Shear Anarchy / San Dorado [Worldbuilding Exercise]

[Siege]

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.

The Mayor chairs the meetings of the Chamber of Councilmen.

I'm not decided on whether there are advantages to owning a few shares as an individual beyond prestige and (a very limited amount of) influence. Would the city pay dividend? Does San Dorado run a profit? Perhaps share holders are preferred customers if and when the city releases bonds to generate additional capital? Who knows.

[Siege]

The Magisterial Commonwealth of the Nine Nations of Dai Xich is built upon the Bond of Concordance, the oaths of loyalty sworn to the Claret Empress by the warlords and regional chieftains she vanquished during her campaigns in the 11th century. Under ordinary circumstances such oaths of personal allegiance would lapse with the death of the Empress -- however according to the history of Dai Xich the Claret Empress did not die, but ascended to heaven. The concords therefore remain binding to this day.

Another consequence is that Dai Xich has not had a supreme ruler since the disappearance of the Claret Empress. After all, she is not officially dead, but continuous to rule in the heavens. The highest terrestrial authority is the Grand Magister, who these days is appointed by an electoral college drawn from each of the Nine Nations.

[Siege]

Bedlam Branham (1837 - 1913), 'the last of the great steam pirates', was a San Doradan sea captain, merchant and privateer. Branham captured the public imagination in a series of dime novels chronicling his adventures in the Cataract Archipelago, painting him as a swashbuckling scoundrel braving the terrors of the islands, swindling hapless natives and skirmishing with stereotypes of authority from Dai Xich and the Daedalean Empire.

The real Bedlam Branham was at least as colorful and bold as the novella's depictions, if decidedly less honest and upstanding. A freebooter and a rogue, Bedlam fought, bluffed and cheated his way around the globe, using his guns at least as frequently as his wits. He was reviled not just by people he deceived and menaced abroad but also by many in his own city, chief amongst whom the associates of the Shakeltruss Easterly Steam Shipping Company, whose unenviable task it frequently was to clean up the image of San Doradan merchants in the wake of Bedlam's passage.

That is not to say however the captain did not have his admirers. Branham fought in more wars than most, and by all accounts did so bravely. He joined the Mad War as a privateer even though he was already 62 years old, fighting for the Sarakan League of Partisans against the overwhelmingly superior White Navy of Tyr Caelhyr. The havoc his steel cruiser Mirela unleashed in the narrow bights, coves and capes of the Deifr Firth and Skrda Bay is still the stuff of tall tales on the Sarakan Peninsula. In the harbor of the Sjenskan port city Timecak stands a bronze sculpture of Bedlam Branham, looking out over the waters and giving a defiant two-fingered salute to the Canhastyri over the horizon.

Branham survived the sinking of the Mirela in the last year of the war and only returned to San Dorado in 1907. In his long and storied career he made, lost and regained a fortune that laid the foundation for a dynasty whose influence is still keenly felt to this day. He built Ginsant Place, the stately manor in Ashcarron Cove that is still the seat of the Branham family today. When he died in 1914 Bedlam Branham was survived by his daughter Peccany.

[Siege]

It's a dynasty, baby.

There might be another family line under Odyl, or maybe she took another name.

Tizzy and Tiff are twins, as are Jinx and Medley.

Havoc Branham in this universe has a role similar to that of his alt-universe cousin Chaos Farley. He was a commander for a Branham-Harper-owned private military outfit. When the Branham stake in Branham-Harper was bought out he was forcibly retired. It didn't take, and he is now running around the world with his own mercenaries, causing the kind of ruckus the Branham family are rather notorious for.

[Invictus]

So I thought I was right about the Chaos connection!

Also "Felony Branham".

[Shroom Man 777]

On lord!

I do really dig the warrior queen wuxia jade empress HUANG DI figure, the national myth... and the GRAND MAGISTER.

[Siege]

San Dorado > Downtown > Shevirat

“Silver City”, "Shekel City", “the Square Mile”, “the Coronet”, “the Tops”, “Tendertown”, “Shevvy”, “the Sublimate” (archaic)

Shevirat is the oldest and most historically significant part of San Dorado City, a storied island in Lake Ventura with a history etched in aged avenues and rich architecture that spans the ages. According to legend the city was founded on this island in the early third century, with the establishment of a trading post and a temple by three itinerants from Akka. From there San Dorado grew to encompass first the six principle sacred hills, then the whole island, and finally the entire peninsula. Today Shevirat is a bewildering mixture of old and new, a place where you can find timeworn architectural wonders down ancient alleyways, yet be mere steps removed from the burnished high-rise headquarters of the city’s most powerful corporations.

[Siege]

The Rais of Tamdoult is a steward and national leader, tasked with maintaining peace and order. They are elected by the Twelve Gates, the council of governors of Tamdoult. The governors are appointed by village masters, who in turn are elected in free local assemblies open to all citizens. Citizens can decide to attend these assemblies passively as an individual or actively as a delegate - in which case their power to make decisions varies based on their support.

The significance of the office of Rais is fluid. By law they are a mere official and highest executive power is exerted by the Twelve Gates. The Rais however has some prerogatives, like appointing lower officials and more notably officers in the army. This influence allows the Rais to exert great influence, especially in times of war, to the point where for extended periods of Tamdoults history the Rais ruled as hereditary military dictators.

On the other hand there have been times when conflict within the Twelve Gates over who should succeed to the Blue of Fencorbau have been so great that some provinces appointed their own, resulting in multiple concurrent Rais. Historically these periods are associated with great unrest and national peril, such as the Caelhyr invasion and overlordship over the southern island of Gelwar.

After the Twelve Gates have picked a new Rais, they are coronated by the Mantrik of Saloum, the Nazhindri holy city in the north of Tamdoult. The current Rais is Moise Shazar.

[Siege]

On maps of the world and in history books the Khaganate of Kagaria appears as a vast, monolithic entity, the largest contiguous land empire in world history home to uncounted multitudes, ruled over by cruel and bellicose rulers all too eager to unleash destruction on the world.

In honesty this image of the Khaganate as a vast, cohesive and threatening colossus is very much a product of its neighbours, many of whom have historically defined themselves by the fact that they are not Kagarian. The regimes in Svarsvik and Daedalopolis* in particular have practically defined their states, their civilizations, indeed 'civilization' as a concept, as existing in opposition of the assumed menace and barbarity of the Kagarians. Here, the potential threat of the boundless empire just over the horizon has tradtionally been used to beat dissent into acquiescence.

Now to be clear, it is true: the Khaganate has been involved in massively violent episodes of history. But then which nation has not? In reality Kagaria is a far cry from a unified horde, and has always been that. The Khaganatre consists of over 2000 separate territories governed by distinct authorities. It is a multi-ethnic patchwork of regional khanates, free cities, holy territories, local fiefs and collective estates. Its inner workings are vastly complex, there is no credible external force that can threaten the vast Kagarian heartland in any meaningful way and, as a result, the modern-day Khaganate tends to be deeply insular. Simply put, their internal culture is one of such color, diversity and complexity that the outside world doesn't really matter all that much to Kagarians.


* The permanent, centuries-long conflict with the Daedalean Empire over the Taor Heights, considered a continuing matter of utmost national importance in Daedalopolis, is widely regarded as as an unimportant border conflict in Kagaria. Indeed it is this vast difference in appraisal of the conflict as much as anything that has for decades prevented its definitive resolution.

[Siege]

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.

'Contra' ended up not sounding quite right. So instead:

One of the most obscure but also formidable and scary offices in the city of San Dorado is the Bureau of Reckoning and Procuration. Its operatives are Reckoners, a title that goes back to the anti-anarchist secret police of the 19th century and the city's public executioners of late medieval times. Today their formal function is 'integrity compliance' -- they enforce observance of San Dorado's Code of Competition and ensure that no person or company undermines the mayor's office or other vital city interests. It is their task, in essence, to enforce some sense of honesty from even the city's most powerful corporations. To this end the Reckoners have carte blanche authority to go where they want and investigate what they deem necessary, a stupendous power reigned in only by the diplomatic sensibilities of the Mayor, who knows his Reckoners' every move will be intensely scrutinized by the Chamber of Councilmen and the Boards of Inside and Outside Regents.

In order to do their job Reckoners have to be spectacularly multi-talented. Depending on the needs of the day and the hour they have to be either brusquely direct or delicately diplomatic. They have to be the mayor's ambassadors, investigators and enforcers, her auditors, attorneys and assassins, sometimes all at the same time. Reckoners need to be proficient with weapons, charters and numbers, feel at home in the loftiest board rooms and dirtiest back alleys both. Their numbers are always limited, because the Chamber of Councilmen naturally fears their overbroad authority. At the same time it is the spectre of that same nigh-unlimited authority that is the only thing keeping megacorporations from simply wiping them out with their vastly numerically superior PMCs.

Reckoners are typically recruited from the Counties of the Palmaran Grace. This is a deliberate effort to prevent infiltration of the Bureau by agents from San Dorado's megacorporations. It is also felt that the typical Palmaran disdain for the pretensions of San Dorado's high and mighty are a welcome attribute for Reckoners to have.

Day to day operations of the Bureau of Reckoning and Procuration are overseen by the Superintendent for the General Actuary, a position that is always held by the seniormost Deputy Mayor. This ensures a clear chain of command but still affords some room for diplomatic wiggle within the Most Esteemed Office of the Mayor of San Dorado. Whilst the Superintendent has an office in in an annex in the Mayor's mansion in Grange Park, the Bureau itself is headquartered on Rook Hill in West Ward, in a foreboding old fortresslike manor nicknamed The Candle.

[Siege]

It is common for San Doradan households to have a small shrine dedicated to Tyche somewhere close to the front door of their residence. The statue of Lady Fortune found in such shrines faces the wall when the tenant is in the house, and is turned to face the door when they leave. Unwanted intruders thus attract the awareness of She Who Answers, it is believed, hopefully with appropriately ruinous results. Upon their return the tenants themselves buy off this negative recognition by burning a small-denomination bill on the altar before turning the statue to safely face the wall again.

[Siege]

The principal city on the island of Dalmakh is Nim Li. Like many settlements in the Cataract Archipelago Nim Li is perpetually assailed by the encroaching jungles, and its people live off the sea more than the land. It is an ancient city, built atop its own ruins by neccesity, hemmed in by great timeworn walls and the abrupt volcanic ridges of the surrounding hills.

The people of Nim Li bury their dead at sea, but not before using hot pokers to ritually burn out their eyesockets. It is believed that otherwise their eyes will be stolen by Cuch'Ain, the blind celestial beast of the depths. Long ago Cuch'Ain was the terror of the world, a ravenous hunter whose crocodile maw spewed an absolute darkness in which only she could see until, in the second age of the world, the Monkey Gods stole her eyes. Now she lurks in the deep and the more dead eyes she gathers, the more infinite her gaze will be, until she rises again and ends the current age of the world with a new unending night.

[Siege]

As previously established the Community of the Companies of San Dorado is essentially the joint-stock legislature of the city of San Dorado.

There are three requirements for buying stock in the Community: one has to be of age, a resident of San Dorado City and a natural person.

My current thinking is that legal persons (i.e. business entities) are not entitled to own shares in the Community. Otherwise I would be hard-pressed to explain why megacorps don't own the majority of shares. And I don't want faceless megacorps to own the city -- I want the people who own the megacorps to own the city. The Ashcrofts, De La Warrs and Sinclairs with their ancient estates (which might somehow be considered natural persons, maybe) who've long bent the very fabric of San Doradan society so that all power and wealth drains into their black hole coffers.

This of course raises the question of how these dynasties have managed to keep their families from splintering under the weight of all that money and power -- but I suppose that is the point: the focus should be on the people of the setting. The corporations are just set dressing.

[Invictus]

My current thinking is that legal persons (i.e. business entities) are not entitled to own shares in the Community. Otherwise I would be hard-pressed to explain why megacorps don't own the majority of shares. And I don't want faceless megacorps to own the city -- I want the people who own the megacorps to own the city. The Ashcrofts, De La Warrs and Sinclairs with their ancient estates (which might somehow be considered natural persons, maybe) who've long bent the very fabric of San Doradan society so that all power and wealth drains into their black hole coffers.

I can't imagine a legal system like that without a bunch of arcane grandfathered exceptions though, especially for an IIRC reformed post-feudal state like San Dorado. There could just be a law that a particular list of ancient estates count as people for the purposes of being shareholder-electors, in exchange for arcane (and if I extrapolate from what I've come across in my day job, very dated and very intransigent) rules on how the estates themselves can be run. They would be far outnumbered by natural people as the city grew, especially as no new ones could be created. You can say the reasoning behind the it evolved from the paterfamilial rights ancient Palmaran nobles had over their families or something.

A modern megacorp's assets probably sprawls far beyond the constraints of these estates, and they may not even be that useful as vehicles for doing the megacorp's actual business in given modern San Dorado's high-flying capitalism. A board position on such an estate, with its responsibilities, could be anywhere between "sinecure" and "horrible exile" because the estate's constitution prohibits its title-holder from doing a whole bunch of things with their money that hadn't even been imagined when the constitution was written centuries ago.

On the other hand, I can also see the estate as a centripetal force on the megacorp-dynasties that have them, because it's enough of a rare trophy for the dynasty members to have petty knifefights over.

[Siege]

I can't imagine a legal system like that without a bunch of arcane grandfathered exceptions though, especially for an IIRC reformed post-feudal state like San Dorado. There could just be a law that a particular list of ancient estates count as people for the purposes of being shareholder-electors, in exchange for arcane (and if I extrapolate from what I've come across in my day job, very dated and very intransigent) rules on how the estates themselves can be run.

Yea, that's what I was thinking: a relative handful of political dynasties like the Medicis or Borgias that have been prominent for centuries, holders of the traditional and deeply unfair right to own shares in the Community as a family.

Their privileges are based off ancient letters patent that haven't been issued for centuries. The details vary depending on the circumstances under which they were promulgated. They could require the payment of certain ceremonial taxes, or for the eldest sons of the family to serve time in the military, for the family to reside in a specific place, or who knows what else.

A bunch of letters patent are missing, and there might not even be a complete list to begin with. If you can find one you can claim it and its concessions (and duties). That is how De La Warr came into his, he came to the city and made a ridiculous fortune and then somehow dug up an ancient title.

You could also forge one, and if you're useful to the Powers That Be they let you get away with it. Which is an end run around the 'haven't been issued for centuries' bit.

A modern megacorp's assets probably sprawls far beyond the constraints of these estates, and they may not even be that useful as vehicles for doing the megacorp's actual business in given modern San Dorado's high-flying capitalism.

It's definitely the other way around: the megacorps are useful vehicles for doing the estates' business.

Of course most megacorps are like Acheron: traded on the SDSE, publicly owned, no majority shareholders. But I'm sure the Old Estates diversify their portfolios to make sure they are heard in all the right boardrooms. That is in addition to their typical Old Money advantages: family connections, vast tracts of immensely precious land, political power cemented through centuries.

(So far) only a single Old Estate wholly owns an entire megacorp, making clan and corporation synonymous: Sinclair. But they are unique, nobody else has that level of control (and SinGen is the smallest of the Gang of Seven).


There is a lot of work to be done on the status, rights and duties of the Old Estates beyond 'can own shares'. But what I like about this is that it gives me the Dallas/Dynasty type rich asshole family intrigue that I want, without completely reducing San Dorado to nobility with stocks. People can still work their way up the foodchain and become massively powerful megacorp CEOs -- they'll just have to deal with boardrooms full of people who've been rich longer on their way. Which is fitting. At the same time I have a working mechanism for how Old Money retains its influence: lots of sway in the Chamber of Councilmen gets cousin Jimmy on the Board of Regents, which means megacorps will grease our palms to get things done.

[Siege]

The Old Estates
The Old Estates are the ancient, uniquely privileged aristocratic families of San Dorado. Their origin lies in old Writs of Tithe and Sequester issued from the 10th century onward: compulsions of arms and tribute placed on local great men, compensated in return with immutable freedoms and prerogatives. From the interplay of these rights and obligations arose the primogenial patriciate of San Dorado: the Old Estates, a tightly knit class of powerful clans invested by centuries of esoteric liberties, interrelated through blood and marriage, bound in arcane webs of duty, obligation, custom and commitment.

The promulgation of Writs was formally abolished centuries ago, in 1606. Since then many of the Old Estates were snuffed out by time, treason or simple tough luck. Others have endured, their wealth rising and falling with the tides of fortune, their political and social influence undimmed. The Old Estates are some of San Dorado’s most infamous names: Ashcroft and Tarielka, Belseram and Santarium, San’Jon and Sinclair. They are, without fail, exceedingly protective of their status, property and exclusive rights. The scope and particulars of these assembled privileges vary between dynasties and is sometimes not fully known outside the family that holds them: fine points and technicalities could be argued and interpreted, and must therefore be jealously guarded with veils of ambiguity, sophistry and tradition.

All the Old Estates predate the most modern form of the Community of the Companies of San Dorado by a significant margin. And by ancient custom, based on the historic formulation of the writs of compulsion at their root, the Estates are considered right-and-duty-bearing units. They uniquely retain the right to own shares in the Community as a dynastic house. This is arguably the most important of all their myriad freedoms, and the root of their vast and abiding influence in the affairs of the city.

The Sanhedrin
As far back as the written history of San Dorado goes there has always been a council, or tribunal, of the great men*, the Conti, the Old Estates. This is the Sanhedrin, the ‘sitting together’, that once ruled the entire city. That function has long been superseded by a more formal government in which the myriad factions of San Dorado have their share. But the Sanhedrin still exists. The exclusive meeting ground of the city’s most highborn dynasties is the Isarnon Barbican, a late-19th century skyscraper located in the heart of Shevirat, known across the city as simply ‘The Sanhedrin’. It is a temple dedicated to maintaining San Dorado's most ancient collusions, and the secret meeting place of the Circle of the Blind Angel.


* I'm using 'men' here because 'great person' doesn't sound quite right, but San Dorado has a long and proud history of affording all genders and sexes equal opportunities to be stabbed in the back.

[Siege]

* I'm using 'men' here because 'great person' doesn't sound quite right, but San Dorado has a long and proud history of affording all genders and sexes equal opportunities to be stabbed in the back.

'Great Sole' fits the bill and sounds pretty neat as a non-gendered alternative to 'great men'. It associates well with souls and the sort of exclusive individuality that fits this part of the setting.

[Siege]

Map of San Dorado, v3.0. This one incorporates several tweaks to the way the city is supposed to have historically evolved that were not previously reflected.


(click to enlarge)

Main revisions:

• Changed shape and size of main island (Shevirat)
• Removed secondary river
• Reduced number of (major) islands
• Increased size of eastern peninsula
• Increased physical distance between East/Sprawl and West/Downtown

As of right now I like basically everything about this map except that there's really no conceivable way to get from East to the metropolitan islands without ferries or some convoluted long way around. That is thematically correct, but still a bit impractical. There might be tunnels. I don't know yet.

[Heretic]

I like it, but at first I was kinda confused what part was water and what was land until I remembered about the fact San Dorado was the island. Will there be a simple colored map down the foreseeable future?

[Siege]

Oh yeah I can see how that can be confusing. I'll clarify that in the next version, along (hopefully) with main points of interests and a bunch of additional details.

[Siege]

Zooming in on Old Town, 'Summit City', the ancient metropolitan islands of San Dorado. This is what has so far been defined.