Background: 20 Answers (Alison)

Alison gave me permission to post her character background and the 20 answers she wrote to the 20 questions I wrote. If anyone else in the group wants me to post their answers, let me know and I will be happy to do that.

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Ok, my character is a human cleric, devotee of the Skaven nest mother goddess. Her name is Nida Endicott (she changed it from her given name, Isabella, to Nida - from the Latin for 'nest'), and she was born and raised in Boston by a fairly wealthy, old family, pretty upper crust. She lived a privileged life and went to a good college (though she didn't get into Massachusetts Bay Colony Institute of Technological and Arcane Arts--didn't have the grades for it--she's not very good at arcane spellcasting, and she's certainly no natural sorcerer; what little magic she has comes only from the goddess). She wasn't raised by Skaven, didn't suffer some life-changing, traumatic event that caused her to reject her own upbringing and seek other society or a different faith. Her upper-class life was perfectly comfortable; but being in Boston, she was regularly exposed to Skaven culture and religion, and something about it just spoke to her, felt right.

She doesn't strike me as much of an adventurer; like the Skaven, she's curious, but essentially a homebody--always stay within range of the nest!--so I'm not quite sure how she's going to wind up on this campaign. Maybe a Skaven colony has been threatened?

She's not particularly exceptional--capable and educated, but not brilliant; active, fit, but no warrior; only a fair-to-middling cleric. I imagine her employing her most rat-like characteristics to help the party--short-range recon, securing our 'nest' whenever we make camp, charming new acquaintances, stashing potentially helpful items for later use, caring for the ill/injured in the party. Of course, she's not Skaven, but these are the the characteristics she loves about them (considering her emotionally distant upbringing, she especially loves how affectionate and demonstrative they are, always touching, hugging), so she's worked hard to develop these characteristics in herself and to utilize the goddess's magic for these purposes.

CONJECTURE--hopefully none of this violates what we already know about this world:

Among humans, even those in Boston where the Skaven originated, the idea of a human living among the Skaven is only just tolerated, certainly raises some eyebrows; elsewhere (especially in CSA and even more so in Deseret), it's looked on with disdain or outright disgust. Her own family is, of course, bitterly disappointed that she has 'thrown away' her education and opportunities to live a life of service and obscurity among 'those creatures'. The one exception is her eccentric, free-spirited Aunt Eliza Gardner, who paid for her seminary training. Even most Skaven--other than those who really know her, those with whom she trained as a novitiate and the congregants she serves--are skeptical about her allegiance; they tend to see her as a dilettante and assume her interest is fleeting, that she doesn't really serve the Skaven and will go run back to her privileged life at the slightest challenge. People of the 500 Nations are most tolerant of her unusual lifestyle; with their culture steeped in spirituality, a shaman in every community, they readily accept the idea that a deity called her into its service.

01)  Where is your character from?

Boston

02)  Where did they get their training or learn their skills?

Went to college on her parents' dime, then decided to devote her life to serving the Skaven nest mother goddess, probably spent a few years as a novitiate at some kind of Eight Paths seminary? I imagine it's like med school--a few years of general study, then a few years of 'residency' to a particular god/dess?

03)  What is / was their family background?

Wealthy, white, privileged. WASP-y.

04)  What is their view of magic use and magic users?

A little envious, actually--never had the natural skill of a sorcerer or the focus/smarts of an alchemist. She's a cleric but not really much of one--the power of the goddess may be less accessible to her because she's not Skaven?

05)  What is their view of the six major powers occupying the continental United States (the USA, the CSA, the 500 Nations, Peachtree, La Republica de Tejas and Deseret?)

USA - good, but not quite progressive enough

CSA - backward, ignorant

Peachtree - cool

Tejas - cool, though she wouldn't want to live there, except in a major city (she was raised in luxury, after all)

Deseret - monstrous a-holes (bounty on Skaven pelts?!?)

500 Nations - cool

06)  Have they been to another planet yet? Do they want to go some day?

Nope - she's curious, but essentially a homebody.

07)  Your character finds $500 on the ground (a windfall equal to a three months' wages for a working class laborer). There's no way to tell who it belongs to. What do they do with the money? Does this answer change if they find it by themselves or in the group?

If she's with others, use it to help the party. Buy everyone dinner? Stock up on supplies?

If she's alone when she finds it, probably uses it to buy some silk underthings and a bottle of really excellent wine (see answer #9). But then she'd feel terrible for not using it to help the party or donating it to the Eight Paths seminary where she trained.(Bostonians are big into philanthropy.) 

08)  What religion (if any) does your character follow, and how fervently?

She's a devotee of the Skaven nest mother goddess.

09)  What's one of their bad habits? How about a good habit?

Bad: She secretly misses the luxury in which she was raised--jumps at any opportunity for fine clothes, good food.

Good: Always fussing over everyone, making sure they're comfortable--refilling drinks and plates before they run out, overstocking on food and supplies.

10)  What does your character do with their leisure time?

Continuously redecorate her little apartment.

11)  What would your character order at a restaurant? Does this answer change if someone else is paying for the meal? 

If she or someone else in the party is paying, she'd stick with fresh fruits and veggies, nothing fancy.

If someone outside the party is paying, she'd get the lobster.

12)  Does your character have any bias against the Skaven, the Red or Green Lizardmen, against Tripod Martians (or against humans, if they're a nonhuman character)? Does your character have any prejudices against other humans if they are a human?

She despises people from Deseret.

Finds the Martians off-puttingly bizarre but hates herself for that reaction so she tamps down pretty hard on it.

13)  Where do they live when not adventuring? Is it just a rented room somewhere or an actual home?

Rented apartment in Boston; would love to own her own place but can't afford it.

14)  How does your character tend to dress when out in the field having adventures? Are their "town clothes" different from this?

Practical--fitted, comfortable clothes, nothing flowy or restrictive or revealing.

She probably has some fancy items left from her younger years, maybe busts out an actual gown if the occasion calls for it, cleans up quite well.

I'm guessing in her role as cleric she probably has some simple, ascetic robes or something?

15)  How does your character pack for travel or for going out into the field for adventuring?

Overpacks, hates the idea of anyone being hungry/uncomfortable because she ran out of something. Probably has a hidden vial of truffle oil or nice perfume hiding somewhere in her gear.

16)  What is your character's education level? (It is presumed that all PCs will be literate in English without a reason for that in the back story.)

Went to a good college, then trained at seminary. 

17)  What is your character afraid of?

Finds the tripod Martians creepy but tries not to show it. Winding up in Deseret is about the worst thing she can think of--they'd probably kill her.

18)  Does your character owe a significant favor to anyone? Does anyone owe them a significant favor?

She feels hugely indebted to her aunt Eliza, who paid for her seminary training after her parents cut her off, and the seminary itself. But Eliza has refused all attempts at repayment.

In her role as cleric, I'm sure she's done some healing, so there may be random folks who feel indebted to her, but she wouldn't consider them to be or even necessarily remember helping them. It's all just part of the job.

19)  What does your character want to get out of adventuring? What to they expect to get out if it? What are they afraid could happen while out on adventures?

Not a natural adventurer, she must be in it to help somebody, protect the Skaven somehow? She's terrified something will happen to her apartment, her...church? while she's not there. Hates being so far from her own 'nest'. Can't wait for this adventure to be over so she can go home.

20)  What, if anything, does your character consider to be a cause worth dying for? What would they see as a good death?

She'd be willing to die in defense of her own 'colony' (the party), the Skaven, Aunt Eliza. She should be willing to die for the nest mother goddess, but in all honesty, she feels more loyalty to real, living beings than to the deity.

21)  If your character was old enough to serve in the Civil War (1861-1874; game takes place 25 years after), what did they do and which army were they in? 

Born too late to participate in the war.

22)  Does your character prefer to keep their personal money as paper or coin (both are available and accepted everywhere)? 

Coins - paper is too easily damaged (especially by toothy rodents).

Bonus question:  What advice would you give your character if you could?

Don't be so trusting--be friendly, but embrace the Skaven trait of cautiousness, too.

Background: 20 Answers (Eric)

With Eric's permission, I'm posting the 20 answers he wrote to the 20 questions I wrote. Alison's getting a post as well; if anyone else wants me to put their answers up on the board I'll be happy to do that.

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01)  Where is your character from? 
Rat enclave in El Paso.

02)  Where did they get their training or learn their skills? 
Latched onto community leaders and protectors when young.  Later took on mercenary and transport security work.

03)  What is / was their family background? 
Tejano rat-town in El Paso.  Primarily interacts with rats but plenty of opportunities for contact with other races.  Was endlessly curious in youth, partially tempered with age.

04)  What is their view of magic use and magic users? 
Indifference.  Magic is too alien to spend much brainspace on except as it relates to survival.  Ie, he’s extremely aware of the capabilities of mages--friend and foe--but neither knows nor cares how magic is accomplished.

05)  What is their view of the six major powers occupying the continental United States?

USA—Mostly indifference.

CSA—Nico spits on the ground when the CSA comes up but doesn’t dwell on it.  He thinks that’s the way of the world and generally it’s Somebody Else’s Problem.

500 Nations—Active curiosity.  Work has taken him to the border towns but he’s never been inside.

Peachtree—Active curiosity.  Has only read about it, never been.

La Republica de Tejas—No particular loyalty because it’s too big for him to adopt as “his”.

Deseret—See CSA.

06)  Have they been to another planet yet? Do they want to go some day? 
No and no.  While he finds other (bipedal) races endlessly fascinating, actually visiting another world exceeds his alien-strangeness threshold.

07)  Your character finds $500 on the ground (a windfall equal to a three months' wages for a working class laborer). There's no way to tell who it belongs to. What do they do with the money? Does this answer change if they find it by themselves or in the group?

 If there's truly no way to get it to its owner, he'd keep it without a second thought.

He's insularly loyal.  If he has embraced the group as "his", in his mind it's as if the whole group found the money.  If the group is NOT "his", then it wouldn't even occur to him to split the cash.

08)  What religion (if any) does your character follow, and how fervently?

 He regards religion and deities disdainfully, but with pragmatism, as forces that simply need to be factored in.  Like gravity, weather, or terrain.  Feels a token affinity for the Laughing Rat King as the embodiment of perseverance. 

09)  What's one of their bad habits? How about a good habit?  Has trouble looking at or acknowledging tripod Martians.  Generally welcoming to other non-human non-Skaven races.

10)  What does your character do with their leisure time?  Reads. 

11)  What would your character order at a restaurant? Does this answer change if someone else is paying for the meal? 
Vegetable and meat but no sugar.  No.

12)  Does your character have any bias against the Skaven, the Red or Green Lizardmen, against Tripod Martians (or against humans, if they're a nonhuman character)? Does your character have any prejudices against other humans if they are a human?

 No bias for the most part, though this is not due to some inherent nobility.  He merely sees supremacist views as factually inaccurate and therefore delusional and wasteful.  In his view sentient beings tend to have far more in common than not, and this commonality means they can be useful to one another.  Wealth is generated by collective effort (this does not mean that he trusts freely; outsiders must prove their value and trustworthiness).

The exception is the tripod Martians.  Their lack of bilateral symmetry makes them seem uniquely alien and unrelatable.  He can't read them and feels consistently uncomfortable around them.

13)  Where do they live when not adventuring? Is it just a rented room somewhere or an actual home?

 He has a room in El Paso, kept by family, but only checks in briefly between jobs.

14)  How does your character tend to dress when out in the field having adventures? Are their "town clothes" different from this?  Leather.  No.

15)  How does your character pack for travel or for going out into the field for adventuring?  ??? medical kit, comb, small amount of dried food and water, compass?  Not sure how detailed this should be.

16)  What is your character's education level? (It is presumed that all PCs will be literate in English without a reason for that in the back story.)  
Highly self-educated, very little formal education.

17)  What is your character afraid of? 

Space travel.  Not much else.  He doesn't expect to live to old age and finds this liberating.  He's not bold, exactly, more resigned. 

18)  Does your character owe a significant favor to anyone? Does anyone owe them a significant favor?  Feels a debt to the community elders who trained him when he was young.  Acquitted himself well on a number of security jobs and is held in reasonably high esteem by past employers.  They trust his competence and reliability but nobody owes him a great debt.

19)  What does your character want to get out of adventuring? What do they expect to get out if it? What are they afraid could happen while out on adventures? Seeks mundane knowledge, meeting travelers, books to read, news.  Sends much of his earnings home to El Paso.  (In spite of the parallel this actually wasn’t inspired by the common immigrant narrative.  I simply have a friend from El Paso and I like the idea that my rat guy is tied to his “nest”.)

20)  What, if anything, does your character consider to be a cause worth dying for? What would they see as a good death? 
Defense of the nest is the only really good cause.

21)  If your character was old enough to serve in the Civil War (1861-1874; game takes place 25 years after), what did they do and which army were they in?  Born too late to participate in the war.

22)  Does your character prefer to keep their personal money as paper or coin (both are available and accepted everywhere)? Credit when possible.  Paper when not.  Paper is quieter (and his DNA remembers that it’s fun to chew).

Bonus question #21:  What advice would you give your character if you could?  Aim for the brain.

Background: Communications

1899 is about twenty or thirty years too early for regular telephone and radio communication; the existence of magic alters this as well in several ways.

Instantaneous communication is available via telegraph (with offices in every major, and many minor, cities as well as at railroad stations and spaceports). Generally telegrams are letters that can be sent instantly (like an email); there's not necessarily an obligation to respond immediately and there are frequent mishaps with downed wires or similar breaks in the wires between one place and another. Telegram operators are required to send messages and receive them, although Calculation Engines are also used to automate some parts of the processes. It's also possible for messages to be routed incorrectly or an error in transmission or reception to give wrong information (especially when numbers are involved). Signatures on legal documents cannot be sent via telegraph. Morse Code exists in 1899 and is used as a simple way to encode letters, numbers and special characters for transmission as telegraphs. Western Union is the largest telegraph company, but there are others (including Rebel Voice, the largest telegraph concern in the CSA, who reportedly refused to call themselves Confederate Union or Southern Union after breaking away from their parent company when the United States was divided in 1874).

Telegraph messengers are human (or Skaven or Lizardman) workers who take telegraph messages from a central office to the person who's suppose to receive it; they work for tips rather than a base salary from the telegraph company.

There are several magic items like scrying pools, crystal balls and other various things like that which can be used to communicate via voice, but they can't send items like paper with writing on it. The most recent magical advance for communication is the "facsimile mechanism", where a small single-purpose Calculation Engine is used to send information from one machine to another. The actual process involves the receiving machine magically creating ink on a piece of paper to replicate the document being sent.

Instant communication between planets is not possible in 1899; magic doesn't go far enough, even at the highest levels (Wish spells excepted, but using one of those to send a single message to another planet is wasteful and dangerous, and would only be used in cases of the direst emergencies). Out of necessity, political and military leaders posted off-planet are given free reign to make their own decisions about policy, tactics and strategy within the limits placed on them by their leadership. Exceeding one's limits in this area is exceptionally dangerous, but success when going beyond one's stated parameters is always useful if one is trying to avoid consequences.

Major cities have several dozen daily newspapers; some of them print a morning and evening edition (as well as occasional "Extra" editions when something sudden and newsworthy happens). Generally each publisher shapes the editorial policy of a given newspaper; with so many people depending on a newspaper as their main or sole source of information, there is plenty of room for papers with opposing viewpoints in the same city. Papers in German, Spanish, French, Hebrew, Skaven and Lizardman languages can all be found in big-city newsstands; there are newspapers run by various charities, ethnic societies, and religious groups as well as political parties. The Abilene Sentinel is one of the most highly regarded daily newspapers in the country; it's also one of the relatively few newspapers with a policy of hiring Skaven, Lizardmen, women, and nonwhites at all levels.

Widespread literacy and gas or electric lighting in the big cities mean that there's time available in the evenings after work for people to read for leisure. The paperback book does not exist at this point, but Dime Novels are short works of adventure (generally about the frontiers, whether in the Wild West or on other planets) that retail for ten cents. More expensive books tend to be priced out of the reach of working-class or poor people, but lending libraries exist where people pay a monthly fee to be allowed to borrow books from them. Amateur magical and scientific societies exist in big cities and small towns alike, where people with similar interests pool their limited funds to develop a private library and laboratory; some truly inspired magical and alchemical techniques have been discovered by groups like that (and the newspapers take a certain glee in covering the disasters that invariably ensue when people outpace their capabilities while trying to develop new alchemical formulations).

Background: Medicine

The Confederate States of America has a cure for cancer. So does Deseret, Peachtree, the USA, Tejas and the 500 Nations. In a world where magic works and where divine spellcasters can literally work miracles, there's a certain number of people that could cure one or two cases of terminal cancer a day. The real issue here isn't "cancer can be cured"; if AIDS existed in 1899 world it could also be cured. At a high enough level, any cleric could restore a single person to perfect health with a touch and a prayer. The real issue is the way that the Faith (or any of the other religions) determine who those one or two people a day are going to be.

As can be expected, the rich and powerful will be able to make use of the clerics' services before the poor and destitute (there's a few cathedrals in Alabama, Mississippi and Florida that exist because the Faith traded cancer cures for enough money to build monuments to the Seven). And there are occasional moments of mercy where a high-level septon decides that someone who can't necessarily do anything for the Faith still deserves a second lease on life. When following the dictates of one's soul, one doesn't always do the expected thing. Also, it's important to note that the lower-level "Cure Light / Medium / Serious Wounds" spells only heal injuries. They don't restore severed limbs, appendages or eyes. A cavalry officer who got his leg blown off and healed by a cleric who only restored his hit points is now a one-legged man. The use of spells like "Restoration (Lesser, Normal or Greater)" can address those issues but the plain healing spells do not.

While divine spellcasters are able to heal wounds, it's amost always on an individual level and the spellcaster must be present to perform this duty (barring the use of healing potions and the like). Hospitals and battlefields are both places where divine spellcasters face the ultimate tests of their abilities, and regardless of how many healing spells they can cast (up to a dozen and a half for higher-level clerics) it is inevitable that more people will be injured and need help than they can treat. Surgery in the Divided States of America is slightly more advanced in 1899 than it was in the real world (there's nothing like a fourteen-year-long war full of traumatic amputations to change the learning curve for surgeons and bring about new techniques). Antiseptics have gone past the "spray every surface with carbolic acid and hope for the best" level and surgeons commonly accept that the time to wash one's hands with alcohol is before they get bloody as well as after. Ether became used as an anaesthetic in the 1860s as well, with some doctors learning to specialize in its use and monitor the patients to keep them in the twilight zone between agony and death while being treated.

As a parenthetical note, the Korean War was the first one in real-world history where there were more casualties due to battlefield injuries than to disease; antibiotics and medevac flights made it possible to treat more wounds more quickly than had ever been possible before. The existence of flying carpets and teleportation wands in 1899 means that battlefield mages and clerics could do more for a vanishingly small number of soldiers than would have been possible in the real world, but the overwhelming experience for wounded men and women in that war was agony, surgical amputation and a lifetime of diminshed capabilities.

Enter the technological improvements of Peachtree and the USA. Alchemy is also real; so are technologies undreamed of in the real world. In a society where tens of thousands of soldiers were saved from death but not from disfigurement the mechanical artificers of the United States were spurred to action. Clockwork prostheses are extremely common, with mechanical hands capable of gripping a pen and fine motor control able to let the user write his signature the top of the line and crude-looking metal gauntlets at the bottom (as in all things, the ability of someone to pay for treatment determines the level of treatment they will get, although there are charitable societies in every country other than the 500 Nations' territory that pay for as many injured soldiers and workers to get as high-quality a prosthetic as they can--and it's more that the 500 Nations don't have an official bureaucracy to facilitate things like that than an unwillingness to treat the injured). Arcane spellcasters have also stepped into the field of limb replacement, with alchemically treated metal, stone or wood limbs magically capable of doing anything the flesh and blood arm or leg could do existing by the hundreds. A modified golem-creation ritual can fuse a statue limb to a living human body and make it flexible like skin (although heavier and tougher; some maimed factory workers have been known to go right back onto the line with metal or hardwood arms because they're extremely resistant to the damages that originally crippled them). In many cases, the mages make a number of golem limb procedures available to the poor and desperate as a trade-off for the knowledge and practice that they gain for crafting the magic item. In extremely rare cases, mages are able to craft enchanted glass and metal replacement eyes for maimed inviduals; one or two wizards were known to have blinded themselves once the replacement arcane-sight devices were perfected, trading up from their human vision to sight that could see things nobody else could.

It's not uncommon for adventurers to make use of enchanted replacements for damaged or missing limbs, either by paying cash up front or in some cases to trade a certain term of indentured servitude to an alchemist for improved limbs, eyes, the addition of wings, or other clockwork or magical enhancements. Some military forts in the less-settled parts of the USA that face monster attacks have surgical wizards and alchemists on staff; the medical officers range from dedicated surgeons devoted to the soldiers under their care to barely sane surgeons crafting scarcely human monsters from the injured and dying enlisted men under their control.

Surgical techniques are harsher on the other planets; Venus and Mars both have limited resources compared to Earth and there aren't large enough cities to support teaching hospitals on either frontier planet. But there are people willing to adventure past the edge of Terran science on both planets that can restore injured adventurers to health, or improve their bodies. Implanting or creating the gills that Green Lizardmen use to breath underwater is possible, as is grafting their membranous eyelids to humans (if willing donors can be found, of course). And taking cadaver muscles and surgically attaching it to an existing human is a way to create strength and toughness beyond human levels.

Background: Firearms

Pathfinder is a game of heroic fiction, and that means violence and combat. Heroes, in 20th and 21st century genre fiction, use weapons. Even Tyrion Lannister got into the act a couple of times in the books and on the show, and he's the least physically imposing person playing the Game of Thrones.

In the Divided States of 1899, there are certain people who don't fit in to the normal world; they go off and have adventures of various times. And that's fine, because there are monsters and there are villains in this world. Heroes destroy those things.

Firearms are legal in the United States of 1899 as well as Peachtree, Deseret, La Republica de Tejas and the territory controlled by the 500 Nations (though they are registered via Calculation Engine in all of those places save the 500 Nations' lands and Tejas, which still uses written file cards to show who is licensed to carry a firearm). The CSA does not allow anyone with African ancestry to own or use firearms; occasional dispensations are made for plantation owners who have slaves go out and hunt or lower the animal (or monster) population around their holdings. Unauthorized possession of firearms by slaves is a capital offense and generally the Confederates do not bother with the formality of a trial in such situations.

In more urban areas of most of the countries, it's not permitted to openly wear or carry guns; police and soldiers do, but citizens at large are considered eccentric at best and horribly dangerous at worst for toting a rifle or pistol around with them. The more one gets out into the countryside, though, the more likely it is that someone will be armed. Thanks to the use of magic weapons, it's also likely to find someone with a bow and arrows or crossbow and quarrels wandering around; enchanted swords, armor or shields are also relatively common in the more sparsely populated areas--guns are used for hunting, vermin control, monster defense and signalling (as well as bank robbery, death threats, duels, ambushes and outright murder). Of course, the gambler with a concealed derringer in his sleeve or boot is a cliche in Western fiction and small hidden firearms can be found anywhere there are people who wish to have an edge in a fight but not to advertise the fact.

Some wizards and sorcerers channel arcane power through their firearms in a newly American kind of magic (the European schools of wizardry were more tradition-bound and stuck to archery or swordsmanship when amplifying one's skills through arcane means). Gunpowder using mages are confined to using load-and-fire weapons that have ramrods and powder horns; part of their arcane focus and weapon knowledge comes from loading the shot or pellets individually rather than using a revolver or a repeating rifle. (This is at least partly a way to avoid unbalancing the game; having a wizard who has to hold still to reload their gun after every time they fire a shot is a way to keep them from having too much power.) They may use the single-shot pistol, blunderbuss, musket or other black powder firearm that requires individual shots to be loaded individually (the rifle, revolver, derringer and shotgun don't allow the same kind of focus for a black powder mage; they might know how to use any or all of those weapons as a gun, but not as a way to focus magic). In game terms, a black powder mage gets to add +1 per two experience levels (+1 at levels 1-2; +2 at levels 3-4, etc.) to casting rolls when channeling a combat spell through a gun (think of something like Burning Hands or Magic Missile being vented through a Kentucky long rifle or flintlock pistol instead of the caster pointing their fingers to aim). They suffer a -3 to casting rolls when trying to use a similarly damaging spell without a gun. Spells that would not be channeled through a gun don't get a bonus or penalty.

Firearm use in Etheric vessels can quickly result in the death of everyone on board, either through breaking through the hull or by damaging critical components of the ship. It's very common for Etheric sailors to learn some kind of melee combat--typically the officers know swordsmanship and the ordinary Ether servicemen use maces, clubs, axes or batons. The Etheric pilot Captain Green of the Gibbous Moon is renowned for his skill with a ten-foot length of weighted chain that he uses to disarm and entangle enemies before attacking them; similarly eccentric weapons like nunchaku or bolas see frequent use in combat on Etheric vessels (and the oceanic and space navies of the various nations tend to offer instruction in a wide range of techniques and weapons; different ships of the line pride themselves on the eccentric fighting skills of their officers).

Just as melee weapons and medieval ranged weapons can be enchanted to provide combat bonuses, firearms can also bear arcane enhancements. The history of America is the history of guns, and some families have arcane firearms handed down from generation to generation like swords in a Samurai clan. There are also alchemical bullets and powder preparations that can have magic effects even when fired from a mundane gun. An outlaw magician may well be telling the truth when he says he has a bullet with someone's name on it...

House rule #3: Attribute scores and leveling

At levels 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, 19, 22, 25 (and so on), characters can add one point to one of their attributes. They may go over 18 by doing so.

Background: Transportation &c.

Moving people or things from place to place in Pathfinder 1899 takes much longer than people living in contemporary American society would imagine. In the USA, rail lines link all the major cities with fuel and water depot stops spaced out so that the trains' engines don't break down; mail delivery stations coincide with the food and fuel storage facilities. It would take a week or more to go from California to Maine via railroad, and if the destination isn't near a big city the travelers would have to switch to stage coaches or horseback to get somewhere more obscure. Inside the various large cities, trolleys, trains or subways move people around while horse-drawn wagons deliver goods like food, coal, consumer goods or ice blocks (home refrigeration is the province of literal ice boxes at this point). Sanitation crews sweep up the mountains of horse shit in the streets, generally in the richer and more prosperous neighborhoods although some attempt is made to clear out the poorer neighborhoods from time to time (not least because animal feces can be used in tanning leather or in making crop fertilizer, and so much of it is lying around free for the taking).

Cities, incidentally, tend to have a patchwork of gas lighting and electricity, with homes heated individually by coal rather than the piped-in gas heating that everyone playing the game would be familiar with. Industrial regulations do not exist; factories can belch smoke and shit chemicals into the air, water and soil with impunity. Want to know what that genuinely looks like? Here you go. Since this is fantasy, there's less smog and chemical foulness in the atmosphere of the larger cities. Since it's fantasy, alchemical pollution can be even more dangerous than the ordinary chemical kind. The rural areas get by with horses for plowing fields or drawing carts for the most part. Roads in and around the main cities are paved with tarmacadam, while the more distant streets tend to be gravel or dirt, though generally kept in good repair.

Airships are also in use, a luxurious way to view the countryside from thousands of feet up. Goods are also shipped by sea and people travel across the oceans on massive liners as well.

Rail lines terminate at the edge of the territory controlled by the 500 Nations; the tribes do not allow heavy industry in their lands. This led to the creation of border towns full of warehouses and shops all over the edge of the Nations' territory; anything people want can be found at these hypercapitalist boom towns...for a price. Similarly, the Native Americans living near those artificially developed cities make a fine living selling fresh meat, spring water or handicrafts to the merchants (who sell them to other people in the USA, taking a cut off the marked-up prices themselves). That far out from the huge cities and smaller towns, criminal gangs tend to gravitate thanks to the promise of easy money and distant governmental forces.

Deseret has miles of railroad lines from when it was part of the USA, but most of their transportation infrastructure is deteriorating for lack of skilled maintenance and industrial facilities capable of rolling out quality steel rails. Horse-drawn wagons and carts make up the bulk of transportation for goods while stagecoaches or horses provide the way for people to get around from place to place.

Tejas, as well, tends to depend on horse-drawn transportation (though the use of refined crude oil as a fuel for mechanical transports shows a great deal of promise for the near future). Some of the existing railways in Tejas have been adapted so that train cars are pulled by teams of horses or mules; the unused engines have been torn down for scrap or sold to Peachtree, the USA or CSA (depending on whether or not it was feasible to move them). Most of the roads in Tejas and Deseret are gravel or dirt rather than paved (and a vast amount of open country exists in both countries).

Peachtree has undergone a massive project to link its major cities with Electric Railways; the smaller towns have spur lines leading to them as well. The Railways are subsidized by nationwide taxes and no charge is assessed for their use; George Washington Carver declared that they are a public good and will be financed by public funds. Shipping into Peachtree is monitored by Engine-using police who watch for sabotage (the CSA is a constant threat on that score). Exports from Peachtree are also closely monitored to prevent advanced technologies from falling into that nation's enemies (and, occasionally, its allies). Like the USA (and the remaining lines in Deseret), Peachtree's railways have a standardized gauge, with the rails always a standard distance apart and the ties made of the same lumber over every mile of track.

The CSA, however, never developed an industrial culture like the United States did. Its country-spanning railroads vary gauge and construction materials state by state or even county by county; individual small railroads worked together or against each other in various places and the nation is covered by a crazy quilt of different rail lines. Switching from one to another is a relatively brief matter for passengers and luggage, but for shipping cargo it's a laborious and time-consuming process. It's been known to take longer for a train to get from Florida to Arkansas than from California to Boston under the worst conditions. Repair and maintenance of the rails and engines is also a patchwork affair, with the poorer lines deteriorating faster than the richer ones and getting restored more slowly. The dirt and gravel roads in the Confederacy are in generally poor repair, while the paved ones are in conditions that range from horrible to impassable thanks to fourteen years of warfare and an impoverished nation that cannot afford to fix them. The ports of New Orleans remain a bustling commercial enterprise, and there is a zeppelin port in Oklahoma that mostly serves as a depot and refueling stop for American and Tejano airships (but does also handle the vast majority of Confederate airships). Nearly all travel and transport in the CSA requires horseback riding; the poorest people walk or simply don't go anywhere else.