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Post by Linde (x-GM) on Aug 15, 2019 21:13:17 GMT
Yes circles would be the equivalent for all actions used to increase and manage hired help, perhaps except for grant title and such where resource checks may be more appropriate. For stability & Prosperity: I meant they should work like reputations in that they range from -3 when infamous to +3 when positive. It would only make sense if Prosperity modifiers are linked to the province rather than a domain, and should affect every domain in a given province equally. Each province would then have a "reputation like" feature called Prosperity that range from -3 to +3 (reputation like, only because of the range) Affecting prosperity should not be much harder or much easier than affecting holdings that grant similar bonus, so pushing from -2 to -3 or from 2 to 3 could be ob 3 and follow same progression of OB as ruling holdings. (affecting negative prosperity will be inherently harder due to the subtracted dice) Stability I envision much in the same way in the sense of adding or subtracting dice from dice rolls, but as it is a global effect, it should be harder to affect it directly. Reductions could be a failure consequence on other rolls, increases could be awarded much in the same way as deeds....... or it could be something else, or stability as a feature could be omitted entirely. Reputations are tricky in size as they potentially increase in area exponentially, a reputation +1 could be as local as a city district, where a +3 could be renown across the civilized world. If holdings are simplified to grant bonus equal to holding level, and that has merit in bookkeeping, then they may at some point become a more substantial contribution to a skill check than the base skill itself. That in itself is not a problem, but it may shift focus of those players who play for the bonuses and should therefore be observed. The other option is to limit the bonus from a holding at +3, and let higher level holdings have a wider scope of actions they can affect. I like this option more conceptually, but it is harder to keep track of and it may therefore be harder for players to grasp and for GM to remember. Note: If holdings of the same type aid when ruling holdings of their own kind, and they grant bonus equal to holding level, then I think obstacle should increase more than 1 per holding level as each holding level also grant you an average of one half success. (To clarify I know this hasn't come up and you probably see it the same way as I. But I think it best that holdings don't aid in their own creation as it is a "recursive curse" that IMO create balancing problems - it is fine if law aid other and guild aid trade as RoE, they just never should aid themselves)
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 16, 2019 4:05:06 GMT
I like that for prosperity:
Twag - reputation +3: This province has seen a massive influx of visitors and wealth due to rumours of gold. Business is booming, people are happy and wealthy. The wealth attracts criminals as well, who are quite successful (+3D), but it hardly seems to put a dent in people's enthusiasm for Twag.
Twag - reputation -3: Turns out the rumours of gold were bust. Cities that previously held 5k or more have dwindled to hold maybe but 5 permanent residents. Ghost towns are scattered throughout. Criminals don't even bother with Twag anymore, and have moved on to the next best thing. There's no wealth to be found here and the people left behind are destitute. (Okay, maybe not -3, but still).
Reputation for a character should just reflect the same as stability. So all Character Reputations are global (for players & important characters anyway). Are you known as a just and benevolent king? As a kind pushover king? Those two are just two sides of the same coin. So you could have "Reputation +3D: You're a feared tyrant. No one dares cross you." or "Reputation -3D: You are a hated tyrant. People kill each other for the chance to rise up against you".
Alignment isn't really a thing, and I'm okay with that.
I agree on holdings re: affiliation. It should be made clear (and simple!) what affiliation does and does not aid with.
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 16, 2019 4:29:58 GMT
To sum what we have so far: Take 10: 1 success instead of 3 dice (remove? I think the "Roll or say yes" rule should be applied) Take 20: Just realized I didn't understand the original suggestion Characters: -All main characters are blooded (right to rule by divine providence). This can be a trait with sub-traits to reflect the blood powers of RoE. Because all main characters receive this trait by default, all main characters are by definition appropriate rulers of their respective domains. -Purchasing properties at Chargen grants you (holdings?) -Relationships: You can be a ruler without relationships, but I don't see it working out in the long-run. Suggested relationship is second-in-command. -Purchasing Affiliations at Chargen grants you holdings -Purchasing Reputation at Chargen grants you +D to most actions ("negative" and positive; it's assumed all "negative" reputation start out helping you as a ruler) You gain property via resource checks. Property can be lost via maintenance checks (tax). You gain affiliation via appropriate skill check (per holding). Affiliations can be lost through contest/failures. You gain reputation You have a holding lvl 0 everywhere you have "presence". Presence can be adjacent affiliation, property, relationship. Losing a lvl 0 holding would mean losing what you gave you "presence". To start: Law (collects income from other holdings), Temple (helps re: province reputation), Guild (helps re: income generation), Sources (required for Gifted, Grief/Songs, Greed, and Hatred) To consider: Manor (helps re: professional military) Provinces have a max size. No single type of holding can exceed the max size (You are simply not able to establish a large enough Cult of the Headless Deer for a lvl 3 affiliation in a lvl 3 province if some people still follow the Moonlit Goddess (affiliation 1). You must convert them or root them out somehow!) Provinces can be ruled . Money is abstracted as resource checks: At least once every cycle, you must make a lifestyle maintenance resource check. The dice combines all relevant bonuses (yes, can be a large number of dice). Failure should result in some temporary or permanent holding loss? Armies desert you. Buildings fall into disrepair. Your priest in Twag ends up indebted to a local scoundrel. Your trade venture in Schlind buys a load of rotten carrots. Worst-case: Your reputation suffers. Holdings generate Artha at a ratio of 6 persona, 3 fate, 1 deed: Persona is more common because otherwise fate will just stack up. Deeds remain rare to prevent a lot of epiphanies. Artha can also be gained via adventures and roleplaying beliefs, traits and instincts. Help can only come from player characters (your hired help should be limited in what they can do, to encourage player interaction) ForKs are generally permitted, but failing a skill-check with a ForK means you mess up in a way that cost you more than usual. --- I think Maintenance is going to be crucial. Here's what I suggest: You can do as many actions as you want. Each action adds no more than +1 ob to your next lifestyle check (hired help might only cost +1 ob for each 2 or 3). Each holding or maybe every other holding adds +1 ob to your lifestyle check? (How many dice does a lvl 1 guild holding in a lvl 3 province with +2 prosperity grant to your resource pool?) Armies, when added, will also require maintenance. Recommend largely applying RoE? You can choose what gets priority maintenance - do you pay your mercenaries first, or your trade fleet? Failing lifestyle doesn't necessarily immediately destroy holdings/armies/whatever. But it at least puts it at risk or on notice and failing two should always result in some losses. Campaign: Limited to regular checks, graduated checks, versus tests and occasional bloody versus Adventure: May add Fight, Duel of Wits, etc...; I highly recommend modifying them because the original concepts are great, but they're awful in execution (Point Point POINT!)
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Post by Linde (x-GM) on Aug 16, 2019 10:49:40 GMT
Below are my comments To sum what we have so far: Take 10: 1 success instead of 3 dice (remove? I think the "Roll or say yes" rule should be applied) Take 20: Just realized I didn't understand the original suggestion Great idea to remove ability to take 10 and 20 as the roll or say yes rule is applied instead. Characters: -All main characters are blooded (right to rule by divine providence). This can be a trait with sub-traits to reflect the blood powers of RoE. Because all main characters receive this trait by default, all main characters are by definition appropriate rulers of their respective domains. -Purchasing properties at Chargen grants you (holdings?) -Relationships: You can be a ruler without relationships, but I don't see it working out in the long-run. Suggested relationship is second-in-command. -Purchasing Affiliations at Chargen grants you holdings -Purchasing Reputation at Chargen grants you +D to most actions ("negative" and positive; it's assumed all "negative" reputation start out helping you as a ruler) Seems good, except the part with negative reputations being beneficial... It could be hard to keep track of. I would limit starting reputations to being positive, and let Stability be the main reputation you could invest in. As affiliations are max +3 at character generation, then holdings could be capped at lvl 3 at character gen as well. Property could be converted to holding levels by looking at the cost of the property in relations to the cost of affiliations and converting to holdings best corrosponding to the cost of the property? Or specific buildings with a cost an upkeep and an effect could be created? You gain property via resource checks. Property can be lost via maintenance checks (tax). You gain affiliation via appropriate skill check (per holding). Affiliations can be lost through contest/failures. You gain reputation You have a holding lvl 0 everywhere you have "presence". Presence can be adjacent affiliation, property, relationship. Losing a lvl 0 holding would mean losing what you gave you "presence". To start: Law (collects income from other holdings), Temple (helps re: province reputation), Guild (helps re: income generation), Sources (required for Gifted, Grief/Songs, Greed, and Hatred) To consider: Manor (helps re: professional military) Provinces have a max size. No single type of holding can exceed the max size (You are simply not able to establish a large enough Cult of the Headless Deer for a lvl 3 affiliation in a lvl 3 province if some people still follow the Moonlit Goddess (affiliation 1). You must convert them or root them out somehow!) Provinces can be ruled . Reputations - Propaganda, positive negative espionage, diplomacy, other relevant skills could affect as well? Money is abstracted as resource checks: At least once every cycle, you must make a lifestyle maintenance resource check. The dice combines all relevant bonuses (yes, can be a large number of dice). Failure should result in some temporary or permanent holding loss? Armies desert you. Buildings fall into disrepair. Your priest in Twag ends up indebted to a local scoundrel. Your trade venture in Schlind buys a load of rotten carrots. Worst-case: Your reputation suffers. Holdings generate Artha at a ratio of 6 persona, 3 fate, 1 deed: Persona is more common because otherwise fate will just stack up. Deeds remain rare to prevent a lot of epiphanies. Artha can also be gained via adventures and roleplaying beliefs, traits and instincts. Help can only come from player characters (your hired help should be limited in what they can do, to encourage player interaction) ForKs are generally permitted, but failing a skill-check with a ForK means you mess up in a way that cost you more than usual. --- I think Maintenance is going to be crucial. Here's what I suggest: You can do as many actions as you want. Each action adds no more than +1 ob to your next lifestyle check (hired help might only cost +1 ob for each 2 or 3). Each holding or maybe every other holding adds +1 ob to your lifestyle check? (How many dice does a lvl 1 guild holding in a lvl 3 province with +2 prosperity grant to your resource pool?) Armies, when added, will also require maintenance. Recommend largely applying RoE? You can choose what gets priority maintenance - do you pay your mercenaries first, or your trade fleet? Failing lifestyle doesn't necessarily immediately destroy holdings/armies/whatever. But it at least puts it at risk or on notice and failing two should always result in some losses. Maintencence: Effective resource stat(-non recovered tax) + Reputation(stability) + Guild + Law + artha. OB = 0+ number of actions taken + ½ per holdinglevel + army upkeep + other assets with upkeep. Failure: tax resource stat. IF MOF is greater than effective resource stat: Resources permanently reduced by 1, tax removed, and holdings/armies/assets that affect resource maintainence obstacle are removed at players discression until MOF = old resource stat(at untaxed level). In addition if MOF is equal to or greater than 2 X effective resource stat, then reduce Reputation(stability) by 1. So having a resource stat of 3, +1 stability and any combination of 5 holding levels of guild/law grant a total of 9 dice before artha. If we assume the domain have 10 holding levels total, then the Obstacle for the resource test is 5 before spending actions and maintaining thier army and other assets. Campaign: Limited to regular checks, graduated checks, versus tests and occasional bloody versus Adventure: May add Fight, Duel of Wits, etc...; I highly recommend modifying them because the original concepts are great, but they're awful in execution (Point Point POINT!) I kind of like duel of wits as is.. (would almost never go point, point, point... but some character builds would leave that option as the strongest.) IMO If adding fight and duel of wits, they should not be used on domain level, only character level adventures and such.
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 17, 2019 6:06:25 GMT
When I said "negative" reputation, I meant a +D reputation based on infamy. So positive, but not in the roleplay sense of the word (mostly just to make it clear that you don't have to be loved to have positive reputation).
Maintenance check: Resource(-tax) + Reputation(Season) + Holding + Artha (You could get help... but that would put the helper's holdings at risk as well) (You could try to ForK barter/related skills, but failure should add an additional tax per ForK)
Maintenance ob: #actions + 0.5*holdings + other upkeep (army, assets) + seasonal
Seasonal: Post-winter maintenance +1 ob, post-summer maintenance -1 ob
---
How do we distinguish property and affiliation?
Affiliation is: -Rulewise: +X dice towards holding-related actions Presence for holding in adjacent regions (adjacency is by land or sea) Circles for hiring et al. Source of artha -RP-wise: It's the King's loyal noble supporters. It's the merchant's well-placed connections. It is the priest's devout parishes. These are people who will aid the ruler as best they can, and from them you can draw aid (+X dice), expand your influence(Presence), and hire competent supporters(Circles)
Property is: -Rulewise: +X dice towards property-related actions (always +X dice towards resource checks, incl. maintenance) Presence for holding in adjacent regions Additional bonus depending on property -RP-wise: It's the King's manor and his serfs. It's the merchant's trade fleet. It's the priest's lavish abbeys and cathedrals.
I feel as if they should almost be identical: Affiliations & Property stack together as the total # holdings in a province, but Affiliations should do One thing extra and Properties should do One thing extra.
It's okay if different affiliation/property types (law/guild/temple) do different extra things. But they should definitely all do the same as far as holdings go.
I also think we almost have enough to playtest a version of it and see if anything needs modification before moving forward. One of my key thoughts in all of this is to keep it simple, but make it fun.
(Yes, I glossed over rule province for the time being)
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Post by Linde (x-GM) on Aug 18, 2019 8:33:22 GMT
That seems good as well.
Ruling province suggestion: Ruling province level X to level X+1 requires a resource check at obstacle = level X+1 +1 per empty holding slot in the province.
Province level could affect circles as higher province level represent a greater pool of people?
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 18, 2019 16:29:17 GMT
That seems like a very organic way to grow provinces: Until it's built up, it'll be very challenging to keep growing.
Should obstacles start at 1 and only grow by 1 per level? Funds provide x dice towards resources and their obstacle is double fund size +1.
That would make a lvl 1 holding = obstacle 3, lvl 2 = 5, etc...
That might work better (lvl 10 is obstacle 21)
Alternatively, 2xHolding + Province Level (so establishing a (1) in a lvl(3) province is Ob(5))
Seems reasonable, given that your average Craftsman shouldn't be able to easily build up massive holdings. But maybe too high ob?
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Post by Linde (x-GM) on Aug 18, 2019 17:49:54 GMT
It may be too high, but I think it is better to start with high obstacles and then lowering them if they prove impossible rather than having obstacles too low and being forced to raise them to keep reigns on development.
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 18, 2019 20:22:40 GMT
To run a simulation, I realized one more issue: Maintenance.
Assume 10 holding levels and a resource stat of 5, no other dice.
You have 15D and a base obstacle of 5. On average you get 7.5 successes.
Suppose you take 20 actions, and roll 0 successes. Your MoF is 25. Your resource stat goes down by 1 (to 4), all 10 holdings are removed and stability is reduced by at least 1 (I would apply it twice).
Next turn, you have resources(4), reputation (-2), and any holdings your 20 actions generated - potentially +20 holdings if you're absurdly lucky. Your next maintenance will have ob 10 and you'll have 4-2+20=22 dice.
But worst-case, the player fails spectacularly and now has 0 holdings, resources (4) and reputation (-2).
I don't think up to infinite actions passes a sanity check unfortunately, and I think the equations could use some work.
(Very reasonably, persona is crucial for small realms and their maintenance, while fate drives the maintenance of larger realms)
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Post by Linde (x-GM) on Aug 18, 2019 21:20:48 GMT
Base number of actions could be a low number.
Ability from property could be granting extra actions rather than granting bonus to actions.
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 18, 2019 22:43:05 GMT
Affiliation are holdings represented by people (and what they own) - Craftsmen, sailors, mercenaries, etc...
Property are holdings represented by material assets - workshops, trade fleets, armories, etc...
All work together to (abstractly) make you wealthier.
You're more effective, however, when you have own sailors to man your fleets, and so on. And your sailors are more effective when they have reliable assets.
So, rules:
Every character inherently has 1-3 actions per turn (no cost)
Every affiliation has 1 action at Holding(lvl) modifier. Does not apply bonus to other actions, except versus tests against the affiliation.
Property grants bonus to all (related) actions in province.
Total Holding(lvl) still counts as dice towards maintenance - whether a group or asset, everything you rule over will attempt to maintain itself.
Consequence:
A merchant with 5 lvl 1 affiliations can take many (unsuccessful) actions every turn through his network of merchants: 8 actions per turn, but only +1 from affiliation.
A King with a 1 lvl 3 affiliation and 1 lvl 3 property has a very strong grasp on that province: 4 actions per turn, one at +6 and 3 at +3.
(Assuming relevant actions - i.e. a raid using a trade fleet is uh, possible, but no bonus dice there)
Unless to simplify: Holding lvl still grants bonus +D to all relevant actions in province.
Affiliation (any lvl) grants +1 action.
Property grants other bonus to be determined (or property gets +1 action and affiliation gets a different bonus).
Consequence of that:
A merchant with 5 lvl 1 affiliation gets +1 in all of those provinces and up to 8 actions.
A king with 1 lvl 3 affiliation and 1 lvl 3 property gets +6 in that province and up to 4 actions.
---
Suggested Limitation: One roll per action per season (follows BW rules), meaning you can Rule(Guild Aff) in Twag and the Aelven Woods, but you can't Rule(Guild Aff) three times in Twag the same turn - it takes time to build up an affiliation and to purchase property! At most you could Rule(Guild Aff), Rule (Guild Prop), and Rule (Law Aff) in Twag, given three actions.
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Post by Elyssia Whiterose (SWT) on Aug 19, 2019 1:56:41 GMT
Characters should compete, but should max holding be based on total holdings?
Merchant A, B and C
Merchant A and B are allies. A and C are enemies. B and C are neutral.
Province 3 is a lvl 3 province where A, B and C all operate:
Should the max be: total guild 3? 3 per character? Something else? (A & B could both have 3, but A and C can have no more than 3 combined? - too complicated)
Also: (if total max = province max) A, B and C all have 1 All try to rule 1 guild holding. What happens? Suggestion! - Initiative is applied (Steel vs Hesitation, Reflex breaks ties, if still tied roll a versus reflex test ad infinitum)
When A rules, a holding level must disappear, so the rule is also a contest (In this case against C) Step 1: Roll versus to see if holding contested (if A wins, holding is gone, if C wins, then ?) Step 2: If contest succeeds, roll to see if holding built
When B rules, they didn't want to be hostile, but assumed A and C would fight. They placed a "Wait" clause - if a holding lvl becomes available they will immediately roll at the same time as the other player rolls to build their holding. A holding lvl must become available, they must meet base obstacle, and they must beat the versus test to succed, but they don't have to contest an existing holding.
When C rules, see A
---
Does it make sense to wrap Rule and Contest into a single action?
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Post by Linde (x-GM) on Aug 19, 2019 10:49:44 GMT
If contest & rule are wrapped into a single action, then I think it should be wrapped into a single roll as well: Versus test where defender gets a number of automatic successes equal to obstacle for attacker to rule the holding.
So in the above example if A try to rule a holding from level 1 to level 2, C get 5 auto successes added to their side of the versus test.
That may make a combined contest&rule action too hard.
Having people interrupt mid action between two rolls of the same action seems a bit too funky, I would personally have it be 2 different actions. (and use steel vs hessitation as you suggested to see if B manages to rule the now empty slot before A)
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