Peasants

Olympia: The Age of Gods PBEM (Oct 4 2000)

## 7.1: Peasants

        Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
        Where wealth accumulates, and men decay.
        Princes and lords may flourish or may fade,--
        A breath can make them, as a breath has made;
        But a bold peasantry, their country's pride,
        When once destroy'd, can never be supplied.

            The Traveller, Oliver Goldsmith

The basis of all government in Olympia is the peasant. The lowliest of citizens, forced to work long hours tilling barren land, conscripted into battles, driven willy-nilly across the countryside by wild magics, the peasant nonetheless is the basic unit upon which the Olympian society is built. The task of government is to nurture and grow the peasants upon which all else is built.

Each province contains some number of peasants. Provinces with less than 100 peasants are considered wilderness; provinces with 1000 or more peasants are usually cities. Left alone, the peasant population in a province will slowly grow over time. However, peasants are rarely left alone. Monsters prey upon them; nobles recruit them, pillage them, sell them opium -- all which reduce their numbers.

In return for the protection of a local garrison of soldiers, peasants will permit a noble to tax them. But taxing too drives away the peasants, so the wise ruler must seek a balance between growing his peasant population and generating money by taxing them.

- Population Growth
- Taxing
- Pillaging
- Opium