City Musings: Economy

This is a hard question.  What sort of economic foundation should a Sythyry-built city have?

Assume, arguendo, that the city is floating in the air not too far from Vheshrame --- something like a skyboat, and something like a sky-bridge city (like Oorah Thrassen).  So it will have no natural resources whatever.  It may have quasi-natural resources: I could, for example, build rooms in which one could grow crops, with labor.

I could also, in principle, support the whole city myself -- well, for a small city, a village perhaps.  I don't much want to.  A cityful of sycophants and clients and people who live by accepting gifts from me seems a bit off.  Also I would probably have to spend all my mornings doing high-price enchantments -- as it is, I spend half them doing that sort and half doing ones for fun or emergency -- and that would not please me much.

A city of crafters would work fine.  Oorah Thrassen is somewhat like that.  I can't, however, import a pile of master-whittlers or master-clockmakers or something.  I might be able to find one or two masters who want to move to a new Ketherian citylet and start a guild-chapter and craft-lineage there.  It may take decades to get established, and we will need other things in the meantime.... but this seems like a good long-term approach. What crafts, though?  Of course it depends somewhat on what crafters are available, but I could court, oh, a certain glassmaker, or tailor, or this or that.

I'm sure there's a lot I'm not thinking of, too. 

This will be difficult, I suspect.  I have appreciated your thoughts on other topics; I would appreciate them on this one, perhaps even more.  

City Musings: Economy

This is a hard question.  What sort of economic foundation should a Sythyry-built city have?

Assume, arguendo, that the city is floating in the air not too far from Vheshrame --- something like a skyboat, and something like a sky-bridge city (like Oorah Thrassen).  So it will have no natural resources whatever.  It may have quasi-natural resources: I could, for example, build rooms in which one could grow crops, with labor.

I could also, in principle, support the whole city myself -- well, for a small city, a village perhaps.  I don't much want to.  A cityful of sycophants and clients and people who live by accepting gifts from me seems a bit off.  Also I would probably have to spend all my mornings doing high-price enchantments -- as it is, I spend half them doing that sort and half doing ones for fun or emergency -- and that would not please me much.

A city of crafters would work fine.  Oorah Thrassen is somewhat like that.  I can't, however, import a pile of master-whittlers or master-clockmakers or something.  I might be able to find one or two masters who want to move to a new Ketherian citylet and start a guild-chapter and craft-lineage there.  It may take decades to get established, and we will need other things in the meantime.... but this seems like a good long-term approach. What crafts, though?  Of course it depends somewhat on what crafters are available, but I could court, oh, a certain glassmaker, or tailor, or this or that.

I'm sure there's a lot I'm not thinking of, too. 

This will be difficult, I suspect.  I have appreciated your thoughts on other topics; I would appreciate them on this one, perhaps even more.