Abolishing different action types

[Mirviriam]

The other thing that preserves the relative lack of agility of that larger realm is that it caps out RP income and is thus less efficient, and yet still has to manage a much larger territory. Ultimately it can end up with an RP deficiency. This would be particularly true if you limited the amount of RP that could be spent on any one action (so Avanil can't just throw 60RP at an action to overwhelm nearly any opponent, which is somewhat difficult to conceptualize in story terms anyway), or allowed smaller bloodlines to not be so limited in RP collection, but rather in accumulation.

Currently the RP collection per turn cap is bloodline score for 2nd/3rd? Minus some skill checks in 3rd.

I noticed in 3rd/BRCS there's a power gap for midlevel domains too as they can't quite justify the money for the extra levels of court. Money is currently the determining factor in how many actions a realm has...should it?

[Vicente]

Anyway, I agree that there should be a diminishing return for expanding government--bureaucracy gets less efficient the larger it gets. What I've drafted includes those diminishing returns; courts get successively more expensive the larger they get.

I don't think extra costs are enough as big realms produce more money after all.

I've also mentioned vassals as part of what determines more actions because I wanted to codify and bring out those vassalage arrangements more, and assigned attitude levels to those vassals based on their current level of satisfaction with the regent. The attitude level functions like a LT or regent skill bonus, or like a Court bonus; a simple number, fairly easy to keep track of, that reflects how cooperative a vassal is currently.

This is probably a big change (and I don't like it much). My main problem is that a vassal is more interesting (and conflicting) when he is the one deciding his own actions. If you just decide what they do I don't know, for me they lose nearly any interest as regents (and try to force a player to do what a NPC says ).

The other thing that preserves the relative lack of agility of that larger realm is that it caps out RP income and is thus less efficient, and yet still has to manage a much larger territory. Ultimately it can end up with an RP deficiency. This would be particularly true if you limited the amount of RP that could be spent on any one action (so Avanil can't just throw 60RP at an action to overwhelm nearly any opponent, which is somewhat difficult to conceptualize in story terms anyway), or allowed smaller bloodlines to not be so limited in RP collection, but rather in accumulation.

Even with the RP cap a larger kd could just try actions without spending RP (spending GB instead or just without any modifier). Normally you wouldn't do that as actions are used when you have a good chance of success, but if you have lots of them it's a good tactic to overpower smaller realms (who will spend most of their RPs defending against those actions because they can't afford them to succeed, even if they don't have much chance).

[Rowan]

Currently the RP collection per turn cap is bloodline score for 2nd/3rd? Minus some skill checks in 3rd.

Yes. I'm more in favor of using bloodline as a limit to how much can be accumulated, and possibly as a modifier to various things such as a cap to how much can be spent on a single action. I think not limiting regency collection within the turn evens some things out, favoring the little guy more than the big guy, and providing a feasible system for non-blooded characters, either in BR or in other settings.

I noticed in 3rd/BRCS there's a power gap for midlevel domains too as they can't quite justify the money for the extra levels of court. Money is currently the determining factor in how many actions a realm has...should it?

It may make sense to allow other factors to help determine the number of actions a realm has, such as RP or domain size. The idea of vassals over certain areas (such as Counts and Barons) is a natural extension/limitation to actions.

I don't think extra costs are enough as big realms produce more money after all.

They do, but incomes increase rather linearly (with the exception of getting those extra trade routes--but I've sketched out a way to address that based on previous discussions on the board about trade holdings). Also, costs for expansion tend to increase, diminishing returns, just as costs for expanding courts would increase. Furthermore, larger realms should normally become vulnerable to more threats and more "random" events. These things should make it so that the larger domain actually has more strain on resources than the smaller domain, though it may have a greater reserve, as well.

This is probably a big change (and I don't like it much). My main problem is that a vassal is more interesting (and conflicting) when he is the one deciding his own actions. If you just decide what they do I don't know, for me they lose nearly any interest as regents (and try to force a player to do what a NPC says ).

I think you misunderstand what I was suggesting. Vassals like I'm talking about (Counts and Barons, or Bishops/Cardinals, lesser Guildmasters, etc.) are totally ignored in the current system, arising only through DM creativity and house rule support. Vassal states are a different matter and would continue to function as you suggest. Furthermore, the intention is that the lesser vassals may indeed take different actions and would still take actions on their own, particularly if their current attitude towards the regent is low. These could either be detailed, or, more commonly related to the otherwise "random" events that are currently a part of the system, influencing the type and/or frequency of those events.

Even with the RP cap a larger kd could just try actions without spending RP (spending GB instead or just without any modifier). Normally you wouldn't do that as actions are used when you have a good chance of success, but if you have lots of them it's a good tactic to overpower smaller realms (who will spend most of their RPs defending against those actions because they can't afford them to succeed, even if they don't have much chance).

The larger domain is going to have a lot more on its plate than a smaller domain, which should make your concern about being able to just throw away actions a phantom. Add that to the proportionately higher cost of administering such a domain and a smaller relative increase in RP collection, and smaller domains will remain more agile. They still won't be able to be involved in as much, but they ought to be able to focus better. RoE likes that concept, as it is stated in HO vs. HOT descriptions, and European history bears that out, with Spain/the Hapsburg Empire being involved in a great many things at once, but often being outmaneuvered by smaller, more agile, less cumbersome rivals such as England, Italy, the Netherlands.

[Vicente]

They do, but incomes increase rather linearly (with the exception of getting those extra trade routes--but I've sketched out a way to address that based on previous discussions on the board about trade holdings). Also, costs for expansion tend to increase, diminishing returns, just as costs for expanding courts would increase. Furthermore, larger realms should normally become vulnerable to more threats and more "random" events. These things should make it so that the larger domain actually has more strain on resources than the smaller domain, though it may have a greater reserve, as well.

The thing is that even if income grows linearly, a realm will break a point where it can substain it's grow pretty easily (as the main problem with growing is the actions needed for Rules and the cost of the action itself). Right now it's hard for small realms to grow because in general they have the actions but not the resources, and for big realms is the inverse.

Even if you change maintenance to account for levels (because right now a level 1 holding and a level 10 holding cost the same to maintain, same with provinces) and make costs exponential, a realm with lots of actions can just try to grow out of pure luck (just pay the base cost and that's it).

I think you misunderstand what I was suggesting. Vassals like I'm talking about (Counts and Barons, or Bishops/Cardinals, lesser Guildmasters, etc.) are totally ignored in the current system, arising only through DM creativity and house rule support.

Ok, my bad sorry. For me that is too low level and usually adds too much work to the DM (at least for me with the NPC regents I have my plate full and my players have more than enough people to remember).

The larger domain is going to have a lot more on its plate than a smaller domain, which should make your concern about being able to just throw away actions a phantom.

The problem with adding too many things for a bigger realm is that then balance is pretty hard to maintain. Imagine that a realm gets a number of random events based on the number of provinces (or better, the province levels). If the realm has average luck, then we have an average turn and everything works. But with lots of events happening you can go to the extremes by chance: getting unlucky (so the realm suffers far more than it can handle) or lucky (so it has a lot of free actions and then the small neighbours are the ones that suffer).

Add that to the proportionately higher cost of administering such a domain and a smaller relative increase in RP collection, and smaller domains will remain more agile. They still won't be able to be involved in as much, but they ought to be able to focus better. RoE likes that concept, as it is stated in HO vs. HOT descriptions,

Right now big realms can't exist because of the number of actions. You are giving them more actions, so at least big realms will be more viable than they are right now. Maybe not much, but a little more for sure.

Also, I don't think smaller domains will remain as agile, as you have given more tools to bigger realms. Maybe on average a big realm won't have actions left, but as soon as it has some, it has just to try Create Holding and it forces the smaller realm to use RP to defend (or later Contest and lose an action).

and European history bears that out, with Spain/the Hapsburg Empire being involved in a great many things at once, but often being outmaneuvered by smaller, more agile, less cumbersome rivals such as England, Italy, the Netherlands.

Well, at least for Spain, I don't think that's true. We have been outmaneuvered also when we were a pretty small empire by bigger people, it's just that except for 2 or 3 kings, in general we have been cursed with pretty bad rulers.

Edit: I was using "kd" for "kingdom" in the post, I tend to say that a lot