Life in Tyr under Kalak - Downloaded from the Wizards Community, all coding removed by Solauren

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#1 tywyll Jan 24, 2011 16:43:53	So... what was life like in Tyr under Kalak? I know it was horrible and oppresive and all that... but can someone give me a snapshop of how someone would observe that wandering into it the first time? How did his Templars dress and act? My slaves might leave the areana and I want to give them a couple of quick scenes to highlight how bad life is outside the arena under the Tyrants rule.
#2 fromost_the_grimm_02 Jan 24, 2011 18:49:00	The dominant theme of Tyr in the final year's of Kalak's rule was oppression, centred around bending all of the city-state's resources to the construction of his ziggurat. Work both on the pyramid and in the brickyards would have continued 24 hours a day, non-stop, day after day. Slaves would have been worked to death, and simply replaced when they fell, speed and efficiency mattering more than health, life or comfort. As Kalak's preparation for his metamorphosis ritual neared completion, he ceased caring for anything other than the ziggurat's construction, diverting an entire city-state's resources to see it built as soon as possible. Remember, Kalak would have no use for the city-state or it's population after his metamorphosis, and like Kalid-Ma was willing to expend it as a resource to hasten the transformation. With this kind of obsessive mentality, the city-state's more mundane resources would have been stretched to beyond their limits by templars able to commandeer anything in the sorcerer-king's name that sped the construction, or simply abolish anything that slowed progress. Most noble estates would have been near-ruined as the templarate commandeered their slave labour forces. Demand for non-essential items would have crashed, crushing all but the largest mercantile houses, and any not dealing in slavery would have been forced to simply to survive. Even then, those specialising in the slave trade would have little bargaining power against a templarate who could simply take the stock of a too-belligerent merchant. Trading houses from other city-states, smelling easy profit and with less to lose, would have flooded the market with additional cheap labour. While popular, noble-sponsored gladiators were probably safe from any draft, lesser known gladiators would not have been, and even private gladiator owners would have dreaded the knock at their door as Kalak's templars sought additional labour. Even free citizens walking the streets of Tyr without a suitable bribe at the ready were vulnerable to being hauled into servitude by a press-gang of templars needing to fill a day's quota. There's a great scene in one of the Prism Pentad novels where High Templar Tithian accompanies Kalak on an inspection of the ziggurat's construction. At the base of the pyramid, the gnarled old sorcerer-king picks Tithian up by the shoulder, and carrying the High Templar levitates up to it's higher levels, drawing the life-force out of the nearest labourers to fuel the magic. As Kalak and Tithian slowly rise up into the sky, a thick line of slaves across multiple tiers topple over and fall from the stone steps, ignored by the sorcerer-king, and irrelevant. As far as Kalak was concerned, everything was expendable in his quest to transform into a dragon. The economy, the entire population of the Tyr ... hell, even the city-state itself. Everything.
#3 Palladinae Jan 25, 2011 4:07:23	I'd also add, that Tyr was a city, when a man could begin his day as a noble living in a beautiful villa, eating fine meats and sweetest fruits but one mistake could bring him down and evening that same day he could mine iron as a slave, if he crossed wrong path. Slaves' population was great, templars were oppresive and law was only excuse for granting Kalak's or his servants whims.
#4 ritorix Jan 25, 2011 8:08:51	That was an awesome summary btw. "How did his Templars dress and act?" Like a black-robed bureaucrat under an impossible set of deadlines and quotas. Men of already-questionable morality pushed to complete the project, no matter the cost, using any means necessary. Failure meant death, and success now just meant the requirements were raised next time, so you would fail then. The end result was Tyr was a powder-keg waiting to go off. So when Kalak finally bought it, things swung from "everyone is a slave to Kalak" to "no man is a slave", and the city went from a dictatorship to flirting with anarchy. Once things settled down they had formed a whole new social order, something never accomplished since the sorcerer-kings took over.

The dominant theme of Tyr in the final year's of Kalak's rule was oppression, centred around bending all of the city-state's resources to the construction of his ziggurat. Work both on the pyramid and in the brickyards would have continued 24 hours a day, non-stop, day after day. Slaves would have been worked to death, and simply replaced when they fell, speed and efficiency mattering more than health, life or comfort.

As Kalak's preparation for his metamorphosis ritual neared completion, he ceased caring for anything other than the ziggurat's construction, diverting an entire city-state's resources to see it built as soon as possible. Remember, Kalak would have no use for the city-state or it's population after his metamorphosis, and like Kalid-Ma was willing to expend it as a resource to hasten the transformation. With this kind of obsessive mentality, the city-state's more mundane resources would have been stretched to beyond their limits by templars able to commandeer anything in the sorcerer-king's name that sped the construction, or simply abolish anything that slowed progress.

Most noble estates would have been near-ruined as the templarate commandeered their slave labour forces. Demand for non-essential items would have crashed, crushing all but the largest mercantile houses, and any not dealing in slavery would have been forced to simply to survive. Even then, those specialising in the slave trade would have little bargaining power against a templarate who could simply take the stock of a too-belligerent merchant. Trading houses from other city-states, smelling easy profit and with less to lose, would have flooded the market with additional cheap labour. While popular, noble-sponsored gladiators were probably safe from any draft, lesser known gladiators would not have been, and even private gladiator owners would have dreaded the knock at their door as Kalak's templars sought additional labour. Even free citizens walking the streets of Tyr without a suitable bribe at the ready were vulnerable to being hauled into servitude by a press-gang of templars needing to fill a day's quota.

There's a great scene in one of the Prism Pentad novels where High Templar Tithian accompanies Kalak on an inspection of the ziggurat's construction. At the base of the pyramid, the gnarled old sorcerer-king picks Tithian up by the shoulder, and carrying the High Templar levitates up to it's higher levels, drawing the life-force out of the nearest labourers to fuel the magic. As Kalak and Tithian slowly rise up into the sky, a thick line of slaves across multiple tiers topple over and fall from the stone steps, ignored by the sorcerer-king, and irrelevant.

As far as Kalak was concerned, everything was expendable in his quest to transform into a dragon. The economy, the entire population of the Tyr ... hell, even the city-state itself. Everything.