> a. Nobles: A hereditary nobility exists. There are lots of fancy titles, many of which correspond to nothing and nowhere.
The Castle Coast is likely your best bet here.
> Nobles are limited in what occupations they can follow, but many
> royal and military offices are reserved to them.
Fairly standard in the West.
> They are not subject to the same courts as commoners are; only other
> nobles ever judge them, with the predictable results.
As a general rule, religious crimes aside, only nobles ever judge any criminal cases in the West. Certainly a noble is not going to be tried by anyone other than another noble.
>
> b. Seigneurs: Some people own permanent "seigneurial" interests
> in the land, which do not include the right to possess and use it.
> These seigneurs overlap substantially with the nobility, but many of
> them are commoners. The rights are a complex assortment, but include
> things like: a small annual payment; a large payment on death or
> sale; the obligation to provide labor and cartage; annual gifts,
> etc. The rights are usually not written down (like everything else,
> local custom varies), so are open to manipulation by the local
> courts, which might be run by the very same manipulators.
You won't get that in post-Ban Loskalm, but, otherwise, I don't think its particularly unusual in the West.
>
> c. The Church: There is an established church that gets something
> like 3 to 12% of the annual farm produce, with a the rate varying
> geographically and a complex assortment of assessments, exemptions,
> and blind eyes. The king appoints nobles to the big positions in the
> church, and they appropriate a lot of the tithes for their personal
> purposes. Some hold bishoprics almost as if they owned them.
Generally no; the caste system tends to prevent that sort of thing.
> The
> church is organized in parishes (each of which has a parish council)
> that are supposed to help the poor and such, but are often
> underfunded. There are usually no parishes where an abbey or other
> religious institution is the seigneur.
That's pretty common - with various local variations, of course.
>
> d. Taxes: The king imposes a bewildering array of taxes; as a
> whole, the system defies fairness.
Jonatela. Well, quite a lot of the West, really, but especially Jonatela.
> e. Farmers: Farmers resent all of the above, but do nothing about
> it. (Yet.) The farmers have a local council that decides many
> things.
Again, fairly common, but with substantial variation across the West.
> The boundaries for the local council do not necessarily match those
> of the seigneur or the local noble or the parish.
Loskalm is the only part of the West that isn't at all like this; either Seshnela or Safelester would be the worst offenders.
> In most places, it would be fair to call the farmers peasants; in a
> very few places, they are really serfs (i.e. not free to leave the
> land without forfeiting all their worldly possessions).
Varies.
>
> f. A Rising Gentry: There are agricultural entrepreneurs who are mostly of common origin and who do a combination of two things. First, they lease land from whoever possesses it and farm it more efficiently. (For example, they might own a better plow and a full team of horses for plowing.) Second, they lease the seigneurial interests, and operate those more "efficiently" (e.g. by "restoring" supposed rights that had not been honored for a hundred years).
Less true in the West than in Europe, again, because of the caste system. Ralios and Nolos would likely be the best places to look.
>
> g. The Constrained King: The king, while notionally absolute, in
> fact is constrained by custom and the threat of revolt.
Only a few Western rulers (if any) are not at all constrained by custom, though the realistic likelihood of any revolt varies by region.
> h. The Royal Court: The quality of the individual in the office
> of the kingship is wildly variable. So, the officials around the
> king often run things. They are all nobles. There are power
> struggles between different factions. Foreign wars and an
> extravagant palace mean that the court is always looking for more
> money.
As a general rule, yes. But with regional variations.
>
> i. The Cities: There are few big cities. The population of the
> cities is a small minority -- 10% or so. Half of that is in the
> capital city, which is always a net importer of food and other
> things from the countryside.
Only Loskalm and the Janube really have a lot of large cities.
>
> j. More Complexity: Every generalization has at least one exception. Even this one.
Yes. (With some exceptions).
-- Trotsky Gamer and Skeptic ------------------------------------------------------ Trotsky's RPG website: http://www.ttrotsky.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/ Not a Dead Communist: http://jrevell.blogspot.com/
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