Medieval Stasis

Medieval Stasis describes the state of essentially all fantasy worlds that are not steampunk. As the title implies, most fantasy worlds are stuck at a technological level roughly equivalent to most of Europe in the year 1000.

On the one hand, it would superficially appear that most of Europe was stuck in a developmental rut between the fall of the Roman Empire and the start of the early modern era in the 1400s, wherein the creation of centralized nation-states and the end of feudalism (eventually) led to a blossoming of science. However, even throughout the medieval era of Europe, advancements were being made: the rise of windmills, improvement in construction and architecture (particularly noticeable in Cathedrals), the creation of plate armour, and the development of the very first guns. Although the overall effect on the common man from generation from generation were not noticeable, gradual refinements in tools and methods gradually accumulated as the centuries went by, eventually making future refinements possible. Hell, they rediscovered the lost technology that was concrete eventually.

However, most fantasy writers ignore this fact and keep their lands at a developmental level equivalent to Europe in the middle of the medieval ages, around the year 1000, until the universe collapses. A knight's ancestors five thousand years ago fought against Orcs on the back of a great warhorse, wielding sword and lance, wearing plate and a greathelm, just as he does at present. At best, some groups in the universe may be more advanced than others (some peoples might be building castles and forging plate armor while others live as primitive cave men armed with flint axes and stone tipped spears), but nobody will be developing new technology.

Even if an author claims that magic makes technological development unnecessary, it still often makes no sense as to why society decided to stop its progress so firmly in medieval times, as opposed to any other particular period of history, like the Roman empire or ancient Egypt (which was a remarkably conservative society, changing very little between 2000 BCE and 0 BCE and only adopting new technology when someone conquered them with it).

But hey, at least we get dudes with pauldrons.

Notable Examples of Medieval Stasis

• Lord of the Rings: Tolkien was a naturalist that wasn't too fond of industrialization, so the heroes of his stories preferred Medieval Stasis as well. Of course, unlike most of the writers that he inspired, Tolkien had five hundred pages of background explaining why (namely because Middle-Earth was in a state of decline due to the ravages of Morgoth and Sauron, the gradual decline of the elves and the Dunedain after the downfall of Numenor and much of their technology was given to them by the Valar) so it's much more excusable.
• A Song Of Ice And Fire: A really notable example, because not only has everything been fairly stable for thousand of years until the Great Fuckening of the current time frame, some individual families have had unbroken rule over their lands for a hundred odd of generations.

Notable Examples without Medieval Stasis

• Warhammer Fantasy Battles: The Empire and the Dwarfs are actually about the level of most European countries around 1500, at the start of the early modern period and the Renaissance. They're also advancing, albeit slowly (the constant Chaos invasions don't help).
• Iron Kingdoms: The Iron Kingdoms setting is one of the best examples of steampunk. They're developed to the extent of the Victorian era (the mid-to-late 1800s), with a slow-but-growing industrial revolution and the discovery and development of electricity and chemistry.
• Eberron: Eberron is so-called "dungeon punk," so the technology is a strange mixture of all eras (plus a lot of magic!). It's one of the few settings that avoids both medieval stasis and outright steampunk, since magic is so common that it has effectively displaced technology in-setting.
• Ironclaw: The once-fantasy world is undergoing a pseudo-Renaissance shift away from magic and feudalism to machinery and Italian-style guild-republics. PCs are actually explicitly part of the burgeoning new middle class.
• Pathfinder: The default Golarion setting includes relatively advanced technologies such as flintlock and matchlock firearms, galleons (crewed by pirates reminiscent of the Golden Age of piracy in the Caribbean), and, in certain sourcebooks, steampunk/magi-tech spaceships. Not to mention the number of people whose clothes and equipment are explicitly based on 18th-century fashions (see, among others, Andoran, Taldor, and Alkenstar).
• Avatar: The Last Airbender: There is a bit of this previously (as well as implications of various major disasters), but in the modern times technology does move forward with the Industrialized Fire Nation with steam powered ships and land vehicles in A:TAS to the 1920s/30s technology of Legend of Korra with automobiles, radios and movers.

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