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weenie
2014-06-16, 06:43 AM
So summer is here and it's time for a new campaign. I've been thinking on what type of setting I would run and started tinkering with the politics of the place. What I came up with is inspired by the ancient Irish and Icelandic system of governance, where there were no states as we have today, but people were able to change their political representatives or in the case of Ireland decide to represent themselves and others if they wanted to.

In my setting there would be no lords and kings, the only functions resembling a ruling body would be judges, who wouldn't be appointed by anyone, but would earn their position through a history of wise and impartial rulings.

Law could be enforced by anyone, which would mean there was nothing preventing violent conflict except the price and risk of it, so I think that separate security organizations would emerge with agreement on which judge will settle their disputes, to prevent unnecessary costs. People could sell their grievances to others, so harming somebody poor could still have repercussions, because even if they can't hire somebody to get restitutions from you, they could sell their grievances toward you to a stronger organization and that organization could then take you to court, or hunt you down if you don't agree to a legal settlement.

A concept that I should work on a bit more is the outlaw. These will be the people, who will agree to a court presiding over a dispute, but will evade the consequences of the solution. People will try to avoid them in general, because they probably won't have anything to loose, and will be desperate, since there will probably be bounties on their head and an "ok to harm" statement issued from several reputable judges.

So what do you think, would you play "people" that found themselves washed up in such a world?

rlc
2014-06-16, 06:53 AM
Sounds fun, actually. Of course, the tech level would probably have to be around the same level as those some people had. And I could actual see a lot of intrigue going on. Maybe your character/party is a group of these outlaws. Or maybe there's an organization that's buying up all of the grievances and even a judge or two.

weenie
2014-06-16, 07:25 AM
Sounds fun, actually. Of course, the tech level would probably have to be around the same level as those some people had. And I could actual see a lot of intrigue going on. Maybe your character/party is a group of these outlaws. Or maybe there's an organization that's buying up all of the grievances and even a judge or two.

Yeah, I think the adventure options might be limitless. That one organization would buy up all grievances or judges would be kinda of an economic problem though, because it would make the price of grievances skyrocket, and if people get the feeling that a judge is biased, they'll just stop hiring him for arbitrations.

For potential plot hooks I'm not so sure what to do actually. Depends on what the players will want to play probably. If they'll want to enforce the law, they might have to hunt down outlaws, or do investigative work for people, or maybe even fight monsters. It's still a fantasy setting, and Manticores don't care much about the law of people.

Any other suggestions regarding plot hooks will be much appreciated.

veti
2014-06-16, 05:32 PM
Sounds to me like - most players I know would consider themselves failures if they weren't running the whole place within two months.

What you're describing is anarchy, in its most literal sense. It can only work as long as (a) everyone around buys into it (it's, paradoxically, a very conformist system) and (b) no-one is that much more individually powerful than anyone else, so individual "outlaws" can safely be ignored.

Your players will probably violate both these rules with a vengeance.

The Oni
2014-06-16, 06:11 PM
The way I see it, there's got to be some way of protecting the borders or a monarchist army would just steamroll over the country, unless the country sucks, and nobody wants it (like the really lousy frozen parts of Russia) or unless there's some kind of guardian spirit or force that prevents that, maybe. Possibly it's even tied to the Judges. At any rate it only awakens to deal with large scale threats like invasions, but skirmishes and squabbles are beneath its attentions. Just a suggestion.

weenie
2014-06-16, 06:12 PM
Sounds to me like - most players I know would consider themselves failures if they weren't running the whole place within two months.

What you're describing is anarchy, in its most literal sense. It can only work as long as (a) everyone around buys into it (it's, paradoxically, a very conformist system) and (b) no-one is that much more individually powerful than anyone else, so individual "outlaws" can safely be ignored.

Your players will probably violate both these rules with a vengeance.

It's pretty much anarchy, yes. Private property anarchy to be precise. I actually hope that the players will try to "break the system" as it were, because I would love to see how it plays out. Of course it's all up to DM fiat, but I get the feeling that if you set up the main PCs beforehand, don't make them incredibly idealistic and then try to play out their beliefs consistently, it would sorta create a simulation of how things would truly work out. Of course if players are lvl20 characters and everybody else is a commoner, they'll be more than able to crown themselves, but this was meant as more of a low-level campaign, so PCs aren't invincible on their own.

weenie
2014-06-16, 06:28 PM
The way I see it, there's got to be some way of protecting the borders or a monarchist army would just steamroll over the country, unless the country sucks, and nobody wants it (like the really lousy frozen parts of Russia) or unless there's some kind of guardian spirit or force that prevents that, maybe. Possibly it's even tied to the Judges. At any rate it only awakens to deal with large scale threats like invasions, but skirmishes and squabbles are beneath its attentions. Just a suggestion.

That's a great idea. A foreign invasion would be very interesting to play out. Then it could be up to the players on how they would fight it, uniting all the security organizations against the foreign threat, not opposing the conquest directly, but sabotaging any attempt to collect taxes on the people covertly or maybe something entirely different, that I haven't even thought of yet.

The biggest obstacle to conquering such a land in my opinion is that you can't just dispose of the previous king, and take over the tax system, like with invading other monarchies. Even if you execute all the most prominent judges in the area, this doesn't give you the ability to administer law yourself or to tax people. You are not attacking a ruler, but the way of life of an entire people, which means they will probably resist you, and if not violently, then at least by supporting the already existing and decentralized armed forces that were present before you invaded them. Engaging guerrilla warriors in a foreign land is the perfect way to lose your crown.

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll
2014-06-16, 11:07 PM
In Iceland, this worked because a) there weren't that many people, so you had to interact with people you wronged or who wronged you, b) it was isolated from foreign invaders, and c) it was economically poor, such that no one was really able to get that huge an advantage over another for a long long time.

Poppyseed45
2014-06-17, 01:12 AM
That's a great idea. A foreign invasion would be very interesting to play out. Then it could be up to the players on how they would fight it, uniting all the security organizations against the foreign threat, not opposing the conquest directly, but sabotaging any attempt to collect taxes on the people covertly or maybe something entirely different, that I haven't even thought of yet.

The biggest obstacle to conquering such a land in my opinion is that you can't just dispose of the previous king, and take over the tax system, like with invading other monarchies. Even if you execute all the most prominent judges in the area, this doesn't give you the ability to administer law yourself or to tax people. You are not attacking a ruler, but the way of life of an entire people, which means they will probably resist you, and if not violently, then at least by supporting the already existing and decentralized armed forces that were present before you invaded them. Engaging guerrilla warriors in a foreign land is the perfect way to lose your crown.

Hmm...problem is, in pretty much every case in real human history where a pastoral, "anarchic" set of groups meets an organized "government-ed" group, the anarchs lose. Every single time. Let's take the foreign invasion scenario above that you mention. There are no systems in place for working together, from what you describe, so any organized army will eat them for lunch, simply because they know how to create real supply lines and the like. Sure, your ragtag bunch of freedom fighters will win a battle or two, but they won't have the ability to win the war. Strangely, guerrilla tactics take organization to work.

Conquering lands were NEVER just a matter of disposing of the king. Take William the Bastard's conquest of England; it wasn't just a matter of disposing the king: have a look (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_the_conquerer#Consolidation_of_power). You've always got to clean up the rest of resistance, and that can take decades.

Thing is, we have exact examples of foreign organized powers taking lands of unorganized ones. When Rome conquered Britain (or the part they bothered to), there was resistance to Rome, sure, but it amounted to nothing thanks to exactly the lack of organization you're describing here; they didn't organize, and slowly but surely, Rome ate them, AND they eventually laid down for it: you can see that here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Britain#Roman_invasion).

This isn't to say that magic and stuff can't offset this; it's your game after all. Just, for me, if I were in your game, I'd be trying to figure out, sometime last week, why the organized powers around us haven't steamrolled us into oblivion.

P.S. - forgot to hit your other point, about "attacking a people's way of life." Sorry, that's poetic, but it's a tad...well, let me just say that a way of life disappears pretty quickly in the face of organized destruction (for example, the Celtic languages were once spoken from the Spains all the way to the edge of what is now Scotland; the vast majority of those languages are gone, thanks to organized groups "changing the way of people's lives", specifically Rome, though the Kingdom of England helped eventually that process as well).

Poppyseed45
2014-06-17, 01:28 AM
In Iceland, this worked because a) there weren't that many people, so you had to interact with people you wronged or who wronged you, b) it was isolated from foreign invaders, and c) it was economically poor, such that no one was really able to get that huge an advantage over another for a long long time.

The other point I wanted to make, thank you! Groups evolved into more organized groups for very specific reasons, usually relating to their neighbors, and if not them, then the organizing of things around agriculture. Sort of a chicken/egg thing really: is it having agriculture that causes organizing, which gives our neighbors the idea to organize, or did the neighbors organize for some other reason, which leads to agriculture, and now we have even more organizing?

If you're interested in the evolution of groups to organized from pastoral groups, there's a good book on the topic, "Guns, Germs, and Steel" by Jared Diamond (here (http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1842.Guns_Germs_and_Steel)).

weenie
2014-06-17, 04:33 AM
In Iceland, this worked because a) there weren't that many people, so you had to interact with people you wronged or who wronged you, b) it was isolated from foreign invaders, and c) it was economically poor, such that no one was really able to get that huge an advantage over another for a long long time.

You first point could be summed up as information being able to spread fast. I think that is very crucial and was wondering how magic could play a role in my society. The fact that is was isolated was a great help for the Icelanders, true. Ireland was also an island and I'm sure that played a large part in why it managed to remain decentralized for as long as it did. I was considering making the land in question an island as well, maybe that will make it more feasible for my players.

As for being economically poor, I'm not so sure that it was. There was no really rich king, but the farmers did pretty well for themselves. Also Iceland didn't stop being decentralized or anarchic simply because somebody became richer than the others, but because of problems in their system as I understand. They had a fixed number of "chieftains", which meant that it was possible to monopolize all of the chieftaincies. Also once christianity came along, chieftains hat the right to tax people according to regional proximity, which went completely against their laws before that.

weenie
2014-06-17, 04:48 AM
Hmm...problem is, in pretty much every case in real human history where a pastoral, "anarchic" set of groups meets an organized "government-ed" group, the anarchs lose. Every single time. Let's take the foreign invasion scenario above that you mention. There are no systems in place for working together, from what you describe, so any organized army will eat them for lunch, simply because they know how to create real supply lines and the like. Sure, your ragtag bunch of freedom fighters will win a battle or two, but they won't have the ability to win the war. Strangely, guerrilla tactics take organization to work.

Conquering lands were NEVER just a matter of disposing of the king. Take William the Bastard's conquest of England; it wasn't just a matter of disposing the king: have a look (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_the_conquerer#Consolidation_of_power). You've always got to clean up the rest of resistance, and that can take decades.

Thing is, we have exact examples of foreign organized powers taking lands of unorganized ones. When Rome conquered Britain (or the part they bothered to), there was resistance to Rome, sure, but it amounted to nothing thanks to exactly the lack of organization you're describing here; they didn't organize, and slowly but surely, Rome ate them, AND they eventually laid down for it: you can see that here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Britain#Roman_invasion).

This isn't to say that magic and stuff can't offset this; it's your game after all. Just, for me, if I were in your game, I'd be trying to figure out, sometime last week, why the organized powers around us haven't steamrolled us into oblivion.

P.S. - forgot to hit your other point, about "attacking a people's way of life." Sorry, that's poetic, but it's a tad...well, let me just say that a way of life disappears pretty quickly in the face of organized destruction (for example, the Celtic languages were once spoken from the Spains all the way to the edge of what is now Scotland; the vast majority of those languages are gone, thanks to organized groups "changing the way of people's lives", specifically Rome, though the Kingdom of England helped eventually that process as well).

Well, it's definitely not impossible to take over a land with a cultural aversion to involuntary rule, but Ireland did manage to stay decentralized for a pretty long time, it wasn't conquered until the 17th century. Geographical isolation may be a big factor in why they were able to fend off invasions for so long, but it's still quite a feat.

Anyhow, I was thinking about how the people of the land would react to foreigners. People coming to this land would mainly be traders, smugglers, refugees and criminals, so a measure of suspicion would probably be used. But I'm not sure what that would mean in practice. I don't think people would go so far as to fence in city districts or things like that, but maybe doing business would be harder for foreigners? Their grievances wouldn't be worth as much, some stores could be off-limits to them etc. What do you think?

Segev
2014-06-17, 08:34 AM
Also, don't mistake tribalism for anarchy. Most cultures of the sort you're describing are culturally unified but distinct micro-nations (or tribes). They have "ruling bodies" in their local village or nomadic group, whether a headman or a council of elders or just the patriarch (or matriarch) of the central family. Humans do naturally self-organize to some degree, whether formally or not.

A government - when formalized - is really just one thing: a body which has taken upon itself (possibly with, possibly without the consent of the governed) an exclusive monopoly on the legitimate use of force. This need not be absolute - many modern governments recognize a right to self-defense - but it tends to be vastly encompassing. A "good" government, by most modern standards, is one where this exclusive monopoly applies as a means to prevent citizens from taking vengeance on each other and to enforce individual rights in the face of individually stronger foes who would deny one those rights. In less-good governments (again by modern standards), this is an exclusive right to tyranny.

In an anarchy - a true anarchy - every man is responsible for his own personal defense as part of his own well-being. If he organizes with others in a family unit or a mutual protection group, he's already moving into tribalism, but he is gaining the benefits of combining his strength with that of others (and, if his strengths are not military, he's freeing up those whose strengths are in the application of force to specialize in it).

The reason the Irish culture was hard to stamp out is because it was a deeply entrenched tribal one. It wasn't an anarchy; it was hundreds or thousands of micro-nations, each of which had to be conquered individually and which shared enormous amounts of cultural identity. They didn't and couldn't organize on the scale of, say, Rome, but they did and could work together to some extent, and they were already used to operating entirely independently, so the usual tactic of breaking a major focus of political power wouldn't really be a hard blow to the morale and organization of the remainder.

Tribalism is, honestly, the natural state into which man enters when faced with no larger organizing body nor rule set. We band together around or under the strong or the clever, in family units or in gangs. Good - as in skilled - leaders can amass larger tribes, and can even develop them into nations, by force or diplomacy or reason.

In truth, the idealized version of James Madison's Federalism, taken down to a municipal level, is probably the closest you'll get to what you're looking for if you want this "land without rulers" to have the ability to unify around anything - even just its cultural identity - in the face of foreign powers. The whole point of Federalism was to secure for its people the benefits of empire (such as unifying organization in the face of foreign aggression) while retaining the responsiveness and individual determination made possible by being governed locally (i.e. not having to deal with a distant tyrant or even unfeeling bureaucracy, but handling your problems yourself or with your community).

weenie
2014-06-17, 09:14 AM
Also, don't mistake tribalism for anarchy. Most cultures of the sort you're describing are culturally unified but distinct micro-nations (or tribes). They have "ruling bodies" in their local village or nomadic group, whether a headman or a council of elders or just the patriarch (or matriarch) of the central family. Humans do naturally self-organize to some degree, whether formally or not.

A government - when formalized - is really just one thing: a body which has taken upon itself (possibly with, possibly without the consent of the governed) an exclusive monopoly on the legitimate use of force. This need not be absolute - many modern governments recognize a right to self-defense - but it tends to be vastly encompassing. A "good" government, by most modern standards, is one where this exclusive monopoly applies as a means to prevent citizens from taking vengeance on each other and to enforce individual rights in the face of individually stronger foes who would deny one those rights. In less-good governments (again by modern standards), this is an exclusive right to tyranny.

In an anarchy - a true anarchy - every man is responsible for his own personal defense as part of his own well-being. If he organizes with others in a family unit or a mutual protection group, he's already moving into tribalism, but he is gaining the benefits of combining his strength with that of others (and, if his strengths are not military, he's freeing up those whose strengths are in the application of force to specialize in it).

The reason the Irish culture was hard to stamp out is because it was a deeply entrenched tribal one. It wasn't an anarchy; it was hundreds or thousands of micro-nations, each of which had to be conquered individually and which shared enormous amounts of cultural identity. They didn't and couldn't organize on the scale of, say, Rome, but they did and could work together to some extent, and they were already used to operating entirely independently, so the usual tactic of breaking a major focus of political power wouldn't really be a hard blow to the morale and organization of the remainder.

Tribalism is, honestly, the natural state into which man enters when faced with no larger organizing body nor rule set. We band together around or under the strong or the clever, in family units or in gangs. Good - as in skilled - leaders can amass larger tribes, and can even develop them into nations, by force or diplomacy or reason.

In truth, the idealized version of James Madison's Federalism, taken down to a municipal level, is probably the closest you'll get to what you're looking for if you want this "land without rulers" to have the ability to unify around anything - even just its cultural identity - in the face of foreign powers. The whole point of Federalism was to secure for its people the benefits of empire (such as unifying organization in the face of foreign aggression) while retaining the responsiveness and individual determination made possible by being governed locally (i.e. not having to deal with a distant tyrant or even unfeeling bureaucracy, but handling your problems yourself or with your community).

Well, this is more of a comment on political philosophy than on the campaign itself, but it's still an interesting one. I equate anarchy with statelessness, so not having a regional monopoly on the use of force is anarchic enough for me. If people band together to combat a common foe, they haven't really done anything towards establishing a monopoly on the use of force. Having a multitude of microstates is in my opinion also a move towards anarchy, since if everybody was his own state, that would pretty much equal to anarchy in my definition. Some call that panarchy, but I find it's just a difference of semantics.

Now another concept I was thinking about was slavery. To me it could be conceivable that such a society would accept as valid contracts where one person sells himself to another, or that slavery could be deemed a just compensation for murder. What do you think?

Segev
2014-06-17, 10:19 AM
Slavery is something that happens in anarchies and tribalism unless there is some incredibly strong shared cultural taboo against it. The line between a "slave" and a "servant" in tribal cultures is relatively thin and often based on interpersonal dynamics.

Formal slavery practices would actually be a strong move away from "anarchy," because it implies a legal construct. Cultural slavery practices will tend to be on the neutral to evil end of the moral spectrum; usually, they are simply the ultimate form of force-used-for-theft: "do what I say or I'll punish/kill you; you're too weak to stop me."

Cultural mores surrounding it tend to make it more "honorable warrior race guy" sorts of things where a "slave" is less property and more working off the shame of defeat.

In short, slavery is either a legal or a cultural construct, and in the latter case, it will be something either formalized by virtue of how they view things, or it will be a fact of life for those under the thumb of tyrants.

LibraryOgre
2014-06-17, 10:24 AM
I'll add that this would probably be a better system in a non-leveled game. When your level determines your skill caps directly, someone can Diplomance themselves into kingship by the rules, which somewhat defeats the purpose.

Sith_Happens
2014-06-17, 11:58 AM
That's a great idea. A foreign invasion would be very interesting to play out. Then it could be up to the players on how they would fight it, uniting all the security organizations against the foreign threat, not opposing the conquest directly, but sabotaging any attempt to collect taxes on the people covertly or maybe something entirely different, that I haven't even thought of yet.

Successfully uniting the region's military/security apparatus against an organized foreign threat seems like a quick way to end up as a warlord when all's said and done.

Poppyseed45
2014-06-17, 02:50 PM
Successfully uniting the region's military/security apparatus against an organized foreign threat seems like a quick way to end up as a warlord when all's said and done.

Or, you know, a king.

valadil
2014-06-17, 03:06 PM
A land without rules? That sounds horrible. How would anyone measure anything?

Sith_Happens
2014-06-17, 04:14 PM
Or, you know, a king.

They're pretty much the same thing when you think about it.

Wyrm Ouroboros
2014-06-17, 04:39 PM
'Organized' does not mean 'effective', any more than 'disorganized' means 'ineffective'. William beat Harald in part because the Saxons were worn down from having just - as in, less than a month before, and marched straight to meet William FROM doing so - beaten off Viking raiders. Harald was king of the majority of England, but his barons had significant rights, honors, and power themselves - the destruction of which situation they fought, apparently for years to come, forcing William to break them individually instead of conquering them collectively.

Having a thing-based government - in which any citizen can stand and debate, though in which the holders of more land do have more influence as a practical matter - is a very workable situation, and though it can lead to aristocracies as the more charismatic or wealthy individuals charm or bribe others to follow/support them, if kept in line by a non-ruling oversight body (your 'judges', for example, who achieve the post by approval of their just and honest works and decisions) is highly workable.

It should be noted that a republic is, functionally, a thing-based government. The early Romans believed strongly in government of, by, and for the people; it is a popular opinion (at least among early historians) that the good emperors of Rome were ones who were judged by the current Emperor to be good, upright, and honest men, and who were deliberately adopted to inherit, and that those who inherited by birth were right bastards who brought about the Empire's downfall. The Emperor concept is itself an evolution of the concept of dictator - a temporary leader, assigned absolute power for usually six months, in order to take care of a pressing situation. Of good example is Cincinnatus:


Cincinnatus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnatus) was regarded by the Romans, especially the aristocratic patrician class, as one of the heroes of early Rome and as a model of Roman virtue and simplicity. ... When his son, Caeso Quinctius, was convicted and condemned to death, Cincinnatus was forced to live in humble circumstances, working on his own small farm, until an invasion caused him to be called to serve Rome as dictator, an office which he resigned two weeks later, after completing his task of defeating the rivaling tribes of the Aequians, Sabines, and Volscians.

In short, kings happen when the people get complacent and enforcement of the ideals of a society break down.

However, I will point out that your typical law structure will not work through a thing-based quasi-medieval government; the thing meets irregularly and/or rarely, and a killing needs to be taken care of quickly. You might consider taking a look at parts of Salic Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salic_Law), which includes among its concepts weregild (death-compensation). I'd wreck the 'no female may inherit' portion, especially since strong female characters are pretty important in a fantasy campaign ...

Wyrm Ouroboros
2014-06-17, 05:16 PM
'Organized' does not mean 'effective', any more than 'disorganized' means 'ineffective'. William beat Harald in part because the Saxons were worn down from having just - as in, less than a month before, and marched straight to meet William FROM doing so - beaten off Viking raiders. Harald was king of the majority of England, but his barons had significant rights, honors, and power themselves - the destruction of which situation they fought, apparently for years to come, forcing William to break them individually instead of conquering them collectively.

Having a thing-based government - in which any citizen can stand and debate, though in which the holders of more land do have more influence as a practical matter - is a very workable situation, and though it can lead to aristocracies as the more charismatic or wealthy individuals charm or bribe others to follow/support them, if kept in line by a non-ruling oversight body (your 'judges', for example, who achieve the post by approval of their just and honest works and decisions) is highly workable.

It should be noted that a republic is, functionally, a thing-based government. The early Romans believed strongly in government of, by, and for the people; it is a popular opinion (at least among early historians) that the good emperors of Rome were ones who were judged by the current Emperor to be good, upright, and honest men, and who were deliberately adopted to inherit, and that those who inherited by birth were right bastards who brought about the Empire's downfall. The Emperor concept is itself an evolution of the concept of dictator - a temporary leader, assigned absolute power for usually six months, in order to take care of a pressing situation. Of good example is Cincinnatus:


Cincinnatus (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnatus) was regarded by the Romans, especially the aristocratic patrician class, as one of the heroes of early Rome and as a model of Roman virtue and simplicity. ... When his son, Caeso Quinctius, was convicted and condemned to death, Cincinnatus was forced to live in humble circumstances, working on his own small farm, until an invasion caused him to be called to serve Rome as dictator, an office which he resigned two weeks later, after completing his task of defeating the rivaling tribes of the Aequians, Sabines, and Volscians.

In short, kings happen when the people get complacent and enforcement of the ideals of a society break down.

However, I will point out that your typical law structure will not work through a thing-based quasi-medieval government; the thing meets irregularly and/or rarely, and a killing needs to be taken care of quickly. You might consider taking a look at parts of Salic Law (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salic_Law), which includes among its concepts weregild (death-compensation). I'd wreck the 'no female may inherit' portion, especially since strong female characters are pretty important in a fantasy campaign ...

Alberic Strein
2014-06-17, 06:50 PM
Actually, I'm pretty sure that, semantic fudging aside, "organised" and "effective" are pretty much the same thing. You want to be effective? You need organisation. You don't have organisation? You'll lose 10 to 1.

As for the setting, well, it seems like a nice embryonic government. It could be something found on an island, which did not get invaded much, and has no experience in war, and hence does not feel the need to unite as a nation. Of course, some nice invaders could stir things up, paving the way for the PCs to become warlords rather easily, as stated.

Don't give this system a background as a 10 000 years strong empire and you're pretty much set, as long as your players are not politics enthusiats.

But yeah, it sounds more like the government of the weak little island that gets invaded by the big badass empire thant the government of the main place for the whole campaign, but hey, being on the son-to-be invaded island can be pretty cool.

Also, going on a tangent there, but you said something about magic being used for communication purposes. DONT. For the love of all that is not campaign breaking, just DONT. That shtick right there is a thousand times more dangerous than a lvl20 cleric who regularly shags his goddess who spoils him with greater wishes.

The Oni
2014-06-17, 07:04 PM
They're pretty much the same thing when you think about it.

Well yeah, a king is what happens when the majority of people are OK with the warlord (or his sons).

Slipperychicken
2014-06-17, 09:40 PM
Law could be enforced by anyone, which would mean there was nothing preventing violent conflict except the price and risk of it, so I think that separate security organizations would emerge with agreement on which judge will settle their disputes, to prevent unnecessary costs. People could sell their grievances to others, so harming somebody poor could still have repercussions, because even if they can't hire somebody to get restitutions from you, they could sell their grievances toward you to a stronger organization and that organization could then take you to court, or hunt you down if you don't agree to a legal settlement.


What's to stop people from simply forming militias to deal with troublemakers? They have families and communities to protect, and it's not hard to imagine that like-minded citizens would take matters into their own hands once the smattering of lawmen proved inadequate or unreliable.


And what happens if a town doesn't want to obey judge's ruling? Suppose the judge lets the accused go free, and the townsmen lynch the accused anyway. What happens next? Why should the townsfolk even wait for the judge and sheriff to show up anyhow, if they aren't beholden to their verdicts?

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll
2014-06-18, 12:11 AM
Part of the idea is there hardly is a "town". In "Njall's Saga", which is my main source of Icelandic life, the closest thing to an anarchic major society I can think of, there are no Icelandic towns of note. There are major land owners who have small villages but no towns, nothing walled and the Thing is the main market.

weenie
2014-06-18, 03:11 AM
What's to stop people from simply forming militias to deal with troublemakers? They have families and communities to protect, and it's not hard to imagine that like-minded citizens would take matters into their own hands once the smattering of lawmen proved inadequate or unreliable.


And what happens if a town doesn't want to obey judge's ruling? Suppose the judge lets the accused go free, and the townsmen lynch the accused anyway. What happens next? Why should the townsfolk even wait for the judge and sheriff to show up anyhow, if they aren't beholden to their verdicts?

Nothing is really stopping them from taking law in their own hands, except custom and not having a personal stake in the matter. And trouble-makers still have friends and allies. Killing one might provoke retribution from somebody else etc. Also if you kill someone people could still take up a grievance against you for purely financial motives. They wouldn't need to really care emotionally about him, they could just be after your stuff.

That's another interesting question, grievances for murder. I was thinking that they would be hereditary, so if somebody kills your parent, you or another member of your family owns the grievance for his murder. What happens in the case of orphans or foreigners though? I guess then people could sell rights to murder grievances to third parties contractually. Or if they didn't do that, the first person to claim the grievance at the scene of the crime owns it. Thoughts?

As for the territorial defense etc, I see no reason why they wouldn't be able to unite in case of an invasion, really. They'll have experience with pirates and all sorts of people, and will probably be armed, since everyone of them is a part time law keeper of sorts. Villages could have militias and towns could have fortifications to withstand sieges, but most of all it would be a kind of Swiss scenario I believe. They are resource rich, but they are armed and geographically protected, and if you attack them, people there might be ready to pay your neighbors to take your land.

Angelalex242
2014-06-18, 03:28 AM
Historically, I only know one example of a nation ruled by Judges...and it transformed itself into a Monarchy shortly thereafter. Most kings weren't very good, with a few notable exceptions in that particular monarchy.

That nation, of course, would be 1000 BC Israel, around the time of King David (Before him by a century was the time of the Judges...most famous of which is Samson, the guy who runs screaming from anybody trying to give him a haircut, but had super strength like Hercules otherwise)

The_Werebear
2014-06-18, 01:50 PM
You'll have to let me know how that works out. I've considered running something like that before.

One thing I would make sure of is to make sure that the PC's know about the cultural impetus behind the Judges. Social and cultural pressure will be a major force here. If one continuously ignores the rulings of judges they bring in to arbitrate, no one will trade or interact with them, marry into their families, or protect them. They'd slide into outlaw status by default.

Alberic Strein
2014-06-18, 04:46 PM
As for the territorial defense etc, I see no reason why they wouldn't be able to unite in case of an invasion, really. They'll have experience with pirates and all sorts of people, and will probably be armed, since everyone of them is a part time law keeper of sorts. Villages could have militias and towns could have fortifications to withstand sieges, but most of all it would be a kind of Swiss scenario I believe. They are resource rich, but they are armed and geographically protected, and if you attack them, people there might be ready to pay your neighbors to take your land.

Before getting into the military aspect, I would like to stress that this system cannot be used if they are resource rich. As the monetary gap between the farmers (etc) and merchants deepens, the merchants will form an oligarchy, since their superior means of buying grievances give them power over the masses, and slowly excludes the many out of the judicial system. And what do merchants want? Political power. So the biggest, baddest ones would form a government, without much fear of retribution. They have the people indebted to them to defend them, and foreign mercenaries are expensive but, in real world at least, very, very good, and would take on militiamen 10 times out of 10.

Now, the military aspect.

Yes, they could unite. There are always people ready to ally with the invaders in the hope of rewards, but if the culture is strong enough, the people will rise to defend it.

The Island has a number of very, very steep advantages : Islands limit the number of invaders, since they must come from boats, boats being f*kin expensive, and a single ship can only hold so many soldiers. Sinking the ship, and islanders are often good with boats, will kill many, many people. Also, knowledge of the terrain cannot be underestimated, it is the keystone of guerilla tactics, and tactics themselves in general, which allow for a smaller force to defeat a bigger one.

Ok, so, the invaders will get schooled, right? Oh yeah, for a whole two minutes, then the island will be invaded faster than you would believe.

Why? What do the invaders bring the militiamen don't have?

"One army."

Militiamen are not an army. Yes, they know which part of the spear goes into the enemy, but how many drills do they perform regularly? What is their day to day training? How many hours a day do they spend with their squadmates? Do they know the chain of command? Who is their boss, and who is the boss of their boss, repeating? Really, there can be military drills about almost anything, and this is military training. Militiamen have a day job, and it's not to train to perform in a war. War is a side job. Is it really anybody's surprise that they would get slaughtered?

Untrained troops break morale and formation easily and cannot be used for advanced strategies.

Worse, your allied army of militiamen is not one, it's a coalition of many groups. Which are HELL to administrate. Why would Drogo the Fierce, Warden of the North, listen to Drogo the Bloodthirsty, Bane of the South? They agree to fight the same enemy, but they won't want to submit to the other. So a chain of command will be hell to establish. Better yet, whomever ends up at the top of said chain has some decent odds to become king real quick once the war is over.

However, for a number of negative point, the allied army of militiamen will behave like a real army. Namely the RP&B department. Groups of militiamen don't need a supply line, an army does. So the army will starve, then turn to the nearby villages and starve them. Which will not sit well with the militamen from that region. That and war crimes have a tendency to happen after a couple of unsuccessful battles and starving soldiers.

So would the militiamen unite to send back the invader? Oh yes.

But they would NOT win against anything more than a few pirate ships.

Ps: No standing army means no warships and no advanced coastal defences, so the invaders would have no issues landing their troops and conquering a coastal village as an advanced base of operations. And since the islanders have no navy, they cannot blockade the invading force and prevent them from receiving supplies and reinforcements.

Vahir
2014-06-18, 05:15 PM
Yeah, an invasion of pirates or a raid by another would be better than an outright invasion. Without a central government to direct its defense, your country would be quickly conquered, the people exterminated via good old genocide, and settlers from the conquering nation would be brought in.

Slipperychicken
2014-06-18, 06:26 PM
Yeah, an invasion of pirates or a raid by another would be better than an outright invasion. Without a central government to direct its defense, your country would be quickly conquered, the people exterminated via good old genocide, and settlers from the conquering nation would be brought in.

Or they'd just be united under a common flag to defeat the threat, undermining the whole 'anarchy' thing.

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll
2014-06-18, 07:22 PM
I feel you misunderstand anarchy as a political system. Anarchy doesn't mean they never unite ever. It means no greater power is FORCING them to unite. It doesn't mean that people can't work together. It doesn't mean that they can't react to changes in situation. In a non-anarchy, there would be a system above everyone telling them "when the raiders come, you guys are all a squad and Bjorn is your leader". Whether the system is a democracy or a monarch is irrelavent.

In an anarchy, the people who feel threatened enough to join up do so and decide that Bjorn is the smartest/strongest of them, so he should be the guy in charge for now. People stick with their friends because they trust those people, so friend groups form squads, and the natural leaders in those friend groups form squad leaders, and Bjorn, the highest respected of all the squad leaders, becomes the leader. People can work together and the natural processes of human interaction will form a temporary hierarchy until they no longer need to work together. In which case if the society is mostly made up of equals (my Icelandic example of equal land-owners ignores the inequal status of the servants and slaves), none will have the power to hold the group together absent an external enemy.

It stops being an anarchy when temporary unity and temporary governmental authority becomes permanent governmental authority.

Anarchy also doesn't lack rule of law. The difference is that rule of law is equal to tyranny of the majority of power in the society. This is why an anarchic society like Iceland was able to have laws of weregild and had strict rules of how courts functioned. They even functioned without set judges. If I remember correctly, the plaintiff would name a certain amount of candidates for judges, and the defendant would choose a judge from the 3 candidates. Then the defendant would choose 3 candidates for judges and the plaintiff would choose a judge from the 3 candidates. There was also a neutral judge chosen by mutual agreement, iirc. These candidates would be similar to your judges in that they were all well-regarded, but they were chosen by the plaintiff and the defendant. The plaintiff and defendant didn't necessarily have to be self-represented in court either, they could choose lawyers to represent them. Men did specialize as lawyers.
Law was decided by oral tradition set down by years of custom. Anarchic societies are not a free-for-all, they just are rule of law by mutual agreement and punishment by direct tyranny of the majority, not by a supreme authority.

Slipperychicken
2014-06-18, 07:43 PM
In an anarchy, the people who feel threatened enough to join up do so and decide that Bjorn is the smartest/strongest of them, so he should be the guy in charge for now. People stick with their friends because they trust those people, so friend groups form squads, and the natural leaders in those friend groups form squad leaders, and Bjorn, the highest respected of all the squad leaders, becomes the leader.

And what's to differentiate such a leader from any other chief or warlord?

Alberic Strein
2014-06-18, 08:35 PM
And what's to differentiate such a leader from any other chief or warlord?

That instead of using his newfound status, authority and power to expand his area of influence, securing new lands for the people who now look up to him, through blades or wedding bonds, as well as using this new power to haggle some nice trade rights or new tolls, ie capitalize on his success and, in pure sedentary fashion, find some way to have his power stick, through a number of ways. Instead of that then, he is supposed to put his sword back in his belt, discard all the authority he has earned and return to his status as one among the many members of his tribe.

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll
2014-06-18, 08:36 PM
And what's to differentiate such a leader from any other chief or warlord?

Time. A chief or warlord keeps control during peacetime. The temporary leader of an anarchy forced to unite, chosen AFTER they unite, and only WHILE they are united, is a general. An anarchy stops being an anarchy once he takes power. In an anarchic system though, once the threat that forced temporary unity is gone, the forces that allowed him to control others are also gone. No longer does he hold enough power to force any more people to do his bidding to take power. He may end up more powerful, with more people respecting his personal leadership abilities, but unless enough join him to overwhelm the rest of the society, he remains just another influential independent citizens amongst citizens.

But I suppose while he IS in command, while they ARE fighting, he is practically indistinguishable from another chief or warlord. It's just that he only holds military power, not judicial or legislative power, and probably not more than a plurality of the executive power that he needs to carry out the campaign.

Angelalex242
2014-06-18, 08:49 PM
Well...that depends. See, the aforementioned 'temporary' war leader could pull an Emperor Palpatine. "It is with regret that I claim these emergency powers in perpetuity..."

"But what about the Senate?"

"I AM THE SENATE!"

And so on. So yeah, a sufficiently powerful war leader could pull off permanent leadership, provided he's NOT simply acting in good faith on behalf of the people. This assumes, of course, the war leader is a sufficiently powerful wizard or cleric to strike down opposition with his own two hands (Palpatine in part got his position because his Sith Power allowed him to do so. Gotta have magic to pull this off in the D&Dverse...)

Vahir
2014-06-18, 09:29 PM
Time. A chief or warlord keeps control during peacetime. The temporary leader of an anarchy forced to unite, chosen AFTER they unite, and only WHILE they are united, is a general. An anarchy stops being an anarchy once he takes power. In an anarchic system though, once the threat that forced temporary unity is gone, the forces that allowed him to control others are also gone. No longer does he hold enough power to force any more people to do his bidding to take power. He may end up more powerful, with more people respecting his personal leadership abilities, but unless enough join him to overwhelm the rest of the society, he remains just another influential independent citizens amongst citizens.

But I suppose while he IS in command, while they ARE fighting, he is practically indistinguishable from another chief or warlord. It's just that he only holds military power, not judicial or legislative power, and probably not more than a plurality of the executive power that he needs to carry out the campaign.

That's a nice military force- In theory. But what happens when the leader dies in battle? Or when soldiers start to dislike their superior for giving orders they disprove of? Medieval warfare is horrifying, with men being trampled by horses, impaled by metal rods, beaten to death, and so on. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that your ragtag militia wouldn't last a minute before routing in face of a disciplined, organized army.


Well...that depends. See, the aforementioned 'temporary' war leader could pull an Emperor Palpatine. "It is with regret that I claim these emergency powers in perpetuity..."

"But what about the Senate?"

"I AM THE SENATE!"

And so on. So yeah, a sufficiently powerful war leader could pull off permanent leadership, provided he's NOT simply acting in good faith on behalf of the people. This assumes, of course, the war leader is a sufficiently powerful wizard or cleric to strike down opposition with his own two hands (Palpatine in part got his position because his Sith Power allowed him to do so. Gotta have magic to pull this off in the D&Dverse...)

This happened often in real life, such as the unification of the german tribal confederations under kingships.

Slipperychicken
2014-06-18, 09:34 PM
But I suppose while he IS in command, while they ARE fighting, he is practically indistinguishable from another chief or warlord. It's just that he only holds military power, not judicial or legislative power, and probably not more than a plurality of the executive power that he needs to carry out the campaign.

I could see that working in the absence of persistent, long-term issues for which the society needs unity, and which could help convince people to let a leader maintain power.


Perhaps the campaign could explore some of these ideas, with some strongman trying to seize power after the PCs help the militia repel a large pirate attack or other threat. Suddenly faced with a choice between freedom and apparent security, an embattled people (and the PCs) are faced with a new quest: To preserve their way of life in a world fraught with danger.

Also, this kind of anarchic system can go a long way toward answering certain pervasive questions, like "Why haven't the guards taken care of it?" and "How do the PCs get away with looting bodies?". You could even incorporate that old Scandinavian law, under which killing a person entitles you to his property (which would probably be worth it just to watch the Paladin's blood-pressure skyrocketing), yet still have consequences in the form of blood feuds, rivalry, and even lawmen leading expeditions of citizen-soldiers to take down troublemakers.


That's a nice military force- In theory. But what happens when the leader dies in battle? Or when soldiers start to dislike their superior for giving orders they disprove of? Medieval warfare is horrifying, with men being trampled by horses, impaled by metal rods, beaten to death, and so on. I may be wrong, but it seems to me that your ragtag militia wouldn't last a minute before routing in face of a disciplined, organized army.


They don't necessarily have to be a ragtag militia. People in such a culture (that is, without a central government) might often find occasion to take up arms, and may even become quite skilled at warfare from all the quarreling that happens.

EDIT: Nor do they need to face a disciplined army in pitched battles. Even in those days, skirmishing, ambushes, and guerrilla warfare were quite viable. One could take for example the Germanic tribes, whose warlike culture and fierce, cunning resistance was more than a match for Rome's armies.

Vahir
2014-06-18, 09:59 PM
Nor do they need to face a disciplined army in pitched battles. Even in those days, skirmishing, ambushes, and guerrilla warfare were quite viable. One could take for example the Germanic tribes, whose warlike culture and fierce, cunning resistance was more than a match for Rome's armies.

I expect you're refering to Teutoberg. I'd just like to point out that the romans had faced similar armies and defeats in the past, in Gaul, and if they had really wanted to, they could have done the same thing they did there (i.e. Scorched earth, genocide, colonization). And the germans were hardly anarchic, they had their own aristocracy, just less centralized.


They don't necessarily have to be a ragtag militia. People in such a culture (that is, without a central government) might often find occasion to take up arms, and may even become quite skilled at warfare from all the quarreling that happens.

If they were in a quarell-prone region, they'd develop centralized government. Conflict breeds power, after all.

Alberic Strein
2014-06-18, 10:14 PM
They don't necessarily have to be a ragtag militia. People in such a culture (that is, without a central government) might often find occasion to take up arms, and may even become quite skilled at warfare from all the quarreling that happens.

EDIT: Nor do they need to face a disciplined army in pitched battles. Even in those days, skirmishing, ambushes, and guerrilla warfare were quite viable. One could take for example the Germanic tribes, whose warlike culture and fierce, cunning resistance was more than a match for Rome's armies.

Actually, and this is terrible, no. A group of militiamen won't become skilled at warfare. Now, don't get me wrong, they do get used to battle, and this goes a long way, but the size of the battles they have been with makes their experience almost irrelevant in warfare. They'll be used to giving death and they will have experience with their weapons, that is undeniable.

But taking a city? The necessity of ( and protecting) supply lines? Battle-size strategies? Formation fighting? Long-range communications?

The warbands won't know any of that. Of course, the average soldier won't really understand all that, but he will have a leader, who will have a leader, who will have a leader who will.

I emphasized drills in my post because it is the one way to prevent your troops from breaking in battle. You can't have untrained (undrilled) units expect not to break, unless we're in novels.

Let's say the Islanders' formation charges the Empires'. They strike hard and true, with the vigor of those defending their homes, and strike down two soldiers. They are quickly replaced and spear blows start being exchanged. You attack, deflect blows meant for your allies, repeat. Your armor is heavy, sweat gets in your eye, your breath becomes ragged. It's dangerous, it's tiring, it's hell. Then BigJon, frustrated by the lack of headway, deflects an enemy spear and charges, drawing his sword. However he got in too fast too quick and before he finishes drawing, he took two to three blows to his unshielded side. His son, SmallJon, rushes to save his father, losing his calm, and gets severely wounded. He starts to retreat into the formation with his father, but he gets skewered. At that point, one guy is going to scream that we'll all get killed, will do an 180 and start running. The rest of the formation will hesitate a bit, but then slowly but surely, it will break apart and people will start running. The Empire will throw their spears at their backs and will chase them down with their sword drawn.

Why? The Empire and the Islanders at that point have had the same casualties. One side however, has experience in full scale battles, has discipline and does not have a single element which will break formation and run for his life. And that can only be achieved with drills. By war being your job. Tough men are not soldiers. They can become soldiers, peerless soldiers even, but they cannot be expected to stand toe to toe against actual drilled soldiers before they have even been trained as soldiers. Likewise, tough men can't be expected to be military leaders, strategists, and such right of the bat. Those things are learnt and take time. No standing army means this knowledge does not exist in the Islander's camp.

For the Germanic cultures. Yes and no. Were they badass and all the points you quoted? Yup. But they managed to stand up to Rome because Rome was woefully overextended. The Francs were not less than the germanic tribes, and they got schooled. Discipline wins against tough men. And Rome, as long as it was not morbidly obese and decaying, took down tribes like the germanics for centuries.

Guerilla warfare, yes. Yes that would work. Unluckily, villages don't have legs. The Empire will strike the villages, and once it has conquered them all, it is de facto the new boss of the place. Also, militiamen would not accept to stay back while their village is subjected to the whole RP&B department of warfare. So they would go, and they would die.

Slipperychicken
2014-06-18, 11:04 PM
This island's militias would have little need to take cities: It's doubtful they would have much military ambition beyond reclaiming their sparsely-populated homeland. Also, I would imagine that the empire setting up shop in villages (presumably after having their supply lines harassed the whole way there) may do little more than harden their resolve, as countless insurgents throughout history have shown a remarkable willingness to conduct clandestine raids against their occupiers' men, structures, and supplies. Indeed, such resistance can be more effective than a 'fair fight', by steadily eroding the invaders' capabilities until they give up or are defeated.

Additionally, small forces like those used in guerrilla campaigns often don't have vulnerable supply lines, while an invading, organized army typically would. A small force might comfortably live on familair land (and on resources contributed by locals), while a large army might become rather hungry and demoralized if its supplies don't arrive on time.


I expect you're refering to Teutoberg. I'd just like to point out that the romans had faced similar armies and defeats in the past, in Gaul, and if they had really wanted to, they could have done the same thing they did there (i.e. Scorched earth, genocide, colonization). And the germans were hardly anarchic, they had their own aristocracy, just less centralized.


That's one of the main reasons that such insurgencies can work: If insurgents can break their invaders' resolve, that's just as good as (arguably better than) defeating them in combat. History has shown that resolve (the willingness to commit resources to a conflict) can sometimes be more important than capability (the resources available to carry out a conflict). That is to say that an inferior-but-motivated force can defeat a superior-yet-demoralized one.

This isn't to say that victory is guaranteed for the islanders, but only that their struggle isn't necessarily hopeless either.

Alberic Strein
2014-06-18, 11:25 PM
This island's militias would have little need to take cities: It's doubtful they would have much military ambition beyond reclaiming their sparsely-populated homeland. Also, I would imagine that the empire setting up shop in villages (presumably after having their supply lines harassed the whole way there) may do little more than harden their resolve, as countless insurgents throughout history have shown a remarkable willingness to conduct clandestine raids against their occupiers' men, structures, and supplies. Indeed, such resistance can be more effective than a 'fair fight', by steadily eroding the invaders' capabilities until they give up or are defeated.

Empire finds coastal city, Empire takes coastal city, Empire fortifies coastal city, Coastal City must now be taken if the Islanders want their territory back. Also, attacking supply lines is not exactly easy, and, in case of naval ones, impossible for the Islanders, since they don't have a military grade navy. Likewise, the Empire does not have to fight the Islanders directly, all they need to do is invade villages, able men of the militia army will leave the militia army and take men with them to defend the villages, they will get killed and the villages taken. Also, guerilla is hard. You cannot just improvise guerilla warfare without some kind of completely incredible talent. If you try, odds are you and your people will simply get killed when you pull too late, misread a parameter, commit a mistake, or one of your men fumbles.

What the OP describes is the archetype of an embryonic society. Each and every single of those societies died specifically because they were bad at staying alive and were terrible at warfare. A standing army will slaughter the entire Island's population before they even get organised enough to think about attacking supply lines.

In History, nine times out of ten, when a disciplined army faces undisciplined tribes, the tribes get slaughtered. And the one time they win, there was the interference of some outside modifiers, like weather, temperature, illness, etc, etc, etc...

weenie
2014-06-19, 03:44 AM
Empire finds coastal city, Empire takes coastal city, Empire fortifies coastal city, Coastal City must now be taken if the Islanders want their territory back. Also, attacking supply lines is not exactly easy, and, in case of naval ones, impossible for the Islanders, since they don't have a military grade navy. Likewise, the Empire does not have to fight the Islanders directly, all they need to do is invade villages, able men of the militia army will leave the militia army and take men with them to defend the villages, they will get killed and the villages taken. Also, guerilla is hard. You cannot just improvise guerilla warfare without some kind of completely incredible talent. If you try, odds are you and your people will simply get killed when you pull too late, misread a parameter, commit a mistake, or one of your men fumbles.

What the OP describes is the archetype of an embryonic society. Each and every single of those societies died specifically because they were bad at staying alive and were terrible at warfare. A standing army will slaughter the entire Island's population before they even get organised enough to think about attacking supply lines.

In History, nine times out of ten, when a disciplined army faces undisciplined tribes, the tribes get slaughtered. And the one time they win, there was the interference of some outside modifiers, like weather, temperature, illness, etc, etc, etc...

There's no reason other cities on the island should take a conquered city back, they do have a good motive to fortify and hire mercenaries though. And I might be wrong, but unless the conquering army slaughters the whole city it conquered, which will make further conquest even harder, because people will now know they are fighting for their lives and not just to resist taxation(which was enough for American colonists to secede from England mind you), they will have to contend with an incredibly hostile population. I don't think it's particularly hard to conquer a city, with rulers or without, the hard part is preserving power over it. With bodies of your soldiers regularly washing up in the city canals, morale might start to drop on your side too. Remember that the conquering army will be considered a band of outlaws by the populace, not just another ruler.

Alberic Strein
2014-06-19, 04:49 AM
Now, this is an unusual vision of cities during occupation. It is, if anything, a modern view, and stems a bit from the Resistance movement during the 1940s in France and what's happening in modern times. In other words, the city you view occupied is a city with guns. Guns are fair. A few weeks/months are enough to use a gun properly, guns are lethal, concealable, ranged, scary and moddable. Anyone, and I mean anyone can pick up a gun, press the trigger and have a decent chance of hitting someone and inflict a wound which has a decent chance of killing someone if untreated.

The armament during the Dark times less so. Being proficient with a spear or a sword takes a long, long time, and, unlike guns, those weapons are rather tough to conceal, there are smaller sized weapons, but their killing ability is lower, and they tend to be unreliable in a fight. Also, it is extremely unusual to be wearing armor in a settlement, ditto for war weapons such as longswords (the two handed kind), etc...

So, an occupied village would have the villagers unarmored and unarmed, while the soldiers would most of the time be the exception and wear both arms and armor, with also some formal training in the wielding of their weapons. If killing is to be had, the soldiers won't be the victims.

Now, we're speaking Islanders. They are big, they are strong, they are tough. They are, from their militia training, proficient in their weapons, maybe just as much as the soldiers, maybe more, maybe less, maybe sufficiently close for the result to be up to luck. But they won't have armor and probably not their weapons, or their heavy weapons, during the encounters, which will make the fight very very tough on them.

Which encounters? Well, occupying a city creates tension, with soldiers demanding much, and giving nothing. As it is, able bodied men of agreeable age are often prone to claiming that they don't need to take this, that this has gone too far/on long enough and that they're going to give the soldiers a lesson. For the aforementioned reasons, this often end in dead villagers. Hey, it can also end in dead soldiers too, I know. But when riots start, the unarmed and unarmored are the first to take casualties rather than inflict them. And blunders from riot control forces, even in dangerous countries, have nothing on armies occupying a city.

It has also been noted that the whole "arrive, conquer, genocide, colonise" was an actual approach, and that it worked. In real life.

Would then the remaining cities burn with outrage? Oh, oh yes. Some. And even then, diplomacy is a magnificient tool, since some cities just would not want to be subject to such treatment, and would actually consider that 10% of their profits and their fealty is not much of a price to pay to keep its male population. But even then, what would the united cities do? They don't have navies to harass their naval supplies, so what, they make an über army and siege the city?

Issues on the army (chain of command/no formal army training) and lack of knowledge and specific tools for their goal (the siege).

Also, the Islander's alliance is going to depend on the strength of the culture immensely. If the culture is not strong and deep enough, a pact is going to be formed between the Empire and some of the Cities (non-agression, etc...) and the Empire will be free to attack and annex the rest. Then they wait till the end of the treaty or break it and conquer the rest.

Long story short : Prior to the creation of firearms, hostile populations could be held in check relatively well through military forces, and the victims usually did not wear soldier armor. And if an army of 100 strong arrives in a village of 100 inhabitants, they will still grossly outnumber the able bodied men in the city. It would not be that unusual to see the male population decimated. With the rest of the cities doing nothing to stop it.

Also, if the other cities don't find a way, FAST, to beat back the soldiers before they fortify this point, this is over. They can stock close to as many soldiers they want in the city and then launch a huge campaign to expand their area of influence. So yeah, taking back that city should be priority 1.

Segev
2014-06-19, 11:21 AM
Yes, your "anarchy" can unite. But what if there's a disagreement between Bjorn and Sven about who is the mightiest and most respected leader? Sure, Bjorn might be able to get 3 of the 5 tribes to back him, and half of a fourth, but Sven's tribe absolutely, positively will not work under Bjorn and Sven can convince half of one of the tribes to follow him, too. After all, it's an anarchy, so nobody can force the fourth tribe's members to all go with Bjorn.

So now Bjorn has to subdue Sven's warriors and prove he's the most fit for leadership by taking down Sven's best men. This weakens the alliance before they ever face the invading empire, but it could work.

However, now Sven's people are leaderless without Bjorn. Let's say they do throw back the invaders. Bjorn has managed to be so beloved a leader in war that many of the men in the three and a half tribes that followed him want to stay in his service. Bjorn, too, feels like the invaders will be back any year, and that they can't afford to be unready. They certainly can't afford another Sven fighting for leadership.

So Bjorn starts a standing army, of which he is the head. And, to avoid having the succession problems Sven's tribe had, he appoints an heir should anything happen to him.

...and now your island has a warlord. Or possibly even a king.

Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll
2014-06-19, 04:47 PM
I was assuming a) no cities or major population centres, and b) no tribal systems. Simply a spread of holdsteaders, a spread of independent farmer/warrior/traders, each with a handful, maybe up to 20, servants and followers. Tribal government is still government. Kinship ties matter, but they're not government.

And I apologize, I wasn't trying to say that they stood a chance against an organized standing army. Against a feudal army of similar size I imagine they'd have a chance, but not a standing army, not anything with discipline. If a Roman legion or a medieval mercenary army or one of the few medieval standing armies landed in Iceland, they wouldn't stand a chance. If the French or English feudal armies landed, other than the bit where the bigger richer country has more men and money, they'd have a chance, especially if the anarchic country has a large martial tradition like the Norse did, where the lawyer would go trading and then maybe sack some small villages on his way back.

But if you have a feudal army, most of their forces are just as unused to combat and low-discipline as the Islanders. The nobility of the feudal army are used to combat, but probably still low-discipline, same as the independent holdsteaders. Only the holdsteaders probably are less trained, but more numerous as a percentage of the force than the feudal knights. The one advantage is that the feudal system ingrains a line of command, whereas the holdsteaders army is a whole network of allegiances that is easier to break up.

As for guerilla campaign, I wouldn't say it's hard to pull off. What it is is hard to pull off in an organized fashion, but it can easily happen organically and naturally through enough people willing to fight small battles and use their own superior knowledge of their own tiny corner of the Island. It's the difference between an army fighting a guerrilla war and a handful of holdsteaders resisting occupation best they can.

Jay R
2014-06-19, 05:00 PM
Of course I'd play in it. And by tenth level or so, I'd plan to be the king.

This is a conquest waiting to happen.

veti
2014-06-19, 05:06 PM
Yes, your "anarchy" can unite. But what if there's a disagreement between Bjorn and Sven about who is the mightiest and most respected leader? Sure, Bjorn might be able to get 3 of the 5 tribes to back him, and half of a fourth, but Sven's tribe absolutely, positively will not work under Bjorn and Sven can convince half of one of the tribes to follow him, too. After all, it's an anarchy, so nobody can force the fourth tribe's members to all go with Bjorn.

Your scenario seems to assume that the system breaks down because Bjorn and Sven are giant egotistical douchebags who rise to the top in a time of externally-imposed crisis. It doesn't have to be that way, there are entirely legitimate reasons why crises happen even without any external stimulus.

Say Bjorn's faction (who aren't anyone's 'faction' initially, they're just a bunch of people who live in a certain area and share a certain degree of kinship and community ideals) wants to clear a forest to make more farmland because their population is growing, but Sven's people rely on the forest for hunting and a reliable source of timber. Or Bjorn's people have built a new watermill, and now the river downstream isn't flowing as freely and all the fish have gone away. Or Bjorn's people like to walk and hunt in the heather on the mountainside, Sven's want to grow vines there.

Basically, wherever there are multiple groups of people sharing the same resources, there will be disagreements. They need some way to resolve those. In our societies, that's what 'politics' was invented for - it's still, to date, the only known alternative to war.

Poppyseed45
2014-06-23, 03:13 AM
I was assuming a) no cities or major population centres, and b) no tribal systems. Simply a spread of holdsteaders, a spread of independent farmer/warrior/traders, each with a handful, maybe up to 20, servants and followers. Tribal government is still government. Kinship ties matter, but they're not government.

And I apologize, I wasn't trying to say that they stood a chance against an organized standing army. Against a feudal army of similar size I imagine they'd have a chance, but not a standing army, not anything with discipline. If a Roman legion or a medieval mercenary army or one of the few medieval standing armies landed in Iceland, they wouldn't stand a chance. If the French or English feudal armies landed, other than the bit where the bigger richer country has more men and money, they'd have a chance, especially if the anarchic country has a large martial tradition like the Norse did, where the lawyer would go trading and then maybe sack some small villages on his way back.

But if you have a feudal army, most of their forces are just as unused to combat and low-discipline as the Islanders. The nobility of the feudal army are used to combat, but probably still low-discipline, same as the independent holdsteaders. Only the holdsteaders probably are less trained, but more numerous as a percentage of the force than the feudal knights. The one advantage is that the feudal system ingrains a line of command, whereas the holdsteaders army is a whole network of allegiances that is easier to break up.

As for guerilla campaign, I wouldn't say it's hard to pull off. What it is is hard to pull off in an organized fashion, but it can easily happen organically and naturally through enough people willing to fight small battles and use their own superior knowledge of their own tiny corner of the Island. It's the difference between an army fighting a guerrilla war and a handful of holdsteaders resisting occupation best they can.

Problem here. Those nobility you discuss; I think you're taking the movie view of them. In real life, medieval nobility spent a whole lot of time and effort training their martial skills. Thus we had, for example, tourneys and jousts and such - that's all martial training. Plus, in between running their holdings and the like, they trained, practiced, and hunted to keep up their skills. For nobles of that time, their martial prowess WAS their key to holding power. Frequent peasant rebellions prove that this training was decisive. You could make a claim that the average peasant in such an army wouldn't be very good, but in many kingdoms of the time, peasants and serfs were required to train for militia duty.

However, all of that misses the major point I mentioned earlier, but will mention again. Organization. For example, for your Islanders, who makes their weapons? For that to work, there have to be classes of people who do nothing but make weapons; they, in turn, have to be supported by people who only farm/hunt/produce food, so that they have time to get good at making weapons. That means you need some sort of regularized, stable economy - which means government of some sort. Enough so that there are classes of society who only do a certain job. It's why nobles can exist - they don't have to grow their own food with their own hands, so they have time to do all that training. Dedicated farmers get good at what they do, producing more food and such not.

I was actually wondering that - how do your Island traders not just steal from each other all the time? There's nothing enforcing contracts except custom and possibly blood ties, as far as I can see from your example, so...who?

Another issue is command structure, as someone up thread mentioned. In medieval times, and certainly earlier, there are clear "levels" in society, so when it comes to commanding armies, we know who does what. Operations can be coordinated and the like, even over distances, using letters and the like, and some sort of messenger system (after all, that's what couriers, heralds, and pages were for).

Also, another question - how do your Islanders communicate? It takes organization to invent things like writing and formalized language. China and Rome beat their barbarians for one reason because they could actually make plans that could be passed to others, or knowledge and information precisely. All of that (organized writing) implies an organized structure of some sort. Again, if we take the Mongol example (who had organization, if not writing), they eventually got REALLY good when they borrowed Chinese writing for their own stuff (and Arabic, and Persian, and some other written languages for that matter).

Another thing -how do your Islanders talk to each other? In tribal societies, language is often extremely local. It happens (even now) that, say, a village in India can't talk to the next village. We don't get unified languages until someone imposes it, or groups decide to use something (once they start organizing). The Gauls and Germans who invaded Rome the first times around (think in Marius's time) ironically used Latin as a lingua franca, because their own languages were mutually unintelligible.

I guess what I'm saying is, it feels like a lot of your setting is missing the assumptions behind it. As I said before, I'd find it hard to buy it; where are the organized cultural underpinnings? The shared religious rituals (meaning at least a clergy that talks to each other, like the Druids as a unifying force for the Gauls/Bretons/Teuetons/Whatevers)?

Alberic Strein
2014-06-23, 09:31 AM
I'm feeling like discussing a bit, so even though I agree with a number of things, here is a "devil advocate" answer ^^


Problem here. Those nobility you discuss; I think you're taking the movie view of them. In real life, medieval nobility spent a whole lot of time and effort training their martial skills. Thus we had, for example, tourneys and jousts and such - that's all martial training. Plus, in between running their holdings and the like, they trained, practiced, and hunted to keep up their skills. For nobles of that time, their martial prowess WAS their key to holding power. Frequent peasant rebellions prove that this training was decisive. You could make a claim that the average peasant in such an army wouldn't be very good, but in many kingdoms of the time, peasants and serfs were required to train for militia duty.

I'm being captain obvious here, but while your view is right, the other view is not limited to movie version of nobility. It is just a question of period. Early middle ages nobility differs vastly from late middle ages/cavalier years. Same for militia serving. It was not omnipresent during all the ages, and sometimes implementing through a sneaky way was considered a major breakthrough. For example England hosted a number of archery tourneys to encourage its peasantry to learn the use of the bow, as regiments of bowmen are way more useful than infantry regiments, with comparatively equal training and equipment. Also, do keep in mind than most serfs litterally worked from sunrise to sundown, leaving little time for militia duty. Maybe it's my inner optimizer talking more than basing my thinking on hard data, but if you already pay a guy for protection, then you're better off leaving the whole thing to him and not try to half do the job you already pay him in full to do. Also, as a lord, I'll sleep better if I know my serfs don't know which end of a spear is the business end.

Of course, your points are still valid. Nobility was warlike and militias existed.


However, all of that misses the major point I mentioned earlier, but will mention again. Organization. For example, for your Islanders, who makes their weapons? For that to work, there have to be classes of people who do nothing but make weapons; they, in turn, have to be supported by people who only farm/hunt/produce food, so that they have time to get good at making weapons. That means you need some sort of regularized, stable economy - which means government of some sort. Enough so that there are classes of society who only do a certain job. It's why nobles can exist - they don't have to grow their own food with their own hands, so they have time to do all that training. Dedicated farmers get good at what they do, producing more food and such not.

Yes, no, yes. Well, my opinions about your different points is zigzagging. Is organization going to be damn important in case of war? Yup. Will it be a huge thorn to the Islander's side? Yup, well, fighting on their home turf will help that a bit, but yeah, the logistics needed to form and supply an army are huge, and probably will overwhelm the Islanders. Will the Islanders hold their own against a noble who can afford to spend his whole life training and/or at war and his ost? I'm doubtful. Now, a knight in chainmail will kick a viking's arse 10 times out of 10. But as it was pointed out earlier in the thread, roman armies are not dark age armies. The training of the average soldier will not be hugely superior to that of a tough man in a tough setting. Battles are 8 times out of 10 sieges, and sieges are 7 parts logistics, 2 parts waiting and 1 part hacking the guy in front of you. Surviving many sieges will not give a soldier huge training as far as killing enemies go. He will have picked a few tricks which usually are enough to surprise and sneak a kill on the enemy, and maybe the soldier might have acquired a sense of battles, but he won't really be used to spearfights/swordfights. Nobles are a huge boon to any army, but they are few and early enough in the middle ages, they weren't much more than warlords, which can be found in tribal settings. A raider chief who commands a group of five and survived many raids may count as a warlord while still belonging to the sorta anarchic government the OP thinks of. I am puzzled by your view of organization needing a government. Villages can (sorta) survive with the jobs pointed out without a higher hierarchical power's influence.


I was actually wondering that - how do your Island traders not just steal from each other all the time? There's nothing enforcing contracts except custom and possibly blood ties, as far as I can see from your example, so...who?

Definitely. However, for those points, I would like to stress that as far as controlling masses go, religion is a beautiful, beautiful thing.


Another issue is command structure, as someone up thread mentioned. In medieval times, and certainly earlier, there are clear "levels" in society, so when it comes to commanding armies, we know who does what. Operations can be coordinated and the like, even over distances, using letters and the like, and some sort of messenger system (after all, that's what couriers, heralds, and pages were for).


Oh yeah, the Islanders are sooooooooooo going to be in trouble with that. I could advance two points though, that battles are typically sieges (yeah I know I'm repeating myself) and so the need for long range communication is less present. Also, the Islanders could use the chinese brick structure. First you form five men teams with a leader, then you take pairs of those teams to form ten men teams with one of the former leaders leading the group of ten, then you do it again, again and again, so any foot soldier knows who his immediate boss his, and his boss knows who he answers to. But yeah, without a rigid system, chains of command are going to be difficult to maintain, all the more during battles.


Also, another question - how do your Islanders communicate? It takes organization to invent things like writing and formalized language. China and Rome beat their barbarians for one reason because they could actually make plans that could be passed to others, or knowledge and information precisely. All of that (organized writing) implies an organized structure of some sort. Again, if we take the Mongol example (who had organization, if not writing), they eventually got REALLY good when they borrowed Chinese writing for their own stuff (and Arabic, and Persian, and some other written languages for that matter).

True. However the Greeks used "voiced" laws a lot, and managed to keep their traditions through songs. For example Homère never ever WROTE the Illyad and the Odyssey. The poems (more songs, really) are attributed to him. Because they survived through the form of sung poems long enough for someone to finally write them down. While non-writing based cultures will certainly have issues leaving a strong legacy and that written laws and agreements are a lifesaver as far as disputes are concerned, "voiced messages" was (and actually still is) a way to communicate plans and such through long distances, through a messenger, herald or minstrel. The culture will have issues surviving, but as far as a campaign is concerned, it should not come up too strongly, unless the players really go cultural revolution on them.


Another thing -how do your Islanders talk to each other? In tribal societies, language is often extremely local. It happens (even now) that, say, a village in India can't talk to the next village. We don't get unified languages until someone imposes it, or groups decide to use something (once they start organizing). The Gauls and Germans who invaded Rome the first times around (think in Marius's time) ironically used Latin as a lingua franca, because their own languages were mutually unintelligible.

I can add a personal touch to that point. My grandfather was an Italian born in Switzerland (long story and nobody cares) but spent his early life in a village north of Italy. After a while he left to find work in France, where he found his wife, Italian like himself. As it turns out she came from litterally the village next to his. A river and half a day separated them. They never managed to understand each other's italian. And they were practically neighbors. In the 20th century.

However, the question of tongue is almost never ever brought up in fantasy settings. So a reason could easily be cooked up, like "it was taught to all mankind through gods/*insert other precursor, possibly the fantasy version of the Roman empire*". Anyway, while it's an issue, it is not setting specific.


I guess what I'm saying is, it feels like a lot of your setting is missing the assumptions behind it. As I said before, I'd find it hard to buy it; where are the organized cultural underpinnings? The shared religious rituals (meaning at least a clergy that talks to each other, like the Druids as a unifying force for the Gauls/Bretons/Teuetons/Whatevers)?

Creating a thread about that is one way to put this perspective to light and allow one to think about it. While their absence should be note, I also think that you don't absolutely need to voice or think deeply of the reasons. One understands that it's a failing, automatically comes up with a half embryo of something of a reason, and it's more than enough to improvise something on D Day. A setting is only full once you're in front of your players.

Storm_Of_Snow
2014-06-23, 11:18 AM
Hmm, what about if it's effectively a communalism? There's no specific rulers, perhaps someone with expertise in a particular area is put in temporary charge (for instance, during harvest time, everyone pitches in with the crops, but the local farmer tells them which ones to gather first and where to put them).

If there's easy travel between settlements, it would be quite easy for them all to become inter-related, and thus more able and willing to group together against threats.

Of course, it all has to be done by the choice of the population, and you'd either need people who're willing to give up their position when it's over (which could involve some magical or mystical effects that cause them to do so), explicit consequences for them if they don't, even if they would be fair, just and hold that position with the blessing of the populace, or there's someone more powerful who can cast them down (gods, maybe a Mage who's set the whole thing up as a social experiment but is willing to step in with a lightning bolt if someone gets uppity, or perhaps an order charged with ensuring no one grabs power, whos existance is known, but whose membership is secret).

Poppyseed45
2014-06-23, 02:58 PM
Snip snippity snip.

I think I agree largely with your addendums and such; I know a case (well, an acquaintance) with much the same experience as your grandfather. But, if I may quote Napoleon: "Italy! Will that country ever amount to anything?" ;)

Otherwise, I hear and see your devil's advocacy. Which, again, still shows we're both right (with your earlier posts): all the cases you mentioned against were specific sort of cultural/era setups. So, for the setting to work (and for our hypothetical islanders not to get bowled over immediately, making for a short game campaign), we'd have to postulate how the various things you said in your reply can come together into one set of circumstance. I think. Or I may have gone crazy.

Wardog
2014-06-27, 02:55 AM
Another thing -how do your Islanders talk to each other? In tribal societies, language is often extremely local. It happens (even now) that, say, a village in India can't talk to the next village. We don't get unified languages until someone imposes it, or groups decide to use something (once they start organizing). The Gauls and Germans who invaded Rome the first times around (think in Marius's time) ironically used Latin as a lingua franca, because their own languages were mutually unintelligible.

If the Islanders regularly trade with or otherwise mingle with each each other, their languages are going to blend together, or they will develop a pidgin - assuming they even had different languages to begin with.

The ancient Germans and Gauls inhabited lands larger than modern Germany and France, and their languages come from two separate families (Germanic and Celtic respectively), so its not surprising they needed a separate lingua franca. But if we are talking about an island community comparable to medieval Iceland, they I doubt they would have multiple, mutually unintelligible languages (unless they were continuingly being settled by peoples from completely different parts of the world).

Jay R
2014-06-27, 11:30 AM
It's an anarcho-syndicalist commune. They take it in turns to act as a sort of executive officer for the week. But all the decisions of that officer have to be ratified at a special biweekly meeting, by a simple majority in the case of purely internal affairs, but by a two-thirds majority in the case of more--

Well somebody had to say it.

Segev
2014-06-27, 12:45 PM
Basically, wherever there are multiple groups of people sharing the same resources, there will be disagreements. They need some way to resolve those. In our societies, that's what 'politics' was invented for - it's still, to date, the only known alternative to war.

Well, there's trade, but it's arguable that all trade involves a certain amount of politics, anyway. Assuming you define "politics" to include just about any social interaction between groups of people.