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  1. #21
    Site Moderator geeman's Avatar
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    At 08:31 AM 2/12/2008, kgauck wrote:

    >>It ignores the population vs source potential issue
    >
    >It doesn`t ignore it. Once population is determined, sources have to
    >be re-calculated.
    [snip]
    >>If population level represents efficiency and size of a regent`s
    >>taxation system (rather than the tax base itself) shouldn`t law,
    >>guild and temple holdings be able to surpass population level?
    >
    >I think you`ve switched back to an earlier model. If you are
    >actually referring to population level, then that is a fixed maximum
    >for normal growth, limited by the administrative capacities of the
    >age. In a sense, having any holding at the population level
    >represents 100% efficiency.
    >
    >If you don`t actually mean population level, but province level,
    >then sure the efficiency of guilds or temples should be able to
    >exceed the administrative efficiency of a landlord. That`s why its
    >better to think of an administrative holding as separate from the
    >population level. The current system, in which province level
    >combines population and administrative efficiency assumes that land
    >rulers don`t control their own efficiency, since they can`t tweak it
    >the way other rulers can.

    There`s very little for me to go on here, since nobody`s really
    described what the ideas are in anything other than generalities, and
    we`re running into a little confusion regarding terms, so let`s see
    if we can fix that first off....

    For the sake of nominal nomenclature, let`s keep "population level"
    actually meaning the number of people in the province. You`re saying
    that population level is fixed and it still interacts with source
    potential, right? So a province might have a rating of 6/1 (or
    whatever depending on its terrain type.) There are law, guild,
    temple and source holdings in addition to a new factor that
    represents the province ruler`s control over that fixed level 4
    population level. Let`s call that "tax base" since that seems to be
    the more pertinent aspect of the concept as has been
    discussed. Effectively, a province ruler`s domain represents a sort
    of holding rather than the province itself. Population level in this
    interpretation doesn`t earn a regent RP, only tax base does. At
    least, it looks to me like it works that way from what`s been
    suggested. Is that about right?

    >>Along those same lines, shouldn`t it be possible for there to be
    >>more than one domain ruler in a province just as there can be more
    >>than one regent for each of the holding types?
    >
    >Yes! Interesting places like the Maesil river where Ghoere and
    >Mhoried have law holdings in each other`s domains could be improved
    >by having administrative holdings on each side, indicating they
    >control towns or keeps in each other`s domains, either directly
    >because they captured them in a previous war or because the lords or
    >towns have sworn vasalage, or because they or their vassals have
    >inherited these places.

    OK, that`s interesting. Assuming the above assessment is correct, I
    have a few specific questions:

    1. Is "population level" the maximum set by the terrain type? If
    not, then how is it determined?

    2. Is "population level" changed in any way or is it forever static?

    3. Can law, guild and temple holdings surpass "tax base" in this system?

    4. Isn`t this "tax base" version of the domain level really just
    splitting the law holding up? Or, more to the point, couldn`t one
    just roll those two concepts into a single holding? Why have
    both? I`ve fiddled around with an entirely holding based system in
    the past, and that`s pretty much how it worked.

    Gary

  2. #22
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by geeman View Post
    You`re saying that population level is fixed and it still interacts with source potential, right? So a province might have a rating of 6/1 (or
    whatever depending on its terrain type.)
    Yes.

    Effectively, a province ruler`s domain represents a sort of holding rather than the province itself. Population level in this interpretation doesn`t earn a regent RP, only tax base does. At least, it looks to me like it works that way from what`s been
    suggested. Is that about right?
    Yes.

    1. Is "population level" the maximum set by the terrain type? If not, then how is it determined?
    Its set by maximum possible for terrain type.

    2. Is "population level" changed in any way or is it forever static?
    I'd say at the game level, its forever static. The increase from x^2 to (x+1)^2 is in the ballpark of a hundred thousand people. As long as we continue to operate as a series of integers for describing these things, population should be static. I think it would take a century to increase a single level from natural growth.

    Plus, if we assume that population is at its maximum set by terrain type, then new people are on marginal or unproductive land. Or they are just hungry marauders. Changes of this kind would seem to require tracking population on excel so you could have decimals out to here.

    3. Can law, guild and temple holdings surpass "tax base" in this system?
    Sure, why should the landlord always be the most efficient guy on the block?

    4. Isn`t this "tax base" version of the domain level really just splitting the law holding up? Or, more to the point, could`t one just roll those two concepts into a single holding? Why have both? I`ve fiddled around with an entirely holding based system in the past, and that`s pretty much how it worked.
    For people who like to roll hide and move silently together into a single hide skill, this might be attractive, but here's what you're giving up:

    Landlords are not always the law. Sometimes, such as in a theocracy, the temples should have the law. If law is really part of land, then you can only do a binary situation where temples own land, or they don't own land. Although the temples could be more efficient, basically its either all church, or its church and state rivalry. Likewise the dominance of Miss Bireon over Cariele is only plain because she holds the law there (as well as some in Dhoesone).

    Indeed, look at Dhoesone. We can see how the state is weaker than elsewhere, because the Baroness doesn't control much law. And its not just she's weak, we know who the other powers are who rival her power. Its not the temples, though it could be. Instead, its the guilders.

    With PC's sometimes you re-design stuff to give everyone a part to play. The law holding allows you to put a PC in the Medoere spot, and another PC in the Celestial Spell spot, and RCS has most of the law (or 20% of the land and 80% of the law) while the Medoere PC has the rest (80% of the land, 20% of the law) then its plain that the RCS is the leader of the group (assuming another PC is the source guy and another is the guild guy).

    Law also is different from land, which is about the military and the money to wage war, basically. When you break the law, who do you face? The nobles? the priests? the guilds? minions of the strange wizard who no one ever sees? Certainly a priest gets favorable treatment against his rivals if the courts are controlled by the temples. Blasphomy may annoy the nobles and require you to pay a fine, but priests may take that offense far more seriously. Law holdings tell you who controls the law from place to place. That certainly tells you a lot about who runs thing, rather than just assuming that the landlord is master.

  3. #23
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    So Kgauck, would all Population levels be set at the race vs. terrain usage levels? So plains provinces by the sea would be 10, and elves in the forest would be 8, etc?

    Then we have five holding types left: Land holder (the Province Rating--not owner necessarily, but invested controller, with a tax base), Law, Temple, Guild, and Source?

    So the human coastal plains are 10/0, supporting up to 10 Land Holding levels, 10 Law, 10 Temple, 10 Guild, and 0 Source? And Elven forests would be 8/9, sustaining up to 8 Land, 8 Law, --Temple, 8 Guild, 9 Source (9/9 by rivers and 10/9 by seas)? Humans end up with almost no source potentials, btw: any plains or hills: 7 or 8/0; forests: 6/1; swamps: 6/2; mountains: 3/4; dwarven mountains: 7/0.

    On a related note, I think there is a problem still with the disruption of mebhaigl on the land. Why would human, dwarven, and goblin bodies reduce mebhaigl simply as a function of their number? Mebhaigl seems to spring from some terrain-based source unrelated to what lives on that land. For example high mountains support higher mebhaigl than forests, despite the fact that they may sustain less life.
    Last edited by Rowan; 02-12-2008 at 11:21 PM.

  4. #24
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rowan View Post
    So the human coastal plains are 10/0, supporting up to 10 Land Holding levels, 10 Law, 10 Temple, 10 Guild, and 0 Source? And Elven forests would be 8/9, sustaining up to 8 Land, 8 Law, --Temple, 8 Guild, 9 Source (9/9 by rivers and 10/9 by seas)? Humans end up with almost no source potentials, btw: any plains or hills: 7 or 8/0; forests: 6/1; swamps: 6/2; mountains: 3/4; dwarven mountains: 7/0.
    These seem fine.

    On a related note, I think there is a problem still with the disruption of mebhaigl on the land. Why would human, dwarven, and goblin bodies reduce mebhaigl simply as a function of their number? Mebhaigl seems to spring from some terrain-based source unrelated to what lives on that land. For example high mountains support higher mebhaigl than forests, despite the fact that they may sustain less life.
    I don't think life produces mebhaigl. Call this the "rocks and streams" argument, many of the descriptions of mebhaigl say that this magical force pools in natural places, and we read about waterfalls, mountain peaks, and so on. Not bio-mass, but nature, including a lot of stuff we materialists don't regard as alive. Rocks and streams may have spirits, and be alive, but that's a cosmological question. Mountains are just as good an example of nature as forests, so they produce as much or more mebhaigl as forests.

    Humans, dwarves, and goblins are not natural. They are, according to the man vs nature dicotomy, apart from nature. This setting seems to embrace this theory. Its related to the magic vs civilization theory. So men and their crafts, towns, and unnatural way of life reduce source potential.

  5. #25
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    If you let holdings exceed province level and run up to 8-10 in most places, holding levels will race up and more than double across Anuire, doubling GB and RP. Expanding province holdings, if kept so much more difficult and expensive than expanding other holdings, will leave Temple and Guild regents significantly more powerful, likely moreso than the landed nobles. Wizards other than elves in elven realms will be incredibly weak.

    I'm not saying the game can't be rebalanced to accomodate these, but it will need to be rebalanced.



    As for mebhaigl, I agree that it's not tied to living things in particular. In fact, if anything, it seems to follow the natural flow of water more than anything else (snow-capped mountains with many streams and lakes, swamps, forests, rivers; plains, hills, etc. are often more arid than these). Non-elven settled lands tend to involve irrigation, channelization, and other manipulation of water, so that could be considered the most direct source of impact.

    I acknowledge the civilization vs. magic vibe in BR, but I'd make the adjustment IMC that this is more of a perception, and the reality has more to do with the conflict between blooded, landed regents tying themselves to the land that interferes with the mebhaigl of the land (as I've described in an earlier post). I think that's an explanation that fits with the flavor of the game pretty well and keeps the current province level structure.

  6. #26
    Site Moderator kgauck's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rowan View Post
    Expanding province holdings, if kept so much more difficult and expensive than expanding other holdings...
    I don't what this means or where it came from. What does province mean? Population? or Administration?

    I acknowledge the civilization vs. magic vibe in BR, but I'd make the adjustment IMC that this is more of a perception, and the reality has more to do with the conflict between blooded, landed regents tying themselves to the land that interferes with the mebhaigl of the land (as I've described in an earlier post). I think that's an explanation that fits with the flavor of the game pretty well and keeps the current province level structure.
    I think that the core idea of the setting is the birthright to rule. Making that birthright a problematic element of the game in conflict with other values seems to oppose the very heart of the setting.

  7. #27
    Site Moderator geeman's Avatar
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    At 11:57 AM 2/12/2008, kgauck wrote:

    One more question and a follow up question about the static concept
    of population and "tax base" to represent the province ruler`s
    control over the domain:

    5. Is it rule in the same way population levels are ruled? That is,
    can it be done only once per domain turn?

    >>1. Is "population level" the maximum set by the terrain type? If
    >>not, then how is it determined?
    >
    >Its set by maximum possible for terrain type.

    So the entire continent is already at its Malthusian maximum
    population level? I`m thinking that this would require a review of
    the existing population level maximums as they appear to have been
    set not as a base-line for population but as actual maximums. There
    should be some sort of way to account for variables in population density.

    Gary

  8. #28
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    Kgauck, geeman just asked what I was referring to about provinces. You've suggested that there should be a province holding like the other four. We're asking if it still costs Target Province Holding Level in GB to Rule a Province Holding, if it can only be done once per season across the whole realm, with no Realm action, if the DC is still equal to Target Level and can't be modified by RP?

    Or can you rule Province Holding levels just the same as any other holding (1GB, DC = to target level, modifiable by RP, can be done any time and as a Realm action).

    How would you rebalance all of this?

    I think that the core idea of the setting is the birthright to rule. Making that birthright a problematic element of the game in conflict with other values seems to oppose the very heart of the setting.
    I don't see what you're getting at. All I'm talking about is explaining the current province level vs. source potential conflict that already exists. Landed rulers already conflict with source potential when they expand their provinces. Where's the opposition you see?

  9. #29
    Site Moderator AndrewTall's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Rowan View Post
    I don't see what you're getting at. All I'm talking about is explaining the current province level vs. source potential conflict that already exists. Landed rulers already conflict with source potential when they expand their provinces. Where's the opposition you see?
    In the standard system if landed regent A rules up their province causing source holder B to lose a source holding level, then landed regent A has boosted their nations strength and cohesiveness, and as a sad side effect weakened source holder B's holding - sorry dude, that's progress. Source holder B may be unchuffed but they can see that the rule action isn't personal. Under your suggestion, as I read it, land regent A is directly opposing source holder B purely on a personal power level with no 'benefit to the people' to justify the insult caused. Given the legendary vengefulness of gamers this could be hazardous to game survival.

    My personal views on sources is to move towards a plant-life basis, with the mebhaighl flow being disrupted by straight fields, drainage ditches, etc which are needed by a civilised population. That then 'explains' the mebhaighl hit from most populations as the 'raw and wild' lands that let mebhaighl pool are converted into fields and the like which while potentially generating the same mebhaighl disperse it by their very nature.

    My personal view on population is that I like to have frontiers and core states with differing populations - although that could easily be built in to the basic 'all provinces are full' argument. I do wonder about the effect of major plagues, and genocidal pillaging on the mechanic though - these are more common in a campaign than RL, similarly goblin (in particular) generational bulges that require either mass culls (ala sparta) or major wars to thin the herd.

    A mechanic whereby the actual population could only be modified with extreme difficulty (to represent slow population growth barring mass immigration) with a new holding type for population level would certainly resolve some issues, but I wonder in practice what the impact would be since effectively you are simply swapping 'I hold the population level 4' for 'I hold government level 4'. The change in mechanic is handy for people like me who want to make, say, Soniele in Dhoesone have 1 level each of humans, goblins and elves with each having a completely distinct government, but it may possibly be easier to simply use the existing province level (split by ruler as necessary) with the actual population split a background issue. The source issue could then be side stepped by assuming minimal values in provinces and other high population areas and beefing it up in forests, swamps and the like to keep source levels low for everyone barring elves and goblins (who also suffer from weak holdings). Alternatively a DM could simply say that source levels relate to connection to the Shadow World, each source level in a realm increasing the chance of a random event by say 1%... that should encourage realm holders not to smile upon high source levels!

  10. #30
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    Under your suggestion, as I read it, land regent A is directly opposing source holder B purely on a personal power level with no 'benefit to the people' to justify the insult caused.
    It's not all personal power. It's still a matter of "progress," in the form of organization, administration, realm unity, and a realm ruler being able to better provide for and strengthen his people by making the realm more efficient/effective and gaining regency to further that. It's just that concurrent with this progress the land bonds more closely with the realm ruler; the progression really parallels the march of civilization, and sources suffer because the land's power gets channeled more through the unity of the people to a realm than through wild mebhaigl.

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