The Commonwealth of Fiuthnolla

A Golden Age in Arm's Reach

Fiuthnolla is a new nation - a young, innovative, passionate, exciting player on the world's stage. Their power projection may be small at the moment, as is their population, but their archipelago is thankfully large enough to accommodate the rapid influx of immigrants and refugees who see in Fiuthnolla a new hope for a better world. But the Commonwealth is still fragile - by far the least populated state in Beacepheron, and one of the least populated in the world, they must still toe the line carefully with their amazing technology to survive - their island is defensible, but the full force of foreign armies could very well sweep over them if they don't use their advantages well - and that's a risk that they won't be taking. The Fiuthnollan Experiment has only lived for three decades - and it will either live for a decade more, or for centuries to come. It will be a footnote or a superpower.

Geography

The Gilded Isles upon which Fiuthnolla is built are generally warm-temperate in climate, with a long growing season. The coasts are guarded by the Tiamat Range, a giant mountain range that stretches in a horseshoe shape, and most of the rest of the isles are composed of temperate forests. Animals on the isles include wild boars, badgers, crows, hedgehogs, and in the mountains, rams, eagles, and mountain aurochs. Unicorns are a common magical species in Fiuthnolla, having undertaken a micro-exodus following the emotional resonance of pure hope emanating from this nation. Thunderbirds also inhabit the mountains in small populations, as do glacier toads in larger numbers, and fae wolverines are a common issue in the forest.
There is one strange geographic feature of the island - the Gilded Deeps. The deep, winding caves on the central island are uncharted, believed to have been an ancient, largely depleted gold mine. However, they are uncharted for a simple reason - access is forbidden. A monastic order of mysterious warriors, half of which bear Fiuthnollan rifles, the other half of which fight with their fists, guard the cave. The fist-fighters are blind, and all of them have strange draconic mutations, and either can fight blind or see in the dark. Thus, the caves are unlit - invading them is a suicide mission for most people, as each inch would be bought with buckets of blood in complete darkness, illuminated only by the attacker's torches and defender's muzzle flashes.

Government and Geopolitics

The Fiuthnollan government is a unique beast in its own right - they represent a system of authoritarian technocratic democracy centered around three core principles - the individual is capable of greatness, the most qualified should lead their fields, and science will improve all things. Their society is centered around four branches - the military, the engineers, the mages, and the clergy. The military, led by the Lord Castellan, is responsible for the defense of the island and the nation's people and is divided into three sub-branches - the National Guard (combat-trained logistics staff and junior member of other branches able to take up surplus arms for the island's defense), the Marines (the frontline combat infantry) and the Navy.
The engineers, led by the Artificer General, represent the scientific body of the state and are responsible for the research, maintenance, and manufacture of machinery, and the programming of clockwork machinery, a mainstay of the Fiutnollan nation. Mages, led by the High Archmage, are responsible for magical research, theory, and application, and clergy, led by the Grand Ecclesiarch, with healing, communing with the divine, and serving the spiritual needs of the nation. Each branch elects its leader internally, with all members having an equal vote. Once the leader is in power, though, they are dictators within their branch and only restrained by the Golden Constitution. Only a 60% vote of no-confidence, which can be initiated by a petition within the branch, can end the 20-year term of the leader early.
Fiuthnolla runs on a command economy, whereupon manufacturing institutions run by the Engineers and allocated to the other branches as needed are commissioned to produce sums of material. Manufacturing centers are built as close as possible to the source of raw materials. Government companies import, export, and internally sell goods, and every citizen of Fiuthnolla is paid by the state for their work. All Fiuthnollans are guaranteed food, water, housing, and other essential life goods - money in the Fiutnollan economy is centered on the purchase of goods beyond one's life needs, predominantly luxuries, personal weapons, and larger sums of life goods such as more food. There is no system of taxation, as the government controls the nation's wealth in the first place.
Fiuthnolla is a tight-knit unitary state, controlled from the capital city, also named Fiuthnolla. All decision-making is accomplished by the four heads of state, elected by their respective constituencies. The only authority above the heads of state is the Golden Constitution. The chain of command is highly respected in every branch of the state, and the authority of a superior is considered to be near-absolute so long as their orders do not defy the Golden Constitution nor the order of a superior to the authority in question. Leadership roles of NCO rank or equivalent in other branches are elected by the units that they will be commanding in a direct democratic system - all leaders above them are trained in their respective colleges and given a commission by their respective head of state.
The Church of Fiuthna is technically the state religion of the Commonwealth, but they practice near-absolute religious tolerance - as long as one's actions remain agreeable to the laws of the state, then one's religion is irrelevant. Temples are built for every major religious population in a settlement, and minor religions are welcome to build shrines in the Public Temple provided to every settlement. Common healing services are given for free the Temples of Fiuthna which are found in all settlements, whether by a single vicar in a one-room shrine, or a staff of experienced priests in one of the urban grand cathedrals. However, smaller and more trivial healings, and larger and expensive healings, cost the end consumer a sum, the former for spending valuable time on minor issues and the latter to attempt to break even in raw cost. Any temple that provides healing can register for funding under this program.
Fiuthnolla is in an interesting position, as a new ideological rival to the rest of Beacepheron. Most nations tend to ignore them, the Fiuthnollans currently are too preoccupied with economic and cultural development to focus on ideological expansion. However, the fact that the Fiuthnollans are not inclined to send troops overseas is a reason why they have no allies. The Commonwealth remains at odds with the Stormaki - the devastation on both sides caused by the Stormaki Aggression has left a tepid frustration on both sides with the other. They have a direct animosity towards the Starflame Kingdom, who have previously tried to enslave Fiuthnollan citizens, as these people are almost all highly skilled and well-trained, making them valuable. However, the number of slave ships to ever enter and leave successfully number in the single-digits, thanks to the fast and expansive system of naval patrols by rapid Fiuthnollan gunboats. The Fiuthnollans hate the violation of their citizens' rights and the infringement on their ideology. The Starflame slavers hate the lost profit opportunities and sunk ships.

Economy

Fiuthnolla has a revolutionary economy - their primary industries are entirely automated, with massive terrace farms that double as fortified strongpoints cultivated and harvested by clockwork machines, and clockwork workers delving into the mountain mines to extract their mineral resources. Factories are also the realm of the machines, with automated clockwork machinery forming almost the entire manufacturing process, maintained by Engineer technicians. This was made possible by the advent of the Magi-Rotation Drive, a simple magi-tech device that draws ambient magic from the atmosphere to turn an axle, and typically this axle then turns a gear, which then powers the rest of the machine. Fiuthnolla is one of the few nations that practice a primarily industrial economy. They have a large agricultural and mining sector, but almost their entire population is sheltered in cities as most 'villages' are simply storage and maintenance facilities to support Engineers maintaining automated gathering networks. Agriculture in the Commonwealth is centered on terrace farming, and their primary grain is rice, though they also grow large quantities of maize and some amount of wheat and sugarcane in non-terrace farms. However, most non-terrace farming takes place in orchards, and typically involves fruit, or otherwise cultivated cotton, which is one of the nation's biggest export products. Coffee is also a beloved crop for the Fiuthnollans, and some would call it an addiction.
The urban economies of Fiuthnolla are some of the biggest and most productive in the world, and certainly the most productive in Beacephereon. In terms of manufacturing relatively simple parts such as gun barrels, gears, metal fixtures, or for goods such as bread, cheese, soap, books, toys, and paper, clockwork automatons are responsible for almost all the work and can operate with minimal oversight for months on end without any major maintenance. Complex goods are produced by the automatons in pieces and assembled by a member of the Engineer branch of sufficient rank, or by one of the experimental models for the sake of analyzing performance. The Fiuthnollans wish to phase out living labor in all production of goods, though the perfection of fine detail and complex assembly machines has more recently stalled. Fiuthnollan cities are gleaming, towering affairs, where many buildings stand taller than a castle's keep. Most Fiuthnollan cities produce the majority of the goods they need for themselves, but import/export relations between cities are common to fill in the gaps.
The Fiuthnollan state mines significant sums of iron from the Tiamat Range, which is largely then processed into crucible steel for gun barrels and machinery. They have some coal reserves, but almost all of it is used domestically for forging steel. They also produce silver, a lesser but significant sum of gold, and tin. Cold iron is also found in a few deposits, and at the very tip of the mountains of the Tiamat Range are sums of Horacalcum - some of these mountains have so much Horacalcum ore that the top of the mountains move at two-times speed compared to the rest of reality. Dragon fossils are often extracted during mining - at least, 'often' relative to how rare dragon bones are - and are largely preserved and kept for study.
The distribution of magical items is based on two criteria - whether or not one needs it in their line of work, and whether or not the distribution has reached a point where they are entitled to one. For example, if an Engineer needed to move large quantities of machine parts to a distant factory or workshop, they may be allocated a Bag of Holding for the task, for as long as one is needed. Meanwhile, magical items that will be generally useful in a line of work will be handed first to the highest rank of the appropriate branch - for example, if there was a supply of Amulets of Natural Armor, the first and strongest ones would be given to combatant NCOs across the entire nation, and then handed down the ladder all the way down to the privates.
Fiuthnolla exports food, gold, cold iron, cotton, and export-technology - a term for technology below the Fiuthnollan cutting edge that can be sold without compromising their technological advantage, in particular muskets and other high-quality flintlock weapons. Fiuthnolla imports coal, steel, and iron to supplement their reserves, as well as copper and magical items.

Military

Despite their small population, Fiuthnolla has the largest standing military in Beacepheron, with their Marines and Navy being able to play both land and sea roles. The Fiuthnollan military has 300,000 personnel, including both active combatants and various logistics and command staff. All logistics staff are combat-ready but primarily serve in their assigned role. Most officers also remain combat-ready in the event that they must defend themselves. Regular combat personnel carry Fiuthollan Army Pattern Breechgun, a breech-loaded rifle that loads a single shot. Officers will carry a Fiuthnollan Army Pattern Cycler - a 6-chambered revolver - and a saber. These advanced firearms carry an affordable magical "kill switch" allowing a code phrase to be spoken into a unified receiver in the capital that will cause a catastrophic failure of the weapon, destroying all important mechanisms beyond recognition. Any weapon whose serial is unaccounted for at the end of a month is destroyed. In addition, a further 300,000 reservists can be raised from junior members of the other branches as part of the National Guard. They will be armed, in times of need, with as many Breechguns as are available, and otherwise with muskets. This near-million manpower is largely unheard within Beacepheron of outside of Fiuthnolla in any professional force but facilitated by the role of clockwork automatons. This number does not include either the Auxiliary Units, composed of intermediate members of the other Branches assigned to in various combat and non-combat roles in support of the military. It also does not include the Clockwork Maniples, experimental units of clockwork automaton programmed to provide durable, fearless forces to supplement and absorb damage for their elite army.
Of the 300,000 regulars, roughly 40,000 are qualified to embark as Dragoons. Of these, 5,000 are Clockwork Dragoons. The Fiuthnollan Dragoons represent the cavalry force of the Fiuthnollan Commonwealth, and their primary purpose is as mounted infantry. They are, however, given breastplates and sabers for engaging in melee as light cavalry as needed. By contrast, the Clockwork Dragoons ride the vaunted Clockwork Horses, wear heavy armor, and serve as heavy cavalry and a very resilient form of skirmishing infantry, able to shrug off musket balls even under ideal combat firing conditions. Soldiers that must be moved quickly but are not qualified to be Dragoons will be deployed in armored carriages pulled by Clockwork Horses. These are reserved for rapid-response units, units that are quite exclusive in terms of qualifications to be transferred to. The Fiuthnollan army is organized into Companies of flexible size and composition as the smallest formal military unit. Smaller units are organized on an ad-hoc basis to meet the demands of the battlefield. Ten-man units called Tents do exist, but they are primarily a social unit, that shares a tent, cooking supplies, rations, and other day-to-day vitals.
The main and only siege weapon used by the Commonwealth is the Fiuthnollan Field Pattern Rifled Cannon, a highly accurate and deadly weapon that can fire explosive shells a very long distance with significant accuracy improvements over smoothbore guns. These are employed as both field guns and siege guns, and a very similar model is used aboard naval ships. The Field Pattern Rifled Cannon, or simply Field Cannon, is the best gunpowder artillery weapon in Iocrade, and arguably the best artillery weapon in general. The combination of these cannons with the deadly, long-ranged, and accurate fire of their Breechgun has made assailing the shores of Fiuthnolla a losing proposition.
The Commonwealth Military employs three types of Auxiliaries - Battlemages, Combat Engineers, and Military Chaplains. They are provided by the branch responsible for training them, which is to say the Magic Branch, Engineer Branch, and Religious Branch, respectively, at the request of the military for a specific task, though the military keeps a small number of these individuals on-staff at all times. This matches the deployment of Security Personelle to all other branches, army units tasked with providing security to various operations and individuals of the other branches. Battlemages cast arcane spells, Combat Engineers operate and maintain artillery and construct complex fortifications, and Military Chaplains provide medical treatment and other divine magic. They are applied quite flexibly across the innovative commanders of the Commonwealth.
The Fiuthnollan Navy is primarily composed of Corvin-Type Gunboats, fast and affordable vessels that operate on both sail power and a clockwork rotor powered by a Magi-Rotation Drive, making them exceptionally fast. These carry six guns, split evenly between front-facing and rear-facing. Their standard naval doctrine is to attack enemy ships from a distance with Sea Pattern Rifled Cannons, meaning they will either turn to pursue and be led on a wild goose chase or simply ignore the bombardment and continue to take damage. They attack in packs and will attempt to break up fleets and draw them into killing fields of other ships. They also employ low, stealthy boarding vessels for Coast Guard actions and ship capture, escort frigates that can effectively hold a line, and Blocking Ships, a medium-sized proto-battleship with both turret and broadside guns.

Demographics

The Fiuthnollan population is largely composed of humans, of Stormaki and Iskar origins in particular. Roughly 50% of the population is composed of humans, and of these, the Stormaki represent 20%, the Iskar 15%, the Ancient Stormaki 5%, and the remaining 60% are composed of a random selection of other human populations, none of which exceed about 10% of the human population. Almost every common race is represented in Fiuthnolla, with halflings and drow underrepresented and gnomes, dwarves, and catfolk slightly overrepresented. Most Fiuthnollans are currently immigrants to the nation, but there has been a steady increase in births among the young nation's population that promise to make the nation self-sustaining in terms of growth. All immigrants are welcome, with a short screening process to ensure that there are no spies or other subversive, hostile elements among their number - as part of those, all immigrants start their chosen employment from the ground floor - if they join the military, they are starting as privates regardless of their previous qualifications, though they may request a commission and be raised to a cadet or junior lieutenant.
A narrow majority of Fiuthnollans, about 60%, worship the Great Golden Goddess Fiuthna, patron of the Commonwealth. Her existence as a Goddess is a recent manifestation, and yet her cult has mysteriously received a full breadth of scripture and ritual knowledge. However, no worship is fully restricted - however, certain practices such as sapient sacrifice are explicitly banned, and their practice may even result in a temple or shrine being dismantled if enough of the clerical staff are complicit. Religious worship is typically divided along racial lines, with Stormaki humans worshipping Stormakstiden, Iskar humans worshipping the Iskar pantheon, halflings worshipping halfling and Fiuthnollan heroes, and so on. Many immigrants to Fiutholla are escaped or rescued slaves, and they bring the worship of Salavakas, Goddess of Liberation, which is quite common as well.
80% of the Fiuthnollan population live in cities, minor to major. Most of the remaining 20% is composed of the Engineer maintenance staff of clockwork RGOs and their associated support staff, or people working at waystations that give supplies to passing travelers, typically moving resources between two points. Fiuthnolla has universal and mandatory public education, and one chooses the branch they will join at 12-years-old, at which point they will receive 4 years of specialized education in their field. They are provided recommendations based on their aptitude, and their teacher during their specialized education can have the student labeled as 'Unsuited' in the event that they simply chose wrong and would be a liability in their field and are thus forced to move into another field, but are otherwise free to choose what branch they join. Between the four branches, there is a roughly equal division between them, with a slight skew towards the military.

Culture

Currently, Fiuthnolla is attempting to foster a culture of gender and racial equality and tolerance. They are beholden to the cultures of their population, and this process is ongoing. Nevertheless, there are no restrictions on race or gender when it comes to selecting one's branch, and there is legislation in place to restrict and penalize these factors being applied to choosing the subjects of promotions. Most families are small and tend to be made within a branch, though cross-branch marriage is not unheard of. The army, in particular, has a high tolerance for homosexual cohabitation, though no formal institution of marriage between people of the same gender. Homosexual relations are generally accepted, though certain wings of the Religious branch, typically coming from countries with religions that are not tolerant of these behaviors, may speak out against this, though they cannot deny anyone healing services on these grounds if the temple in question provides them. Couples tend to have equal say in matters of family, though this may alter somewhat based on cultural origin. Children are generally expected to be obedient to their parents and accept their final decision on matters, though it is normal for a child to speak their mind on issues concerning them. Most households have parents and children, though families that prefer to live so can form multigenerational households with just a bit of paperwork.
Fiuthnolla is arguably the most technologically advanced country in the world - in terms of engineering prowess, the nation employs the Magi-Rotation Drive in their humanoid automatons who function on punch cards that provide instruction for how to move and behave. They are able to perform almost all forms of simple manual labor - the more repetitive the better. These are accompanied by clockwork threshers, cotton gins, and sowing carts in the fields and various pieces of industrial machinery in the factories, allowing them to produce huge numbers of goods and harvest massive sums of resources 24/7 at a rate similar to or in certain situations superior to human labor. In terms of weapons, Fiuthnolla is the only nation that employs any form of breech-loading rifle that chambers a metal cartridge, and the same is true of revolvers and rifled cannons. Their large army punches above its weight because of this.
Core ideas of the Fiuthnollan national identity include bravery, ambition, forgiveness, and open-mindedness. By improving oneself, one improves the whole, and by earnestly considering new ideas, one enriches one's society, one thought at a time. Fiuthnolla has prominent wings of the Engineers and Religious Branches, namely the College of Mind's Mechanics and the Cult of Chal, God of Knowledge and keeper of the Akashic Record, both studying memetics to attempt to learn how ideas are created and spread for the advantage of their people and their state. At once, one is expected to show respect and trust in one's countrymen, but not too much trust - one is expected to be skeptical, but not paranoid, and investigate or pass along any leads to superior officers. Espionage is treated with extreme prejudice, as the Fiuthnollans are totally opaque to sharing their cutting-edge technology in this early stage of their existence. The Fiuthnollan salute, used in the military, is much the same as the salute we know, but the free hand of the lower-ranked individual is held open at hip height, to show that one is unarmed. Peers are not expected to do this with one another - a superior who does this for a subordinate is a very big sign of respect.
All Fiuthnollans own a military uniform - a salmon-pink military longcoat with a white-cream undershirt and breeches, and some blue-black boots. Military men are expected to always wear these in public. Non-military people see these primarily as formalwear. Salmon pink is the color of the nation, alongside gold, and worked into most outfits for its association with vigor, vitality, and perseverance. Pink is also the color of that hastily-shipped undyed white coats would turn to in the blood and muck of battle, which caused a cultural perception of pink coats as patriotic. Yellow coats, the originally planned color, are still worn by a handful of older, high-ranking, veteran, or retired Fiuthnollans, and wearing one without having served in the Aggression is considered stolen valor. Engineers tend to wear patches of pink on their heavy-duty work clothes, Mages make robes in this color, and Clerics tend to wear a visual depiction of a holy symbol in this color, or otherwise wear a cape, belt, or headwear in this color. Carrying a weapon in public is also normal, and most people own a musket or flintlock pistol for hunting, personal defense, or recreational target shooting - black powder and lead bullets are available in abundance. These personal weapons are often accessorized, for practical and aesthetic reasons alike.
Fiuthnollan music tastes are rather evenly divided along branch lines - the Military has adapted their many catchy marching songs, sea shanties, patriotic anthems, and mnemonic tunes into a selection of drinking songs and morale-builders that can be performed well with just voice and maybe something to tap a stick on - the tune "Next Knight Up" derisively follows a lineage of Stormaki knights as they make grand sweeping claims about their upcoming victory only to meet anti-climatic yet entertaining ends. The Engineers started to sing tunes in time with the industrial machines they were overseeing, and eventually wanted to bring the music to others, without having to drag them to factories. Using artisan-built instruments that aim to emulate the sounds of industrial machinery, Fiuthnollan Industrial Music was born - derisively called "metal" abroad, a title that was eagerly appropriated and reclaimed. It is known for its high-impact sound, intensity, and some tracks are known to be quite fast-paced. Mages manipulate illusions of sound to make noises that are either impossible or impractical to produce mundanely, which were used to create the genre known as Arcano, which has a repetitive beat and often a fast pace, and a unique sound overall. And the Clergy have been cultivating an amazing crop of operatic singers and master instrumentalists of all kinds to add sweeping orchestral epic songs to their sermons.
Target shooting is a near-universal activity for the residents of Fiuthnolla - for this purpose, they tend to use muskets, as metal cartridges are saved for war. Army soldiers who wish to go target shooting do use pointed bullets and rifled muskets to best be able to train with a weapon similar to their standard issue combat arm. Fiuthnolla also imports activities from all over the world, including many Halfling board games. Gambling is seen as a waste of time, but sufficiently strategic card games are seen as suitable entertainment. Wargaming has started to become a trend among the military, and books are available to everyone and highly popular - there are many Fiuthnollan authors. There are rare Clockwork Fighting Rings, distinctly illegal and firmly punished, that exist in some locations, normally involving stolen, misappropriated, or salvaged Clockwork Automatons. Rice wine is the most common drink and part of the army rations, but rum is often purchased with wages and is a favorite among the people of Fiuthnolla. Sealord wine and brandy are also frequently used to celebrate among high-ranking officers, and absinthe is reserved for major diplomatic meetings and officer messes involving at least one general.

Information

Type: Nation, Authoritarian, Technocratic, Democratic
Continent: Beacepheron
Population: 4,000,000
Standing: Minor Power, Rising Rapidly
Allies: None
Rivals: The Kingdom of Stormakt
Enemies: The Starflame Kingdom