Per capita GDP in Daventry, aka Petra strikes again

[Petra Rocks]

I was rereading the life expectancy in Daventry thread, and of course most of the talk came back to standard of living.  It struck me that the way to determine that was to see the amount of goods in the houses you go in.  I've been in a number of reproductions of houses in the 17thc, 18thc and the 1870's, and the difference is remarkable.  The poor woodcutter in KQ1 (recall I've played only remakes) looks very much like the earlier, poorer periods.  The castle is more ambitious but it's elite.  Ditto Dracula's place.  The multi-room structures in the town in KQII+ look more like 18thc or later buildings.  So my question to you all is, are  do most other houses you enter in quests looks sparsly furnished with one or two rooms, or are there non-elite houses with multiple rooms and finishings?

 You may now return to your regularly scheduled oddness. 

[Baggins]

Well homes in Tamir range from 1800 style fishing shanty up to victorian style mansion.

Though the Ogre Family has a stone house with a straw roof, and more modest furnishings.

The antique shop, and home of the old lady in Kolyma actually looks fairly modern compared to other KQ standards even showing alot of glass, it even looks as if she might have an electric lamp, and even a old fashioned steam heater grill;



As for the official Dracula's Castle;



The Monastery of the Blessed Wilbury(where Graham and Valanice were married) has the spanish mission look to it;

[Yonkey]

If a room was cluttered with furniture, it wouldn't be very accessible.

[Baggins]

In the swamp near Daventry were rather poor swamp shacks made of boards and thatched roofs;


Connor's house is representive of architecture seen in his village;

As does Sarah's and the Simm's houses;





Most of the houses in Connor's village are small 1-2 room buildings, sparsely furnished. If you are interested I have made very thorough descriptions in the Omnipedia of every building in Connor's Village and that section of Daventry, as well as screenshots of their outsides.

Houses in Ooga Booga also seem to show victorian style architecture.

However houses in Falderal tend to go more towards french baroque period, though whimsical and exaggerated.

[Petra Rocks]

  Woot!  Thanks for bringing up those screenshots, you are really too kind. 

 Unfortunatly, I can't tell much from the outside.    1-2 rooms indicates poverty on part of the owner of course, though the furnishings (eg presance of carpet, lighting,writing materials etc) say much more than a simple room number.  After all apartments now don't have much more than that.    Glass is normally not something you would see until first industrial revolution tech levels or later, but I can't tell if those windoes actually have glass in them. 

 From the inside of old ladies house I would be inclined to say they are quite rich.  Unless the dirt is dyed blue  she has carpet all over the floor, not somthing you would see in the dark ages.  Ditto paintings on the walls, I am pretty sure your average serf wouldn't have that. The fancy light fixtures (a lot more fancy than a pine knot, even if they are not electric) and the glass clinch the matter. If a poor old lady has this, then by one means or another living standards seem to be pretty high.   

  Thanks, Baggins you've been most helpful yet again. 

[Baggins]

Well certainly the living standards in Kolyma seem to be a alot higher than in Daventry.

While we can't see into the rest of the Old Lady's Antique Shop, we at least know she must be doing well based on all the stuff she has for sale and furniture in the front room. The building obviously has glass based on the fact that their is a sign in the front window resting against the glass .

Even Grandma's house seems to have late 19th, early 20th century furnishings.

But ya as I mentioned its hard to get screenshots of the inside of houses in MOE without actually taking several shots by facing in different directions. However, I have thorough descriptions for them in the Omnipedia. But I'd rather not directly quote from the articles in this thread... They are rather long.

But you can find the articles here.

Essentially most of the houses in Connor's village are 1-2 rooms, have a bed or two, one table, maybe some chairs and a fireplace. Not much else. They are rather spartan, and the middle ages look to them(no apparent technology).

Granted we know that people in Daventry have mastered at least the water pump as far as technology goes. As well as grinding mill, and water wheel.



Woodcutter has one outside his house, and Connor finds one in the Swamp. Also depending on which version of King's Quest 1 you play, you can also see a kitchen sink in Woodcutter's home. There is also a fountain in Connor's Village that sprays out water.

Granted the lack of technology in Daventry is actually somewhat by choice, as people of Daventry have a fear of science and technology. Seeing as it as antithesis to magic and the natural world, and what drove them out of their original world in the first place. They despise machinery for the most part seeing it as a form of evil.

I hope to add more shots of the insides of houses and buildings from KQ games to the omnipedia at some point. But at alas my college semester has started...

[Petra Rocks]

  Please don't feel obliged to chase things down for me, I don't want to run you ragged on what is after all just an idle curiosity on my part.  I'd much rather you stayed well rested and on top of things than get worn down for my sake. 

  It is interesting though.  I wonder if Daventry changes much in material wealth over area.  Like the Marsh Arabs near Baghdad in 1970's Iraq.  If Kolyma is really a lot richer than Daventry you would have expected it to conquer Daventry, though one might argue that is what the magic treasures are for. 

[Baggins]

Well Kolyma exists on another continent;




Most citizens actually live on east side of the mountains, a place that cannot be visited during the game. We don't actually know how the people in that half of the continent live though.

Western Kolyma is actually quite a bit more remote than eastern Kolyma apparently, few people live there. Especially since the undead exist in that part of Kolyma. The only way to travel between the two sections of the continent is with use of the right key in the magical doorway.

Though Old Lady apparently still gets customers from somewhere.

Luckily the undead can't escape that part of kolyma as the high mountains to the east, and the ocean(ruled by Neptune) to the west, and the Magical Law of "Containment" keep them contained.

As for Daventry it might be important to point out that standard currency in Daventry is gold coins(likely thanks to the Chest of Gold). Though they do have a copper coin as well (at least one version imprinted with the face of Valanice and one with Graham's face, or both).

Gold is apparently rare in other nations though, it would seem that Daventry may hold a monopoly on the precious metal. As King's Quest companion repeatedly points out that Castle Daventry has never had much of a need for money, because of the chest, and they can fund anything that is important.

Though as is pointed out in See No Weevil they don't like tossing the money around too much. As the the castle Seneschal Oswald complains when Rosella hires merchants, and carpenters outside of the castle to supply the food, drink, and entertainment and to clean up the festival  and to clean up the festival grounds for the Harvest Festival.

Its something that apparently costs far more than just using the castle musicians and staff. The Castle wouldn't normally hire outside of the already payed staff.

[Petra Rocks]

 That's why I hoped to see the level of prosperity by the amount of consumer goods in the houses.  If the means of production are magical,  we may not be able to see them but they should still make the people healthy, wealthy and wise, so to speak.    Gristmills of one sort or another are as old as farming (though the oldest are just a couple of rocks), and coins were invented in Lydia when Hector was a pup, so to speak.  Waterwheels came later though.


 And cross-continental invasion is not impossible with low techs levels.  Just ask anyone from Carthage or the nearest Aztec.     Of course if Neptune rules the ocean and Neptune is a pacifist that pretty much kills that idea. 

[Baggins]

Yes a grinding meal is old technology. The kind used in daventry is the sort with a water wheel turning two stone wheels. That kind itself has been used for a long time.



I didn't say it was impossible just that we don't know how manhy people actually live in Kolyma. Any invasion would have to come from eastern Kolyma, if an invasion was to occur. We certainly don't know how many live there.

There are not enough people in western Kolyma to take over a nation as large as Daventry. Just a few monks, an old lady, Grandma, big bad wolf, Little Red riding hood, Hagatha, a Dwarf, and who knows how many undead... But certainly not enough to make invasion plans. Especially with Neptune preventing the vampires by leaving by sea.

Daventry is also protected by invasions by use of its Magic Shield. As long as the enemy isn't some kind of magical creature such as a three-headed dragon, or magical tempests turning everyone to stone, or powerful wizards like Mordack, or Telgrin.

Any nations that would try to attempt to take over Daventry would have to go through the local countries around the nation first. Consequently the other nations put up walls around Daventry when the dragon reached it, so that it wouldn't leave the country and damage their lands further.

Daventry in all of the games other than MOE, is shown to be in a valley in mountainous region towards the middle of the continent. So it's location is actually kind of remote, except to other countries nearby it, living in similar circumstances.

Apparently for Daventry to even reach its fleet it would have to travel through other nations, though perhaps it can access the sea by river.

In MOE somehow Castle Daventry arose on top of a mountain, and half the continent is shaved off placing it closer to western sea. But as Derek Karlavaegen explains things, the world is always reinventing itself and is in some kind of magical flux. The strange changes could be other changes caused by the catclysm but who knows.

[Petra Rocks]

If that part of the country is sparsly populated that would do it.  This is getting a little beside the point anyway.   

 Water wheels are as old as farming, but were not used much until the Middle Ages IIRC.  They are still used now, though not that little wooden kind.    Again, from what I have seen I would be thinking that these people have a reasonably high living standard, though the descriptions of Connor's village has me rethinking that.  Some kind of Marsh Arab or colonial situation would be the things that springs to mind at first, unless that old lady was secretly a noblewoman or something. Either that or Kolyma's magic makes people richer than those in Daventry's somehow.

  And as an aside, if poor Roberta could see us now she would probably be stunned you could read so much into her writings.     Either that or thinking I should get a life. 

[Baggins]

The way of living in Connor's Village, which is a small farming community apparently outside of Daventry proper, is comparable to life in Village/Town of Daventry.

The town of Daventry as mentioned in King's Quest Novels,  is the town nearest to Castle Daventry, and Daventry's largest population center. It has purely medieval way of life.

So Connor's Village appears represent standard living of people in the kingdom.

Life in the Castle Daventry  isn't much different, of course. As it is a fairly drafty castle, though they do live better than most people in town.

[Petra Rocks]

I see.  I wonder why it would be so differant in Kolyma?  If its location remote maybe trade is limited, like the 18thc highlands or something.   Anyway that does seem to put Daventry in the pre-industrial area.  Which also says it's life-expectancy pretty well.   

[Baggins]

Graham was considered an old man at age 42 in King's Quest 4, .

[Petra Rocks]

That would certainly indicate a low level of effective medical technology. In Afghanistan for example life expectancy is 43, in Botswana 33, and in Canada 80.  So an old man at 42 probably indicates something closer to the first two nations than the last. 

[Baggins]

He may actually be living on borrowed time at this point, thanks to the magic fruit... The intent for him in MOE was that he was absolutely aged (unspecified amount of time has passed since KQ7, at least a decade), thus the reason why he had white hair in that game. Aged almost to end of his life, but not dead yet.

[Petra Rocks]

 So Daventry may look a lot like Botswana eh?  Either that or all that walking out into the unknown without anything is catching up with him. 

[Baggins]

Hah Hah.

Granted we also have to figure in the fact that loss of his son, near loss of his daughter, and the shock of his returning children further weakened his already deteriorating heart, .

[Yonkey]

Actually, it wasn't the magic fruit, nor Rosella which defined Graham's fate.  If he had not suffered the heart attack at the beginning of KQ4, Rosella would not have ventured on her perils to begin with (nor would she have to deal with Lolotte ).  But the question is, why would Roberta start KQ4 off with a heart attack?  You could ask Roberta, but chances are, you won't get an answer.

Anyway, this magic fruit not only saved Graham from death, it made him strong enough to become our lead in Shadows.

[Baggins]

But the question is, why would Roberta start KQ4 off with a heart attack?

Well Roberta once answered that question, I think the anecdote is in the Roberta William's Collection. She said she wanted KQ4 to start off with something darker than previous games. Something tragic, that would pull on people's emotions.

She showed the intro movie to a crowd at what the equivalent to E3 at the time and it worked. The journalists cried.

The reason how he had got a heart attack is explained in the King's Quest companion, and in the intro. A little of old age, and a little of hardship of as he believed he had lost all of his heirs, and the shock of getting them back. Plus some guilt from having to take his daughter to the dragon.

If Alexander has not shown up to save Rosella, its possible Graham might have had the heart attack anyways and he would have had no one to save him.