Quote Originally Posted by ecarden View Post
[SPOILER=Response]My objection isn't that they remain isolated (indeed, I think their isolation can't be that complete both due to human nature and because there were sufficient clues to lead the Ten Rings to them in the first place) or that they started at a small size.

I couldn't tell if they still had access to the rest of their world (and its cities more magnificent than ours) but they clearly aren't anywhere near the carrying capacity of their region as they're able to support a large group of warriors and artisans despite that group apparently producing nothing of value for multiple millennia! And despite allegedly coming from a superior civilization and then getting an additional advantage in the form of the dragon, they're still right where they were technologically thirty seconds after the Dweller was locked away (based on the art we see as this is explained to us? I mean, medieval stasis is a trope and all, but I really dislike it here and in the 'back to nature'/'magical native' episodes of Star Trek.
There are countless small villages across Asia, Africa and South America where despite having contact with the modern world, the people for the most part live lives not all that different from there ancestors from centuries gone by. Heck, even in the United States, that is pretty much what the Amish do. As for their not being more people, perhaps each generation loses some their young to outward immigration. It could be that not all chose to stay, but they generally respect the village not talk about where they came from.