Story Land

The population of Story Land is comprised of the characters of the Earth’s folk-tales, plus some “ordinary folk” who help give the folk-tale characters plenty of other people to interact with and, in general, things to do. The folk-tales of every Earth culture are represented somewhere in Story Land.

The technology of Story Land is about at the level of Europe in the 13th century. This means that just about any weapon – melee or ranged – and armor are available so long as the materials aren’t more advanced than 1299 CE tempered steel, and firearms aren’t available at all. A fay-spell has been placed upon Story Land so that only technology at this level is allowed – even the trains that travel throughout the rest of Fabulorigo cannot enter Story Land. The Fay haven’t done this out of a particular distaste for guns, mind you – they certainly have done nothing to prevent guns from being present in Toy Land or Wonder Land. The working theory – which happens to be correct – is that the Fay are more entertained, if you will, by the drama of pre-firearm combat. Why single out Story Land, then? The Fay simply prefer Story Land over the other three, but none except the Fay know that this is the answer to that question.

The technology level of Story Land allows for various anachronisms. King Arthur, whose exploits are supposed to have taken place around the 6th century in Britain when plate armor and jousts and huge stone fairy-tale palaces actually didn’t exist yet, lives in a huge stone fairy-tale palace and wears plate armor and jousts in Story Land. China’s Yue Fei, however, who led armies in the early 12th century when firearms were just becoming available in China, must do without the fire lances of his day because 12th century Europe didn’t have anything like them yet. So, some folk-characters in Story Land get a technology upgrade, while others get a downgrade, so to speak.

Folk-characters whose popularity arose after the 12th century but before the mid-19th century can often be easily imagined without firearms due to the limitations of guns during this time period (perhaps with the exception of ocean pirates, who really need cannons to be truly threatening, but we digress). But what of post-mid-19th century folk-characters, such as North American cowboys and lawmen, or 20th century space heroes? In theory, nothing prevents them from showing up somewhere in Story Land, though without their signature clothing and weapons. Holmes and Watson, for another example, could live in Story Land, though they may dress quite differently. It may be a moot point, though, as it turns out that if a folk-character is nowhere to be found in Story Land, they probably exist in Wonder Land or as a toy in Toy Land. So, eventually all of the folk-characters get represented somewhere.

There is magic in Story Land, which can do just about anything EXCEPT undo the technology-damping fay-spell. This is in contrast to Gingerbread Land, where only the gingerbread is magical, but the Gingerbread folk don’t even think of it in those terms.

The thing that most people find most interesting about Story Land is that it has scores and scores of heroes and villains. These combatants make it such that nearly all parts of the vast country of Story Land are under some kind of threat at all times. Villains are always thwarted, of course, but sometimes only after a good deal of destruction has taken place. In a way, living in Story Land is rather like living in a low-fantasy RPG game.

Story Land features a giant bay with a huge island in the center of it. It’s called many things by many people, but the European-derived folk-characters call it Avalon. As it turns out, any person who lives in Story Land, if they’re about to be dealt a killing blow, is magically rescued by the Fay of Avalon, who either immediately deliver the hero to someplace safe in Story Land or bring the hero to Avalon to heal before being taken to someplace safe in Story Land. People get hurt in Story Land and, presumably, could die. But, whenever death is immanent, the Fay of Avalon are ever faithful to save the doomed person in just the nick of time and nurse them back to full health, if that’s called for. It’s been observed that the Fay  provide this service not just to native citizens of Story Land, but to visitors as well. It only works, though, for both natives and visitors if the brush with death happens within the borders of Story Land.

Story Land doesn’t have a capital city, but many prominent strongholds, and some of them are on the shore of the bay.

Certainly, a player can play a citizen of Story Land in the Gingerbread Land RPG game, or the entire party can play citizens in/from Story Land, but, in that case, the character building and overall play mechanics would better be based directly upon Fate Core rather than upon the Gingerbread Land rules that we’ve based upon Fate Core.