Magocrat

Strictly speaking, a magocrat is any wizard who protects a community of mundanes who have sworn an oath of obedience to her in exchange for that protection. The relationship between a lone magocrat and the community she protects is fairly simple. The people the wizard protects provide for all of her mundane needs — food, clothing, accommodations, and so forth. In exchange, the magocrat uses her magic to benefit the community as a whole.

As useful and flexible as magic is, the role of the magocrat runs the gamut from doctor to civil engineer to lookout to artillery unit. A wizard need never fear that her skills will not be constantly put to use by the mundanes who owe their loyalty to her.

The mundanes obey the magocrat's orders less because they fear she will use magic to destroy their community — though a wizard could cause a great deal of damage — and more because they fear that she will leave, taking her magical power and the blessings it provides with her. After all, a wizard is a precious commodity, and a magocrat who does not feel respected in one town will have little difficulty finding a more appreciative community elsewhere.

Matters grow more complicated when magocrats develop cooperative relationships with other wizards. Despite the stereotype, wizards do recognize the many advantages of working with other wizards.

First, no wizard is equally skilled with every magical application useful in maintaining a community. By exchanging specializations, magocrats can improve the quality of life for their mundanes while eliminating a less pleasant magical chore for themselves.

Second, every wizard's martial skill is finite, so mutual protection agreements can greatly improve the chances that a magocrat will successfully drive off a Drake raid or similar threat. Drakes tend to become shy when facing even a lone magocrat, but caution often turns to panic when several wizards arrive to defend the same village. By providing a consistent show of magical force at every community within the area, a group of magocrats can drive Drakes away from the region for months, or even years, at time. Even if the Drakes don't turn and run, the magical tactics a lone wizard can employ are nothing compared to the devastatingly effective battlefield tactics available when two or three wizards work in concert.

Third, wizards enjoy the friendship of their peers as much as anyone does. While it is easy to see the practical reasons why magocrats often form alliances, what many people overlook is that many magocrats establish these relationships with wizards with whom they are already friends. Mar history is full of stories of bands of wizards who sought out a group of towns in the same region with the intention of forming a cluster of allied fiefs as magocrats.

Finally, ruling as a magocrat is difficult, dangerous work. Between the threat of Drake raids, the constant presence of Dinah's Curse, and the logistical considerations of sanitation, hunting, and foraging — to say nothing of the political squabbles and judicial burdens associated with being in a position of authority over any community — magocratic allies provide a support network and a source of advice from those who are also trying to rule successfully and well.

These agreements can complicate matters for the mundanes these groups of magocrats rule, however, especially if such alliances develop into hierarchies or produce a single, oligarchical fief. In these situations, it can become difficult for the mundane citizen to determine to whom he owes fealty. These two models produce very different problems, of course.

In a hierarchy, it is often a reasonably simple matter to explain that the mundanes owe loyalty to their local magocrat unless that magocrat's own liege gives contradictory instructions — in which case the liege's orders stand. This is relatively simple if the liege only controls a small area, since it remains possible for his vassals' mundanes to identify him. In large fiefs or if the hierarchy develops more than two levels of authority, this becomes increasingly difficult, since the average citizen would not recognize the local magocrat's liege's liege on sight and faces the uncomfortable prospect — when presented with a wizard claiming to wield authority over the local magocrat — of choosing between possibly disobeying a higher authority or potentially disobeying a known authority on the orders of an imposter.

In an oligarchical model, several wizards share authority over a collection of communities, and the mundanes are sworn to obey all of them. As long as the magocrats remain in agreement, this does not pose any problem for the citizen. As soon as conflict emerges between the wizards, however, the oligarchy degenerates into either an all-out war between different members' centers of power or a macabre political game in which mundanes become pawns that magocrats willingly sacrifice in an effort to strengthen their positions. Since the mundane has sworn to obey all the magocrats equally, he is forced to break his oath the moment he receives contradictory orders.

As the political unification of magocrats expands, all these problems are exacerbated. This is most noticeable in the duxies, though any fief whose magocrats become highly specialized will notice these issues. Additional problems also emerge in the duxy model.

Specialization is the mark of any complex civilization, and a magocracy is no exception. A lone magocrat must take on all the roles her community needs her to fill — doctor, civil engineer, warrior, judge, and more. In a political unit as large and populous as a duxy, however, a magocrat can select a role that best fits her interests and abilities. Warrior wizards take up stations in towns on the borders of the duxy to protect it from outside threats. Justice-thirsty wizards maintain law and order within the duxy — either as police or as magistrates. Some roles that could not exist in a smaller fief also emerge — such as auditors who oversee the work of other wizards and bureaucrats who help manage the smooth flow of goods and services to prevent gluts and shortages.

This specialization makes clear oaths to individual magocrats unrealistic. Certain classes of magocrat — such as judges, generals, and civil authorities — retain their authority over the mundanes, but the majority lose almost all this power. While still important parts of the magocratic machinery, these muted wizards are not magocrats in the strictest sense — but then again, neither are the wizards who retain power but do not provide the vast majority of the services upon which the mundanes rely. For this reason, the definition of magocrat has expanded to include those who are magocrats in the strict sense, plus all wizards who serve them or their agents.

By this definition, however, it is almost impossible for a wizard operating within the boundaries of a duxy to escape the magocrat label. Even teachers bolster the ranks of the dux's servants, and a scholar's discoveries often have practical applications that serve the duxy. Few wizards resent being called magocrats, since there are many benefits to operating within the boundaries of a duxy.

Those who despise the title often find themselves living on the margins beyond the boundaries of any duxy, and even these seldom escape the title for their entire lives. Power often brings authority, and even wizards who take the route of the benevolent public servant soon find mundanes looking to them for guidance. After all, if your fire-conjuring friend who can kill a dozen or more goblins in a few minutes thinks attacking the goblin village is too dangerous, wouldn't you give his assessment a bit more weight than that of your spear-toting buddy who can probably best one or two goblins — if he's lucky — but seems certain the goblins will be easy prey?

(Contributed by Weard Sigrath Brennen)

Copyright 2005-2007 Eric Zawadzki and Matthew Schick. All Rights Reserved.
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