[@Flagg]

I wanna make a rich, rich, rich, [b]FILTHY RICH[/b] almost-industrial merchant state that characterizes itself by having as its capital one of the biggest, most populated and advanced cities in the setting that owes it's success to being situated on an ancient water purification station or archeotech hydroponics farm or just a tech graveyard. All of their lands are merely adjunctions and branches of the City, which gorges itself on all resources that it can find and all migrants who come there in search of better life and churns out wonders made of sweat, blood and coin and dug-up archeotech. A city that opens it's gates to everyone who comes knocking, because all work is the same, no matter the shape and number of digits on the hands that do this work. A city that allows crime legally - as long as the guilds of murderers, muggers and thieves always leave a recepit at the place of the crime, never take more than what they are allowed to, pay the monthly crime tax and keep the streets safe from anyone who tries to commit crime without being a part of the guild. A city that provides it's citizens with one thing a simple man wants the most - stability, where every new day isn't very different from the last unless you want it to be. A city that rarely wages wars because his banking system makes wars in its vicinity unprofitable - the motto of their armed force is "If you start a war, we will call back the bonds and nullify our contracts. And stop pointing the arquebus that [b]we[/b] made in my direction. And don't tread [b]our[/b] earth with the boots that were sewn by [b]our[/b] cobblers. And don't you owe like ten dollars worth of liquor to the bar where my sister works?"

The master of this city would probably be a powerful spirit that personifies the best and brightest features of commerce and capitalism of the Old World. Or just a simple smart man with a knack for organizing systems who will never be killed or dethroned because living in the City without him would be more trouble than it's worth.

Would that work?