Strongholds and Domains: A Revised Approach

maybe the domain morale levels would benefit from a summary table to go with the text descriptions, and little dashes to indicate when certain effects haven't kicked in yet?

They would - good idea!

Thanks for the detailed response!

[quote="jedavis"] Understood, and taken in good faith. I agree that it is a trivial rule to drop, but it perplexes me that it is still there. If you want to approximate steady state, it is easier to just not add noise by default, no? [/quote]

It's there because when I ran the game, it felt like there needed to be some fluctuation in population for the player's domains that might model random events. At the same time I wanted a mechanic I could drop for NPC domains without impact. Hence the +/-d10 approach. (More on this later).

I suspect I run NPC domains how you run PC domains - how much gp does the NPC have to spend on his army to fight the PCs. 

[quote="jedavis"] There are nine distinct morale values, all of which modify slightly different facets of the domain, and then there's a table of 12 modifiers to the roll. Me, I'd be pretty happy with domains having two morale states ("tolerates ruler" and "open revolt"), with a d20 roll triggering a revolt on a 1+ (or 5+ or 9+ if the ruler has done something egregious lately) and revolts persisting until either egregious ruler behavior has been addressed / peasant demands are met, or they are put down by force. That's about the level of complexity I'm in the market for. [/quote]

Got it. More on this later.

[quote="jedavis"]  At the end of the day, my players only want to deal with one layer of henchmen. As a consequence, PC domains are practically limited to one layer deep (if they weren't already by other factors). Likewise, I have a limited amount of prep-time and interest for NPC realms, which is best served by paying attention to the count/duke layers of the chain (who make reasonable patrons or villains; not too high that the players are irrelevant, not so low that the players can kill them trivially). I don't care if there are marquis or whatever below them or not, and my players sure aren't willing to manage a multi-layered domain structure, so any actual rules for low-tier (or very-high tier) vassal rulers are wasted space as far as I'm concernd. [/quote]

Got it. My own experiences as a Judge have been very different. Each time I've run ACKS my players have assembled domains, then conquered other domains and ultimately ended up running realms at anywhere from prince to king tier. The campaign villains have been at king to emperor level.

[quote="jedavis"]  It's not that I can't ignore them - it's just one more thing I have to houserule around, particularly given shrinking maximum personal domain size. Houserules are expensive; in a complex system, the number of unexpected possible interactions between parts grows superlinearly with the number of parts. ...  I'm not willing to worry about it. [/quote]

I do understand this approach. It's why I always try to offer standard or averaged outcomes for every area of the game - here's a standard caravan, here's a standard kingdom, here's an average treasure type value. At the same time, I've always felt that as a designer it's better to offer more detail, then to offer too little detail, thinking that it's easier to ignore what isn't needed than to create what isn't there. Or, put another way, unexpected results are more likely to occur when adding new rules than from simplifying and averaging existing rules.

[quote="jedavis"]  As far as my players are concerned, a domain is a thing that gives you gold and XP every month, and helps offset the cost of the mercenary army you wanted. Broadly, the point of the game for us is killing things and taking their stuff (because these give you XP). Everything of interest is one of: threat, weapon, loot, simultaneously weapon and loot, or Not Sure Yet. The value in a domain is measured in how much better it makes you at killing things, and how much stuff it gives you, and we measure its cost in paperwork against its value in those terms. [/quote]

Ok. So I would say the point of ACKS for me as designer was to allow players to achieve and exercise power. Killing things and taking their stuff is a means of achieving and exercising power, and a fun one. But as a player and GM, I've always felt frustrated that in most RPGs, the dungeons and the characters get tougher hand-in-hand - the player is always fighting "level appropriate" challenges and as such is on a treadmill. So I wanted to offer an opportunity to achieve and exercise power in qualitatively different ways over time. 

Hence, rules for managing a domain, creating magic items, defeating enemies on the battlefield. It's certainly true that the domain game is over-designed if actual play stays focused on traditional adventuring throughout. One could simply say "for each hex you control you get XX gp per month to spend on troops" and that's that. 

To what end do your players use their mercenary armies? Do you do mass combat in your games? If so, what system do you use? 

Thanks for the feedback, again.

 

OK, good! Yes I think you did.

I've been thinking about this. I think there's opportunity for more detailed mechanics on how to control territory - new proficiencies, new specialists, etc. But for now I'll leave as is...

 

It definitely sounds like something better left to a self-contained "module" of extra rules for people looking for increased complexity in domain play.  possibly something to go along with stuff for the people who, for example, want to care about where the roads in their domain are, or how many aqueducts and temples their city has.

The sooner ACKS can fulfill my Civ 5 cravings, the happier I'll be

right there with you (/¯–‿・)/¯

[quote="susan_brindle"]

Re: At the end of the day, my players only want to deal with one layer of henchmen. As a consequence, PC domains are practically limited to one layer deep (if they weren't already by other factors). 

But that's exactly what these rules achieve? Now if you want to know how big the Count is, you just ask how many marquis he has, and then you're done! You don't need to know anything about the marquis's vassals. 

[/quote]

Fair enough, I guess?  I should sleep more.  Still seems simpler to just cut them away entirely.

>

> >

Re: There are nine distinct morale values, all of which modify slightly different facets of the domain, and then there's a table of 12 modifiers to the roll... Me, I'd be pretty happy with domains having two morale states... That's about the level of complexity I'm in the market for.

> >

Fair enough. Personally, I think many levels of morale is great. In the game I ran, our Paladin was ecstatic every time he pushed his domain's morale up another notch.

> >

I seem to recall that my players mathed out a setup that converged to +4, but I forget the details (probably relied on a high-cha ruler).  I guess it was sort of satisfying to see it operate as intended, but hardly exciting except inasmuch as their income went up.

Frankly I’d be unsurprised if you ran NPC domains at a higher detail / higher level of interest than we run PC domains :stuck_out_tongue:

I believe the highest level PC we’ve seen in my games was 9th (with most of the party around 7th), and the largest PC domain was 3-4 6mi borderlands hexes, in a campaign starting at 4kXP and running about 40 4-6 hour sessions (~2 years in-game). Conquering (or at least pillaging) other domains is something they’re interested in, but the practical matter of amassing enough troops to actually do it, and then maneuvering the political situation to get away with it, have so far prevented it. Toppling kings seems a very distant prospect.

I suspect the history of the hobby will show that creating more rules is a much more common event than removing rules, for the typical DM. Given that, it would be very useful to have explicit documentation of things like “don’t modify this, because if you do thief domains spiral out of control”. Making assumptions explicit (as the Secrets chapter does) is great, but noting game-consequences of tweaking values would be even better.

I absolutely agree that dungeoncrawling gets old, and that challenges should change qualitatively with level. “I use my sword to kill this orc (and his family) and take his pie” and “I use my army to kill this count (and his army) and take his domain” are qualitatively different (enough for us, I guess), if analogous, and they share a comparable risk profile. Domain mismanagement, item creation, running thieves’ guilds, and trading put PCs into emotionally-charged situations much less readily than combat; keeping or losing your life and holdings very rarely comes down to any given ruffian’s hijink roll or a mercantile value roll or a magic research throw. To manage a domain into the ground and open revolt would typically require aggressively poor play. There’s not enough risk involved for these activities to be exciting (notable exceptions: hijinks performed personally by PCs, magic research using experimentation rules with possibility of catastrophic failure). I suppose jedavis’ corollary to “do not point the dice any anything you are not willing to destroy” is “do not bother pointing the dice at anything that they have no possibility of destroying.” On reflection I don’t think domain management and magic research are fundamentally unworthy or uninteresting; it’s an implementation detail. However, high danger is not necessarily compatible with realism. Domains didn’t rebel every 20 months in expectation, historically… but managing domains would be much more exciting if the Sword of Damocles hung a little nearer.

So far, mercenaries (“armies” might be overselling things) have been used for hunting monsters (massed crossbowmen and occasionally light ballistae vs dragons, chimeras, giant scorpions, skittering maws…), knocking over humanoid lairs / keeping massed humanoids off the PCs while they kill chieftains during hex-clearing, mass combat via DaW:B in defense of domains against beastmen at platoon-scale, and road construction. There was some discussion of taking the domain next door last campaign, but their forces were judged insufficient.

[quote="susan_brindle"]

The sooner ACKS can fulfill my Civ 5 cravings, the happier I'll be

[/quote]

You say that now, but then Ghandi announces he's researched a 6m hex Fireball ritual...

*Oppenheimer :stuck_out_tongue:

That said, Jard’s statement about roads and temples put me in mind of the Birthright domain rules. I wonder what I could do inspired by those but with the math reworked such that it fits the same average as the ACKS economy.

(Probably nothing right now because I am still trying to work on the Foundation Stones, but it might distract me enough to do something with the idea.)

Suffice to say that I come to ACKS for granularity and would rather get detailed rules that I can, if desired, house rule into a simpler form than the reverse.

So I don't know that I'd classify this as better or worse as much as "more for me to pick and choose from".  Which is, again, a good thing.

I wonder if there's room for some form of followers that show up when your PC rules a domain at levels below 9.  I mean, if you're 1st level, it might not matter that much if the Lord is 7th level or 9th level, because he's a really skilled fighter and rules his own domain.  There should be some attraction to that...

Not sure if it's already been raised, but is there any guidance for the Starting Peasant Families in a domain less than a 6 mile hex? If my party is a bunch of Level 1s and clears themselves a single 1.5 mile hex and starts a domain, how many families do they get? (The easy answer is just to divide by 16 to get families per 1.5 mile hex, but I'm wondering if there was any other intent).

[quote="Alex"]

10. The rules would be written in such a way that new "modules" of rules could be easily added for Judges who sought more detailed mechanics. In particular, the rules should be easily expanded to cover future systems for (a) land value by terrain and technology, (b) different types of government (e.g. senatorial), (c) separating landownership from lordship, and (d) domain actions.

[/quote]

Alex, I gave them a quick read and like the idea of simplifying the various domain calculations (particularly the recursive vassal income).  I'm still underwater with my master's program (but less than 5 months to go) so I'm really only running Dwimmermount, not doing much campaign building.  I don't see myself modeling anything too soon (but I'll look forward to December).  :)

I do have a question on your point 10 - with Guns of War coming out soon, do you foresee expanding the domain rules to cover periods other than late antiquity and medieval - for instance, early modern, or Greek city states?  Seems perfect for a future Axioms.

[quote="susan_brindle"]

The sooner ACKS can fulfill my Civ 5 cravings, the happier I'll be

[/quote]

 

And from the Patreon, it looks like you just got a new government type! Prepare for a few turns of anarchy!

 

[quote="Civ4-Leonard Nimoy via Winston Churchill"] "It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried." [/quote]

[quote="susan_brindle"]

My only concern is that this seems like a big hit to the personal income of Emperors. I have no idea what kind of reprecussions that'd have though. 

[/quote]

Maybe the ruler should receive only 2 gold from his vassals, while 1 gold should be payed to the highest ruler at the top of the financial pyramid? If church gets 1 gold/family from everyone, it's reasonable the Emperor should get at least that.

On a quick readthrough, I like these changes a lot! They won't remove my need (or love) of spreadsheets, but it will make things easier.

Without having too much time to think about it, the change that you don't get money from your sub-vassals feels a bit strange, though. It's an odd way for your subordinates to save money. Hmm.

My current campaign has just reached the point where the players are about to forge their own domain, and I'll certainly use this version of the rules. Simpler math, without losing any of the depth of the original system.

One problem I'll have to solve is how to handle chaotic domains under this new ruleset. One of the biggest drawing points of chaotic domains was the doubled morale modifier for garrisons, but under the revised rules garrisons give no morale bonus...maybe I could implement something like this:

- in chaotic domains, domain morale modifers for liturgies and taxes are doubled. Having a garrison above normal gives a +1 to morale roll adjustments for each gp/family above normal.

I was also considering to add another feature to chaotic domains. I'd really appreciate some feedback:

Training militia and conscripts in chaotic domains. Beastmen societies tend to be much more militarized than civilized ones. Hunters and raiders are common, while farmers and artisans are almost unheard of. Because of this, freshly recruited conscripts and militia in such domains will automatically be trained and equipped as light infantry, with no further expense needed on part of the domain ruler (aside from their monthly wage, of course). The domain ruler can still train conscripts and militia if he desires to turn them into a better troop type. While having a freely trained militia is usually a benefit, it also means that chaotic domains tend to be more dangerous if the domain's morale ever becomes turbulent, defiant or rebellious: as always, rebels are drawn from the militia, and chaotic militias are always warriors, not peasants.

If I recall correctly, the new Axioms has a revised Domain approach and Chaotic domains do get to field more military from their population than lawful domains. I forget the exact numbers. Don't have it on me. Posting from my phone.