Editing Tinker Gnome (section)

==Reorx's Curse==
The Curse of Reorx is a truly cruel thing, as it fills the minoi with the [[Adeptus Mechanicus|obsession to perform science, but the complete inability to do so in a sensible way.]]

The precise mechanics of how this works are subtle and manifold, with slight tweakings of detail between different sourcebooks across different editions.

The first glimmerings are seen in ''Leaves from the Inn of the Last Home'', the first sourcebook to really talk about Krynn's tinker gnomes. Here, the primary facets of the curse are described as a prioritizing of show over substance, confusing action with accomplishment, and considering the means as outweighing the end result - or, in a nutshell, minoi are seemingly incapable of viewing the merits of clean design, easy system and cost-effective program.

As such, when a gnome sets out to invent something, it's a good bet that, at least initially, [[Communism|the device will be thirty times larger than necessary, make ten times as much noise]], will be crammed full of redundancies, and will fail miserably, if not [[3.6 Roentgen|disasterously]]. Further tinkering may improve some flaws, but will usually just compound the problem by cluttering it up with fail-safe devices, warning signals and redundant safety features, making it even bigger and often less reliable than it was before.

Compounding the problem, minoi and "organized research" are practically contradictory terms. Every tinker gnome is off working on his or her own little project, indifferent to the advances of science and technology from other sources, and often redesigning the whole project from scratch at any given point. Small wonder that minoi technology is locked into an endless cycle of "reinventing the wheel", as the saying goes.

As Sester's Law states, "If there's any possible way to ruin a perfectly good idea, a gnome will find ten of them". Lord Sester was the head of the human colony on Sancrist, and knew well of what he spoke.

The tinker gnomes' description in ''Dragonlance Adventures'', the 1e PHB/DMG for Dragonlance campaigns, was much more abstract: it describes the great curse of the tinker gnomes as a combination of improving technological devices to death, scoffing at simple mechanisms and an obsession with redundancy.

''Tales of the Lance'', the 2e adaptation/upgrade for ''Dragonlance Adventures'', basically reiterates these points. Tinker gnomes prefer style over substance, strive for constant "improvement", and are obsessed with redundancy - to the point they have actual proverbs like "simplicity is for simpletons" or the more polite "small, simple machines are made by small, simple minds" . One unique aspect of the curse mentioned in this sourcebook is that gnomes are scholastic packrats, obsessed with gathering information but incapable of discriminating between the useful and the useless.

The next new aspect of the curse was revealed in the 3rd edition update, ''Dragonlance Campaign Setting'', where it states the following tinker gnome proverb:
"Embrace failure. One never knows when a mistake with one project may provide an intriguing lead for a completely new project. An invention that is too simple and works too well stymies inventiveness and must be discouraged." In fact, the ''Dragonlance: Legends'' novel ''War of the Twins'' featured a tinker gnome who inexplicably invented devices that always worked perfectly and accomplished exactly what they were intended to do- so of course they exiled him before he could render their entire society redundant.

''Races of Ansalon'' describes tinker gnomes thus: "they do not stop to think; they go then think". It also mentions abstractly that tinker gnomes, at least culturally, do not believe in the principle of Cause And Effect.

The end result is that, ironically, Krynn's greatest proponents of technology have probably done more to stymie its growth than anything else. Anything that minoi machinery can do, magic can do better - so long as you define "better" as "cheaper, quicker, safer, more reliably and more efficiently". To say nothing of the fact that magic can just plain do outright many things that minoi "science" simply cannot.

This truth would probably incense the minoi if they could bring themselves to acknowledge it.

Indeed, on more than one occasion, minoi "devices" have only functioned because they unwittingly incorporated magical artifacts into their construction. It's well known that most minoi [[spelljammer]]s only function because they contain a spelljammer helm hidden away amongst the bells and whistles, but reading between the lines of the story of the minoi who retrieved the Greygem in ''Dragonlance Adventures'' suggests that was another such case. After all, the "Moon-Seeking Ladder" was a segmented ladder where the user could winch up the top, climb to the top, then winch up the bottom segment as the ladder hung steadily in midair, climbing up segment by segment until they reached their destination, and it only functioned because Reorx gave its creator a "secret device". In all likelihood, the ladder's core component was an Immovable Rod.