BRCS Questions and Clarifications Regarding Domains

[Will]

I'm going to feel that these are some remedial things to ask, but ask them I will.

I've been digging into the BR.net BRCS and am a little hung up on some of the specifics of Domain building and management.

A Realm is built of Provinces, which contain Holdings, yes? How many Provinces can one Regent control? Does he need to delegate a Vassal per Province? Per Holding? It seems as if the Vassalage rites surrender any gains that a Holding would provide to a Regent to said Vassal, giving only 1 RP per turn to the Regent in exchange.

Why would a Regent surrender those gains of RP and GB for such a paltry reward?

I didn't see anything about restrictions on how much a Regent can keep to himself, so I'm left wondering on this one a bit. I'm looking to base a campaign in Brechtur, with the PCs working for a coastal trading Guild, one of many in this particular City-State, and I need to know if it's normal for the Guild to held by a Vassal, the Province to be held by a Vassal, or everything to just be controlled by a Regent, and worked by non-blooded folks.

Also, is there a handy guide on building a Realm, Province, or Holding according to these rules, anywhere around here?

Thanks for any help with clarifying this. I really appreciate it.

[AndrewTall]

I'm going to feel that these are some remedial things to ask, but ask them I will.

No problem

A Realm is built of Provinces, which contain Holdings, yes? How many Provinces can one Regent control? Does he need to delegate a Vassal per Province? Per Holding? It seems as if the Vassalage rites surrender any gains that a Holding would provide to a Regent to said Vassal, giving only 1 RP per turn to the Regent in exchange.

In theory a regent could control every available province and holding. In practice the domain would be unmanageable, the ruler would gain only a tiny fraction of the available RP (it is capped by bloodline) and would have only 3 actions to try to answer every random action and every other action fate threw at them.

In practice therefore the ruler of a large domain sub-divides their ownership through vassalage, directly controlling only the key (usually geographically proximate) holdings and then controlling the others through their vassal. That way the RP cap can be less burdensome, the vassal can deal with random events, etc, and various diplomatic role-play benefits occur.

The ruler then agrees (if they can) for the vassal to provide them with a share of the GB, perhaps military support, and through the vassalage agrement itself can obtain the agreed amount of RP (minimum 1 but normally would be set higher). The balance of what is actually paid over (aside from RP) depends on the people involved and the agreement that they actually follow.

Why would a Regent surrender those gains of RP and GB for such a paltry reward

The rules only set the RP transfer, and that is usually 'pure profit' for the Regent as they tend to be at their RP cap. Diplomatic agreements would then set other exchanges, which would depend on the situation - if a Regent owned holdings outright and granted them to a lieutenant in exchange for the lieutenant becoming a vassal, then I'd expect a fairly hefty GB and military tirubte to be agreed along with a mutual defense pact as part of the deal - though not enough to encourage the lieutenant to immediately seek to undermine the deal, if the vassalage agreement was between two existing domains I'd expect a much weaker deal.

The Regent loses some GB if they previously held the domain to be held by the vassal, but they then have a potentially deniable pawn to take some actions for them, and may be able to improve efficiency in their domain - the obvious example is a non-caster Regent granting source/temple holdings to a wizard/priest in exchange for vassalage where the vassal can then gain RP and support the Regent with realm spells, but a province owner moving guild holdings to a vassal who can then expand the guild into other provinces which might not tolerate a guild owned by the Regent directly could give major espionage, etc benefits to the province owner.

The general rule is the smaller the domain the more likely it is to be run by one regent, and the larger and more complex the more likely it is to be broken up.

Where the vassalage follows a defeat in battle, etc (so th eloser surrenders, pays a forfeit and has to agree to become a vassal) is a more obvious way for some vassalage agreements to arise.

Diplomacy and internal cohesion of domains (role stuff) can also play a part in some games.

It depends a lot on DM game play too, the Ruins of Empire games by GreenKnight had lots of vassals - 3 or 4 in most realms for example, but the player played the 'realm' which included the vassals. The vassals might not be 100% loyal, but generally were part of 'team regent', although they gave the DM plenty of scope for intrigue.

[Will]

Thanks for the response. I'm still a bit overwhelmed, and while I think that playing this in person with experienced players would help with that, I'm disappointed to know that's probably not an option for me. Nevertheless, it clarifies a lot, and I appreciate it.

[AndrewTall]

Very welcome, happy to help.