Eras and magic items / spells...
 

Hmmmmm. Might be the caffeine, but my brain is telling me that it's a little weird that any E1 mage can be forging Black Steel Plate (and any E2 mage, Black Steel Full Plate) without research even in the early era when equipment is generally archaic and even Ulm uses scale mails and iron caps.

Is there a way for items and spells to be restricted through the ages? Might make sense if these were Ulm-only (or required higher Construction research for other nations) in EA.

Re: Eras and magic items / spells...
 

There is no way to do that, other than through the use of national spells, but there are no national magic items.

I'm ok with anybody being able to forge black steel as magic items. What is special about Ulm is that they can make it with their normal blacksmiths, whereas for everyone else it is a magic item requiring earth gems. And even for Ulm it can only be made in middle era, the rest of the time it might as well be magic to them too.

Re: Eras and magic items / spells...
 

It would be nice, and a lot of work, if someone took the time to do mods which redesigned types of equipment/magic into various technology-ages. I'd be happy to act as an advisor on such a project, as I've got a lot of background in archaic arms and armor, along with all the other relatively useless but interesting knowledge in my brain, and could probably put into fairly accurate order-of-invention (or atleast order of cultural symbolism) various historical and mythological innovations.