Nova Europa is a world that very much mirrors our own Europe circa 1890-1915. A small, densely populated continent full of petty, warring nations, each devoted to their own idiosyncratic traditions. It is a world where steam engines, gunpowder and the internal combustion engine have taken off as emergent technologies, leading to a technological dystopia of brass-banded war zeppelins, giant, one-wheeled velocipedes and massive, armored land fortresses. But in the deep and forgotten places of the world, ancient magicks, tribal shamanism and spirits of nature have awakened and seek to reclaim the world that they long ago lost to man's ingenuity. Though it is a losing battle for them, it is not uncommon to meet a fey and desperate invoker at the local pub.
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Roughly equivalent to Great Britain, Hartannia is an island nation of rolling hills, and picturesque woods abutting vast cities of technological import, the smoke from whose factories has shrouded the island in a dark, perpetual haze. Believing themselves to be the most civilized and pragmatic of all Nova Europa, Hartannia has stayed out of the many conflicts on the continent, preferring to trade alternately with each of the beleaguered nations. Queen Phyllydia III and the Industrial Parliament rule with staid
More or less the France of game, Jehanne'Amer is a cosmopolitan republic of aesthetically pleasing cities filled with wide boulevards, salons, museums and public monuments. Concerned above all else with the pursuit of beauty, art and the frivolous indulgence of idle pleasures, Jehanne'Amer is still not a stranger to military tradition—being led, in times of war, by the charismatic dictator, Baulearon of Tuallaire. Having eschewed their noble class for a body politic of representative electors, they believe in fraternity and equality almost as much as interior decorating. In winning this war, they will bring democracy to the hoi polloi of Nova Europa...that is, if they can get Baulearon to relinquish control.
A land of ancient, traditions, overstuffed with inbred nobility and oozing social breakdown, the VC Empire is not unlike Austria-Hungary. With a thousand knightly orders serving hundreds of petty despots and minor lordlings, all related in some way or another to theImperial Ruling Family and their current patriarch, Leopold von Cherbourg, the VC Empire has been in decay and decline for centuries, collapsing under the weight of its own restrictive and archaic traditions. This war marks their last chance for renewed glory and Europan domination.
Italian in flavor, the BR States are a loose confederation of flamboyant city-states held together by a baroque council of Cardinals, still clinging to the Old Church, which stresses ritual, prayer and obedience. While most of the other nations of Nova Europa have rebelled against their once great religion, forming splinter sects or abandoning it altogether, the Brava Rostulo states remain fervent in their commitment to the true gods and their avatar on earth. By winning this war, the BR states hope to fling wide the doors of the church once again and let every wayward soul of every nation back into the fold.
A long way from its romantic past, the Reikblitz Protectorate (the pre-Weimar Prussia of our world), is a nation ready for all out war and conquest. Every bit as technologically savvy as Hartannia, the Reikblitz long ago abandoned petty morality in favor of the supremacy of their armed might. Led by the Adamant Chancellor, Siegfried von Totemkopf, more automaton than man after his various implants and enhancements, the Reikblitz seeks to bring all of Nova Europa under their steel-toed boots and create a world of machine powered cruelty and absolute loyalty.