PDA

View Full Version : DM Help Fantasy Government Systems



Morty
2014-05-19, 01:58 PM
Like many tabletop fantasy gamers, I have my own pet setting that I come up with things for. Technically speaking, it's bound to a system of my own creation, but like most homebrew systems, it's not good for much. One way or the other, in recent times I've decided that I'd really rather move it away from the dull, medieval-European fantasy mould. There's a number of ways I'm going about it, and one of them is examining the way societies and governments function. In "typical" fantasy, human societies tend to be pseudo-feudal kingdoms, run by kings, and the lords and knights who swear fealty to them, with the peasants at the bottom - all tremendously simplified and generalized, unfortunately. It also spills over to non-human societies, except they don't follow the pseudo-feudal structure. I want to move away from that, to create a more varied and unique tapestry. The feel I want to go for is, somewhat Sword & Sorcery - hence why I have no mages or wizards, but sorcerers, among other things.

So, with that in mind, I'd like to ask the folk from this forum to list all the various forms of government they've encountered in fantasy - literature, gaming, comics, anything. We have feudal kingdoms, tribal chiefdoms, theocracies, petty kingdoms run by warlords, oligarchies run by the richest merchants around, magocracies run by powerful magic users - what else?

Red Fel
2014-05-19, 02:13 PM
I happen to be fond of the idea of a scholarly meritocracy based upon personal achievement and merit, and measured by a series of increasing bureaucratically-administered state-mandated examinations. This is modeled after the old Imperial Chinese system of examinations.

As a result of this highly structured merit-based system of achievement-and-reward, people rise to positions suitable to their knowledge and skills. Yes, those from noble families have advantages (e.g. literacy, personal trainers and tutoring, etc.), but on the whole those who achieve high status or accolades are generally perceived to have earned it (and, to a lesser extent, to have come from important families).

And before you assume that such a society consists entirely of bookworms, consider this - martial skill is similarly evaluated. Not only are the examinations physical trials of stamina and combat skill, but also written tests regarding military history and tactics. Under such a system, for instance, the title "Master of the Martial Arts" refers not only to the man who can break bricks with his fist, but also the one who understands the proper application of cavalry in an open-field campaign, and can describe in several pages the proper application of pressure points to render a muscle numb.

Also: In before "I told you. We're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week."

Gildedragon
2014-05-19, 02:41 PM
At a regional level: city state hood, empire, trade leagues, kingdom states, nomadic leagues over territories, semi nomadic nations

Governance systems tend to break down into a couple general categories depending on these three questions:

What is the power structure:

big person on top (king, emperor, single-chief-chiefdom, president...)
group of big people on top (tribal council, guild council, chiedom with specialized and temporary chiefs, parliament, gerontocracy)
or a combination: (king with powerful councilors, king and a tradesmen's guild council, multiple chief system from which a chief of chiefs is elected...)
or neither: no power center, people move around as they will/as society constrains them (consensus society/small variable affiliation bands)



Is the power exerted coercive or not (do(es) the person/persons have the power to make you do something you don't want to? if so is it direct (army, they are big and strong and can bully you/mind control you)? or indirect (they control access to food, or they have the ear of someone who does. disobey and you are socially stranded)? or are they just persuasive (they pitch generally good or interesting ideas, and following them has been working for ya)?)

Is the society stratified, and to what degree? (does a class cross-section look like a pyramid? an upside down pear? a rhombus? or is it mostly flat?) And how rigid is the stratification: can you move up and down the class system? Only up? Only down? Not at all? And if movement is possible: what allows it?

with these questions, in different arrangements, can be produced. A mostly flat society with coercive power and a single leader might feel like a wizard overlord terrorizing the countryside. No one but him has much in the way of resources or power, so everyone steps in line...

Morty
2014-05-19, 04:57 PM
I happen to be fond of the idea of a scholarly meritocracy based upon personal achievement and merit, and measured by a series of increasing bureaucratically-administered state-mandated examinations. This is modeled after the old Imperial Chinese system of examinations.

As a result of this highly structured merit-based system of achievement-and-reward, people rise to positions suitable to their knowledge and skills. Yes, those from noble families have advantages (e.g. literacy, personal trainers and tutoring, etc.), but on the whole those who achieve high status or accolades are generally perceived to have earned it (and, to a lesser extent, to have come from important families).

And before you assume that such a society consists entirely of bookworms, consider this - martial skill is similarly evaluated. Not only are the examinations physical trials of stamina and combat skill, but also written tests regarding military history and tactics. Under such a system, for instance, the title "Master of the Martial Arts" refers not only to the man who can break bricks with his fist, but also the one who understands the proper application of cavalry in an open-field campaign, and can describe in several pages the proper application of pressure points to render a muscle numb.

Also: In before "I told you. We're an anarcho-syndicalist commune. We take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week."

That is interesting. It implies a rather extensive and sophisticated bureaucracy, though, doesn't it? I'm not sure how well it'll work in a system where societies tend to be somewhat fragmented and individually small.

Gildedragon
2014-05-19, 05:44 PM
Well there are Gerontocracies (rule by being as old as possible)
Councils of Undeath
Guild/Mafia/Corporation coalitions (ie a city broken up into different areas of power, each guild/family has absolute power in their domain. folk have to navigate the tenuous aliance-vendettas that these 'corporations' hold with each other) Think Ravnica

Also what do you mean by "sorcerers" and no "mages"
as in there are no ritualistic casters, just wild wielders of wild magic?
Or no priests but yes to diviners and augurers?

Knaight
2014-05-19, 06:06 PM
That is interesting. It implies a rather extensive and sophisticated bureaucracy, though, doesn't it? I'm not sure how well it'll work in a system where societies tend to be somewhat fragmented and individually small.

It wouldn't work all that well in that sort of society - it is also explicitly based on Imperial China. Even when China descended into civil war (which is often) the individual states at war were frequently larger than lots of other countries.

As for fantasy government systems as a whole - read The Reluctant King Trilogy. The story involves a traveler who's a bit of a pulp adventurer, but it's almost an excuse for him to go to varying lands with varying political systems, with all sorts of functionality. Highlights include the one the adventurer came from (they have a king, who's an absolute monarch. Every 5 years, they're executed and their throne is thrown to the crowd, whoever catches it is the new king, with the tradition being strong enough that avoiding it is pretty much the one thing they won't get away with), one involving the "Grand Duke and Grand Bastard", wherein the political leadership of a city does have a noble line, but the military leadership is led by the bastard children of the political leader, with the idea being that they can't take over as everyone knows the have no legitimacy, and one involving a scholarly-merchant class. They aren't exactly realistic, but it's a fun read with a lot of ideas for government systems.

It might also be worth looking into actual medieval government systems, particularly regarding cities. A lot of fantasy takes the general feudal system, then manages to strip out everything actually interesting about it. Having a feudal system that feels like a real feudal system instead of a fantasy feudal system would be nice.

Cikomyr
2014-05-19, 08:12 PM
I am personally very partial to a Council-based Plutocracy, inspired by the Marienburg Directorate (WFRP).

Basically a council of the 8 (or 12?) richest merchant houses of the city/province.

- It dispense with the blood-based discrimination (making anyone can become a ruler if he can build up the dough in a competitive environment, so players can hold ambitions).
- It allow for personal contacts with rulers directly (8/12 Directors/Senators are going to be much more available to talk privately than 1 King or Lord)
- It kind of makes sure that a good majority of the rulers are probably crafty and competent (easier to guarantee the savviest people are in charge when what puts them in power is their success at scheming rather than who their father is).
- Is allow for a wide diversity of rulerships (in my game, I had a Dwarven Director, an asian-themed one, another who was close to the Elves, etc.. They each had their own special personalities and agendas)

Finally, it allows for some flexibility in the government representative. Even in a 8-house Directorate, you can allow a special seat on the Council for, let's say, the High Priest of the city's most popular religion. The Captain of the Guard. Etc.. etc.. All of these positions may be vied upon in the political game between the various Merchant Houses.

veti
2014-05-19, 09:13 PM
Matriarchy/patriarchy: rule by heads of families.

The highly centralised, bureaucratic empire is always a popular favourite. The good thing about this is, it provides a framework in which you can insert literally dozens of different factions with their own internal politics and power structures, while providing a safety net in case the players manage to trash one (or more) of these that you didn't anticipate.

Then there's "direct democracy" as practised in ancient Athens, but that doesn't easily scale to anything larger than a city-state.

Arbane
2014-05-20, 01:11 AM
Theocracy: Rule by priests.
Deiocracy: The god(s) decided the cut out the middlemen, and rule directly.
Necrocracy: Rule by the (un)dead. The Great Emperor died without heir and was never properly deposed, so now mediums consult his spirit on all matters of state....

Axiomatic
2014-05-20, 01:52 AM
I've got a vaguely South American empire where the interesting thing about it is that it DOESN'T have succession laws. In fact, every Emperor from the beginning of the Empire is still in power, and still controls all the land he held in life. They're all just a bit dry-skinned and don't talk very much and tend to let their wives and advisors do the actual day-to-day running of the estate.

As a consequence, each new heir to the Empire doesn't actually inherit any of his father's holdings, because the dead and mummified father is still lord of them. So the only way to get some is to conquer some more territory.

The Empire is extremely expansionist as a result.

NichG
2014-05-20, 01:54 AM
One way to look at it is to look at the features of a given system of government as things which arise from some sort of instability - a government without that feature would be more unstable to collapse or being replaced than one with that feature.

The older the government in the world, the more such stabilizing features it would need to have in order to still be around.

So, a group of people just acting independently is the simplest system. That might be stable on the timescale of a year or so. But one guy who says 'hey Bob, lets work together and make the others give us their food' can cause it to go unstable towards something with a network of changeable alliances. Now, someone might have power because of who his friends are, but who has power and who doesn't changes very rapidly since there's nothing to prevent those relationships from being overturned. The result might be stable on timescales of a few decades, but when people age and die/have their priorities change, its going to break down.

So one way to fix that is to create some sort of centralization so that power sits with a fixed position or individual, with the various networks of relationships extending outwards from that center. Depending on how that center is fixed, you can get things that look like tribal systems, dictatorships, hereditary rule, etc.

But you could think of other stabilizing features associated with things present in the fantasy world that wouldn't work in reality.

Gildedragon
2014-05-20, 02:15 AM
I've got a vaguely South American empire where the interesting thing about it is that it DOESN'T have succession laws. In fact, every Emperor from the beginning of the Empire is still in power, and still controls all the land he held in life. They're all just a bit dry-skinned and don't talk very much and tend to let their wives and advisors do the actual day-to-day running of the estate.

As a consequence, each new heir to the Empire doesn't actually inherit any of his father's holdings, because the dead and mummified father is still lord of them. So the only way to get some is to conquer some more territory.

The Empire is extremely expansionist as a result.

Except how do future wives/advisors get chosen. And there you see a shift in power. As more dead with fiefdoms accumulate more people are filling in these advisories...
the empire has to be very young to support that behavior, but that behavior is one that seems very culturally tight. So it must have been evolving for a while. The conclusion to this is that the empire gets overthrown internally every so often.

Better to allow the young to join the old. Just that special advisors are the ones that interpret the noble families' council of ancestors.
Society looks like a gerontocracy where the older you are the more power you got: even in death.

Morty
2014-05-20, 07:56 AM
Also what do you mean by "sorcerers" and no "mages"
as in there are no ritualistic casters, just wild wielders of wild magic?
Or no priests but yes to diviners and augurers?

I don't use "sorcerer" in the way D&D does. I use it in the way Robert Howard, Fritz Leiber and Jack Vance did. The usage of the word is meant to evoke a theme.



As for fantasy government systems as a whole - read The Reluctant King Trilogy. The story involves a traveler who's a bit of a pulp adventurer, but it's almost an excuse for him to go to varying lands with varying political systems, with all sorts of functionality. Highlights include the one the adventurer came from (they have a king, who's an absolute monarch. Every 5 years, they're executed and their throne is thrown to the crowd, whoever catches it is the new king, with the tradition being strong enough that avoiding it is pretty much the one thing they won't get away with), one involving the "Grand Duke and Grand Bastard", wherein the political leadership of a city does have a noble line, but the military leadership is led by the bastard children of the political leader, with the idea being that they can't take over as everyone knows the have no legitimacy, and one involving a scholarly-merchant class. They aren't exactly realistic, but it's a fun read with a lot of ideas for government systems.

I might look into it if I can.


It might also be worth looking into actual medieval government systems, particularly regarding cities. A lot of fantasy takes the general feudal system, then manages to strip out everything actually interesting about it. Having a feudal system that feels like a real feudal system instead of a fantasy feudal system would be nice.

Indeed. There is one feudal kingdom in the setting, and if I get around to defining it, I'll try to make it resemble the actual feudal hierarchy of Eastern Europe, as opposed to the "king-knights-peasants" simplification fantasy tends to goes with.



Then there's "direct democracy" as practised in ancient Athens, but that doesn't easily scale to anything larger than a city-state.

It doesn't, but fragmented city-states certainly have their place in such a setting.

Gildedragon
2014-05-20, 12:24 PM
That was surprisingly unhelpful an answer: what theme? What is the difference for you between a mage and a sorcerer?

But lets say you want a Bronze Age feel:
Soft-power chiefdoms; non-inheriting chiefs elected for tasks and periods of time either by their campaigning, posturing, producing of feasts, and showing off their talents; or by a council/cabal; or by lots (which may well entail kingly sacrifices)

Storm_Of_Snow
2014-05-20, 02:01 PM
I've just been reading through an ancient collection of White Dwarf articles, which had an article covering three new government types (actually for Traveller, but they could be moved across), one of which was a Demarchy - essentially a democratic anarchy, everyone votes for what they want to do, and there's no ruler, politicians or civil servants (or at least none with any real power).

Probably wouldn't work for a large state in a medieval/fantasy world without swift mass communication, but a smaller one - say a tribe or a single village - might use that as their government.

You could have a technocracy - say the blacksmiths as the village governors, all the way up to the most highly skilled watchmaker as the ruler.

Gerontocracies were mentioned, but what about their inverse, a society ruled by the young - say a council who're between the ages of 12 and 18, or possibly even younger?

Cikomyr
2014-05-20, 02:21 PM
I've just been reading through an ancient collection of White Dwarf articles, which had an article covering three new government types (actually for Traveller, but they could be moved across), one of which was a Demarchy - essentially a democratic anarchy, everyone votes for what they want to do, and there's no ruler, politicians or civil servants (or at least none with any real power).

Probably wouldn't work for a large state in a medieval/fantasy world without swift mass communication, but a smaller one - say a tribe or a single village - might use that as their government.

You could have a technocracy - say the blacksmiths as the village governors, all the way up to the most highly skilled watchmaker as the ruler.

Gerontocracies were mentioned, but what about their inverse, a society ruled by the young - say a council who're between the ages of 12 and 18, or possibly even younger?

Yhea. That hasn't "stupid" written all over it.

Sounds like one of the silliest ideas came up by Gene Roddenbury. That, or the Children Level of Fallout 3

Gildedragon
2014-05-20, 02:23 PM
Problem with pedocracies is the source of power. Where do the children get the power? They have had no time to build a power base, so the power must be inherited, which raises a huge question: Why would a generation pass it on? Even if it was law: you change the law. Like when the people in charge of passing the budget are the same in charge of producing it: they will give themselves pay raises

And it could happen but it is best restricted to a single individual... And the real power is gonna be an eminence grise

Cikomyr
2014-05-20, 02:31 PM
The idea could work, but only if you have something to somehow enforce it. And then the government becomes more about the source of that enforcement than the actual government system.

best example I could give you was in a game. the Law said that no Man could hold the Throne, so a Queen was usually in power. But when she disappeared, a boy was appointed as leader. How could that work out? Well the city itself had been built by Modron thousands of years ago, and left a substantial number of Inevitable to blindly enforce the Law to the letter.

So basically, unless you overthew the Inevitables, you had to deal with the boy in charge. But the game was more about the Inevitable than the young boy.

Morty
2014-05-20, 02:53 PM
That was surprisingly unhelpful an answer: what theme? What is the difference for you between a mage and a sorcerer?


I assume you're not familiar with these authors, then. Well, the theme I'm trying to accomplish is that this type of magic is weird, somewhat illicit, not very well understood even by its practitioners, and rather scary. But that's not entirely relevant to the topic.


I've just been reading through an ancient collection of White Dwarf articles, which had an article covering three new government types (actually for Traveller, but they could be moved across), one of which was a Demarchy - essentially a democratic anarchy, everyone votes for what they want to do, and there's no ruler, politicians or civil servants (or at least none with any real power).

Probably wouldn't work for a large state in a medieval/fantasy world without swift mass communication, but a smaller one - say a tribe or a single village - might use that as their government.

That could work, yes. As a small, self-contained community that its neighbours look on as strange, perhaps.


You could have a technocracy - say the blacksmiths as the village governors, all the way up to the most highly skilled watchmaker as the ruler.


It might work for goblins, who are the cutting edge of the otherwise low-tech world, but I'm not sure how such a system would emerge.

Gildedragon
2014-05-20, 03:34 PM
Technocracy: hard to accomplish pre-industrially in a pure state buuuut...
along with ritualization of tasks and control over keystone tech (ironworking for example) you could see certain crafting groups gaining a lot of political clout.
Add to these groups a secret-society esque feel (very limited access, lots of ritual and secrecy) and they can become major social players.
Alternatively, a technocracy is a form of guild rule. Keystone industries control the city: The Architects, The Smiths, The Shipwrights...
One must ask then how are these guilds ruled.

With magic being a chancey dangerous thing Sorcerer-Priests may play an important role in government. Probably mostly nominal but accepted as a safeguard against magic. SorcererPriests played a big role in RL governance systems, and in a world where magic is a real thing that happens their role would only be increased.

Axiomatic
2014-05-21, 02:09 AM
Except how do future wives/advisors get chosen. And there you see a shift in power. As more dead with fiefdoms accumulate more people are filling in these advisories...
the empire has to be very young to support that behavior, but that behavior is one that seems very culturally tight. So it must have been evolving for a while. The conclusion to this is that the empire gets overthrown internally every so often.

Better to allow the young to join the old. Just that special advisors are the ones that interpret the noble families' council of ancestors.
Society looks like a gerontocracy where the older you are the more power you got: even in death.

As you have correctly guessed, it is NOT supposed to be a very stable place.

Storm_Of_Snow
2014-05-21, 04:48 AM
Yhea. That hasn't "stupid" written all over it.



Sounds like one of the silliest ideas came up by Gene Roddenbury. That, or the Children Level of Fallout 3
Actually, children are more likely to just start to do things, rather than sit around talking about them, will try something because they've no preconceptions that it won't work, and don't have the social hierarchies that adults do, so they aren't afraid to look stupid by suggesting something, and everyone's effectively at the same level, so they're not kowtowing to someone they think is their superior for whatever reason.

You can leave the adults to actually implement everything.

And frankly, given the likelihood of age related impairment of mental faculties, a gerontocracy is probably a far sillier idea.

Technocracy - if you need a plough to grow your crops or everyone starves, or weapons to defend you from raiders, then the village blacksmith is the most important person.

A guild model could be one way, with your position in the guild determined by your skills - an apprentice might be the lowest level (but still above anyone outside of the guild), and if those in the level above you think you know enough, you're raised to the next level, and can then learn more.

At the top levels, you've probably got a commitee - maybe with a particularly prolific inventor as the chair person.

Talesin
2014-05-21, 05:46 AM
I know it's not all that unique but one of the cities in my campaign world is run by a town council with a bit of a stupid twist as I wanted to see how a town would play out with my PCs being in the mix.

The top guy is the Lord Mayor but he is mainly a figurehead ruler. He 'controls' power within the city but can't actually do anything on his own. He's basically a glorified universal advisor for the Praetorians below him and tends to be voted in, which occurs every 2 years, based on popularity rather than being a ruling figure.

However because he's so popular the Praetorians below him do attempt to get him on their side as he publically votes in the yearly election and this can sway public votes.

There are 5 Praetorians in the council:


Praetorian of Agriculture
Praetorian of Construction
Praetorian of Commerce
Praetorian of The Streets
General Praetorian


They are voted in every year and control the day to day goings on in the city each with their own ever growing department of minions to help them out. Although it seems like they would all control a certain aspect within the town, except for the General Praetorian who controls everything else, they're all constantly at war and are trying to extend their influence into other aspects of the city.

As an example my PCs were out attempting to guard a shipment of farm equipment coming from a local town, being paid by one of the wealthy farm owners, and as it approached closer to the city 3 bands of soldiers turned up (one from each of the top 3 Praetorians in the list above) and demanded to guard the shipment, which obviously broke out into a fairly large battle with the PCs not exactly sure what to do.

Along side the Praetorians is the Town Guard Captain. He's not voted in by the people but is selected from a pool of candidates with each of the Praetorians having a vote and the Lord Mayor getting 2 votes. So every time this happens then tends to be wide spread discourse within the city as each of the Praetorians wants their own man as the head of the guard.

Because the Praetorians are voted in so often it actually means that they have to attempt to be good to the city folk or they'll lose a huge number of votes very quickly. So although the city is awfully run overall due to several solutions to most problems occurring at the same time a lot does get done and it's actually become an oddly successful system.

The town also has a lot of festivals celebrating various things, which have basically turned into a giant 'it's a knockout' style competition with people donning different colours in order to join one of the Praetorian teams in the festival games.


I created the city because my PCs said they fancied running an urban campaign but they wanted to get involved in politics without having to actually become part of the government. They're slowly ramping up their involvement and have actually helped one of the Praetorians basically cripple another one's department so he's starting to take over more aspects of government. Also there's a subplot in the background that they're not vastly aware of yet but will end up consuming the vast amount of the later game.

Also I made a rule that you had to have lived in the city for 10 years before you can run for office so all the PCs were ineligble for office.

russdm
2014-05-21, 01:31 PM
In my fantasy world, the Dragons rule and given that they are extremely long-lived (As long the world keeps turning they survive), only the ones that can actually rule the other races well decide to be rulers or kings over the other races. Most dragons don't bother, but of the 9 realms and the dragon Empire, they are all ruled by a dragon aside the elven land which has its own elven king.

The dragons all rule through appointed officials in a system like Imperial China. It makes easier for the dragons to relax and do as little work as possible, except for the couple who actually like ruling. Most of the dragons spend their time fighting over land and try to expand their lands at the expense of the others.

Gildedragon
2014-05-21, 02:16 PM
Reincanating Autocracy: Same person, gets reborn when they die (or if souls can move through time some ~20 years prior to death). They claim the throne by, say, opening a complex puzzlebox no one but the ruler knew how to open.

russdm
2014-05-21, 06:07 PM
No discussion about long lived dragons as rulers, then?

Gildedragon
2014-05-21, 10:39 PM
No discussion about long lived dragons as rulers, then?

well it is a long lived autocracy where the means of retaining power are "cuz i'm a MoY** F***ing dragon! Hells yeah!" which is a fairly powerful argument, and is further backed up by the "Else I eatcha" clause.
It is a gov. susceptible to the whims of the ruler.

Tvtyrant
2014-05-21, 10:42 PM
No discussion about long lived dragons as rulers, then?

I had a campaign where human civilization was the result of the machinations of an extremely old and powerful Dracolich who was aiming toward the recreation of the civilization it was born to. It taught humans arcane magic and psionics because those were prevalent amongst the dead Kobold civilization of its childhood, and did not teach them advanced none-magical technology because the Kobolds did not use machines.

I was super sad that the party never got a chance to tangle with it, as the campaign ended when they killed Orcus.

Ravens_cry
2014-05-22, 12:00 AM
Ah yes, Dragons. I had an idea where most dragons were integrated into society as vessels, nobles and kings in their own right in a feudal system.

Storm_Of_Snow
2014-05-22, 03:38 AM
No discussion about long lived dragons as rulers, then?
I think The Giant said it all in SSDT.

"Give me fish" :smallwink:

A ruler is a ruler - whether they're the same species as those they're ruling or not. If they're not, then they're probably more likely to be at the crueller and more dictatorial end of the spectrum (less empathy towards their subjects).

It needn't be a dragon - you could have a Beholder, a Mind Flayer, any one of the giants, an outsider, a lich or vampire, a sphinx, or any intelligent being.

Actually, another possibility for a form of government is a council of the intelligent races - humans, elves, orcs, dwarves, whatever else you choose to add in, with everyone jockying for position for their race, but outright war effectively prohibited while the council survives, and no one really willing to break it apart on purpose.

Morty
2014-05-22, 03:56 AM
A draco-cracy, while potentially interesting, doesn't work for my purposes, since dragons are long-extinct in the world I'm working with, and they were simple-minded beasts even while they weren't. There are no other long-lived magical beings to fill the spot either.

A rule of the same person reincarnated over and over might work... although its authenticity would be very much dubious. The details of the afterlife in the setting are purposefully left vague.

Gildedragon
2014-05-22, 10:29 AM
Who cares if the Arha is actually the same Eaten One since the dawn of time or just some new schmuck that fits the omens and prophecies. Power keeps moving and the people believe it, and that is legitimacy enough.

Augurocracy: rule by omens and lots. have you read Borges's "Lottery of Babylon" short story? That. If you haven't, read it. Interesting Chaotic-Lawful aligned government.

Morty
2014-05-23, 02:54 PM
Obviously. What I meant was, the system won't be provably legitimate, which it might be in another setting.

Thomar_of_Uointer
2014-05-24, 05:14 PM
Okay, here are a few excerpts from a guidebook I've been writing. It should give you an idea what this city's government is like.

DROOLING IDIOT'S GUIDE TO THE KEYSTONE GOVERNMENT

GLOSSARY OF TERMS

Borough: A few city blocks where nosy citizens pool their resources to keep sellswords on retainer and task them to evict anybody who doesn't follow their philosophy. Only experienced thieves should work Boroughs because of the high number of sellswords with licenses to murder.

Bounty: See Fool's Gold. An amount of money that the Justice Department will pay to anyone who brings in a criminal alive. Anybody can pay the Justice Department to put a bounty on anybody's head. Crust can pay to lower their bounties, which is why you never want to piss off anybody richer than you. The processing fees to put bounties on Crust are very steep, it might profit you to develop a forgiving disposition.

License: The Justice Department issues licenses for every illicit act imaginable. If you have filed the proper paperwork, anyone who has it out for you will have to file a nontrivial processing fee to put a bounty on your head for it. This guide recommends that you obtain basic licenses for the following: tresspassing, loitering, and mayhem. The bare-minimum recommended licenses for a competent sellsword: breaking and entering, serial murder, and littering.

Public Servant: Anybody who gets arrested for having a bounty turned in. To work off the debt that was paid to the bounty hunter, public servants are forced to labor in any number of exciting Civil Works occupations.

Squab: A Peace Officer who stakes out a Bounty until the Bounty Hunters show up so that he can swoop in and steal it. Most Silvers who are smart enough to do this are actually very competent sellswords.

Voting: See Crust.

Thomar_of_Uointer
2014-05-24, 05:21 PM
I think The Giant said it all in SSDT.

"Give me fish" :smallwink:

A ruler is a ruler - whether they're the same species as those they're ruling or not. If they're not, then they're probably more likely to be at the crueller and more dictatorial end of the spectrum (less empathy towards their subjects).

It needn't be a dragon - you could have a Beholder, a Mind Flayer, any one of the giants, an outsider, a lich or vampire, a sphinx, or any intelligent being.

Actually, another possibility for a form of government is a council of the intelligent races - humans, elves, orcs, dwarves, whatever else you choose to add in, with everyone jockying for position for their race, but outright war effectively prohibited while the council survives, and no one really willing to break it apart on purpose.

There is some real-world basis for this. There have been countries ruled by foreigners for various reasons. Most often, it's because citizens can trust a foreigner to not be loyal to any of the local political groups that are their rivals.

Bogardan_Mage
2014-05-25, 04:17 AM
I did a bit of worldbuilding that was mostly an exercise in thinking up interesting systems of government that could arise out of D&D rules (I used 3.5, not sure how well some of these would translate to other editions).

I started with a Europe-analogue which began (in universe) as standard hereditary monarchy. All the royals claimed descent from dragons and had some Sorcerer levels. They made frequent use of Raise Dead and similar spells, which would prompt a civil war in one case when the king died in combat and his remains were not recovered until many years later. Also, centuries ago the heir apparent to a different kingdom was selected by the Elan Council, and so began the long reign of King Eternal Xavier the Inscrutable (who, in addition to never dying of natural cause, protects himself against unnatural causes by an Astral Seed hidden amongst the Crown Jewels).

On a different continent, there was a land ruled by a council of seven druids. Whenever one nears the end of his natural life they gather together and ritually kill and reincarnate the old druid. Beyond this, it's more of a loose alliance than a single country. The druids have a formal hierarchy but in practice each rules his own province as he sees fit, and even the highest ranking has no official power over the others in matters of administrating their own lands.

Then there's a country that rules itself, because it's a Genius Loci. Long ago, there was an oasis in the middle of the desert that, through a process unknown even to itself, took on a life of its own. For a long time it subsisted on whatever desert creatures came to drink at the oasis, until one day it was visited by a nomadic tribe of herdsmen. The oasis took control of the tribe's chief and learned of a better way of acquiring food: animal husbandry. Today, the oasis is a walled-off park at the centre of a bustling mercantile centre, whose king is revered as the very embodiment of his kingdom itself, and where nobody really notices if the odd person goes missing once in a while...

Basically if there's powerful beings in your campaign then either they're ruling their own fiefdoms or you have to come up with a reason why they aren't. Epic level characters can seize control of a kingdom and then live forever (or pretty close) as its ruler.

Beleriphon
2014-05-25, 01:56 PM
Basically if there's powerful beings in your campaign then either they're ruling their own fiefdoms or you have to come up with a reason why they aren't. Epic level characters can seize control of a kingdom and then live forever (or pretty close) as its ruler.

At least until some band of ragamuffin adventurers come along and kill the guy. Sure the last 10 seconds suck, but the rest of them time is awesome!

Wait, that sounds awfully familiar....

Gildedragon
2014-05-25, 02:11 PM
At least until some band of ragamuoffin adventurers come along and kill take over the guy.
FTFY
A ragamoffin PC really ought expect a better host than an orc wearing a panty for a mask. An all-mighty Lich (with a panty mask) sounds like so much better a host.

Besides far better than killing is dominating and humiliating for the rest of time.

Bogardan_Mage
2014-05-25, 06:05 PM
At least until some band of ragamuffin adventurers come along and kill the guy. Sure the last 10 seconds suck, but the rest of them time is awesome!

Wait, that sounds awfully familiar....
Well sure. That's what makes it a game instead of a sociology thought experiment.

Amidus Drexel
2014-05-27, 08:19 AM
In a setting with active gods, I've always liked the idea of a ruler who has a proper divine right to rule - the gods have come down and publicly chosen someone as the new ruler. Bonus points if the ruler would be horrible for the position, but the people go along with it anyway. :smallamused: