“By harnessing the electrical current generated by the cheek-based spark pads, it is possible to create a temporary but effective charging system utilizing these coils of copper wire surrounding a steel coil - we can further improve this by smoothing out the natural variances in voltage and amperage through using electrolytic canisters and carbon resistance tracks. While hardly useful near Canal City, it is could allow for use of some vehicles deep within the underground when access to the grid isn’t available…” -Professor Shen Virtanen, Canal City University
The general level of understanding of the world lives between several eras. The original pokemorphs of legend did what they could to bring with them knowledge of the lost world in order to better prepare their decendants for a world of limited space and resources, but that information was brought using ancient human data-storage and retreival artifacts that have long since been lost to time. While they were operational however, information was transcribed into book forms, and both literacy and books themselves have been entrenched within the setting below. As centuries have passed, some scientific knowledge was continually used, and some simply relegated to the dust bins of ancient Noble vaults if not lost completely. As such, the world can seem both surprisingly anachronistic while also having modern touches - what was deemed useful was spread, what was interesting remains available and that which carried with it great risks was squirreled away in case it was ever needed.
Due to this, the general ‘feel’ of a large settlement is mostly determined by what they found useful at the time, then built from there. Smaller settlements have a fairly steep drop off in the level of technology they employ - due to both the cost of maintenance and the dedicated resources and supply chains involved.
Animal husbandry does exist in the underground, specifically for feral pokemon allowing some to be used as livestock or labour sources, although no purely ‘domesticated’ breeds exist and keeping feral pokemon around can get very exciting if they are mistreated or decide they are done.
The underground treats a lot of technology as a gift from the ancient ancesters, and as such care and gilding is often used when built. If you need some good examples of the level of decoration involved, a victorian-era steam punk design (only with electricity and cables instead of steam and brass) is a good inspiration to start with.
Some specific examples are listed below, but details for the three major cities can be found in their specific information files.
Energy and Power #
Electricity is a fundamentally known force, especially amongst ELECTRIC types. As the key motive force in generating electricity is still magnetic fields and rotational movement, electrical infratstructure is probably the most wide spread technological infrastructure in the underground. Canal City, the original settlement, has hydro-electric generation from the dam that created resevoir lake, carefully maintained and controlled by the noble houses for the city - despite the city having far outgrown the original capacity of this system. Basalt City takes advantage of incredibly heat resistant water pipes to directly heat water with their magma rivers into steam to run their geothermal power plants. The generational capacity of Basalt City has made them a central power plant for several of the smaller nearby settlements as well as selling power to Canal City. Scrap Town has the most unique situation, as they simply have massive substation panels within various parts of the city, all connected to some ancient artifact that has yet to be found - although those that have tried all fell deathly ill before they could figure out the source of the power.
Smaller towns tend to get by with what they have available. Those created as an offshoot from a larger settlement generally will pay for a mains cable to be routed to a central “Power Hub” to charge electric devices as well as provide a place to do more power inensive tasks in the case of crafting or metallurgy. Independent towns may take advantage of an undergound river and a water wheel in a smaller scale version of what Canal City has to get some renewable power. If all else fails, Electric Types themselves can provide a small amount of power, although the exhaustion that it can cause tends to leave that to a last resort.
In places where electricity isn’t available, the fallback is just to utilize pure mechanical power from waterwheels or treadmills. In some cases, coal and steam engines still find their way - although the size of the caves and the buildup of toxic smoke and pollution make these either temporary or emergency at best, and as the air flows through the underground generally such installations are frowned upon without a way to manage the pollution.
Battery technology is available, with battery life expectancy rated in years and the equivelent density to a LiPO battery, although using using different chemestry. The creation of these energy cells is a Canal City secret, although it is not unheard of that some artifacts can contain even more efficient energy cells inside of them if carefully removed at some risk.
Transportation #
Pokemorphs are a fairly active lot, and as such, walking is the primary mode of transportation. In larger caves, Fly becomes useful to know and FLYING types can let loose. Through major canals and underwater rivers, WATER types can simply swim to their destination, moving at incredible speeds with Surf if they know it. But not all caves are conducive to specialist travel and some distances can be quite long, so there are quite a few other modes of transportation available.
Due to the nature of the cave network, a lot of transportation is incredibly limited either to already established cities, or through routes that have been carefully dug out and graded. There are few modes of transportation that can handle the extreme environments of a raw cave passageway - especially as it can even deny larger pokemorphs even being able to fit!
Personal Travel #
The most popular form of transportation is the electric moped. A simple two-wheeled vehicle running on air-inflated tires made out of a specific rubbery mushroom variant, mopods can carry one and up to two average sized pokemorphs for several days worth of travel on a single charge. The second seat can be replaced with a small cargo platform to haul goods to and fro as well. These are located all over and made by multiple craftsman, with the motors and batteries available through Canal City Merchants for others to put their own spin on the design.
The electric quad is the larger cousin of the moped, and they are not used within the large cities, but rather for along the outskirt of larger caves or along routes that have already been graded and cleaned. Running on four wheels gives them a bit more stability and the larger frame and motor allows them to also utilize a trailer - a common use for these is for moving goods between established locations where the surroundings allow.
For nobility there are also fully enclosed vehicles - although these longer four-wheeled carriages are the exclusive use of the Nobility and not only have climate control systems but carry some of the luxury demanded by nobles where ever they go, while keeping them isolated from those beneath them.
In places without access to charging or unable to pay the price for motorized vehicles, the trusty bicycle is still alive and well, as well as tuk tuks (tricycles designed explicitly for carrying passengers).
Canal City makes extensive use of gondolas and small barges for moving people and goods, but they’re quite the exception as most underground rivers are not as calm as the canals.
Long Range Travel #
Mostly limited to Canal City and Basalt City, when walking distance can reach into days, additional transpotation infrastructure is needed for people and goods to make their way around. Electric Rail is the most common solution, sitting somewhere between light rail and freight rail in width, and utilizing specific cars based on the intended purpose. Electric Rail is incredibly fancy and used both for its utility and as show of wealth - since only the largest and wealthiest of cities would need to cover such distances regularly.
Hanging monorails are used for major trade routes between cities, as it keeps the floor clear and the vehicles away from non-flying feral pokemon. The only line of this kind that’s well-known is the line from Canal City to Basalt City, operated as a joint venture between noble families in each city.
Communications #
Radio communication runs into a signficiant issue in the underground due to the density and composition of the strata. While the equivelent of FM radio is used in cities for news and entertainment, the reliability of radio communications at range limits it for actual critical communication capacity. Additionally, the infrastructure to run anything more complex then telegraph along train lines has been lost to the pages of history. The one exception to this is a repeater system that has been set up between Canal City and Basalt City - there are stations that are shared between the two.
For the most part, letters and newspapers are the main way to communicate with others. The mail system has formed as an independant guild on it’s own, and is one of the few groups that have access to nobility on the regular: delivering letters, packages, and newspapers to whomever requests it for a nominal fee. It is supported by all three major cities and as such, they are some of the most well-protected groups. They are incredibly neutral in all things, and to be a part of the mail guild is to remain apart from all other things. They also run newspapers between cities on request.
Mail carriers are not to be messed with, as the security force from all cities, big and small, carry a steep punishment. Mail carriers also cannot be playable characters - they’re just too apart from everything that happens.
There’s also one more wrinkle to Communications that has reduced the technological need, and that is PSYCHIC types. Between their natural telepathic abilities and the boost from PSYCHIC they are able to function as communication hubs in their own right, and as long as they’ve had a chance to ‘imprint’ on another psychic type, can also communicate across long ranges. Having a PSYCHIC type in an exploration group or along with a caraval is the equivelent to being added to a mobile, local area chatroom.
Scrap Town does it’s own thing, as their city came with a full telecommunications suite, although time has worn it down and some floors within their buildings have lost the infrastructure to support it. They have both audio and video phones, and happily enough, the phones themselves have a label for their number allowing for those high enough in society to reach out with a known list as needed. The leaders of the gangs can even get their hands on portable phones that will work within Scrap Town’s influence, although they are still limited like other radios for range and cease to function at all past the outer cave that contains the city.
In reality, Scrap Town isn’t the only place with advanced information infrastructure - it’s just the main place an average person might run into it. Canal City has a complete intranet infrastucture throughout the noble and upper distracts, although it is used primarily for handling information storage and retrieval, remote monitoring of some of the city’s infrastructure, and a method for Nobility to ‘be in the know’ without ever leaving their villas. Access to this is strictly controlled.
Entertainment #
One of the most popular forms of entertainment is the live show. These can be anything from traveling story teller troops with a small band to back them up, to a dedicated musical group that plays songs on a variety of instruments either in public or at a venue. Stage plays, especially those talking about the legendary first pokemorphs or famous individuals being shown in a heroic light are always crowd pleasers. In addition to live shows, readings, sports competitions, and board games are also quite popular within the underground. Simple, physical games such as tiddleywinks, ring toss, and u-shows (derived from horseshoes) are taught at an early age. Games of fantasy set in mysterical, heroic times bridge the gap between group story telling and games of chance.
For nobility, games on tactics and strategy are also common, ranging from Checkers and Chess to full on hex-grid war games.
Gambling is also a form of entertainment, although games of chance with a bet are frowned on in Canal City. There’s Basalt City for that.
Weapons and Armor #
For the majority of the population of the underground, nothing can quite beat having a knife and a dagger on them at all times. Melee weapons tend to rule the day given the twisty nature of cave passages, with short swords reserved for those trained to handle them in close quarters. As most pokemorphs have their own built-in methods of both giving and resisting damage, there hasn’t been much in terms of advancement in every day carry beyond what can be used without hindering those natural abilities. ELECTRIC types, as an example, tend to favor metallic weapons that can be used as conductors while FIRE types prefer weapons that withstand their high thermal output. In fact, some of the most popular forms of weapon mastery is simply “Martial Arts” done “open hand” - FIGHTING types have a natural knack for this, but anyone can learn to move their body in a way conducive to survival.
Nobility often engage in structured duals, and as such, can have training in a number of different sword styles, although fencing and longsword are the two most popular. Nobles also tend to be the most well trained in terms of personal martial arts in general, as part of their noble curriculum.
Armor is generally consisted of chainmail or plate artfully worked into clothes to provide protection without sacrificing style. Laminated Plates and high tensile-strength materails fill out the armor, although generally armor follows more of a “rule of cool” then practical niche for most pokemorphs. As simple as this sounds, armor is effective against most forms of non-special attacks, providing either a limit to internal injury or preventing worse case injuries.
It’s hard to really quantify how armor works without a full combat system involved. A good rule of thumb is the following: It reduces the effectiveness of physical attacks by 10-15 HP, and reduces the physical harm based on the armor (e.g.: A slice or cut becomes a bruise or a welt when chainmail is in the way, and a peircing hit can likewise be turned into a knock-back with plate). Armor doesn’t work against Special Attacks in general, but really, armor provides a “Rule of Cool” to last a little bit longer then someone without it.
Now, that isn’t to say there isn’t other weapons available, only that they are not commonly used for one reason or the other. The underground has semi-automatic pistols, bolt action rifles, shotguns and others weapons common in the 1910s here and there, but the fact that so much of the possible combat will be in exceedingly short range has just made them something only used for large-cavern open combat - and the one time they were used the results were so devestating that even the nobility frowns upon using those particular tools of mass-harm within city limits. Ammunition is stricly controlled, and explosively are mostly constrained to assisting with expanding tunnels and caverns.
Checmical Warfare is considered dishonorable, although assasinations through poison still occur despite this.
Medicine and Treament #
Medical attention in the undergound is actually quite advanced, given the number of healing moves available to pokemorphs and a library of care information available. Heavy internal injuries can be treated in hospices by trained medical staff, and the care available at even small towns is enough to keep permanent disability at bay assuming it can be treated quickly enough. Medicines for common colds and flus are available as concentrations of natural apothecary summplements from well-known underground flora.
Canal City and Scrap Town both also have access to very expensive medicines that were formulated before the arrival of the pokemorphs, including Potions, Cures, and Revives that are frighteningly effective. Due to this, they can command a very high price. These kinds of medicines are generally only available to the upper echolons of the cities, or through The Guild, which acts as the only licensed distribution point - and generally only for their members heading into Mystery Dungeons for artifact retrieval.