Fortified Holdings and Contest Actions

[irdeggman]

Not likely, a level 0 guild holding does not have the capacity to meet demand. Endier does not have the merchants, guards, employees, warehouses, and supply routes in place to bring his goods to market. It is one thing to persuade (or threaten as you seem to imply) people into agreeing to buy your goods. However, when push comes to shove when i need bread, or pants, or a new cow and El Hadid can sell them to me and Guilder Kalien can't I'm gonna have to buy El Hadid's pants.

But with a 0-level holding as a base Kalien can convince the populace that El Hadis's products are not worth buying. Then when the guild level drops (a refelction of this) he then steps in to meet the demand by raising his guild level.

>propoganda undermines the people's trust in EH's
>merchants and goods;

Same as above. I'll buy it, but i won't like it. This would be an agitate action to reduce loyalty, not a contest action. Don't confuse influence with loyalty. Loyalty indicates how cooperative I feel, influence indicates how much of a choice I have in the matter. If you are the only person that can give me what I need, then you have a great deal of influence over me, regardless of whether or not I'd like to kick you in the shins. If I kick you in the shins and take it anyway, well that is a revolt.

Contest is like an agitate except it has a direct concrete effect (i.e., it lowers a holding level) - it is more focused than an agitate action.

>perhaps Kalien diverts vital products out of Braeme's
>markets entirely (through banditry, bribery, conspiracy, or simply buying up
>all the trade goods before they reach the market), leaving the people with
>nothing to buy - and they'll hopefully blame EH for not coming through.

These would qualify as attacks as I see them.

But not in the way that a fortification would help defend. Having walls and swords won't deter this type of action.

Banditry= attacks on human and material assets.

Yes, but that is not what we are talking about. Banditry is an act of physical violence and not one based on influence and advertising if you will.

Bribery and conspiracy= attacks on human assets, and perhaps indirectly on the material assets as the human assets exert control over the material assets for the regents.


Buyout scheme= a fairly obvious, but nonviolent attack on the material assets.

These are the tools of a contest action. Those more subtle less dependent on troops with swords.

>the primary function of fortifications is to protect against raiding and
>pillaging.

Forgive me for being cynical, but i think that the primary function of fortifications is to maintain control

I disagree - the primary function of a fortification is to provide a physical defense usually against invasion, but also against insurrection.

I think it is also a fallacy to think that a fortification is just a wall. Frankly, it is a pretty crappy wall that will fall over almost immediately if the regent fails to pay maintenance. There are examples of walls all over the world that have stood for hundreds if not thousands of years without being maintained.

So where does the money go? I will admit that some will go to routine maintenance, but consider also this: walls have gates, and gates need people to open and close them, and walls need people to walk them. A fortification is more than just a wall. It is too is human and material assets, but unlike a holding whose assets are directed outward towards the province, the fortification is directed at the holding. It controls who has access, when they have access, what they can bring with them, what they can take with them. In short it is vigilance, "security measures" if you will, and people are watched.

Well that is were reality and fantasy have to diverge. It is also the way to handle things game-mechanically - otherwise it really can't be done.

Even if the primary purpose of the fortification were protection against pillaging, that purpose would be only rarely used. It seems that all this expense could also be put to another use, a more commonplace use. Think along the lines of this analogy: A fortification is to a holding as a law holding is to a province. It provides control, but it doesn't ensure it.

And that is why almost all fortifications are at the province/capital level. They are designed to keep invaders out. Fortifying holdings is an expensive option with not too much to be gained by it - unless of course you are anticipating someone to use troops against you. Like say the province regent when he tries to use an occupy province action to lower your holding level.

And don't think that the only means to get around it is through a "physical attack". Guards can be bribed, elaborate means of getting messages in and out can be devised, security can be overcome. However, all that is an extra effort. You have to peel back the levels of protection before you can get at the meaty bits. Hence, my proposal.

>If a Contest action is viewed as eroding influence, I don't think it is at all
>confusing means and ends to think that there are plenty of non-physical
>ways to do this (numerous examples supplied in my previous post).

What I meant by my admittedly cryptic remark was this: Holdings are not influence, holdings produce influence. If I have a holding, I therefore have influence. If your end is to reduce my influence, you don't sally forth to wage a campaign against the influence itself. That would be tilting at windmills, it would be akin to persuading people to buy your goods instead of mine without having any means of backing up the persuasion. The means then by which you deny me influence is by attacking the source of that influence.

The system in the BRCS is an attempt to capture what the 2nd ed system did with fortifications (which was indeed only to defend against troops by the way - that was their only function) and still try to make things a skill based system ala 3/3.5.

[soudhadies]

>But with a 0-level holding as a base Kalien can convince the populace that
>El Hadis's products are not worth buying. Then when the guild level drops (a
>refelction of this) he then steps in to meet the demand by raising his guild
>level.

>Contest is like an agitate except it has a direct concrete effect (i.e., it
>lowers a holding level) - it is more focused than an agitate action.

[Quote]
Hostile populaces despise or ridicule the regent . . . the regent receives no seasonal regency or gold collection from areas that maintain a hostile attitude from the regent . . .
[\Quote]

I don't know, it seems to me that encouraging a boycott of El Hadid's products by the populace thus denying him the revenues and, incidentally, the influence (in the form of RP) generated by the holding sounds a lot like agitating the people's attitude of the guild to a hostile attitude. Just goes to show that there is more than one way to achieve an end.

>Yes, but that is not what we are talking about. Banditry is an act of
>physical violence and not one based on influence and advertising if you will.

>These are the tools of a contest action. Those more subtle less dependent
>on troops with swords.

I was not the one to bring up banditry, Osprey did. I was responding to that.

>Well that is were reality and fantasy have to diverge. It is also the way to
>handle things game-mechanically - otherwise it really can't be done.

Ah, but I've just provided a simple, functional game mechanic for the complexity I'm talking about.

The way I have explained my vision of the birthright campaign to my players is as follows: Imagine that you take the greyhound from New York to LA. You see a narrow swath of the country in tremendous detail: people going about their business, trees, rows or corn, gas stations, etc. Now imagine that you fly over the same route. You now have a much broader view of what the country is like, instead you see forests, farms, cities. However, you understand that all the detail and complexity you saw before was there, even if you can't see it.

The flight is of course the BR ruleset. It is the big picture, but in applying it, and playing with it you lose sight of all the richness and detail that underly it. If you refuse to consider it, even in a cursory manner, then you turn it into a "tactical war game with role-playing" rather than a rich, complicated, and living role-playing campaign setting.

>And that is why almost all fortifications are at the province/capital level.
>They are designed to keep invaders out. Fortifying holdings is an expensive
>option with not too much to be gained by it - unless of course you are
>anticipating someone to use troops against you. Like say the province
>regent when he tries to use an occupy province action to lower your
>holding level.

The problem is that fortifying a holding is not only a very expensive proposition, it takes a long time to do. When you have anticipated an imminent attack, it will generally be too late. If the province regent is of a mind to attack you he will do so immediately when you start building. At the very least he will suddenly become very suspicious. It is currently just an expensive boondogle for regents to build on the off-hand chance that maybe someone in the future will somehow try to attack you.

My design philosophy, which you are more than welcome to disagree with, is that if some rule or apect of the game is useless, it either needs to be made useful, or it needs to be cut from the game entirely.

>The system in the BRCS is an attempt to capture what the 2nd ed system
>did with fortifications (which was indeed only to defend against troops by
>the way - that was their only function) and still try to make things a skill
>based system ala 3/3.5.

I will agree that the only function of fortifications in the original birthright campaign was to defend against troops. I will also say that the destruction of holdings was not the only function of the contest action, nor even the most useful function of that action in the original campaign. In fact, I would argue that it would be most foolish use of the original contest action. Contest-Invest was the way to go.

The current incarnation of the contest action functions like pillaging: a limited number of levels are utterly destroyed. Call it symmetry, call it underlying complexity. It just makes sense to me. ::Shrug::

However, I am well aware that my ideas are not neccessarily popular, and that nine times out of ten anything that I post will be met with casual disregard if not outright derision. That happened last time I started a campaign and tried to contribute. I don't see much point in continuing the argument. My idea is out there. If anyone likes it, they can use it. I yield the field, and the last word to those who may wish it.

[Robbie]

I tend to agree with Bearcat's reasoning and I'd like to add a few thoughts on the matter.

The primary function of a castle in the middle ages was not to defend against an invader, it was the control of the population. When 5,000 Normans conquered a 1.5 million Saxon England, the only way for them to maintain a hold over the extremely overwhelming hostile populace was to build a network of Donjons (and later full size castles) which had the following effect:

- The lord and his relatively small retinue (let us assume about 20 armed men at most that any particular lord could command - there were about 250 greater lords in William's England) could focus their attack on any single village, farmstead, or perhaps even a small town because 20 armoured and armed men did command respect and, if it came down to that, could in fact defeat a bunch of peasants without weapons or armor. Moreover any lord had connections (allies, relatives) which could provide him with reinforcements if things got really ugly. So, even if there was a large scale revolt, lets say a few hundred peasants rebell, all he had to do was sit in his castle until enough seasoned troops of other lords or the king arrive to do some crowd control.

In fact the castles were the law, since the very sight of their impregnable walls (one mustn't forget that even seasoned armies actually resorted to siege warfare, as there was little chance of capturing a castle by storming before the age of gunpowder, and it happened very rarily in the middle ages), showed the populace that "resistance is futile" since there was no chance of a coordinated all out assault against the entire noble population of the country, which would have been the only way to defeat them - take on all of them at once (which was impossible, of course)

Because of the power a castle gave to a noble residing in it, most kings reserved the right to approve any castlebuilding projects. In Hungary, the king had many castles build after the Mongol invasion in 1241, so one could say that the external threat was the motivating factor, but one needs to see the effects of this decision. As long as the majority of the castles were in the hands of the king (during the Angevin dynasty for example in the 14th century) things were fine and the powerful lords were obedient and loyal. However, when Sigismund of Luxemburg was elected he had to grant many of the royal castles to his followers (since his claim to the throne was weak he depended on their support), giving them in fact the "keys to the realm." Since he commanded great personal respect, especially after becoming Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, this problem did not surface in his lifetime, but after 1437, the kingdom became the private playing ground of contesting noble factions - basically - anarchy. Castles equalled power and control of the land, and without a strong king this power became nearly absolute. The only reason why the kingdom didn't fall apart was because the magnates' castles were dispersed throughout the land (which was the Angevin strategy for maintaining control).

Therefore, what Bearcat argues is correct from this point of view. As long as the castle physically stands it commands influence and respect. If a sheriff appears with 50 men and tells the villagers that his liege is the new lord, while the castle of the previous lord still stands on the hill, how can the villagers react. Most likely they would pay both the new sheriff and the local lord who would again reassert his power the moment this new sheriff left the county.

The lord of the castle needs perhaps 10-20 men to defend the castle and ride out to punish the villagers who refuse to pay, whereas a new claimant would probably need 40 or 50 to control the region without a castle. When you don't have a place to hide and rest in, accidents can happen. A guard will fall asleep, a stray soldier will vanish in the forest etc. Feeding and paying so many troops will become a logistical nightmare and sooner or later, unless the castle itself is taken, the local lord will reassert his claim.

Of course, how this should be reflected in the game mechanics, I have no idea.

[Robbie]

Perhaps a fortification could add to the level of the holding for the purposes of defending against contest only (no income, rps, offensive contest etc) AND unless destroyed it could regenerate the owner's influence over time.

Perhaps the owner could use a contested rule (I think there was once an action of this sort in some home rules) which allows the takeover of an opponent's level up to the level of the fortification. This would simulate the ease with which one who controls the fortification can reassert his influence in the local population, whereas it makes it increasingly difficult and costly for the opponent.

Let's say lord A has a fortification 2 and a holding 4 in a province. Lord B contests him out of existance in a series of actions, but doesn't storm the fort itself. Lord B builds up his holdings to level 4, but during this time he has to defend against lord A using contested rule to snatch a level from him. If lord A succeeds in his action (which is a question of GB/RP) and steals a level of holding he's back in business and lord B has to contest again. Once lord A has reclaimed 2 levels he can no longer use the contested rule action as his holdings cannot regenerate more than they're worth.

This would make the fortifications both realistic and useful, while justifying their high cost at the same time.

Additionaly, ther should perhaps be a way for the "invader" to contest the fortress itself, perhaps besieging it or something like that, be that through a non-declare war action or, in the end, perhaps one really needs to dedicate troops to be able to safely claim a province. No one said conquests should be easy

[irdeggman]

Per Fields of Blood – the Book of War by Eden Studios.



The section on defining Realms has some definitions that are fairly consistent with the BRCS usage. Note that Fields of Blood was published in Nov 2003, a long time after the BRCS-playtest was posted (Feb 2003) – so we didn’t “take” anything from them. regardless it is averygood ruleset for those who want something other than the BRCS.



Under permanent Fortifications pgs 20+ it is extremely clear that fortifications provide a Physical defense only. Castles: In a strict, functional sense, a castle is a building with solid, stone walls meant to protect its defenders, no more and no less.”



DMG Chap 3 (Actually the SRD):

Walls and Gates

Many cities are surrounded by walls. A typical small city wall is a fortified stone wall 5 feet thick and 20 feet high. Such a wall is fairly smooth, requiring a DC 30 Climb check to scale. The walls are crenellated on one side to provide a low wall for the guards atop it, and there is just barely room for guards to walk along the top of the wall. A typical small city wall has AC 3, hardness 8, and 450 hp per 10-foot section.



A typical large city wall is 10 feet thick and 30 feet high, with crenellations on both sides for the guards on top of the wall. It is likewise smooth, requiring a DC 30 Climb check to scale. Such a wall has AC 3, hardness 8, and 720 hp per 10-foot section.



A typical metropolis wall is 15 feet thick and 40 feet tall. It has crenellations on both sides and often has a tunnel and small rooms running through its interior. Metropolis walls have AC 3, hardness 8, and 1,170 hp per 10- foot section.



Unlike smaller cities, metropolises often have interior walls as well as surrounding walls—either old walls that the city has outgrown, or walls dividing individual districts from each other. Sometimes these walls are as large and thick as the outer walls, but more often they have the characteristics of a large city’s or small city’s walls.



Watch Towers: Some city walls are adorned with watch towers set at irregular intervals. Few cities have enough guards to keep someone constantly stationed at every tower, unless the city is expecting attack from outside. The towers provide a superior view of the surrounding countryside as well as a point of defense against invaders.



Watch towers are typically 10 feet higher than the wall they adjoin, and their diameter is 5 times the thickness of the wall. Arrow slits line the outer sides of the upper stories of a tower, and the top is crenellated like the surrounding walls are. In a small tower (25 feet in diameter adjoining a 5-foot-thick wall), a simple ladder typically connect the tower’s stories and the roof. In a larger tower, stairs serve that purpose.



Heavy wooden doors, reinforced with iron and bearing good locks (Open Lock DC 30), block entry to a tower, unless the tower is in regular use. As a rule, the captain of the guard keeps the key to the tower secured on her person, and a second copy is in the city’s inner fortress or barracks.



Gates: A typical city gate is a gatehouse with two portcullises and murder holes above the space between them. In towns and some small cities, the primary entry is through iron double doors set into the city wall.



Gates are usually open during the day and locked or barred at night. Usually, one gate lets in travelers after sunset and is staffed by guards who will open it for someone who seems honest, presents proper papers, or offers a large enough bribe (depending on the city and the guards).





Simple House: This one- to three-room house is made of wood and has a thatched roof.



Grand House: This four- to ten-room house is made of wood and has a thatched roof.



Mansion: This ten- to twenty-room residence has two or three stories and is made of wood and brick. It has a slate roof.



Tower: This round or square, three-level tower is made of stone.



Keep: This fortified stone building has fifteen to twenty-five rooms.



Castle: A castle is a keep surrounded by a 15-foot stone wall with four towers. The wall is 10 feet thick.



Huge Castle: A huge castle is a particularly large keep with numerous associated buildings (stables, forge, granaries, and so on) and an elaborate 20-foot-high wall that creates bailey and courtyard areas. The wall has six towers and is 10 feet thick.



Moat with Bridge: The moat is 15 feet deep and 30 feet wide. The bridge may be a wooden drawbridge or a permanent stone structure.

Castles also evolved from forts which were used to defend the population against hostiles - either animals or armies (raiders, etc.) by giving them someplace to go to be better defended. For a BR related story - read the Spider's Test for the formation of Endier.

I still don't see how having a fortification should in any way aid a guild, temple or source holding against a contest action. I can see how it might work for law holdings - but to have a single exception seems kind of too particular and specific for me.

Regardless I'll start a poll to put this to rest, one way or another. If people want fortifications to assist against contest actions then we'll come up with something - if not then we won't.