Technology vs. Wild West

[Enoki]

What you really need right off is the means to construct shelter and grow food. This means you need consruction tools and equipment. Assuming a somewhat Earth-like planet this would include a big assortment of hand tools for general construction, a portable saw mill (critical assuming wood is available) and, agriculturial equipment like plows and such.

If wood were not available and rock was to be substituted then you need block and tackle, along with other equipment that allows easy movement of heavy stone. You would also want several cement mixers, screes for screening sand, gravel, etc.

Equipment like this running on water power, steam, or other less advanced technologies are what will make a colony capable of sustaining itself. Once you can grow food and have shelter you can start doing more esoteric things like looking for mineral deposits etc.

Trying to mine and smelt iron when you cannot make cement or mass produce lumber is getting ahead of the survival curve. Civilization is built on brick and lumber not steel.

I would add if some means of fuel were readily at hand locally then you could add rollers, excavators, generators, pumps, air compressors and, other large power equipment to the list of useful items.

 

[Metropolitan District 268]

Rancke -

I personally don't see a problem with your concept.

Wealth accumulation and technological advancement arise out of an excess of productivity over the bare needs of survival. The more difficult survival is, the less surplus productivity is available for technological achievement.

So there's your key - make survival DIFFICULT on this continent. If you want fur wars, then you need plentiful animals with worthwhile pelts. But if their flesh is toxic to humaniti ... your nomad hunters are going to need to survive on something else.

There IS something else ... but that is also the principal food source for the pelt-givers (which are both (a) carniverous, and (b) have a very inefficient metabolism, which makes even the hare look like a frugal eater!). So your nomads are in competition for food with the animal which provides their source of trade goods. It creates a delicate balance.

Then, there is the matter of tools. If your continent has no readily winnable iron ore, then your nomads just ain't going to develop a ferrous-metal winning and working capability of their own.

If you want to be REALLY mean to them, then make flint an unknown mineral resource, too.

What's left?

Bone, hide, stone ... that should give you the technology level you're after.

As for why the other continent didn't trade with them for two hundred years ... why should they? What do they have to offer in trade? Nothing, except these pelts. The other continent being sub-tropical has very little need for pelts. It was only when Igor Redbeard, a visiting merchant from an ice world happened to see one that he realised the potential, and made a trip to the other continent to see what trade possibilities existed, that anybody could be bothered with the "other continent".

Quickly discovering that what the "other continent" lacked was metal, Igor realised that the potential to trade cheap metal trinkets for massively valuable pelts was enormous ... and that he could have the entire profit if only he could keep others at bay.

And the rest, as they say, is history (which you will need to write for yourself ... )