Does this make any sense?

Ok so a bit of background: this story takes place in a universe where practically everyone can use a limited form of magic that uses runes. Limited, because everyone only has a certain amount of energy they can spend, and will die if they spend all of it. This means that things like singlehandedly levitating large boulders or regrowing limbs is impossible, and technology is used to fill in the gaps. Religion is really different too; the basic values and beliefs are pretty much uniform everywhere, and there are incorporated parts of Taoism and Shinto (so no major wars or conflicts over religion). Magical energy is like Chi, and there are spirits that preside over certain concepts or places.

Anyway, the story takes place generally in Europe during the late 19th century (like 1870-1880), and I had an idea of how the whole magic and religion things mentioned above might affect the politics of the British Isles, which is a pretty important setting. Seeing as England, Scotland, the Republic of Ireland, North Ireland, and Wales were united then under the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, things would be pretty much the same, but relations with Ireland would be a lot smoother with the general uniformity of religion. They would all have their own unique cultures and variations on laws, but would be ruled together. They still have some animosity between them because of differences in culture.

Each "state" has a quasi-governing family of its own, and a magical artifact picks the ruler from the heirs of those three or four (I haven't decided yet) families. There is a new selection every 50 years or so, and in the case of the ruler's death before their turn is up, the 2nd-in-line of the ruler's family gets the position. Does that make any sense? Or did I completely misread everything and make a totally implausible political system?

No, that makes sense. I only have one critique: a lot of what makes cultures diverse is difference in religious beliefs and traditions—you might want to think about how this lack of diversity would affect people and society.

Yeah, I thought about that. I've been focusing a bit more on the political side of things and less so on the cultural parts. Though, I guess the main thing is that different groups worship the spirits and deities that apply to them, specifically. Magical creatures live alongside humans, so that affects a lot of things. Going back to the specific deities, for example, forest elves might worship forest and animal spirits, while creatures like harpies might go towards wind and sky-related ones. For humans, it would depend on where they live, who they live with, and their occupation.

@SprigofThyme huh. Makes sense. Overall, I think your idea is very interesting and well-thought out :)

Thank you! I was a bit worried about it, so I'm glad you like the concepts ^^

@SprigofThyme no problem! Good luck :)

I like this! I don't usually gravitate towards magical anything (other than Harry Potter lol) since I'm a sci-fi reader, but this sounds like something even I could enjoy and understand. I like the effort to build political structure since thats what makes books and shows like game of thrones so successful. One question: if the magical artifact picks an heir, but the heir dies, will the artifact accept the second in line if that person wasn't chosen? Maybe I'm reading that part incorrectly. Overall, sounds good though!

Yeah I'm purposely trying to incorporate a flaw into the system, since the second-in-line could easily be a horrible ruler (which does eventually happen because plot), which forces a change in government to ensure that the monarch doesn't have absolute power, basically adding a council-type system. Long story short, the king's brother overthrows him but the king escapes and eventually starts a rebellion against his tyrant of a brother. The rebellion wins but the king dies in the process, and everyone realizes that it's stupid to give one family all the power because you never know if the next guy might have a few screws loose. They then end up picking a new leader every time the previous one dies instead of once every 50 years.

@SprigofThyme Sounds great!! Very Lion King-y in a good way! Super cool to have the "flaw in reasoning" since you're literally pointing out that it's a flaw in the system. Your whole story sounds super well thought out.

Aw, thank you very much!