Abolishing different action types

[Rowan]

What do you all think about streamlining the domain action system by getting rid of the various action types so that there are no Court, Realm, Full, Lieutenant, Domain, and Character actions, but just Domain actions?

This is one of the things I've been working on for a while, but I'd like people's initial impressions.

Domain Actions would be linked to overall size of the regent's support staff--Court and Vassals. So a regent would start with one Domain Action per month (three per Turn/Season), but could increase this with more extensive court (courtiers, departments, ministries, etc) or vassals (presumably with their own support staff).

Lieutenants would be assigned to various actions to lead them, possibly providing a bonus depending on their expertise (like the regent could).

I think this could result in a simpler, more versatile, and even more realistic system.

Criticism?

[Mirviriam]

It's scope and time thing ... you should try it on two levels:

First - the amount of time something should take
Second - the other is how much focus something takes - can your pc be doing other things in addition? Physically present how often of the month? Any delegation possible? (personally as long as they guy is skilled anything but spells can be delegated)

It will take a really fine line to drop everything into one class of action. You could try dividing actions up into smaller parts possibily?

I've seriously been considering this before I write any more plans for my game. I don't want to see the court actions go personally...I think they should be expanded as the standard action & several of them make up the domain action. Bonus's if you use more up to a certain point?

Maybe an increasingly greater number of court actions, with one of the ones on the list being regent presence required (representing some things are better ordered done & left to experts till approval or near completion). This could also be tied in to the adventure side, because at the low level a player regent has to have his friends to make any domain/court(whatever we call it) action work.

Still there needs to be free actions that can happen without tying down your pc.

[Green Knight]

What do you all think about streamlining the domain action system by getting rid of the various action types so that there are no Court, Realm, Full, Lieutenant, Domain, and Character actions, but just Domain actions?

This is one of the things I've been working on for a while, but I'd like people's initial impressions.

Domain Actions would be linked to overall size of the regent's support staff--Court and Vassals. So a regent would start with one Domain Action per month (three per Turn/Season), but could increase this with more extensive court (courtiers, departments, ministries, etc) or vassals (presumably with their own support staff).

Lieutenants would be assigned to various actions to lead them, possibly providing a bonus depending on their expertise (like the regent could).

I think this could result in a simpler, more versatile, and even more realistic system.

Criticism?

The idea is intriguing enough, but for me to comment more fully I'd like to know why:

A) It is simpler? You're already listed several permutations, making me think it will be different, but not necessarily any simpler.

B) More versatile? Simplicity often least to less versatility IMO. Could you give some examples?

C) ;ore realistic? Please elaborate!

[irdeggman]

Most of the reasons why the BRCS added the court actions was becasue of the limited number of actins that a regent got in 2nd ed and to increase the "realism" factor.

Lt actions were mechanically designed in 2nd ed to give the regent 1 additional domain action per turn.

The BRCS expanded on these to give more versatility - and unless I totally recall poorly, to reflect a lot of what the BR community had developed over time to increase realism and add more versatility to the 2nd ed rules.

[Rowan]

I'll expand a little, trying to avoid a long and detailed post for the time being.

1. Simpler: 1 action type. No longer will you have to worry about which action type and how many you have alloted is appropriate. For those of us familiar with the system, this doesn't take much brain power, but I believe it is still cumbersome to learn and cumbersome for a DM to have to review and make sure everything is done properly.

The "permutations" are really just the measure of how many actions you get, somewhat similar to the existing Court system.

2. More versatile: No longer will you have to assign Court actions to make Realm actions possible. A regent with an extensive administration can create a law holding here, rule a couple more over there, rule a guild holding in another province, and agitate somewhere.

Granted, to balance this all appropriately, some modification may have to be made to some actions to even them out. Many of us have wanted to encourage more Agitate, Contest, Diplomacy, and Espionage actions while making Rule more expensive. Such modifications would help prevent abuse. Of course, limited amounts of RP is also a natural limit on such actions. Also, what were previously Court actions could be upscaled--Build could accomplish more, for instance.

Once this initial rebalancing is done, though, the end result is streamlined.

3. More realistic: This argument does depend on your interpretation of existing actions. I'm of the school that believes that every action at the domain level in the current system is really undertaking primarily by a fairly large array of courtiers and administrators, with the regent or LT leading but not doing much of the actual work themselves.

As governments grow in sophistication, administration expands considerably, allowing the government to do more. People get appointed to offices that have wide-ranging duties that in a smaller domain a regent might be more involved in. Whole departments or ministries form to take on specialized tasks. If a government grows like this, I don't see why it would be limited to just three rather rigid standard domain actions per season (Court actions are pretty limited in scope).

[irdeggman]

Hmm - why not just go back to the 2nd ed system then?

It is much simplier in that there was only 1 type of action - domain action (realm for multiple holdings). Well there was also a character action but that took up a domain action (and was pretty much designed for non-regents).

I don't know but off hand it still seems to be as (or more) complicated than the BRCS system in concept anyway. You need to know how many actions are allowed by the size of the court (which will pretty much screw over wizard only regents by the way).

The BRCs helps to prevent the screwing over of wizard regents by having the court actions pretty much be limited to minor or ceremony types of things - and building. Mostly things that a source only regent would not do anyway.

In concept this new system would allow a law guild regent to accomplish more rule holding actions in a turn that a source only regent could since all court only actions are now under the domain action umbrella (basically all actions appear to be equal). Anyway - things to keep an eye on when you go down this path. . .

[Rowan]

Thanks, that is something to consider. I think it can easily be remedied. Even under BRCS, the problem you mentioned, biased against the Source holder, existed. Many common house rules fixed this by giving the Source holder more Source Court actions, or something similar. Point is, this deficiency can be overcome. I can see it being overcome the same way as with other regents: having vassals, paying for a larger Court administration (apprentices and magicians, paid out of a Source holding income), creating a powerful Nexus or Focus of some kind as a special Source manifestation that can enhance the wizard's ability to draw more mebhaigl under his control (allowing him to Rule or Create more Source holdings, etc).

The 2e system had the deficiency that actions were TOO limited. A large centralized government can simply handle much more than a little frontier court can. Spain in the early Renaissance period was fighting multiple wars on many fronts, while colonizing the New World. In France, the Sun King's reforms in government administration made France extremely powerful. Both were very centralized forms of government for their time, run not just by a central King delegating to various self-interested vassals with their own fiefs (localized authorities), but also by professional ministries and departments with non-localized authority.

[AndrewTall]

The question of whether you want to distinguish between court, domain, full or realm actions really boils down to:

Q1. How many actions are best per turn?

Q2. How wide should an action be?

A1. 2e had 3 domain actions a turn, but these could be very wide as they were echoed without limit by the court. BRCs by comparison has 3-7 domain actions, and some variants have 3-13 (1 per court level) making turns more cumbersome and slower.

A2. If 1 action affects 1 holding in 1 province then either turns become individually less important as plans inevitably unfold over several turns, or you need lots of actions each turn to keep each turn vital. The width then is reliant on the number of actions desired and simply reflects the method chosen to encourage/discourage similar actions each turn.


Personally I'd prefer to have the court provide bonuses to actions, domain size will already impact GB/RP meaning that big domains will automatically be much more effective but a good court be reflected in, say, +1 bonus per court level to be spread over actions, no more than 1/3 of the bonus spent on any given action.

My way you'd need to ignore repeated actions for builds and the like - just one action to start and then its going to continue barring some random event.

The action types are then just personal and domain - a personal action by the Pc / a lieutenant maybe granting a bonus to a domain action if they have a relevant skillset and time to spare.

[Vicente]

The 2e system had the deficiency that actions were TOO limited.

I'm not sure if it's common, but that's probably one of the things I like the most about Birthright: having only 3 actions (4 with a lieutenant) forces big kingdoms to stablish vassalages and depend on other regents, increasing a lot the interactions between people (and backstabbing and all kinds of nice diplomacy/politic stuff).

If you allow big kingdoms to get more actions then small kingdoms are going to be wipped out pretty fast because they can't keep with the big guys (they have less actions and they have less income).

[Rowan]

I'm not sure if it's common, but that's probably one of the things I like the most about Birthright: having only 3 actions (4 with a lieutenant) forces big kingdoms to stablish vassalages and depend on other regents, increasing a lot the interactions between people (and backstabbing and all kinds of nice diplomacy/politic stuff).

If you allow big kingdoms to get more actions then small kingdoms are going to be wipped out pretty fast because they can't keep with the big guys (they have less actions and they have less income).

I have thought about this, because I, too, liked that, to an extent. I think it was taken too far, though.

I also think that just because you have lieutenants and a court under you doesn't mean you don't have many of the same sorts of tensions that you would have with vassal states. Many of those "court" members are landed vassals themselves. A duke probably contends with both counts and vassals in his own land, not to mention other wealthy or influential landholders.

Anyway, I agree that there should be a diminishing return for expanding government--bureaucracy gets less efficient the larger it gets. What I've drafted includes those diminishing returns; courts get successively more expensive the larger they get.

I've also mentioned vassals as part of what determines more actions because I wanted to codify and bring out those vassalage arrangements more, and assigned attitude levels to those vassals based on their current level of satisfaction with the regent. The attitude level functions like a LT or regent skill bonus, or like a Court bonus; a simple number, fairly easy to keep track of, that reflects how cooperative a vassal is currently.

The other thing that preserves the relative lack of agility of that larger realm is that it caps out RP income and is thus less efficient, and yet still has to manage a much larger territory. Ultimately it can end up with an RP deficiency. This would be particularly true if you limited the amount of RP that could be spent on any one action (so Avanil can't just throw 60RP at an action to overwhelm nearly any opponent, which is somewhat difficult to conceptualize in story terms anyway), or allowed smaller bloodlines to not be so limited in RP collection, but rather in accumulation.

[Mirviriam]

The other thing that preserves the relative lack of agility of that larger realm is that it caps out RP income and is thus less efficient, and yet still has to manage a much larger territory. Ultimately it can end up with an RP deficiency. This would be particularly true if you limited the amount of RP that could be spent on any one action (so Avanil can't just throw 60RP at an action to overwhelm nearly any opponent, which is somewhat difficult to conceptualize in story terms anyway), or allowed smaller bloodlines to not be so limited in RP collection, but rather in accumulation.

Currently the RP collection per turn cap is bloodline score for 2nd/3rd? Minus some skill checks in 3rd.

I noticed in 3rd/BRCS there's a power gap for midlevel domains too as they can't quite justify the money for the extra levels of court. Money is currently the determining factor in how many actions a realm has...should it?

[Vicente]

Anyway, I agree that there should be a diminishing return for expanding government--bureaucracy gets less efficient the larger it gets. What I've drafted includes those diminishing returns; courts get successively more expensive the larger they get.


I don't think extra costs are enough as big realms produce more money after all.



I've also mentioned vassals as part of what determines more actions because I wanted to codify and bring out those vassalage arrangements more, and assigned attitude levels to those vassals based on their current level of satisfaction with the regent. The attitude level functions like a LT or regent skill bonus, or like a Court bonus; a simple number, fairly easy to keep track of, that reflects how cooperative a vassal is currently.


This is probably a big change (and I don't like it much). My main problem is that a vassal is more interesting (and conflicting) when he is the one deciding his own actions. If you just decide what they do I don't know, for me they lose nearly any interest as regents (and try to force a player to do what a NPC says :p).



The other thing that preserves the relative lack of agility of that larger realm is that it caps out RP income and is thus less efficient, and yet still has to manage a much larger territory. Ultimately it can end up with an RP deficiency. This would be particularly true if you limited the amount of RP that could be spent on any one action (so Avanil can't just throw 60RP at an action to overwhelm nearly any opponent, which is somewhat difficult to conceptualize in story terms anyway), or allowed smaller bloodlines to not be so limited in RP collection, but rather in accumulation.

Even with the RP cap a larger kd could just try actions without spending RP (spending GB instead or just without any modifier). Normally you wouldn't do that as actions are used when you have a good chance of success, but if you have lots of them it's a good tactic to overpower smaller realms (who will spend most of their RPs defending against those actions because they can't afford them to succeed, even if they don't have much chance).

[Rowan]

Currently the RP collection per turn cap is bloodline score for 2nd/3rd? Minus some skill checks in 3rd.
Yes. I'm more in favor of using bloodline as a limit to how much can be accumulated, and possibly as a modifier to various things such as a cap to how much can be spent on a single action. I think not limiting regency collection within the turn evens some things out, favoring the little guy more than the big guy, and providing a feasible system for non-blooded characters, either in BR or in other settings.



I noticed in 3rd/BRCS there's a power gap for midlevel domains too as they can't quite justify the money for the extra levels of court. Money is currently the determining factor in how many actions a realm has...should it?
It may make sense to allow other factors to help determine the number of actions a realm has, such as RP or domain size. The idea of vassals over certain areas (such as Counts and Barons) is a natural extension/limitation to actions.


I don't think extra costs are enough as big realms produce more money after all.
They do, but incomes increase rather linearly (with the exception of getting those extra trade routes--but I've sketched out a way to address that based on previous discussions on the board about trade holdings). Also, costs for expansion tend to increase, diminishing returns, just as costs for expanding courts would increase. Furthermore, larger realms should normally become vulnerable to more threats and more "random" events. These things should make it so that the larger domain actually has more strain on resources than the smaller domain, though it may have a greater reserve, as well.



This is probably a big change (and I don't like it much). My main problem is that a vassal is more interesting (and conflicting) when he is the one deciding his own actions. If you just decide what they do I don't know, for me they lose nearly any interest as regents (and try to force a player to do what a NPC says :p).
I think you misunderstand what I was suggesting. Vassals like I'm talking about (Counts and Barons, or Bishops/Cardinals, lesser Guildmasters, etc.) are totally ignored in the current system, arising only through DM creativity and house rule support. Vassal states are a different matter and would continue to function as you suggest. Furthermore, the intention is that the lesser vassals may indeed take different actions and would still take actions on their own, particularly if their current attitude towards the regent is low. These could either be detailed, or, more commonly related to the otherwise "random" events that are currently a part of the system, influencing the type and/or frequency of those events.



Even with the RP cap a larger kd could just try actions without spending RP (spending GB instead or just without any modifier). Normally you wouldn't do that as actions are used when you have a good chance of success, but if you have lots of them it's a good tactic to overpower smaller realms (who will spend most of their RPs defending against those actions because they can't afford them to succeed, even if they don't have much chance).
The larger domain is going to have a lot more on its plate than a smaller domain, which should make your concern about being able to just throw away actions a phantom. Add that to the proportionately higher cost of administering such a domain and a smaller relative increase in RP collection, and smaller domains will remain more agile. They still won't be able to be involved in as much, but they ought to be able to focus better. RoE likes that concept, as it is stated in HO vs. HOT descriptions, and European history bears that out, with Spain/the Hapsburg Empire being involved in a great many things at once, but often being outmaneuvered by smaller, more agile, less cumbersome rivals such as England, Italy, the Netherlands.

[Vicente]

They do, but incomes increase rather linearly (with the exception of getting those extra trade routes--but I've sketched out a way to address that based on previous discussions on the board about trade holdings). Also, costs for expansion tend to increase, diminishing returns, just as costs for expanding courts would increase. Furthermore, larger realms should normally become vulnerable to more threats and more "random" events. These things should make it so that the larger domain actually has more strain on resources than the smaller domain, though it may have a greater reserve, as well.


The thing is that even if income grows linearly, a realm will break a point where it can substain it's grow pretty easily (as the main problem with growing is the actions needed for Rules and the cost of the action itself). Right now it's hard for small realms to grow because in general they have the actions but not the resources, and for big realms is the inverse.

Even if you change maintenance to account for levels (because right now a level 1 holding and a level 10 holding cost the same to maintain, same with provinces) and make costs exponential, a realm with lots of actions can just try to grow out of pure luck (just pay the base cost and that's it).



I think you misunderstand what I was suggesting. Vassals like I'm talking about (Counts and Barons, or Bishops/Cardinals, lesser Guildmasters, etc.) are totally ignored in the current system, arising only through DM creativity and house rule support.


Ok, my bad sorry. For me that is too low level and usually adds too much work to the DM (at least for me with the NPC regents I have my plate full and my players have more than enough people to remember).



The larger domain is going to have a lot more on its plate than a smaller domain, which should make your concern about being able to just throw away actions a phantom.


The problem with adding too many things for a bigger realm is that then balance is pretty hard to maintain. Imagine that a realm gets a number of random events based on the number of provinces (or better, the province levels). If the realm has average luck, then we have an average turn and everything works. But with lots of events happening you can go to the extremes by chance: getting unlucky (so the realm suffers far more than it can handle) or lucky (so it has a lot of free actions and then the small neighbours are the ones that suffer).



Add that to the proportionately higher cost of administering such a domain and a smaller relative increase in RP collection, and smaller domains will remain more agile. They still won't be able to be involved in as much, but they ought to be able to focus better. RoE likes that concept, as it is stated in HO vs. HOT descriptions,


Right now big realms can't exist because of the number of actions. You are giving them more actions, so at least big realms will be more viable than they are right now. Maybe not much, but a little more for sure.

Also, I don't think smaller domains will remain as agile, as you have given more tools to bigger realms. Maybe on average a big realm won't have actions left, but as soon as it has some, it has just to try Create Holding and it forces the smaller realm to use RP to defend (or later Contest and lose an action).



and European history bears that out, with Spain/the Hapsburg Empire being involved in a great many things at once, but often being outmaneuvered by smaller, more agile, less cumbersome rivals such as England, Italy, the Netherlands.


Well, at least for Spain, I don't think that's true. We have been outmaneuvered also when we were a pretty small empire by bigger people, it's just that except for 2 or 3 kings, in general we have been cursed with pretty bad rulers.

Edit: I was using "kd" for "kingdom" in the post, I tend to say that a lot :p