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Thread: House Rule Dispute
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05-28-1999, 07:27 AM #1SCO Adam TheoGuest
House Rule Dispute
Hello Birthrighters, Adam Theo here.
This day of Friday, May 28, 1999, at 3:22:14 AM
hello. just a little while ago i posted this rule here. i just
intoduced it to my PCs. one was fine with it, and welcomed it. the
other had serious problems. started fuming at the mouth practically.
his argument was that it takes too much time, and that it is not
worth the effort to rule up a province to *any* level, especially high
ones.
my argument. the only thing really affected is time. it takes time
to rule up provinces with this. some extra GB and RP, but for any
moerately powered realm with a moderately powered regent, it is not
much considering the benefits.
i really need some more input in this, since i am going to make a
final ruling on it very soon, and need some input beyond me and the
player. the rule is below, for those that didn't see it before. it
deals with ruling provinces.
here is my House Rule on Province Ruling. I think it gives excellent
balance to the game.
you may *successfully* rule the province in issue only once a season
for Huamn, Goblin, Orog, etc. Realms. This changes to Once a Year for
Elven and Dwarven Realms. if you do not get it the first time, you may
keep on trying for the next months, until you do. Then when you do,
you must wait until the next season (or year).
the roll is equal to 10 + the level of the Traget Level. ruling to a
level 5 takes a 15 or higher.
you may use RP to improve the roll, and any regents of holdings in
your lands may contibute to assist or oppose your ruling. when
everyone has settled on the amount they want to pay, the die is
rolled.
it takes a number of rulings equal to the Target Level to actually
get that province up to that level. To rule to a level 5, you must
have 5 Successful rulings on the province, taking at least 5 seasons
(or 5 years for elves & dwarves) to get that province to that level.
The DM may impose situational modifiers. for example, a bonus of +4
to the roll if your next door realm is having refugees flee into your
lands. or an outright extra Successful Ruling if the situation is
really bad next door, and your realm looks safe and good to the
refugees.
So because of the multiple rulings to raise a level, a province can
have fractions. a Level 4/3 province which is 3/5 of the way to the next
level. otherwise written as 4(3/5)/3.
when an army invades and pilliages, the first pilliaging does not
take away the first level of the province, but instead takes out any
fraction that may exist, then the second pilliage takes out the levels
as in the Rulebook. So effectively you loose no levels on the first
pilliaging.
what does everyone think of these rules? please give me feedback.
and if there are any PBeMs or other games that want to use it, feel
free to.
- --
Adam Theo, A Patriotic American Libertarian Capitalist.
SCO of Theoretic Internet Services, http://www.theoretic.com, http://www.theoretic.com
'Your Web Hosting, Email Forward, and Weather Forecast Solution,
With Just Two Words: Quality and Privacy.'
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05-28-1999, 07:54 AM #2Simon GraindorgeGuest
House Rule Dispute
> what does everyone think of these rules? please give me feedback.
> and if there are any PBeMs or other games that want to use it, feel
> free to.
I always liked the way Ruling (of a province) was handled in Darkstar's
PBEM. Simply put (and maybe Darkstar can expand on this), when ruling a
province, the regent was not allowed to use any extra modifiers (RP/GB/etc)
to affect the dice roll. Thus, the higher the level of the province becomes,
the harder it is to increase its level.
I generally don't like the "limit rule action to once per X seasons/years"
ideas, mainly because my group doesn't get to play very often, and this sort
of a restriction *seriously* stalls the game.
In addition to this, I do allow Mages with source holdings (only - no
guild/temple/law) to use their source level to oppose the regent. In this
case, the regent is allowed to spend GB and RP (1 Gb + 1 RP per to counter
each penalty point) to boost the roll, but *only* to counter the penalty of
the source holding. The reason for allowing sources to effect a rule action
is that I tend to play up the "magic is tied to the land" angle. Source
holdings thus assume a much higher "power" in my game, and even the lowliest
wizard with a source level wields considerable political might.
eg. Regent X wants to increase Province (5/3). Wizard Y has a source(2) in
the province and decides to oppose the move (ie. -2 penalty to dice roll).
Regent X now has the option of spending up to 2 GB + 2 RP to bring the roll
back to even.
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05-28-1999, 07:55 AM #3BenGuest
House Rule Dispute
>
> i really need some more input in this, since i am going to make a
> final ruling on it very soon, and need some input beyond me and the
> player. the rule is below, for those that didn't see it before. it
> deals with ruling provinces.
>
> here is my House Rule on Province Ruling. I think it gives excellent
> balance to the game.
I really like it. I always thought that the ability to rule provinces to
really high levels that fast just never made sense. I mean, where are all
these new citizens coming from? In some of my earlier games I could have
sworn that regents had cloning vats...
Anyway, I stopped allowing the "rule province" action altogether. I
simply raised the level of the province when I thought it made sense
demographically and economically. If my players want to raise their
provinces now, they have to do other things to "attract" more people
there--like no taxes,infrastructure investment or tourist and cultural junk.
Sometimes I will lower the level of another province or two to represent
migration when a province increases in level.
Your method looks like it might just be hard enough to keep it
believable.
Ben
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05-28-1999, 08:08 AM #4
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House Rule Dispute
At 03:27 AM 5/28/99 -0400, you wrote:
>Hello Birthrighters, Adam Theo here.
> This day of Friday, May 28, 1999, at 3:22:14 AM
>
> hello. just a little while ago i posted this rule here. i just
>intoduced it to my PCs. one was fine with it, and welcomed it. the
>other had serious problems. started fuming at the mouth practically.
>
> his argument was that it takes too much time, and that it is not
>worth the effort to rule up a province to *any* level, especially high
>ones.
>
> my argument. the only thing really affected is time. it takes time
>to rule up provinces with this. some extra GB and RP, but for any
>moerately powered realm with a moderately powered regent, it is not
>much considering the benefits.
>
> i really need some more input in this, since i am going to make a
>final ruling on it very soon, and need some input beyond me and the
>player. the rule is below, for those that didn't see it before. it
>deals with ruling provinces.
>
>
> what does everyone think of these rules? please give me feedback.
>and if there are any PBeMs or other games that want to use it, feel
>free to.
>
>--
>Adam Theo, A Patriotic American Libertarian Capitalist.
I beleive they are too expensive, especially considering how easy it is to
pillage lands. I know my players wouldn't afford to rule anything with
these rules. That might of course be because they have been kept at a very
low budget (and maintains an army that definately does not reflect that).
I have my own variations on both the pillage and rule actions.
The rule action works exactly like the rulebook one except for that the
effect of ruling a province only comes into effect after 3 months, the
people spend 3 months building industries and gathering there.
While the pillage action requires the units spend one full turn pillaging
and that they can only pillage if the number of units equal the province
level. And I use the raid province rule for quick raids.
Hope this is input like you asked for....
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05-28-1999, 09:33 AM #5DarkstarGuest
House Rule Dispute
Simon Graindorge wrote:
> I always liked the way Ruling (of a province) was handled in Darkstar's
> PBEM. Simply put (and maybe Darkstar can expand on this), when ruling a
> province, the regent was not allowed to use any extra modifiers (RP/GB/etc)
> to affect the dice roll. Thus, the higher the level of the province becomes,
> the harder it is to increase its level.
I introduced the change to stop regents from ruling up provinces too
quickly. Using the standard rules, and with a liberal application of
RPs, it is theoretically possible to go from a level 1 province to a
level ten province in just ten turns. In other words the population of a
province can increase from 1,000 to 100,000 in a little over 2 years,
which is hardly a reasonable increase in my opinion. So I changed the
rule action to forbid the use of RPs, and then later I altered it again
to add the target level of the province to the success roll. Then I
modified it a third time to allow wizard with source holdings in the
province to either support or hinder the rule attempt.
Example:
Regent A has a level 2/5 province which he wishes to rule.
Regent B is a wizard with a level 3 souce holding in the province.
Under the standard rules the success roll is 10+ and regent A can spend
RPs to improve that to 1+
Under my modified rule action the success chance is 13+, no RPs can be
spends and Regent B can use his source holding to influence the roll and
make the success chance 16+ which is a much more difficult proposition
that the original.
So using the modified rule action is become increasingly difficult to
rule a province and wizards with high source holdings in a province are
able to exert more influence over the attempt by the province ruler to
increase the population.
I didn't alter the standard rules for holdings, as they seemed to work
fine as they were.
- --
Ian Hoskins
e-Mail: hoss@box.net.au
Homepage: http://www.chariot.net.au/~hoss
ICQ: 2938300 AIM: IHoskins
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05-28-1999, 05:38 PM #6ryan.caveney@alum.mit.edGuest
House Rule Dispute
On Fri, 28 May 1999, SCO Adam Theo wrote:
> his argument was that it takes too much time, and that it is not worth
> the effort to rule up a province to *any* level, especially high ones.
The response is, "not worth the effort at what scale?" Yes,
within the time frame of a campaign, ruling a province (6) to a province
(7) probably won't help you. However, over the next 20 years, the extra
taxes and especially the extra trade route will be more than worth it to
the country's future. Perhaps you need some short-term incentive (extra
XP? Increased loyalty? Bonuses in diplomacy?) for acting the way a good
long-term planner of a regent should.
Much the same is true of bloodlines: in order for spending RP to
increase them to make sense (in terms of RP gained), a player must expect
the game to last at least his new bloodline number of domain turns. This
means that even in PBEMs, it probably doesn't make sense in the short term
to raise even a 30 to a 31, much less that 30 to a 35 (how many games do
you expect to run 165 domain turns?) However, over the lifespan of a
dynasty, doing just that starts to pay benefits 40 years down the road.
Thus scions of old, established families may (and should) have higher
bloodlines not only because they were closer to the big bang at Deismaar,
but also because they've been gathering RP and pumping them into their
bloodlines for longer. As it was considered a nobleman's duty to insure
that his heirs inherited all the lands he started with and as much more
besides as he could grab for them, it should similarly be considered a
nobleman's duty to insure his heirs inherit a bloodline higher than what
he started with. Of course, bloodtheft allows such an increase with a
much smaller investment of resources, but at the risk of your life.
> my argument. the only thing really affected is time.
Yes. Time. Rate of population growth is one of my two biggest
objections to the Birthright rules (the other is the "On turn 3, Theofold
buys Muden" syndrome induced by the explotratory trade action). My house
rule essentially keeps population growth (over which the ruler has no
control) separate from the Rule action (which now represents things like
building infrastructure, hiring new local officials, etc.). If a province
level increase represents a doubling of the population (as it seems very
likely to do for the first 3-5 levels), it should never happen more often
than once in 30 years; probably closer to once in a hundred. This
obviously means that natural growth alone results in only a handful of
rule actions in the entire game world per campaign, but otherwise people
are just materializing out of thin air, or we have one of those "every
female constantly pregnant with duodectuplets" problems of which "Murphy's
Rules" was so fond. I allow a certain amount of migration-as-an-action to
colonize new provinces or repopulate pillaged ones. I'll post my system
sometime this weekend; the pillage effects still need much work.
> the roll is equal to 10 + the level of the Traget Level. ruling to a
> level 5 takes a 15 or higher.
A house rule on this I really like (but I can't remember who I
took it from - Solmyr, maybe?) is to make the success number equal to
20 - max possible level + target level. This means ruling a plains
province from one level to the next is easier than ruling any other
terrain type between the same levels, with it getting progressively harder
as the terrain gets harder to live in. I do the same thing for creating
provinces (same target number as ruling with level 0 as the target).
> it takes a number of rulings equal to the Target Level to actually
> get that province up to that level. To rule to a level 5, you must
> have 5 Successful rulings on the province, taking at least 5 seasons
This is not a bad plan, but it makes it too easy to increase the
lower levels. I'd suggest making it ten times per increase. Yes, this is
fairly arbitrary, and makes ruling new provinces a huge chore, but
something is needed to keep population growth anywhere remotely sane.
Unfortunately, this causes a delay by sucking up actions, RP and GB. In a
model where you just have to wait, at least they don't lose all that time
and money. In my system, I have a percentage chance for the rule action
to get a chance to roll; the longer they wait, the higher the chance of
being able to roll. If they wait longer than the 100% chance time, they
get a bonus to the action roll.
> when an army invades and pilliages, the first pilliaging does not
> take away the first level of the province, but instead takes out any
> fraction that may exist, then the second pilliage takes out the levels
> as in the Rulebook. So effectively you loose no levels on the first
> pilliaging.
I like this a lot.
- --Ryan
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05-28-1999, 07:48 PM #7JNeighb934@aol.coGuest
House Rule Dispute
In a message dated 05/28/99 0:30:03 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
adamtheo@Theoretic.com writes:
> you may *successfully* rule the province in issue only once a season
> for Huamn, Goblin, Orog, etc. Realms. This changes to Once a Year for
> Elven and Dwarven Realms. if you do not get it the first time, you may
> keep on trying for the next months, until you do. Then when you do,
> you must wait until the next season (or year).
I made almost the same rule for my campaign, but much simpler. I just stated
that no province could be ruled up successfully more than once per year.
After I first went through the BR rules, it struck me that if you could rule
up a province every action round, then why would any regent in any realm
anywhere have a province less than at least 7, if it were that easy? So I
thought limiting province advancement in some way was very sensible, and
since none of my players had ever played Birthright before either, luckily
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05-31-1999, 03:33 AM #8Kenneth GauckGuest
House Rule Dispute
In general I favor slow and believable growth.
However, some growth in province level may represent something other than
simply more bodies. It may reflect the development of institutions and
structures that produce more of what provinces produce. It does take
forever to get more colonists to come to your land. Legalizing joint stock
companies does not. Building a mint, a hall of records, a courthouse.
Enough investment in institutions and the per-capita output may rise. IMC
province growth past level 5 tends to be more about institutions and less
about more bodies.
Kenneth Gauck
c558382@earthlink.net
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06-01-1999, 12:03 AM #9MemnochGuest
House Rule Dispute
I'd hate to start an arguement, but I have to... moral imperative, you see
:-)
- -----Original Message-----
From: Darkstar
To: birthright@lists.imagiconline.com
Date: Saturday, May 29, 1999 3:49 AM
Subject: Re: [BIRTHRIGHT] - House Rule Dispute
>
>
>Simon Graindorge wrote:
>
>
>I introduced the change to stop regents from ruling up provinces too
>quickly. Using the standard rules, and with a liberal application of
>RPs, it is theoretically possible to go from a level 1 province to a
>level ten province in just ten turns. In other words the population of a
>province can increase from 1,000 to 100,000 in a little over 2 years,
>which is hardly a reasonable increase in my opinion. So I changed the
>rule action to forbid the use of RPs, and then later I altered it again
>to add the target level of the province to the success roll. Then I
>modified it a third time to allow wizard with source holdings in the
>province to either support or hinder the rule attempt.
Actually, this is the way that it is supposed to happen according to a
reading of the original rules. Your "modifications to the rule action" put
them back to the way they are supposed to go.
I can do some quoting if you like.
>Example:
>
>Regent A has a level 2/5 province which he wishes to rule.
>Regent B is a wizard with a level 3 souce holding in the province.
>
>Under the standard rules the success roll is 10+ and regent A can spend
>RPs to improve that to 1+
>Under my modified rule action the success chance is 13+, no RPs can be
>spends and Regent B can use his source holding to influence the roll and
>make the success chance 16+ which is a much more difficult proposition
>that the original.
Under the standard rules, the rule action already has a 13+ success roll,
due to having to add the "target" province level to the original (10+)
success number. The only difference that you had was the not being able to
use RP to improve it. Also, the source holder already had the option of
opposing the rule action.
This is one of the major misconceptions that I have seen in the past 3 or 4
years of playing BR. Someone down the line forgot to read *all* the rules
and that particular mistake propogated itself exponentially.
Again, if anyone would like me to point the actual phrases in the rulebook,
I can do so.
Memnoch
>
>So using the modified rule action is become increasingly difficult to
>rule a province and wizards with high source holdings in a province are
>able to exert more influence over the attempt by the province ruler to
>increase the population.
>
>
>I didn't alter the standard rules for holdings, as they seemed to work
>fine as they were.
>
>--
>Ian Hoskins
>
>e-Mail: hoss@box.net.au
>Homepage: http://www.chariot.net.au/~hoss
>
>ICQ: 2938300 AIM: IHoskins
>
>
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06-01-1999, 05:36 AM #10JNeighb934@aol.coGuest
House Rule Dispute
In a message dated 05/31/99 17:12:10 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
memnoch@comic.net writes:
> Under the standard rules, the rule action already has a 13+ success roll,
> due to having to add the "target" province level to the original (10+)
> success number.
I'm sorry, but where is that rule written? I don't see it under the "Rule"
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