A New PBeM

[Question]

You need to be more clear which domains are strictly NPC,which are taken(and by who) and which is available.You also need to post regent stats and holding info,or only the people with the books have the faintest idea what kind of realm they are choosing and what kind of regent they will be playing.The classic map is missing a lot of province info,icemarch for instance just has capital listed,no province levels listed.

And IMHO the rule province rules are ridiculous.The way you setup it up there will be NO incentive to rule provinces.

Example : rulling province 4 to 5.

This takes 5 GB,5 RP,5 court actions(and thus you need to convince other regents to help you,probably 2.), then beat a DC of 15 with NO modifiers allowed,AKA 25% chance to suceed.

On average a player would need to spend 20 GB,20 RP and convince other regents to help him accumulate 20 court actions to do it.

And what does he get?An extra 1 gb on moderate taxation.An extra 1 RP.

20 turns to get back your investment and start making a profit.This translates to about 1 year 8 months assuming each turn is 1 month and turn processing is instant.Realistically 20 turns will be slightly over 2 years.No player is going to try and make an investment that pays off in about 2 years IRL.

Law holdings also appear to be seriously nerfed.......they were already weaker than guilds or temples in making money(1/3rd instead of 2/3rds a GB per level),now your system just makes everything much worse.

High (+1)
Average (+/- 0)
Poor (-2)
Rebellious (-10)

I also take issue with this unfair loyalty system.Poor loyalty gives a -2 penalty but high loyalty is +1?How is this fair?

It should be :

Fanatic(+10)
High (+2)
Average (+/- 0)
Poor (-2)
Rebellious (-10)

Actually +/-10 is probably too large so.....

Fanatic(+4)
High (+2)
Average (+/- 0)
Poor (-2)
Rebellious (-4)

Sounds fairer.

Theres no incentive to agitate to high loyalty.A grand total of a +1 bonus to DDC checks...omg so huge.......Why not just take the dozens of RP i spend agitating on altering the DDC checks instead.

Also dark blue on gray is a very bad idea.

Im not trying to insult your house rules or anything but these are my opinions and suggestions......i hope you at least consider them.

[fiftyone]

The Player list shows realms taken, realms with an NPC ruler and realms that are blank or open. If that isn't clear enough I don't know what is.

* edit, ill add 'available' in next to the realms that are open

There is a page under construction that I am going to put up in a week or so that will have the remaining Available domains and small description of its regent's stats and holdings. The point of accepting people at this time is to get a good number of people who have the books and know the landscape.

The provinces with no information on the classic map are provinces that No information is known about. The capital labled in the Icemarch is actually a myth, a fantastic location, if you will.

No incentive to rule provinces? Working as intended. Moving thousands of people in any way, fantasy, settlement or whatever, should never be easy. Rarely even feasible.

Law holdings generate less money than guilds and temples. In the original rules they generated none. They had to claim tax on other holdings income (guild/temple) and take part of that. That would probably annoy many players. The added bonus of Law holdings is that they are the only holding that passively controls/sustains a provinces loyalty.

The Loyalty system I may change a bit, but rebellious will remain -10.

Dark blue on dark grey.. I can change that easily

Fiftyone
- Chris K.

[Question]

Erm in the BRCS it explictly says that law holdings generate 1/3rd GB per level.Which original rules are you referring to?

And naturally law holdings need to sustain province loyalty......guild/temple regents very often do not rule landed realms and have no need for province loyalty.Only a few cases such as in the case of talinie gets the best of both worlds(landed AND money income from temples).

There is a fine line between "realism" and "uselessness".I mean,realistically we could have a "mass execute" standard action that signifies your troops just killing as many people in the province as possible,but there would be NO incentive to do it.....no GP,RP,etc rewards.Thus,no one is going to use it.Even a blood thirsty awnshegh would be smart enough to just investiture the damn land for RP/GB.

I am VERY against useless or near useless actions or "features" in a game that serve no purpose other than to give the players an option to make a very poor investment or to try and "resemble" real life workings just for the hell of it.

Might as well add a "tell populace to fuck off" standard action that instantly causes all provinces to go rebellious.........

[fiftyone]

Erm in the BRCS it explictly says that law holdings generate 1/3rd GB per level.Which original rules are you referring to?

The original printed material, circa 1995.

The rule province action stands as is for now.

*edit.. 1d4-1 !!!!

[ausrick]

Just something I noticed that you may or may not have already considered. I know some rules and situations lower a province's rating, i.e. getting a bunch of levies killed off in foreign wars, plagues, pillaging, etc. With your ruleset as it is, recovering from such catastrophies is much more diffucult unless you were going to have a different ruleset to rule a province back up to a level it had in its former glory.

[fiftyone]

What's posted on the website at the moment are really just the basic rules. If a player really roleplays a situation, gathers his people, escorts them with an army (and did the action the way its supposed to be done) and just thoroughly puts a lot of effort and heart into it, how could I say the action failed?

Some situations will just require me to roll a d20, but if the player really digs in and loads tons of details and great thought into an action.. things could go very well.

That's something i'm working my way into right now, just trying to word the next page of the website correctly, a page that will have all of the real house rules and and variants used in the game. As well as the little (and BIG) nuances of playing a game in Vosgaard.

I guess I just really want to get the feel of the game right for everyone, including myself.