Twilightpeaks.net
RoE Development => Regent Guide => : X-Points East August 31, 2013, 06:54:13 AM
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OoC:
For a composite domain, perhaps the threshold for annual stability increase could be reduced by the number of domain types beyond the first?
Hypothetically, in the following manner (with the four relevant domain types being landed, temple, guild, and sorcerous):
Annual Stability Increase
STABILITY
THRESHOLDS | 1-Type
Domain | 2-Type
Domain | 3-Type
Domain | 4-Type
Domain |
| LG | +2 | +1 | +0 | –1 |
| LN/NG | +1 | +0 | –1 | –2 |
| LE/TN/CG | +0 | –1 | –2 | — |
| NE/CN | –1 | –2 | — | — |
| CE | –2 | — | — | — |
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Why?
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To reduce the benefits of Sun-King type courts.
To quote a ruler in a game I was playing "why tax the guilds when I can hold them? Other regents are just wasted resource"
It also reflects the inherent tensions in different types of organisations competing for the regents time.
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I'm afraid I don't see the issue, I don't understand what problem is being addressed here.
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Where does manor and trade enter this equation?
This is a fix to keep landed rulers from snatching up guild holdings if leidang become dependent upon guild control.
That you control 2+ different holding types already bear the handicap of having way to many ways to spend your limited actions. So to take out the nurf bat in that situation is a bit harsh.
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And there is no logical rationale for the effect either, it seems an arbitrary rule with no justification other than to discourage a course of action the DM finds undesirable - and I dislike such rules immensely.
If you want to dissuade people from having too many holding types, just have them attacked/contested by other domains of all the types they have. For example, if I have a domain with extensive land/manor, guild and temple holdings, then I can very easily find myself embroiled in a struggle with the neighbouring landed regent, facing a hostile takeover from some guild domain, and having a rival church proselytizing my holdings out from under me, leaving me to try use my 3 actions to counter the 9 actions of my various unrelated opponents - in short I am screwed.
This approach is infinitely preferable to a heavy handed arbitrary penalty that has no rational justification behind it.
Besides this rule totally hamstrings wizards, since they almost automatically suffer because every wizard needs a few money making holdings scattered about just to make ends meet.
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It also reflects the inherent tensions in different types of organisations competing for the regents time.
Sorry Andy, but it does no such thing.
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I am not a fan of such enforced srictures either... Especially since it is a bandaid on a patch that is the idea that leidang should be connected to guild/trade in any way.
Rip off both bandaid and patch and problem is solved. Reanalyze original issue (if any) and try again.
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It also reflects the inherent tensions in different types of organisations competing for the regents time.
Sorry Andy, but it does no such thing.
The idea is that reach type of holding has particular interest, goals, etc - so two holdings of similar types work well within the same organisation.
Where you get different holding types then the different structures, goals of members, etc are considered likely to have some sort of negative effect. Stability hit is one (of many) ways to reflect that.
The problem I've come across in other games is the ruler seeking to replace the guilds, and sometimes both guilds and temples (although role-play tends to prevent the latter). The ruler sees power and sees no reason to share it.
That should be less of an issue in RoE where vassals are much more prevalent, but then we saw some players stripping out vassals in RoE 2.
The "only so many actions" is a very valid point that argues against big realms, but I'm not sure if a single holding spread over 6-7 realms would have any less need for actions than if the same number of holding levels were combined in a single all-dominated realm and suspect that actually the sun-king realm would have fewer opponents at any given time simply due to reduced geographical spread meaning there aren't many other potential rivals - and of course the Sun-King would have huge advantage stacks under RoE rules.
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The idea is that reach type of holding has particular interest, goals, etc - so two holdings of similar types work well within the same organisation.
That's a silly idea. Think about it. A temple of a god with a focus on crafts would be expected to have guilds, and one with a focus on trade or wealth would be expected to have trade holdings, etc.
And if you really do think that the supposed difference in goals, etc. would affect things (I do not subscribe to that point of view) then the DM should create those tensions - that's his job. But to have an arbitrary rule that basically says "If you do things out of the ordinary you will be penalized" is bad DMing, and bad rule writing.
If the ruler tries to grab everything, let him. he's just made a bunch of enemies who have a common cause against him. You should not write rules with specious explanations to prevent people from doing things differently.
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If you really want a rule then insert something that is broad and at GM discretion.
"If a domain is made up of un-related holding types (i.e. GM discretion as to unrelated) then the annual stability increase due to alignment may be capped at a lower level. I.e. A priest of Saramie with temple, guild and trade holdings are all related, while a duke with province, law, manor (related) and source (not related) holdings are not all related."
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The idea is that reach type of holding has particular interest, goals, etc - so two holdings of similar types work well within the same organisation.
That's a silly idea. Think about it. A temple of a god with a focus on crafts would be expected to have guilds, and one with a focus on trade or wealth would be expected to have trade holdings, etc.
The concept to encapsulate in a rule is "how many potential disputes on what to do or who should do it will occur in the domain", and this gives rise to the question "will there be more or less potential disputes if there are twenty law holdings present in the domain, or 10 law holding, 5 guild and 5 temple" - the different holding types are more likely to have different needs, employee ambitions, etc than similar holdings so in the latter case the answer is generally going to be "more" - it might be the same, but if a general rule is wanted than it goes "more", it's no different to saying a lawful domain finds it easier to raise stability than a chaotic one.
The "minor side show" issue is one that I'm aware of, I'd expect less problems in a 90% temple + 10% guild domain than in a 50:50 scenario where no member knows if the next head will be a priest or a merchant, or if the year's surplus will be spent on a cathedral or bonuses. I might be persuaded to an "x"% rule with lower divergences ignored, or that if there are less than "y" holding levels you'd ignore the problem, but I'd want to see how the book-keeping worked in practice.
And if you really do think that the supposed difference in goals, etc. would affect things (I do not subscribe to that point of view) then the DM should create those tensions - that's his job. But to have an arbitrary rule that basically says "If you do things out of the ordinary you will be penalized" is bad DMing, and bad rule writing.
If the player does something that will significantly increase tensions between their holdings then yes, that's for the DM to sort out on a bespoke basis (whether between different holding types or similar or even different levels within the same holding), but I wouldn't want to do that routinely, I'd rather have a simple stated rule than an arbitrary "the DM noticed this turn and thwacked me" approach - plus, by stating a rule up front people can plan for it which avoids the appearance of capricious smacking down of the unexpected.
If the ruler tries to grab everything, let him. he's just made a bunch of enemies who have a common cause against him. You should not write rules with specious explanations to prevent people from doing things differently.
The suggested rule doesn't prevent, it just states the cost up-front, people wishing to grab multiple types can still do so, the suggestion is merely a minor increase in DC to stability checks - you can come up with whatever fluff explanation you like if you don't consider that a merchant might have different ambitions, etc to a noble or a priest in how the profits and influence of the holdings should be spent.
Rules are written to handle broad-brush common areas to reduce need for fiat, discourage arbitrary decisions, and encourage strategic planning - but also to encourage certain styles of play. BR was originally designed to give each class a holding type, historical counter examples (like Monks selling wool and wine, nobles investing in business, guilders buying titles, popes being princes and the like) were circumscribed to aid game balance (if taking things too realistically I suspect that theocracies would be endemic given historical church power and the addition of tangible proof via magic). So in BR the divisions between land, church, guild, etc are greater than "would be expected" because that's the way the original designers built built the holding types, since I don't want to see the guilds crushed out of existence, or feel compelled to conquest, some sort of recognition in the rules to encourage "stay within the bounds" type play seems appropriate, although I'm a little concerned about how far the suggestion goes. Where it works less well is "common pairs", i.e. province+law, or law+manor, or guild+trade, etc. Possibly something to think more on - the issue may in reality only be on crossing guilds since RP protects temples more and sources are less "profitable" for rulers, but in Cariele for example the risk is the reverse of the norm.
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Where does manor and trade enter this equation?
OoC:
Conceptually, provinces, law holdings, and manor holdings could constitute landed domains; temple holdings could constitute temple domains; guild holdings and trade holdings could constitute guild domains; and source holdings could constitute sorcerous domains.
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Where does manor and trade enter this equation?
OoC:
Conceptually, provinces, law holdings, and manor holdings could constitute landed domains; temple holdings could constitute temple domains; guild holdings and trade holdings could constitute guild domains; and source holdings could constitute sorcerous domains.
IMO This doesn't match up with current rules as all classes except nobles and various fighters then gain regency from holding types of different domains.
I don't like the idea of putting domains into restraining boxes like that, but if it is done then I like this model better:
Landed noble: Province + Manor
Unlanded Noble: Manor + Guild
Temple: Temple + Manor
Guild: Guild + Trade
Wizard: Source + Trade
Druid: Temple + Source
Any: Law
This model will create a border around a domain, but allow for friction between domains of different types.
As you can see, this model will allow any domain to have 3 different holding types,
Landed will be the only who can hold provinces witch is a huge advantage when mustering troops keeping them as the strongest domain type.
Guild domains will have the advantage of having synergy between guild and trade, making rule trade easier for them.
Temple, druid and wizard will have the advantage of realm magic.
In conjunction with the proposed leidang rules this would allow a landed ruler to expel a guild and give the holdings to his unlanded vassals instead of being forced to either take the prosperity hit or create a vassal guild.
This model still doesn't take into account that all classes can gain regency from provinces.
And if this model or one like it is introduced, I think that classes should be made to only grant regency within a single domain. For IMO it doesn't make sense that you gain divine favor from your blood for governing something that hurt the stability of your realm, unless you have made the choice to diversify and taken a second or third class to justify it.
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OoC:
Edit: Feel free to delete this post.
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That would free up law holdings, so Landed and guild could have 3 different types of holdings.
But temple, sorcerous(druids) and unlanded noble rulers will then only be able to have 2 types of holdings.
The spell casting ability of temple, sorcerous & Druids IMO doesn't make up for that handicap since they will have to fight everyone for the law holdings.
Put together with the guilds ability to gain advantage to Rule(trade) actions from guild holdings I find guilds favored in that proposal.
If it is argued that only guilds should hold trade holdings then I could argue that they don't need a bonus to rule on top of that monopoly.
But rather than argue that, I would argue that if we need a way to contain domains within a few holding types, then my previous proposal is a better way of leveling the playing field.
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plus, by stating a rule up front people can plan for it
I guess I must have been confused all these years, I thought the idea was to avoid rule-playing at the expense of role-playing - silly me.
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Where does manor and trade enter this equation?
This is a fix to keep landed rulers from snatching up guild holdings if leidang become dependent upon guild control.
That you control 2+ different holding types already bear the handicap of having way to many ways to spend your limited actions. So to take out the nurf bat in that situation is a bit harsh.
You would know this from personal experience...ruling a province+guild+sources=lot of grief and not enough resources.
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ruling a province+guild+sources=lot of grief and not enough resources
Exactly, so there is no need to throw in an arbitrary rule to make it even harder.
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The best way to discourage this is too ensure that each focus of the domain is always tempting to be the primary focus of the domain. I think Andy and Matt are good enough DMs where a multi-focus domain will have adequate challenges that their lack of specialization will not be a boon (which it is not suppose to be).
All domains types are fundamentally equal in power. A multi-type (focus) domain shouldn't allow you to run over a single focus domain per se.
With this being said, I can see the value of a rule where the DM is disinclined to place adequate challenges in front of the player.
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OK, I'll bite. Why is there a need to discourage multi-focus domains?
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Discourage was a poor choice of words. My intended point was that a multi-focus domain should always have demands from all of its foci, such that there is a choice to and consequences when the domain focuses on only one aspect vs. others. Basically, that the domain should under most circumstances have tension amongst its foci.
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I still don't see the problem that this proposed rule is supposed to address.
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I still don't see the problem that this proposed rule is supposed to address.
The you presumably haven't come across the situation in play, please trust me that it is a game killer - basically under mechanical terms the uber-glomph where the ruler claims all holdings (usually by threatening pillage and offering a pittance as payment for the holdings) is the single most effective tactic to "win the game", it is the fastest route to riches, the fastest route to cutting actions "wasted" on dealing with other regents, maximises abilities and powers available to the ruler, the fastest route to preventing "spying and disloyalty", etc.
Since many players come to BR via the computer game or war-games, they do not look at the setting and see the mechanics as secondary stuff purely there to support the roleplay, quite the reverse, they see the mechanics as "the rules" and get very annoyed by "cheating" players and DMs who start making "arbitrary" decisions and levying punishments based on "stuff that isn't against the rules" they see BR as a "board-game" first, and role-playing as secondary if they consider it at all.
In my first game one player first glomphed the jarls in his realm (surrender holdings or be executed for treason), then the guilds (surrender holdings to the guild former-jarl vassal that paid 90% tribute - or be executed for treason) and then pillaged the Oaken Grove into nothing after it "turned traitor" by refusing to provide adequate support or transfer its holdings to his pet druid vassal, all of which actions incidentally were perfectly ok with the DM as he isn't breaking the rules.
The player was furious with me for publishing diatribes against "the slaughter in the snows" (he drove out the druids in mid-winter but insisted that he'd just commanded them to leave), for declaring our alliance void over his godlessness, and raising an alliance to invade and conquer his realm "just because you're friends" - in his mind he hadn't broken the rules, he'd just made his realm more efficient, so we should have emulated his "winning tactic" not whined because we hadn't thought about the tactic and then ganged up on him (there was a big divide between the role-players and the roll-players in that game).
Players are different. The rules need to cater for all-comers. The rules both provide a basis to permit planning and indicate what actions are / are not deemed appropriate.
DM fiat is inherently perceived as arbitrary and unfair if it occurs without warning, is generally time-consuming to apply, and generally should therefore be used to fine-tune issues - not deal with them completely, and ideally it should always be sign-posted by mechanics that indicate that an action is disapproved of.
Another rule which I'd consider, feel free to complain up-front, is a heavy penalty to any ruler who pillages holdings in their lands (pillage is a necessary tactic or at least threat for someone trying the uber-glomph tactic), probably manifesting as a big prosperity hit, high risk of great captain events, etc. I'm not sure how much of it I'd apply via a standard mechanic and how much by fiat, but I'd want something, even though the issue hopefully wouldn't come up in ROE III (the players are role-play vets) but it might (it almost did in ROE II at least once).
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Actually I have come across that situation, one of my players swears by that very tactic, and it doesn't kill the game at all, he is the player always needing "just 1 more action) and running out of money before anybody else. Now this could be because I was just lucky, but seeing as it has happened in three campaigns I doubt it, and I doubt it's because he is incompetent player, I am going with I am a competent DM.
So basically you are advocating for a rule to compensate for having a lousy DM. Sorry, I have no interest in that sort of thing, and as far as I am concerned it is that sort of attitude that ruins the game.
And as far as not seeing the rules and mechanics as supports to the role playing, well this rule only reinforces that attitude as it takes the fun out of things by reducing it to a predictable penalty that can be planned around as opposed to a natural outcome of the regent's poor decisions.That and your constant use of the term "fluff" to dismiss those very role playing aspects.
And nobody is talking about DM fiat here, we are talking about the DM doing his job by making the NPCs more than just faceless sets of stats.
Like I said, this is a bad rule with no valid rationale other than to cater to bad players and bad DMs, neither of which are a demographic I think any rules should even play lip service to let alone try to accommodate and compensate for. If a player screws up he dies and gets to roll up a new character and if the DM sucks, somebody else takes over as DM. That's the way it works. That's the way it has worked for the for the 36 years I have been playing the game and i don't see any reason to change that.
And like I said, if this rule is instituted - I won't be playing.
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sorry Bob, I fouled up the response, hopefully fixed
Let's take an example.
Let's say that Linde manages to gain control of almost every holding in Talinie, and turns his sights on Thurazor.
Well Linde has 4 actions + Court actions per DT, and so do I. However so does my vassal Donals and my vassal Taren, so I am up to 12 actions. And assuming I haven't scewed up and alienated Viktor, I can count on his 4 actions as well, and since the guild holders will likely see a better future under me than under Linde (seeing as he grabs all the guild & trade and I don't) I can count on a few actions from them - let's say 1 each.
So, to oppose Linde's 4 + 10 (let's be generous) court actions I have 12 + (let's be conservative) say a total of 7 court actions and can count on the support of another 6 + (again being conservative) 5 court actions.
Linde: 4 + 10 = 14 actions total
Me: 18 + 12 = 30 actions, with a good chance of another 6-10 actions as well.
As you can see, purely on raw mechanics, Linde, with 1/2 the available actions, is the one at a disadvantage.
So there is no need for a mechanic to penalize a horizontal monopoly realm as there is already one that slaps a devastating penalty on them. A disadvantage so severe that it will require some seriously superb role-playing, combined with some world class clever stratagems and a whole truckload of luck to overcome.
Even in your example you managed to conquer the supposedly game winning/killing realm, right?
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So there is no need for a mechanic to penalize a horizontal monopoly realm as there is already one that slaps a devastating penalty on them. A disadvantage so severe that it will require some seriously superb role-playing, combined with some world class clever stratagems and a whole truckload of luck to overcome.
a disadvantage identical to playing a realm one step away from LG compared to a peer? It's a fairly trivial one as far as I can see.
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So basically you are advocating for a rule to compensate for having a lousy DM. Sorry, I have no interest in that sort of thing, and as far as I am concerned it is that sort of attitude that ruins the game.
No I'm not, and you know it - it's a fairly minor rule to indicate that there are disadvantages to mixing holding types, and signal that the DM may step in if the situation merits, a good DM warns players, they don't just whack them out of the blue, that approach would be exactly the arbitrary behaviour that you are complaining about.
And as far as not seeing the rules and mechanics as supports to the role playing, well this rule only reinforces that attitude as it takes the fun out of things by reducing it to a predictable penalty that can be planned around as opposed to a natural outcome of the regent's poor decisions.That and your constant use of the term "fluff" to dismiss those very role playing aspects.
The people the rule, or others like it, are useful with will use "fluff" and far worse to describe role-playing, and will complain bitterly of arbitrary DM's who step in and punish them for playing "well", the ruleset should handle all sorts.
I could have a perfectly good RPG using the rules for chess, other players crave a game with much more extensive rules and some prefer little to no role-play interaction at all - I think that they're missing out but the community is too small not to invite a wider audience and then through example and experience encourage newcomers to see the fun of true RPG.
I take the view that good/bad roleplaying can influence pretty much anything, a good player could avoid or even reverse a penalty, a bad one could make it truly crippling, but the presence of a mechanic lets the player know that the situation is considered something to play round one way or the other.
And nobody is talking about DM fiat here, we are talking about the DM doing his job by making the NPCs more than just faceless sets of stats.
Fiat is exactly what you are describing, the application of a rule which isn't written down and therefore which can't be predicted or planned for is inevitably seen by some players as arbitrary.
Putting a rule (of any sort) down in writing warns that there is an issue, indicates the basic impact of the situation, and indicates (if the descriptive text is appropriate) that a smart player should discuss their plans with the DM to see the potential outcome, allowing the player a chance to then role-play as required if they want a different outcome. By stating the ability for a player to influence that outcome the DM's input to turn the "bare stats" into "people" doesn't come as a surprise and is less likely to appear as "cheating" or "favouritism", it lets those less familiar with RPG's know that there is an "e" in role-play not 2 l's and that the DM will act to handle that "e" on behalf of the NPC's - I don't see a rule like this, or many others frankly, slowing down a veteran role-player who can sort out an appropriate looey or vassalage deal to avoid the issue.
I'm a little surprised by your vehemence given that there are so many similar rules that we are far more likely to see in practice most of which have a much larger impact, the potential loss of a free point of stability once a year if a domain is below par is hardly substantial.
Again, think of the players it is intended for, this is a PBeM, some people may never have played a tabletop RPG - and I've played with lots of people who struggle with the concept of NPCs much less the concept of NPCs with faces, agenda's, etc. The rule is something a DM can point to and say "you were warned, read the text under it, it states clearly that tensions can be inflamed by x, y, and z... - when I enact those tensions I'm applying the rules to the specific situation, and you had fair warning."
Like I said, this is a bad rule with no valid rationale other than to cater to bad players and bad DMs, neither of which are a demographic I think any rules should even play lip service to let alone try to accommodate and compensate for.
Yes, and you were corrected before.
I'm far more concerned with rules for poor players than rules for good ones, and similarly inexperienced DM's need a more robust system than those more experienced - to say that a game should only pay attention to "the best" is both to limit it to an even smaller minority than a game normally gets and make a wide assumption that one style of play is superior to all others. The "my kind only" approach can work in a local group where people have played together or in a community for years, it works far less well over the internet where widely varying play styles can interact without any foreknowledge or understanding of "norms" expected by one side or the other.
If a player screws up he dies and gets to roll up a new character and if the DM sucks, somebody else takes over as DM. That's the way it works. That's the way it has worked for the for the 36 years I have been playing the game and i don't see any reason to change that.
In a PBeM if a player sucks they can ruin the game for everyone and that can be a fairly large number of people in RPG terms, I'd rather the player avoided fouling up in the first place. Given issues with BR game lifespans and the notorious drain on DM resources, any rules system which requires widespread routine intervention to keep the game on an even keel is poor - the game shouldn't "stop at the rules", but the rules should make a good starting point and indicate areas where DM intervention is more or less likely.
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Well.. Not counting trade and guild I control almost every holding in Talinie.
But the question is: "Is it best for me to further the agendas of Talinie and NIT by expanding my influence outside or inside of Talinie?"
Unless I have an agenda stating otherwise or the guilds are openly contesting my actions or diminishing my profit. I would personally rather have the guilds figure out the guild stuff and focus on other issues. And if a guild made trouble I would rather have another guild come take over the business in Talinie. But if the guild situation in Talinie becomes FUBAR I would rather control it myself than have empty holding levels.
I would expect negative events costing GBs each turn from bad administration.(taking away some or most of the GB I earned from holding the guilds) Heck I would probably invest a court action most turns to try and make a finances check and keep the business running as smoothly as possible. (Consulting with the DMs about how they would react to me doing so)
And I would take stability loss from poor handling of those events head on. But if my regent was a guilder as well as a noble and a priest I would play her differently and expect differently if she picked up guild holdings. So just capping the annual stability increase is not the way I would go.
With the FoW I think cooperation between multiple domains will be the win button even more than it was in RoEII. So I would rather have a player or NPC guild with a network of holdings that I can benefit from in times of trouble than I would like a more or less steady income of 10-20gb extra.
Perhaps I am wrong, and the win button is placed in province/realm sized monopolies on all holding types. Perhaps I expect too much when I expect the DM's to counter actions going against the nature of the domain/regent with events.(After fair warning)
And if either is the case, then we need to address it, as it is not in the spirit of the game that people need to create sun king type domains to get ahead or that it should be the easiest way out of a conflict just to annex your enemies holdings of another type.
It could be done in the character rules where rulers(and only rulers) could have a limited amount of proficiencies that grant bonus to specific rule/contest actions. or in some other way that grant bonus for staying on the path of your domain.
I think that capping annual stability increase is the wrong way to go about it.... This might be because I am okay with people getting a bonus, but I hate getting hit with a nurf bat, no matter how small it is.
But if the DM team think that the best way to signal disapproval of multi-domains is an annual stability cap rather than granting a bonus to those who walk the straight and narrow. Then the change is small enough for me to let it slide.
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Let's take an example.
Let's say that Linde manages to gain control of almost every holding in Talinie, and turns his sights on Thurazor.
Well Linde has 4 actions + Court actions per DT, and so do I. However so does my vassal Donals and my vassal Taren, so I am up to 12 actions. And assuming I haven't scewed up and alienated Viktor, I can count on his 4 actions as well, and since the guild holders will likely see a better future under me than under Linde (seeing as he grabs all the guild & trade and I don't) I can count on a few actions from them - let's say 1 each.
So, to oppose Linde's 4 + 10 (let's be generous) court actions I have 12 + (let's be conservative) say a total of 7 court actions and can count on the support of another 6 + (again being conservative) 5 court actions.
Linde: 4 + 10 = 14 actions total
Me: 18 + 12 = 30 actions, with a good chance of another 6-10 actions as well.
As you can see, purely on raw mechanics, Linde, with 1/2 the available actions, is the one at a disadvantage.
And in gold, you've spent 30 GB on actions and at least 12 more on courts behind those court actions so 42 GB - minimum. Your court actions are mainly at penalties from being a small court, and unless you've got treaties already in place a lot of your actions won't get advantage and hardiness.
He's spent 17 GB to get 3 base actions (and a free action) + 7 court actions (plenty for most stuff) and so has 25 troops units more than you assuming overall parity in total realm income - and that's assuming that he hasn't planned and built up troops that were then garrisoned in which case he could have double that. His court actions start with a bonus as he's got a bigger court and internally everything is advantaged and hardy cutting his costs to a minimum and allowing him to maximise the amount that goes into war. Your espionage actions better be very effective, he only needs 1 action to wage war...
But it doesn't stop there, in peace Linde spends no actions keeping his guys onside, he spends no actions fixing fights they start, he has no problems with vassals that are disloyal or actively working to undermine him, etc, every single action improves his single realm. Your team on the other hand often spends actions against another team members or in diplomacy squabbles. His base economy is likely to be larger (in Gb but not RP) - your team should recover from a pillage fest sooner, but once a realm fills up a lot of your actions can go wasted.
Its a Gulliver vs the Lilliputions model, yes, the little guys can tie the big fella down, but they can also trip each other up and get stomped piecemeal. A good roleplayer should be able to get their team pulling together and take down the big guy, build a strong realm more quickly, etc - but a good role-player could also do a lot with the Gulliver model.
A key disadvantage that the Gulliver approach would have incidentally is RP - RP caps can greatly reduce the income benefit of dominance.
So there is no need for a mechanic to penalize a horizontal monopoly realm as there is already one that slaps a devastating penalty on them. A disadvantage so severe that it will require some seriously superb role-playing, combined with some world class clever stratagems and a whole truckload of luck to overcome.
You over-estimate the benefit of extra actions, if your vassal has no money for a court or regent actions - necessary to maintain an equivalent army - then you have no action bonus at all, if they have just 1 or 2 GB for actions then those actions have to be well placed. And in a game with a lot of internal dissent the Gulliver may well have more actions - not fewer - to spend against outsiders or on growth, add that to their income advantage and they can be well ahead.
I wouldn't say that there needs to be a strong mechanic, it depends a lot on how much internal dissent there is supposed to be in the game and the roleplaying ability generally, it depends a lot on how open a DM is too clever roleplaying, espionage, etc - some DMs are quite restrictive and that limits the advantages of mass action spams a lot.
Even in your example you managed to conquer the supposedly game winning/killing realm, right?
Yes, but then I like to think that I'm a better role-player than he was ;) I'd got alliances with 4 realms, good relations with my jarls, had two churches and the guilds on my side, attacked with surprise following pre-espionage, etc. I've also seen it go horribly badly in games and don't want repetition. I note that in many BR games NPC's are barely played - RoE's approach helps the problem a lot, while the change in law holding income methodology is a huge enough change that it might be enough in itself, but as a concept I'm happy to consider other options.
I don't expect our NPCs to be as destructive as Bjorn's (ask Niels if you want an idea of the trouble a regent could have), but they aren't likely to grant you their every action either (except perhaps during war).
I'd note that one of the issues isn't so much that the Gulliver's win, as they foul it up for others - the guilds and temples who get ordered to get out of domains, etc lose out badly, and seeing the Gulliver get smashed before the would-be-sun-king can build up new directly held guilds and temples is poor comfort, even when a new roleplayer takes over the now vacant realm they have a big fixing job on their hands. I had one game where the same player did this 3 times on different realms, I wound up practically screaming at the DM to kick the guy out.
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I'd got alliances with 4 realms, good relations with my jarls, had two churches and the guilds on my side, attacked with surprise following pre-espionage, etc.
Exactly. And that is exactly how it should be done. Such a coalition, whether started by a PC regent or an NPC regent, is precisely how such a situation should be handled. Not by an arbitrary rule that makes no sense, and that will have to be waived almost as often as it is applied.
This rule, like most of the rules being proposed by Brandon detracts from the role playing and makes the game more like a video games with the aim being min/maxing to game the system. And I am sorry, I completely disagree with you about dumbing the game down to attract players. All you get by doing that is a lousy set of rules and bad players.
And that is the reason for my vehemence, as you put it, I see an excellent set of rules being messed with in an unbeneficial manner for no valid reason. Take it from me, as somebody who has been tweaking and rewriting rules for a long time it is hard to improve on Bjorn's work - very hard, and this rule, like the others being proposed honestly seems to be making changes just for the sake of making changes rather than to correct a flaw in the rules, and take the game in a direction which will be detrimental to the quality of the game as a whole.
The rules should be as lax as possible to allow players to do whatever they want to, and the DM should then give events appropriate to those actions. That is the way the game is supposed to run. One should not be able to predict with certainty exactly how spreading oneself too thin will effect one. If you strip holdings from other regents without killing them, they will seek revenge. And it may take them a while to cobble together an alliance such as you did, but they will never stop trying. The greedy regent will have all sorts of problems based simply on the fact that he made a whole slew of enemies out of his potential allies.
Oh, and your math regarding the GB cost of the actions is way off. "I" have not spent anywhere near that much - but me, my vassals, and allies have spent a bunch - but there are several of us so the GB expense on any one of us is much less.
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The math is very simple Bob, each action costs 1 GB, each court action costs effectively 2 as you need the court, and then the court carries out the action. The math is actually under-selling the point as it still assumes 100% efficiency in action coordination and mutual support.
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Yeah,but there like 6 of us spending on one side, and one on the other, so it actually costs each of us less.
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I don't follow. You have 6 courts, 6 (sometimes competing) agenda's, etc - they have 1 court and 1 agenda. Inevitably your cost base is higher as you are paying for 5 more courts and agenda's.
In practice there is a "sweet spot" in terms of number of actions vs more income and the sweet spot moves depending on circumstances, but the spot iss biased towards income (particularly gold) as gold is infinitely scalable in power terms whereas actions need income to be really effective, and successive actions past a certain point inevitably reduce in necessity/profitability - I've had plenty to do in realms (except when playing wizards) but while I could have used another 2 or 3 regent actions easily, another 10 wouldn't have added much as I could do my critical needs and run out of cash well before using the extra 10.
The potential inefficiencies of a multi-realm generally occur when the domains don't pull together if, say, 1 or the 6 hated you and worked against you constantly, 2 loathed each other and spent half their efforts attacking each other and you could only ever get one of them "on side", while another only helped if you paid in full leaving you with only 1 realm to "support you freely" the discrepancy in power gets very apparent very quickly.
The key problem with a romp 'n' stomp usually comes where there are no penalties from pillaging, and province/law get inherent income rather than directly from other holdings, that combination permits the threat of forcible divestiture to be made credibly, which in turn permits the very rapid growth-via-glomph for the consolidator and prevents the building of alliances, experience, etc that would otherwise form against them. Bjorn's Law holding income rules undermine the tactic a lot (the consolidator would likely try to raise taxes first to get the same/similar income), I'll have to check if he has a pillage penalty.
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You don't follow?
OK, I will say it as simply as possible.
We have 6 incomes.
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You don't follow?
OK, I will say it as simply as possible.
We have 6 incomes.
I concur that you have X incomes (6 for this theoretical), the issue isn't about the number/size of your incomes, but rather how much of that potential maximum income you will be able to apply. The one-regent realm, while having less income can focus 100% of their income with one regent's decision. The multi-regent realm needs co-operation to be able to focus 100% of their income. Friction will make achieving the 100% focus only a theoretical possibility for the multi-regent realm (Chapter 7 of Clausewitz's On War is a good read here).
For the record I don't believe that a numbers based rule is needed, but rather the statement within the rules that domains that contain unrelated holding groups are more likely to experience internal friction (events, etc). This makes it clear to players that grabbing everything is likely to result in role-play challenges and leaves the reaction in the hands of the DM rather than a mechanic.
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OoC:
Might number of domain types conceptually impact a domain's loyalty?
Might number of domain types conceptually impact a domain's effectiveness?
Quotation from Regent Guide: "Stability is a measure of the overall loyalty and effectiveness of your domain."
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For the record I don't believe that a numbers based rule is needed, but rather the statement within the rules that domains that contain unrelated holding groups are more likely to experience internal friction (events, etc). This makes it clear to players that grabbing everything is likely to result in role-play challenges and leaves the reaction in the hands of the DM rather than a mechanic.
I concur 100% with that. If the idea is to be broached at all (not something I am at all convinced of) then that is the way to do it.
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Might number of domain types conceptually impact a domain's loyalty?
It may in some specific situations, either positively (Temple of a god of wealth/Luck, etc. owning trade & guild) or negatively (a regent of a LG realm owning evil temple holdings), but there is no reason to assume that it would in most situations.
If you think otherwise, then by all means tell us how you think it would do so so universally as to justify your proposed rule.
Might number of domain types conceptually impact a domain's effectiveness?
Same answer as the above.
In fact, just the opposite actually, as there would be no conflicts between the various segments, so stability would be increased. If the law, nobles, and church (or the church & guilds) all agree on everything then there will be less strife and less political infighting.
The thing is, there is no inherent conflict between the interests of the various holding types, any such conflicts will be entirely case dependant, and be based wholly on role-playing considerations, so role-playing is the appropriate method of dealing with the issue.
Now, if you were to change your rule to be a suggested penalty that applies only to those rare cases where the specific situation creates a conflict, then it would not be an entirely bad idea. But in the absence of any such "fluff"-based case-specific conflict, it is.
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The thing is, there is no inherent conflict between the interests of the various holding types, any such conflicts will be entirely case dependant, and be based wholly on role-playing considerations, so role-playing is the appropriate method of dealing with the issue.
Now, if you were to change your rule to be a suggested penalty that applies only to those rare cases where the specific situation creates a conflict, then it would not be an entirely bad idea. But in the absence of any such "fluff"-based case-specific conflict, it is.
Where there are multiple regents for different holding types the inherent division occurs without need for DM intervention (the arguments over taxation levels, whether or not to bless provinces, building of castles, level of military, etc are classic examples). Where that division is artificially eliminated at game-mechanic level by removal of the named regents, this sort of mechanic allows the DM to insert a "base level" tension, which allows the DM to focus their (extremely scarce) time on those realms who are outside the norm.
Ideally all bread-and-butter stuff like low level internal dissent, synergies, tax rates, loyalty, military prowess, etc should be handled by the basic mechanics with the DM then only intervening when the realm is unusual one way or another or the DM is running a plan - if the DM has to look at and fiddle with every single little thing then the game first delays then collapses. As noted many times already the mechanics also make it easier for people to plan, negotiate, anticipate, etc.
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You don't follow?
OK, I will say it as simply as possible.
We have 6 incomes.
I concur that you have X incomes (6 for this theoretical), the issue isn't about the number/size of your incomes, but rather how much of that potential maximum income you will be able to apply. The one-regent realm, while having less income can focus 100% of their income with one regent's decision. The multi-regent realm needs co-operation to be able to focus 100% of their income. Friction will make achieving the 100% focus only a theoretical possibility for the multi-regent realm (Chapter 7 of Clausewitz's On War is a good read here).
Actually the comparison is of realm A - income split over multiple regents and identical realm B - all income in the hands of one regent, because the problem noted is what happens when (generally board/computer-gamer type players) simply glomph every holding in their land. The single regent has - at least - the same total income since the holdings and province levels are identical in the sample sets.
The inevitable efficiencies of cutting down on the courts of other regents then gives the consolidator a very large surplus to apply as they wish - most BR mechanic systems tend to have a "critical mass" point in income generation and ROE is no exception - a domain that has base expenses of, say, 21 (4 for holdings, 6 for court, 3 for regent actions, 4 for at least 4 court actions) and income of 24 is eking its money out and likely has only 4-5 units; one with similar expenses but income of 36 is not 50% richer in practice as the gross suggests, but has 5x the surplus wealth to spend on military, buffing actions, etc - it's a serious temptation for the computer gamer who struggles with the concept of "dude, that's people not just resource-generating units, and its r-o-l-###ing-e playing not r-o-l-###-l playing"
They key risk with the tactic is the clean-up problem, short of a major ret-con or similar the game is routinely left with a very very broken set of domains which damages the game, quite possibly to breaking point, the fact that the player tends to have quit / been kicked out is therefore fairly redundant at that point.
For the record I don't believe that a numbers based rule is needed, but rather the statement within the rules that domains that contain unrelated holding groups are more likely to experience internal friction (events, etc). This makes it clear to players that grabbing everything is likely to result in role-play challenges and leaves the reaction in the hands of the DM rather than a mechanic.
Any time - any time at all - that there is a base effect - positive or negative - the mechanics should reflect it, so that the DM is freed up to focus on the ones in need of particular attention, fun, etc. In practice different military units would cost more/less as pay rates vary, minor lordlings gain/lose ambition, etc - in the game the DM doesn't have time to consider how every unit is composed, their situation, etc, so they need a mechanic to set a "base", and the DM then intervenes when it's special or the player contrives a situation and asks for it to be recognised. The only real restraint on bread-and-butter rules should be clarity and simplicity - it shouldn't be fear of setting a base or outlining a norm.
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Whatever, I am no longer going to discuss these things with you. You are way out of line.
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Whatever, I am no longer going to discuss these things with you. You are way out of line.
I don't mind someone asking me to explain rules, or why I think rules are good or bad.
I do mind when the person ignores posts, repeats points that have been answered without explanation of why they disagree with the answer, argues strawmen, etc.
When that person crosses the line into making statements that they know are false - or would know if they had read the other persons posts (the point on the poor applicability of the suggested mechanic for micro domains and minor divergences had been made more than once so my view on it was known) - I will slap them down for it.
Sometimes I'll be right, sometimes I'll be wrong, and sometimes I'll be tired; that's life I'm afraid.
One point of difference incidentally in a tabletop and a PBeM is the lack of face-to-face makes it much harder to identify nuances in position which - together with the much larger player size, lack of personal familiarity and divergent group norms - much of my desire for rules to warn of or divert from issue areas, reduce intervention in low-priority areas, etc comes from those practical problems - it isn't just concern over time available for tweaking and the 3 game issues discussed.
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Whatever, I am no longer going to discuss these things with you. You are way out of line.