How far should the game go in the type of technology used in Harvesting. How far has science progressed in Terminus?
Maybe while Terminus is a land of magical wonders, I imagine that purely scientific advances are probably something that would be more likley played with in a local workshop, instead of being widespread.
I think you might see a lot of folks instictively recoil at the idea of technology in any form in a fantasy MMO. Maybe there is a fear that a line will be crossed and it'll become some kind of steam-punk fantasy world instead of the high fantasy everyone is rooting for.
That said, I have no problem with that. EQ and EQ2, gnomes made liberal use of steam powered machines and technology in their own right. If it's kept isolated like that, people seem to not mind so much. It's when there is technology strewn about all of Terminus that I think jimmies might be rustled. But really, if we hypothesize that the laws of physics in the real world are similar to those within Terminus, and depending on the timeline of this world, it would only make sense that some of those scientific discoveries have been made when it comes to improving the quality of life for the population. I mean, if you're gonna have a gnome with all that intelligence, surely he knows how to operate an internal combustion engine, right?!
But the argument could also be made that, given the differences of the real world and the world of Terminus, science took a back seat to Magical research. Except by gnomes. Because gnomes.
-Tralyan