Another use for RP

[ryancaveney]

I like the idea of using RP in place of XP. 4th edition is finally going to get rid of the XP costs anyway, but in the meantime perhaps 1 RP = 100 XP or so?

That's exactly what I've done for years, and it works great. In fact, that's the basic idea behind the realm spell Consecrate Relic (Book of Priestcraft, pp. 113-115): it establishes a formula for taking a set of magic item bonuses and calculating the RP and GB cost of making the desired object with a domain action.

As for adventure-level bonuses, though, I've always used bloodline score as a fixed modifier, rather than allowing variable RP expenditure. To me, the most obvious adventure modification is increasing effective caster level by the level of the casting wizard's source holding in the province. The method I've liked best for bloodlines is adding some small fraction (usually one-tenth) of the bloodline score as an overall bonus to everything; as the most extreme non-awnshegh, that would give Darien Avan +7 to hit, damage, and saving throws, but give most BR landed rulers just +2 to +4 -- a nice advantage, but not an overwhelming one, and one they could readily duplicate by spending a few dozen GB to purchase magical equipment. I tend not to use it for skills unless mythically appropriate; e.g., Bluff for Azrai, Sense Motive for Anduiras and Escape Artist for Brenna. Applying the same number as a *penalty* to mythically inappropriate skills strikes me as an excellent balancing mechanism -- Avan would get +7 to figure out whether others are lying to him, but would suffer a -7 penalty to telling any lies himself, which would make it very hard indeed to be a successful politician. =)

[Rowan]

I had almost forgotten about the magic item creation system in 2e. Good points, Geeman! It's a matter of mindset, I think. If you make every non-expendable magic item of any real power the focus of a quest, that also helps things.

I have always liked the idea of powerful magic items created for or by great heroes to pursue epic goals; Birthright realm-level play lends itself well to this, with the RP and realm spell function potentially allowing temples and wizard regents to make a focused effort and craft a mighty weapon against the awnsheghlien. That's how many of the artifacts in BRCS were probably created.

I think it likely that Rhuobhe, the Spider, the Seadrake, the Chimaera, and certainly the Gorgon will never be vanquished until a great hero can wield an epic relic of power in combat against them.


If we really want to play up the divine nature of the bloodlines, we should be looking into some of the ideas in the 3.5e rules for deities (scaled down, of course). Climbing out of the box a little more, RP or the Bloodline score/modifier could be used to pull off wondrous things (dodge terrible blows that would otherwise have hit, or stand and take them as subdual damage/DR/heal them; cut through a foe's resistances; deliver smites, etc).

I have always wanted to play a game that embodies some of epic-ness of the old Ted Nasmith paintings of middle earth, with resolute heroes standing against foes much greater than they (Morgoth, Balrogs, Shelob, Ringwraiths, etc.). These are things outside the realm of mere mortals; Birthright's scions, though, seem made for them.