Before the Industrial Revolution, farming and food production was a major source of employment, but also a factor that limited expansion. Because a large portion of the population had to be dedicated to growing food and transporting it to where it needed to be, those same workers couldn’t be employed in factories and textile mills.

But with the advent of coal and steam-power, and the Industrial Revolution, came the advancement of agricultural technology. The ability to dedicate fewer and fewer workers to growing or transporting food, and better yield for the seeds that were planted, allowed for cities to grow and factories to expand.

Traditional fantasy settings will usually be placed before this change, and their towns, villages, and cities will reflect that status. There will be a great number of farmers and only a handful of craftsmen dedicated to the production of most goods. In a Gunpowder Fantasy, especially those set in the middle and later eras, your characters are going to find fewer and fewer farmers, and more and more unskilled factory laborers.

How you approach this can be an important plot point, or a minor note in your worldbuilding. The improvement of food planting and transportation meant that people in the cities didn’t need to go out and farm their own food, but they still needed to pay for it. Workers that are paid a poor wage for long periods will become hungry and begin demanding better wages and living conditions.

One way to approach this is to introduce unionization to your workforce, which can be a major political aspect if you want it to be. Where in traditional fantasies, Guilds of skilled artisans can hold great power, Unions that represent the common-man can be a part of your Gunpowder Fantasy.

Industrialization and improved transportation methods also means better quality food reaching the populations of your city, which in turn has other effects. Longer life-spans means workers are going to be able to stay on the job longer, learning their trade better but at the same time requiring housing for longer and likely demanding higher wages for their experience.

Families will grow larger as they are able to support more children than they could before.

Agricultural advances will also have an impact on your militaries, which is a topic I’ll be discussing in a later post.

The important thing to remember, as always, is to take the changes of the Industrial Revolution into account when you’re building your world.  And Agriculture especially.