Caldera Archipelago and snack on Bashmu, known as Hydropteres in the Daedalean Empire (renamed Hydrazoans, 'cause I didn't like the original name), and so keep the sea clean for fishers. The oldest, biggest and most gnarly scarred crocodiles are venerated almost like deities and brought fish so they don't have to hunt in their old age, and maybe local priests ride around on them. You know, War Crocodiles, festooned with feathers and such.
I like the idea of maybe whole tribal federations who use giant crocs as living amphibious transports, able to cross water and land and tough enough to clamber over razor-sharp coral reefs that would give modern boat hulls and wheels trouble. Maybe with half a dozen picked warriors riding on each for stealthy status-raids. Hell, if this requires the crocodiles to be too unrealistically big, maybe they're some pygmy-like mutant offshoot! There's been articles going around the web about re-evaluating heterogeneous human origins and it might fit the biological themes of your world.
"This explanation posits that external observation leads to the collapse of the quantum wave function. This is another expression of reactionary idealism, and it's indeed the most brazen expression."
-
REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 1 - Rey Quirino Versus the Dark Heart of the Philippines
"...a literary atrocity against the senses..." - Ford

REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 2 - Advent Rey Returns: REVERGELTUNG
Coming NEVER
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Image

An overview of the bodies of water that have been named so far, mostly so I can keep them straight.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

- Minor updates to Palmara: the Confederacy now consists of the counties Aleramo, Dal Salona, Falcaras, Ferromonte, Ravane and Tingitane.

- Western continent upon which Dai Xich is located tentatively named Yãxhia.

- There is a region in the Silent Sea, possibly named Fygonesia by Daedaleans, comprising thousands of smaller and larger islands scattered over a vast area. Its peoples usually live a seaborne lifestyle as sea gypsies, ranging from the coasts of Yãxhia all the way south to Ninkhursag and the Cataract Archipelago. Although exposed to colonial pressures from Dai Xich, Ninkhursag and the Daedalean Emperors throughout their history, they have never been definitively subdued.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Shroom Man 777
Global Mod
Posts: 4637
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:09 pm
Contact:

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Shroom Man 777 »

What do you use to make the map?

Also the low-key weirdism of Shear Anarchy and San Dorado makes me wonder how a full-blown modern New Weird setting ala a Mieville-ized Shadowrun or Bright would work. Like helicopter gunships dropping Assault Remade or something... Armada's thaumaturgists and skypilots having to deal with drone strikes. While weird weather, unnatural magicks, Torque mistakes, etc. still keep the world incompletely mapped or something... acting like the Minkowsky Particles in Gundam.

Were environmental oddities, like radioactive weirdness and Stalkerisms... even Annihilations, officially added into the Shear Anarchy setting?
Image

"Sometimes Shroomy I wonder if your imagination actually counts as some sort of war crime." - FROD
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

The map is essentially hand drawn in paint.net. I've tried those online fancy map generators for RPGs and such but they never come out quite looking the way I want them to :-) .
Shroom Man 777 wrote: Wed Jul 25, 2018 2:07 pmWere environmental oddities, like radioactive weirdness and Stalkerisms... even Annihilations, officially added into the Shear Anarchy setting?
Yes. There's an entire region between Dar Qimr and Akingha that's pretty much impassible because of it, although the precise nature of the anomalies is yet to be determined. There's also Black Flowers and similar incongruities that pop up in the world.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Image

The Palmaran Confederacy, the Grace of Palmara, Cenn Fiachta, Alermiai, Kust Susayliqiya is a collection of six city-states in the north of the Astrafican continent. Each has its own ruler or system of government: the Nazhindri Mantrik in Dal Salona, the Estense family in Ravane, the Chiefs of the Rock in Fierromonte, the Mansart family in Tingitane, the Cortz d'Aleramo in Aleramo and the Fraternal Society of Falcaras.

The Astrafican cape, its resources and its harbors have historically been of strategic and economic importance, and as a result many empires have tried to control the headland with varying amounts of succes. The remnants of these foreign influences remain very apparent however to this day. Nazhindrism is unquestionably the dominant religion, and for the impact of Canhastyri expeditions one needs only look at the titles of some of the Grace's ruling families.

Until the early 16th century San Dorado was typically considered a backwater part of the Confederacy, thereafter less so until by the late 17th century it was by all but the most stubborn of claimants treated as its own separate entity. San Dorado's history as part of the Confederacy is still reflected by the fact that its mayor sits on the Consegio de i Siette, the Council of Seven that is formally tasked with maintaining the security of the Confederacy.

'Confederacy' is the customary term for the Grace of Palmara, but to the casual observer this may suggest a far more cohesive, centralized authority than is actually present. In reality the Grace is an infighting league plagued by intense internal rivalry. Its leaders disagree with one another about political primacy, economic policies, special privileges of the nobility, the role of religion, in fact pretty much everything. Central government is small, constrained, ad hoc and extremely informal. In fact the Confederacy can be said to be held together by only two things: a mutual antipathy toward outsiders and money from San Dorado, whose powers-that-be are resolved to no longer tolerate other influences in their back yard.

The distaste for foreign domination as a result of past annexations is so real the Palmarans have a word for it: Dovore, a kind of bitter grief in the face of insurmountable odds, the feeling of having one's honor tarnished by forces outside one's control, a repressed knowledge that justice may never come, an obstinate rancor, a dogged vow of future retaliation—all these combined. It has social, cultural, spiritual as well as philosophical dimensions.


Falcaras is governed by the Fraternal Society, an organization that is equal parts gentleman's club, secret service and cabalistic lodge. The inner workings of the Fraternal Society are shrouded in secrecy, and its members are only revealed after their death. The Fraternal Society has strong ties to similar organizations in San Dorado.

Aleramo The Cortz d'Aleramo, also known as the Dorna is a democratically elected unicameral parliament that traces its history back to meetings summoned by the Grand Prince of Palmara in the 12th century.

Fieromonte The Chiefs of the Rock are descendants of the families that sold the Rock of Fieromonte to High Potentate Emryn Canhastyr III, thus giving the Auld Demain its first grip on the Grace. They carry the title Maganhastir and are still recognized as foreign princes by Teyrnon Canhastyr today.

Dal Salona The theocratic Mantrik of Dal Salona is one of the most important religious figures in Nazhindrism, second only to the Mantrik of Akka himself. He derives his authority from his position as custodian of Sivas Jelar, the holy site where Shalmaneser Armari supposedly attained the supreme body of the godhead when divinity itself merged with him.

Tingitane Nominally ruled by a senile count but in actuality controlled by the Mansart family, whose bank is one of the most prosperous and respected institutions in the Grace. The Mansarts base their power not on ancient titles but on purely on their financial succes and the leverage it buys them.

Ravane is the most southerly of the Palmaran counties. It is ruled by the Estense family, who are amongst the oldest and most powerful dynasties of the Grace. The Estenses style themselves Counts of Ravane and Hereditary Grand Princes of Palmara, Suzerains of the Coast. The latter two titles are contested.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

The Palmaran Confederacy does not have a modern constitution; rather it operates on a complex system of ancient charters, privileges and liberties accrued over centuries.

The Tertia ('Thirty') is an assembly of representatives from all six Palmaran counties. Its seats are unevenly divided along lines of old political primacies: Ravane hold the greatest number of seats (7), followed by Falcaras (6), Fierromonte and Tingitane (both 5), Aleramo and Dal Salona (both 3). A final seat is reserved for San Dorado, which bought its seat from Fierromonte in the late 19th century but these days tends to be absent. The Tertia is not a legislative body and does not draft laws; it functions solely as a meeting place where representatives meet to air their grievances and discuss issues relevant to the Grace. The Tertia seldom agrees on anything, but when it does, it is taken as almost binding directive for the various governments of the Grace. The Tertia meets in the Palazo Albrazar in Sivas Jelar. It is lead by one of the three Venerants of Dal Salona.


The Consegio de i Siette is the de-facto governing body of the Palmaran Grace. It evolved out of the personal advisory council of the 14th century Grand Princes of Palmara. In its current form, established in the late 19th century, it is composed of seven voting members, one from each of the six counties plus one from San Dorado. Leadership of the Consegio is officially vested in the Grand Princess, whose prerogatives are not defined with precision-indeed neither are those of the Council itself, although it is formally tasked with maintaining the security of the Palmaran Grace and the integrity of the Tertia.

The current members of the Consegio are:

Iselin En-lai, Mantrik of Dal Salona
Cassel Mori, Maghantir, First Commandant of Fieromonte
Renier Zen, Prolocutor for the Fraternal Society of Falcaras
Sandor Cezary, Presidente della Cortz d'Aleramo
Hippolyte Mansart, Consligliore per Tingitane
Alisa Estense, Hereditary Grand Princess of Palmara, Suzerain of the Coast, Countess of Ravane
Camaron Gold, Mayor of San Dorado
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Sitarah, the seat of the Malik of Dar Qimr, is also known as the City of Small Gods. According to belief in the Malikate there are gods in all things, from the smallest objects to the very largest. There are gods that reign over fire, wind, grains of sand, houses, animals, forests - and also vast gods, whose cosmic domains are the sky above, the cosmos or concepts like freedom, love or the happiness that comes with thoughts of well-being.

According to the people of Dar Qimr, only small gods merit invoking. They stand spiritually close enough to humanity to understand our wants and needs, and may answer our solicitations. The small god of a house understands its inhabitants, especially when they have lived there a long time. Conversely the gods of existence, of stars and moons, or of death, are so vast and distant that to pray to them for intercession is to attempt to push against a hurricane. They cannot hear, and even if they did, they could not understand. This is why the people of the Malikate pray solely to small gods.

An ancient and unsettled debate amongst the philosophers of Sitarah is whether gods of abstract yet relatively modest concepts - like, for example, the number four - are small or vast, and as such whether they would listen to us or not. While this seems a relatively abtruse metaphysical debate, it has at times grown heated enough that mobs favoring one thinker over another have rioted in the streets of the capital over presumed support or lack thereof by one of Sitarah's many princes or indeed the Malik him- or herself.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Revised history of the Sarakan Peninsula

1890: Lash of the Dead Khan - a series of border skirmishes exposes the strategic weakness of the Daedalean Empire.

1900-1906: Three Crowns War - Teyrnon-Canhastyr invades the Sarakan Peninsula on a flimsy pretext. The War House expected to fight a brief colonial skirmish and concessions from the other great powers, but the conflict rapidly spins into a total war between the Daedalean Emperor, the Khan of Kagaria and the High Potentate.

1908: Majorly weakened the Daedalean Empire can no longer maintain control of its overseas territories. Daedalon Hyperpontis is dissolved and the Sarakan League is created, a disparate federation of provisional states awkwardly drawn across historic, religious and ethnic boundaries.

1941: Night of Khalmyradov - a coup d'etat in which the Zagori marshal Sarhy Khalmyradov seizes power in the Sarakan League. He is backed by the Khan of Kagaria.

1947: During a public parade in Sarakovar Khalmyradov is assassinated by the Secret Commission for National Literature, a nationalist organization of ethnic Sjens, with the help of the Black Internationale. The Khan of Kagaria backs Khalmyradov's 11-year old son Hakan as his successor. In response, several states in the League rise up in revolt - the First Rising.

1949: After his proxies in Zagor and elsewhere are repeatedly defeated, an increasingly unstable Khan sends his own army to pacify the peninsula. This is one of the triggers for the Great Wars.

1950: the Great Wars throw the world into chaos. A decade of heavy fighting follows on the Sarakan Peninsula and elsewhere.

1961: the Final Act of the Congress of Svarsvik ends the Great Wars and determines the territories of the states on the Sarakan Peninsula. Sjenska is particularly hard hit, losing more than 70% of its territory to the Lordship of Wilusa, a newly established Canhastyri protectorate. The end of the war immediately spawns a number of low-level insurgencies.

1970: in Novi Jela and elsewhere worker ands student protests against the occupation and disenfranchisement have been building for two years. In the biggest demonstration yet, protestors clash with security forces of the White Wand. The troops open fire. Twenty-four people die. This bloody event sparks the Second Rising.

1971-1973: after a brief but violent struggle for control and with intervention from Kagaria looming on the horizon the Canhastyri High Potentate decides the cost of hanging onto its rebellious extractive colony is too great. She pulls back her forces but hands power to the Wilusa Free State, a weak and unstable territory that many ethnic Sjens consider nothing but another Canhastyri puppet.

1973 - 1977: Sjenskan civil war, pitting ethnicities, religions and ideologies against each other. Ultimately the ethnic Sjens faction lead by Srdjan Karic wins the war.

1975 - 1978: Vlasenican civil war, a spill-over from the war in Sjenska triggered by the assassination of president Aleksandar Radojevic.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Srdjan Karic, the autocratic dictator of Sjenska, was not always an oppressive tyrant. Once he was a mild-mannered professor of philosophy in Secujac, a small town in the sloping hills of northern Sjenska. Until in 1974, in the midst of the civil war, when a Karasuk militia ethnically cleansed the ethnic Sjens minority with a mind of annexing the region for Zagor.

Karic ends up shot in a ditch full of corpses but survives and is rescued by Sjens nationalists. He joins them as a broken man, but rapidly reinvents himself as a proficient, callous and brutal field commander. While his ruthlessness concerns other captains ultimately his armed displays of strength wins him sufficient support to become the de facto leader of the Sjens uprising. In this capacity Karic emerges victorious from the civil war by late 1999.

Karic is a despot by pure force of will. He has refused all formal titles or positions. Sjenskans on all levels of government carry out his decrees not because of any legal force but purely because they fear what would happen to them if they did not. It is whispered that Karic purposefully makes a mockery of the formal trappings of the Sjenskan state and civilization in this way, that he simultaneously challenges Sjenska to end him and punishes his country every day it continues to allow him to exist.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Updated:

Nazhindrism The Nazhindri faith the faith of Akka. It is an ancient religious system of esoteric teachings that includes a wide corpus of texts, practices, theological positions and organizations. Nazhindri cosmology principally concerns itself with three unchanging, eternal, and mysterious godheads and their relationships with a multitude of lesser empyrean beings and the mortal and finite universe.

Nazhindrism was founded as a sect in the 4th century BC* on the teachings of Salaman Armari. Persecuted as a heretic, Armari was forced to flee Old Assam and made his way to Akka, where his teachings spread until in 346 BC the royal house converted and became the new core of the Nazhindrist priesthood. Today Armari is considered an awakened prophet by his followers.

According to his Creation Hymn our universe starts with the Mist of Lights which gave birth to the two gods: Ki-Eru, who represents order, measurement, control, intellect, Earth; and Isin, who represents change, expectation, a release in freedom, instinct, Sky. The two gods meet in Eru-Kar, the "first city", that was conceived before the creation of the universe. They bicker, and their argument alters the cosmos, passing through a series of increasingly complex metamorphoses until they spawn a third godhead: Tyche, Firstborn, the blind mistress of change, fortune, progress and ruin, right and wrong, who is both greater and lesser than her begetters. This cosmic birth simultaneously spawns the present world.

The center of Nazhindrism remains to this day Tirthankar, the capital of the island kingdom Akka, seen by Nazhindrists as the current incarnation of Eru-Kar. Here the Sibilants maintain two great temples hewn out of the rocky heights overlooking the holy lake. One is dedicated to Ki-Eru, the other to Isin; a great artificial ford of red bricks reaches across the lake and connects the two temples, allowing processions one way or another depending on the day, the hour and the positions of the planets. The edges of the lake are lined with palaces and smaller temples dedicated to innumerable Ylem-kim, lesser creatures from Nazhindri cosmology, each of whom has a specific philosophical purpose in the working of the universe.

Much the temple-masters of Tirthankar are considered enlightened scholars, Nazhindrist theological thought is highly diverse and has no central doctrinal authority. There are multiple distinct Nazhindri movements across the world, typically centered around a holy site or city. Most of these are located on Astrafica, but not all. There is a wide range of differences in authority and doctrine between different sects; some are ascetic and monastic whereas others are outwardly oriented; some are sombre whereas others are joyful; some venerate Armari as a lesser deity whereas many do not; Nazhindrist beliefs have inspired saints and terrorists alike. Some do not consider themselves Nazhindri at all; for example few San Doradans will describe themselves such, even though the widespread folk beliefs surrounding fate, chance and ruin are clearly syncretic derivatives of Nazhindri beliefs. Great philosophical debates rage between different denominations, but they are still bound by shared cosmological concepts, recognizable rituals, poetry and exalted texts.

Nazhindrism is one of the largest religions in the world, and its temples can consequently be found the globe over. Missionaries have frequently faced persecution, and while Dar Qimr and Dai Xich today grudgingly tolerate Nazhindrist cults as long as they keep a low profile, the religion is still outlawed (but survives in hiding) in the Daedalean Empire and in Kagaria.


* BC in this world stands for 'Before the City', and relates to the dedication of the first Basileion in Daedalopolis. The grand palace is considered the seal that fully realized the city, and its completion symbolizes the moment that Daedaleans stopped thinking of themselves as a city-state and began to consider themselves an empire.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

The Eye of Sher Razma or the Ravening Waste is a system of deserts and dry lakes in the heart of Khem Qimr. Very few people live here. It is said to be the place where in primeval times a vast god fell to earth, whose head is kept in the mythical city of Syr Tengzi, hidden deep in the forbidding deserts.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

This is honestly more to keep my own thoughts straight, but it might as well be up here. I may have given this too much thought.

Governing San Dorado

The public eye has many misconceptions about San Dorado. But perhaps the most common and easy misunderstanding concerns its governance. It is accepted almost universally by the masses of the world that in that great city of commerce the anarchy of unchecked capitalism reigns supreme, and that San Dorado has no government. But while the former may be true, the latter certainly is not. No city of millions can be completely uncontrolled and persist. There must be some sense of order, some skeleton of procedure, to keep its grand pandemonium from crumpling into bedlam.

And there is. San Dorado does have a government. Its form is unimitated anywhere in the world, a product of the city's unique circumstances. Where it falls on the great scale from unchecked personal freedom to absolute state authority is a question for philosophers. And there is no doubt that the volatility of its statecraft is a constant source of ire for the great governments of this world. But it exists, and it endures.

City Hall

City Hall, officially the Community of the Companies of San Dorado, is a joint stock company. Its shares are traded publicly on the SDSE in the Lower Exchange. The price of a single share is high, but not so high as to be beyond the means of a reasonably well-off person. Nonetheless for even for a reasonably well-off person owning a share represents a significant investment, and is considered a mark of status.

Owning stock in the Community makes one a share holder. Share holders are entitled to sit and vote on the historic Chamber of Councilmen of San Dorado City Hall. However, the number of shares issued far exceeds the 600 seats 'under the dome'. In City Hall there is place only for those who represent the greatest number of shares. In the past 'represent' used to mean 'own', and only rich magnates who directly owned vast volumes of shares sat on the Council. Because of contracting innovations since the 19th century however the majority of Councilmen today are proxies representing stock holding institutions: large corporations, wealthy families or indeed cabals of investors who have banded together in clubs or associations to attain representation. Councilmen can be principals for a single person, dynasty or corporation, or for large numbers of smaller companies, associations or shareholders.

A Councilman's voting power in the Chamber is directly proportional to the number of shares they represent. Share holders need to register their intermediary of choice with City Hall, which has a significant bureaucracy dedicated to keeping track of each Councilman's clout. Stock holders can decide to switch who represents them at pretty much any time. If a Councilman loses control of too many shares they lose their place in the Chamber in favour of someone with a greater number. Needless to say this mechanism represents an obvious business opportunity: proxy solicitation is a lively trade where stock holders barter the influence of their shares in exchange for favors and promises from Councilmen.

Because shares are relatively expensive and a large volume of them is required for a seat on the council, buying seat on the council as a private person is only achievable for the very wealthiest individuals. Impetuous self-made billionaires at times attempt to muscle their way onto the council by simply buying up the requisite number of shares. What they frequently fail to realize is that the upheaval this causes in the market is such that established investors will see them coming from a mile away. Many an arriviste has blown a fortune on stocks only to find themselves thwarted at the last possible moment. It can be done, but it requires a slow, canny, methodical approach - qualities not regularly found in nouveau riche who believe themselves to be freshly made masters of the universe.

The Boards of Inside Regents and Outside Regents

Ever since the first predecessor to the Chamber of Councilmen was founded in the mid-12th century there has been a perpetual conflict within its venerable ranks. It is a struggle between on the one hand the city's very largest corporations and dynasties, very few in count but affluent beyond comprehension, and on the other its upper middle class, whose individual capital may pale in comparison but whose numbers far outstrip the private jet set.

This is a complex conflict of interests between the superrich who wish above all to preserve their position and those whose boundless ambition it is to replace them. It is a conflict between the owners of San Dorado's megacorporations and the middle management they hire to run them. It is a clash between the go-getter attitude fostered by San Doradan propaganda and the grim reality of the capitalist pyramid - at the very top there is room for only so many.

There is an extremely delicate balance between these groups, and every time it is significantly disturbed it has resulted in great upheaval and unrest. To resolve the collision of these two groups' very different motivations the Community has established two cabinets: the Boards of Inside Regents and the Board of Outside Regents.

The Inside Regents

The Board of Inside Regents are the inner circle of the oligarchy that effectively runs San Dorado. Its members are elected by the One Hundred, the most preeminent stockholders on the Chamber of Councilmen. The ten Inside Regents consequently represent the wealthiest and most powerful people, families and corporations in the city. From amongst their members they appoint the Executive Regent, who is the most senior officer in charge of managing City Hall.

The Inside Regents have authority over security and expenses, and are in effect the executive arm of San Dorado. By ancient precedent no more than one member of the same family or corporation can serve on the Inside Regents at any one time.


The Outside Regents

The Board of Outside Regents represents associations of smaller investors that have banded together to gain representation on the Board of Councilmen. These cooperatives speak for groups of small businesses, neighborhoods, or factions within society with specific political or economic interests. While the volume of shares and capital the Outside Regents control is limited, they are estimated to represent over sixty percent of the total number of shareholders.

There are forty Outside Regents. They oversee the mint and the San Dorado Monetary Authority, the administration and the arbitration system, making them also the de facto supreme court of San Dorado. Arguably their most important privilege is that they appoint the Mayor of San Dorado, who also chairs their meetings and may cast a tie-breaking vote.

Market volatility

Stock in the Community can be sold at will and there are only six hundred seats on the Council. This means the number of shares required for a seat fluctuates constantly. At the underside of the market smaller investors are therefore locked in a constant vicious competition to acquire and retain sufficient shares.

That volatility is exploited by larger investors, who will attempt to pull smaller shareholders into their orbit by offering stock in exchange for favours or support. Nowhere is this effect felt more keenly than amongst the Outside Regents, each of whom constantly has to lobby for and maintain support from an array of minor benefactors. Because the smaller investor groups that appoint the Outside Regents are easily charmed by larger, wealthier corporations the Outside Regents are commonly nicknamed the Courted Council, or Corta for short.


The Joined Boards

Exceedingly rare occasions may call for a convocation of the Joined Boards of Inside and Outside Regents. This typically happens only during times of major crisis; foreign wars, natural disasters or massive internal inrest. Only a supermajority of the Chamber of Councilmen can call a meeting of the Joined Boards, which is always chaired by the Executive Regent and has unlimited emergency powers for a predetermined period or until the next Armarimas, whichever comes first. The last time the Joined Boards met was during the Short Bluffs insurrection.


Shareholding and Council membership

To be eligible to purchase a share in the Community of the Companies of San Dorado one needs the same qualifications as are required to trade on the San Dorado Stock Exchange. The buyer has to be at least 15 years old and be a resident of San Dorado City.

To be eligible to sit 'under the dome' one has to be at least 15 years old and either be a share holding resident, a sole trader or partner in a partnership that is a share holder, or an appointee of a venture that is a share holder.


The Mayor of San Dorado

The Mayor's office is notably a separate institution from City Hall, and much older. There is no surviving record of a charter first establishing the mayoralty, but the office already existed when San Dorado was still ruled by a Serene Rèn in the 10th century. It is likely to be the oldest continuously elected office in the world.

The Mayor is appointed by the Outside Regents for a three-year term, during which they retain numerous traditional powers, rights and privileges and can only be removed by a unanimous decision of the Joined Boards of Inside and Outside Regents. They function as Master of the Port of San Dorado, Rector of Ashcroft University and Captain of Constabulary. As Doyen of the City they are the first line of diplomatic contact for foreign governments. The Mayor also presides over the Chamber of Councilmen and the Board of Outside Regents. They are the public face of the city and in many ways its most powerful individual.

For all their massive influence and tangible power however the most important role of the Mayor is to be the grease between the wheels. They have to be a master negotiator and diplomat, an intercessor between all city's disparate forces in order to wrench San Dorado onto the desired course and keep her there. There is no limit on the number of terms a Mayor can serve; the longest serving Mayor, Buddha James, sat for 23 years and famously died in office.

The Mayor is elected at City Hall once every three years on Armarimas, and takes office on the Monday before the second Wednesday in September, at the Unspoken Rite. The Mayor's Office is located at 13 Grange Park on Manor Rock.


Law Enforcement in San Dorado

Like most services in San Dorado law enforcement is privatized. The city has no central police agency. Instead the law, or what there is of it, is upheld by a wildly diverse range of different private companies whose prerogatives and bailiwicks depend on the terms of their contracts.

Each law enforcement company holds an Enforcement License issued by the Mayor's Office and a Peace Contract that issued by a third party through City Hall. That third party may be as small as a single individual or company or as large as an entire neighborhood. As a result peace contracts vary wildly in scope: they can encompass many blocks, a single street or a part of one building. They can encompass a wide range of different surveillance, patrol and investigative services or include only very specific ones. And they can include very different means to generate additional income, for example in the form of the opportunity for a contractor to levy fines for infractions or confiscate property.

As a natural result, upscale neighborhoods tend to have blanket coverage from first-rate agencies, particularly in Downtown areas. Poorer districts on the other hand may only have a handful of watchmen from a cheap but inferior firm. In ghettoes meanwhile there may not even be a peace contractor under license, or if there is they may well simply be the armed thugs of a resident strongman. Even in relatively well-secured areas richer citizens or succesful businesses frequently contract better services for themselves, giving rise to a patchwork of different and sometimes conflicting contracts, agencies and priorities.

To make matters even more complicated most large corporations have their own enforcement arms, which provides specific services tailored to the corporation. These services may be as simple as protection of facilities by armed guards, or as specialized as high-end financial fraud detection. Some people require bodyguards, others arrange private detectives to combat specific inequities not covered under the neighborhood contract.

A handful of major enforcement firms operate across the city. These are typically well-known organizations with outstanding reputations: Paradigm, Stormbrink, OGRE, Knight Errant. Each of them is associated with a specific megacorporation, and each has such a large number of operators under contract they essentially qualify as a private army. As a rule, when one of these big players comes into conflict with a smaller fish, the small fish scatter, no matter what their contract stipulates. Perhaps the only thing such large firms respect are the agents of the Mayor's Office Contravention Section (Contra), who investigate serious contraventions of contract and in ultimo even have the power to suspend an Enforcement License.
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Invictus
Posts: 1306
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:44 pm

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Invictus »

I'm glad that in order to preserve its exclusive character, the Chamber of Councilmen didn't go for something sensible like proxy voting. :v
Siege wrote: Fri Mar 22, 2019 5:42 pmAs a natural result, upscale neighborhoods tend to have blanket coverage from first-rate agencies, particularly in Downtown areas. Poorer districts on the other hand may only have a handful of watchmen from a cheap but inferior firm. In ghettoes meanwhile there may not even be a peace contractor under license, or if there is they may well simply be the armed thugs of a resident strongman. Even in relatively well-secured areas richer citizens or succesful businesses frequently contract better services for themselves, giving rise to a patchwork of different and sometimes conflicting contracts, agencies and priorities.
This does mean that barring anything else every armed gang in the city is on the hook for the crime of unlicensed peacekeeping, right?
"This explanation posits that external observation leads to the collapse of the quantum wave function. This is another expression of reactionary idealism, and it's indeed the most brazen expression."
-
REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 1 - Rey Quirino Versus the Dark Heart of the Philippines
"...a literary atrocity against the senses..." - Ford

REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 2 - Advent Rey Returns: REVERGELTUNG
Coming NEVER
User avatar
Siege
Site Admin
Posts: 2563
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 7:03 pm
Location: The Netherlands

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Siege »

Invictus wrote: Sun Mar 24, 2019 1:46 pm I'm glad that in order to preserve its exclusive character, the Chamber of Councilmen didn't go for something sensible like proxy voting. :v
They kind of have though :). Councilmen have voting power proportional to the number of shares they represent. I should probably have clarified that (EDIT: and now have updated accordingly). Councilmen need to solicit enough proxy support to be eligible to sit on the council first, and then their voting power is proportional to the number of shares they represent.

Above all else I want the system to represent the vast amount of effort it takes to become even vaguely important in San Dorado. You buy a share at great expense - you're nobody. You're elected chief of your gentleman's voting club - you're nobody. You sell your soul to gather enough share holder support to get on the council - you may now be a high roller in your neighborhood but to anyone that's anyone you're still nobody.

Siege wrote: Fri Mar 22, 2019 5:42 pmThis does mean that barring anything else every armed gang in the city is on the hook for the crime of unlicensed peacekeeping, right?
At a minimum, yes ;).
"Nick Fury. Old-school cold warrior. The original black ops hardcase. Long before I stepped off a C-130 at Da Nang, Fury and his team had set fire to half of Asia." - Frank Castle

For, now De Ruyter's topsails
Off naked Chatham show,
We dare not meet him with our fleet -
And this the Dutchmen know!
User avatar
Invictus
Posts: 1306
Joined: Mon May 19, 2008 11:44 pm

Re: Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

Post by Invictus »

Siege wrote: Mon Mar 25, 2019 9:39 am They kind of have though :). Councilmen have voting power proportional to the number of shares they represent. I should probably have clarified that (EDIT: and now have updated accordingly). Councilmen need to solicit enough proxy support to be eligible to sit on the council first, and then their voting power is proportional to the number of shares they represent.

Above all else I want the system to represent the vast amount of effort it takes to become even vaguely important in San Dorado. You buy a share at great expense - you're nobody. You're elected chief of your gentleman's voting club - you're nobody. You sell your soul to gather enough share holder support to get on the council - you may now be a high roller in your neighborhood but to anyone that's anyone you're still nobody.
Ah, I see. It's more of a double-layered representative system, except the Shareholders are basically the electorate, but only Councilmen can actually vote on issues, and they can't split the votes they represent. I seem to be missing who chairs a regular Chamber meeting, though.
"This explanation posits that external observation leads to the collapse of the quantum wave function. This is another expression of reactionary idealism, and it's indeed the most brazen expression."
-
REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 1 - Rey Quirino Versus the Dark Heart of the Philippines
"...a literary atrocity against the senses..." - Ford

REBUILD OF COMIX STAGE 2 - Advent Rey Returns: REVERGELTUNG
Coming NEVER
Post Reply