Rulers and Styles of Play

[A_dark]

Some options were:
1. Rewarding players with increased loyalty: Regent or lieutenant finished a quest; the population is proud and happy
2. Couple extra GBs - especially for temples or guilds or realms strapped for cash
3. Couple new Lieutenants: inspired by the quest, they ask to come in the regent's service bringing much needed skills


Id love to see if any of you had other "benefits" to suggest..

Good ideas. You can have Bloodline increases or RP gains, due to reputation and admiration. It would be exactly the reverse of RP losses when the players don't deal well with random events. You can also have them protected from random events (if you are using them) for a period of time. For example, if the adventure involved dwarves, perhaps an architect comes over and gives a few pointers to protect the realm of earthquake. If they get a Nat disaster event, you can inform them of it and tell them that they can afford to ignore it.

When I was DMing, I found events a good way to keep players occupied, have them work for their alignments etc. Usually they weren't random, but consequences of actions. Ie if the player had a rebellious province, it would not be difficult for a Great Captain figure to emerge or if the player decided that his benevolent temple would launch a Jihad, perhaps a Heressy would spring up. I used events to reward consistency and sticking to alignment (whatever alignment the player had chosen) and "punish" the opposite.

[cyrano24100]

Good ideas. You can have Bloodline increases or RP gains, due to reputation and admiration.

Ah yes, of course; totally forgot that one! Absolutely, I guess that characters are also allowed a bloodline increase once in their life -- so I would have to limit that to repeated adventures, or the favors of the kinred god (or blood type of the old god)

You can also have them protected from random events (if you are using them) for a period of time.

Yup, that's a good one too; or solve a current random event that is lingering...

Good.. let me go back to my Characters whom I've not rewarded yet...

[AndrewTall]

I think the bloodline increase of one per lifetime relates to the strength of the bloodline: minor/major/great/true rather than bloodline points / regency - regency in particular makes a great adventuring reward as for non-landed regents it can be in shorter supply than gold.

Another old favourite of mine was 'free' lieutenants or rare hirelings, the chance to obtain an alliance with a reclusive race, obtain a favour from a powerful person, the chance to obtain a rare item such as dwarven platemail, a mighty warhorse, etc.

These types of reward don't have to be from the DM, Hruthvar owes Storm a favour for his support and Ragnar in particular would give short shrift to anyone who claimed the aaolfer was a coward or lacking in Rjurik ways due to Storm's support. For that matter a certain 'Thaelesian' might be able to wrangle a favour despite her possible true loyalties...

Dargal admittedly failed to win Ragnars favour, something about the goblin king playing the flute while he was cleaving the minions of evil in twain and failing to stand on a tile when requested despite there being no reason whatsoever not to, aside from a slight smell of ozone and burnt Sviniker...

Btw, the only bad thing about the adventure was not remembering to copy it and paste it into a word doc at the end...

Spent two hours afterwards instant messaging other players (had 3 separate conversations going at once and nearly told the white witch about the invasion plans.. oops...) sure sign of a good evening is when you talk about the game so much afterwards.

[cyrano24100]

Btw, the only bad thing about the adventure was not remembering to copy it and paste it into a word doc at the end...

I'm still kicking myself for not having copied that whole coversation string; I'd forgotten about Dargal playing the Flute!.. that's right!... And he didn't want to go first into the corridor (he's the smallest, so we can shoot over his head!)

[The Swordgaunt]

For those of you considering this idea, I can reccommend it. I've used it, occationally in BR, but have real good experience with the Magus/Compannion/Grog-model from Ars Magica.

This frees the high-power (Ruler) character to do high-power stuff, while it allows the GM and players to explore other aspects of the scenario. Say, after a tense game of thrones, the Ruler (Magus) descides to send an envoy or a spy (Compannion) to another court. The success, or failiure, can influence the outcome of the next Realm Action. This can be expanded by running an encounter involving men-at-arms (Grog) on pallace guard duty, or even on the field of battle. I've found that this can open up new dimentions to the story.

Also, should the need arise to have one of the main characters do something on their own, in stead of running this as a one-on-one session, the other players can sit in with Compannions or Grogs. This can be helpful for spinning plots around single charactersm or give less dominating players a spot in the limelight.

[kgauck]

I've also found that with multiple domain rulers (or even only jarls, vassals, or officers of a full domain) the players often feel they need to split up and deal with a variety of time schedules. In addition to the Magus/Companion/Grog-model, or as an alternative, I've also had players develop heir PC's or just new PC's so that when their ruler PC is busy, they have a lower level PC to play with. It also allows a campaign to continue beyond the original PC's.

[The Swordgaunt]

kgauck>
A friend of mine ran a game a while back using this Dynasty-model, to great success. IMO, this allows for a more laid back approach where you can run through years of relatively peaceful times (lots of realm actions, and little Real Time-consuming adventuring), thus building the strenght of the Realm.

I can also see the advantages of building the plot over a few generations. Characters will have more insight in the workings of the Realm, and he can also invoke the name of his great grandfather, the Hero of the Realm who slew the Giant King of the North.

To coin a phrase, the Ars Magica-model could be called the Hierarchical model to avoid copyright infringment and confution.

[Trithemius]

*throws off the leafmold and cobwebs!*

Did someone say Ars Magica?

[/Ben Gunn]

[Trithemius]

I think the key to developing character archetypes for realm-based play is in pinning down, in general terms, what makes a good leader. As part of my thinking about BR -type games using non-D&D systems I have been trying to do this.

Obviously you don't want to have one archetype being good at everything, since this would make choices about character very dull and totally inconsequential. At the same time you don't want to have too many choices as this needlessly (in my opinion...) complicates things. Another advantage of having several archetypes is that if you go for a cooperative realm-based game you can then have different PCs doing different, but still useful, things.

The real issue is then what are these basic archetypes? How many problem solving techniques are there in real-based play?

[kgauck]

Nice to see you, Trithemius.

One of the subjects generating a lot of ink from way back is that a party of adventurers should have a warrior, expert, divine spellcaster, and arcanist. When looking at society, where are the places to find spheres of action for realm based play?

• Societies are actually federations of organizations
• The earliest and most basic locus of power is physical force. The state originated in warfare.
• Early socity saw the simultaneous development of hierarchy and exchange mechanisms. As the chiefdoms gave way to more formalized social forms, the barracks and the market split, and two power centers emerge.
• Maintenence of these inequalities would be much easier with an ideological support, especially one with divine sanction. Enter the temples.
• Temples and their ideologies provide for legal regulation, and the rise of the law court.
• Temples also provide a learned class, and the rise of knowledge as power.
• Whatever we call the knowledge locus, university, academy, college, whatever, the power of knowledge is greatly magnified when knowledge begins to include the arcane, and in Cerilia, that locus is the source.

This explanation, whatever its utility for analysis in the real world, provides an excellent context for realms. Each of these loci of power; barracks, market, temple, court, and source, is actually a BR domain; province, guild, temple, law, and source.

The barracks is a natural for the fighter, and the number of PrC's for military command complete the picture. The fighter is an individual combatant, and whether a campaign tends toward heroic combat or medieval combat, some fighter certainly makes sense for the captain, but leadership, morale, and teamwork abilities are also a part of the mix.

The market is an extensive, diffused organization, almost the opposite of an army, where discipline and proximity are essential. Markets operate by negotiation, across the distances of trade routes, without direct supervision because every part of the organization has a similar motivation - profit from cooperation.

The temple is powerful because it provides three things, meaning, norms, and ritials. If my temple tells me that knowledge is power and that reason and discipline are the highest pursuits, I think you can tell what patron I have selected. Meaning is generally a role play aspect, but it provides a common context for human action. If I share values with others, I can more easily cooperate than I can if my partner values only physical strength and a test of dominance. If my comrade and I share either set of values, we can organize a hierarchy, provide a context for action, and shift from values to action. If I want knowledge and order, and the other guy wants me to submit to his physical strength, we haven't even agreed on the basis of our interaction, let alone cooperation. Whatever rituals do for people in the real world, in D&D ritual includes concrete game effects, most often through spells and supernatural powers. If a temple can monopolize meaning, norms, and rituals, it has consiserable control which is both intensive, like an army command, and extensive, based on common goals and desires. The weakness of temple power is the danger that someone down the road may offer a better set of meanings, norms, and rituals. After all that person talking about luck and prosperity, and their happy descriptions of material comfort are backed up by the spells and powers just as potent as the priests of knowledge and discipline. All that remains is what I want - knowledge or wealth.

The law court is another kind of ideological power. Its based on shared values, but its applied mostly to those who would deviate from norms and the group meaning. As such it has to be backed up by punishment. This could be in the form of physical force, rituals, or confiscations of wealth. Law can support the province, the temple, or the market by asserting their values and norms as regulations subject to enforcement. Where the temple is mostly persuasive, the court is mostly about punishment and enforcement.

Sources certainly have their mystical aspects, as do the connections of all domains to their rulers, but what I am interested here is the utility of knowledge. Knowing how to manipulate arcane energies is a very personal source of power, since it only extends to where the wizard is or can be expected to be. Knowledge by itself is the weakest form of power, but it can be a potent force multiplier when connected to any other locus of power.