Free City of Terrikton

The Free City of Terrikton is a city state governed by a nine member council known as the Directorate. The Directorate is comprised of the leaders of the eight major design conglomerates which dominate the city. These eight serve as the primary executive, legislative, and judicial power of Terrikton, alongside the ninth, the Chief Aeronaut- the leader of Terrikton's military, elected by a vote of all citizens of Terrikton, and a holding a permanent (though generally unoccupied) seat as co-presiding officer. The other eight rotate through co-presiding officership on a weekly basis in order of seniority, and while each of their design companies specialize in a different industry or product (typically regarded as airships, gliders, gyrothopters, dirigibles, runestone, black powder, artifice trinkets, or specialty enchantments, respectively) each conglomerate competes with the others beyond its niche and are broadly alike in structure, although the directors of the various conglomerates traditionally hold a predictable set of general values and outlook according to their side's interests.

Terrikton's founding ideal is to offer gnomes worldwide a safe haven in the event of a crisis, and views itself as the effective protector of gnomes worldwide. Seconarily, it acts to preserve the Concord and status quo peace, but generally only insofar as any threat to peace threatens gnome's interests.    Given Terrikton's mentality that it must always offer a safe haven for the world's gnome, Terrikton acts exceptionally cautiously, and treats its own defense as imperative. While others might be satisfied by the virtual impregnability of Terrik's Rock, or take comfort in their virtual monopoly on air power, Terrikton is never satisfied, and maintains a large enough fleet of airships on the island at all times to repel an attack by the next three greatest air-fleets combined. Moreover, because the state's assets and the assets of the trade and design conglomerates are inexorably interlinked, the Directorate of Terrikton is exceptionally reluctant to engage in any course of action that could disrupt the flow of trade, threaten their precious ships, or which risks a backlash against gnomes abroad. While to some, the relatively slow response of Terrikton to global crises appears to be apathy or bureaucratic dilly-dallying, the gnomes of Terrikton are rarely apathetic to global plights, but act in measured consideration and wisely husband their thinly stretched resources.    Terrikton's official domestic agenda tends to be one of the passive referee, and aside from stepping in where one design conglomerate's acts of espionage go too far, where a research accident, testing error, or design flaw injures citizens, or finally where a dispute between the conglomerates threatens to spiral out of control and throw the city into tension, the directorate mediates. Aside from these measures however, the Directorate promises little else for the citizens of Terrikton besides security and the basic freedoms laid out in the Concordance, leaving the management of their day-to-day affairs to their respective conglomerates and community organizations, and again stepping in when disputes threaten to grow out of hand.

Terrikton draws its influence from two chief assets, its air fleet and its control over the valuable Runestone mines of Terrik's Rock. The most obvious as apparent of these assets is certainly Terrikton's impressive air fleet, boasting the largest in the world with a dizzying array of ship designs, each serving different functions. First among these are the those assets held explicitly in control of the standing military as part of the city's Aeronautical Corps.    The largest of these military airships are the huge dirigible airships known as "Dreadnoughts." These well-armored intercontinental war-balloons bristle with weaponry capable of blowing threats out of the skies or bombarding targets below, including magical weapons, huge and repeating ballistae, various bomblets, and even the occasional black powder cannons, all in addition to being capable of launching their own squadron of gyrothopter flighter-bombers, war-gliders, or even disgorging the onboard security detachment of grenadiers, musketeers, and crossbowmen in an offensive or defensive role. While these Dreadnoughts are few in number, they are the true "capital ships" of Terrikton's military and serve as the chief tool of Terrikton's expeditionary power abroad. Beyond the famed dreadnoughts, Terrikton's military still boasts a formidable array of airships. These include smaller variants of war-balloons, the more maneuverable and versatile sky-frigates, corvettes, and skiffs, as well as Gyrothopters (including fighters, bombers, and reconnaissance flyers) and war-gliders, though the vast multitude of Terrikton's military airships are dedicated exclusively towards (and often only capable of) local defense of greater Terrikton. Terrikton keeps its aeronautical corps up-to-date with all the cutting edge variants of its airships and maintains high readiness, and places its primacy in this field its its chief strategic interest and asset.    As a result of its emphasis on airpower, and perhaps also correlating to the gnomes diminutive stature, Terrikton's conventional land and naval forces are neglected though professional. Terrikton's navy is especially small (consisting of only a few search and rescue vessels and trade ships), finding that almost any task the gnomes could want naval power for could be accomplished just as readily in the air. In contrast, Terrikton's army, while small, is considered more than capable enough for its strategic goals. Most of the military is oriented around strictly defensive operations given the natural fortifications of Terrikton itself and its outlying dependencies,  and are well-suited to the task. For local defense purposes, Terrikton's ground forces rely upon a mix of experimental and irregular troops (such as Black Powder Musketeers or Alchemists' Fire Grenadiers), as well as more common but still devastatingly effective crossbow militias, assuming the mix of the withering fire from these forces and attacks from the air can see off any threat before it overcomes the natural and artificial defenses and reaches these defenders- a strategy which has never failed when properly employed. Beyond these defensive and ad-hoc forces, Terrikton's army also boasts an especially small (though widely considered elite) standing expeditionary force which accompanies air fleets and gives Terrikton at least moderate power to act on behalf of its interests abroad.    Beyond the official power of the Aeronautical Corps, Terrikton can also rely upon the collective assets of the various airship design conglomerates which make up the Directorate, all of which can be nationalized in times of crisis, and which all ostensibly belong to the broader populace of Terrikton. These assets include not only the ships and personnel of these companies (not something to be overlooked, given that each possesses its own air fleet often consisting of dozens if not hundreds of vessels including the huge intercontinental trading airships and small armies of security forces, crews, and officers and bureaucrats), but also the facilities they operate such as the critical repair, refit, and construction yards, and the goods they possess. Although rare, the Directorate can take control of any of these assets and guide their usage towards the public good by executive action.    Beyond its wider air fleet, Terrikton's equally important (but oft overlooked) strategic asset is its substantial supply of Runestone, mined deep in the rock beneath the city. Crucial to the production of certain magic items and greatly enhancing and facilitating magical enchantments, Runestone is an invaluable strategic resource. Terrikton's supply is highly coveted (perhaps part of why Terrikton has an almost paranoid fixation on its defense), and widely exported around the known world, and it is upon this trade that Terrikton has built a large part of its wealth. Even where Runestone is not directly exported, its is widely utilized in various products, and are also one of the unique specialities and most prevalent exports of Terrikton. This trade has created a substantial reserve of wealth for Terrikton, and while it is generally held in reserve, it gives the government a budget more than robust enough to accomplish anything it commits itself to.    Finally, Terrikton benefits from a variety of natural assets as a result of its geography. Most apparent among these is the relative security typically afforded to the various settlements both on Terrik's Rock itself and off-rock by the gnome's proclivity for dwelling high up on unassailable sea-stacks, and while this generally precludes traditional agriculture, the waters around Terrikton and Terrikton's respectable conventional fishing fleet (and its sizable fishing air-fleet) mean Terrikton never wants for food. This includes a different kinds of of kelp, sea grass, and seaweed, as well as an assortment of marine invertebrates and shellfish, and a broad diversity of fish, which are all supplemented by Terrikton's small (though not insubstantial) fungi farms and more conventional orchards and small plot farms which produce various root vegetables, herbs, and greens, as well as occasional fruits like citrus, olives, figs, pomegranates and dates.