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Yora
2015-01-08, 08:41 AM
Are there any RPGs that deal with players gathering small hordes of warriors and leading them into battle? Adventurer Conqueror King seems to try something kinda like that, but from what I understand it only has some rules for managing your domain by collecting taxes and economic surpluses. I am more looking for something that focuses more on a band of warriors doing warrior stuff, but also things like recruiting and building your own forts and things like that. But also focusing more on the roleplaying of war leaders, and not going too deeply into tactical mass combat.
Probably isn't hugely popular, because there will most likely always be one PC who ends up being warlord and the other players "only" playing lieutenants, but I still think it might be a really cool sub-genre.
Is there anything like that?

Madfellow
2015-01-08, 09:37 AM
The two systems that come to mind are ACKS and D&D 5th. ACKS because it has rules for henchmen and mercenaries and loyalty, and D&D 5th because it has those same rules, only better.

LibraryOgre
2015-01-08, 10:02 AM
2e's Birthright specifically had rules for recruiting soldiers, and running the domains you created.

Yora
2015-01-08, 10:40 AM
But running a domain is something I am not really interested about. All too often it boils down to financial management and literal bookkeeping. That's administration, not leadership. I am interested in things like forging alliances with other warlords, getting people to swear allegiance to you, military campaigns, and such. The talking and plotting, not the number crunching.

I only looked once at birthright years ago. Does it deal with anything like that?

LibraryOgre
2015-01-08, 11:28 AM
But running a domain is something I am not really interested about. All too often it boils down to financial management and literal bookkeeping. That's administration, not leadership. I am interested in things like forging alliances with other warlords, getting people to swear allegiance to you, military campaigns, and such. The talking and plotting, not the number crunching.

I only looked once at birthright years ago. Does it deal with anything like that?

There's a fair amount of number crunching, because the realm DOES have to be maintained, but there's also in-place rules for gathering armies and taking over a place.

Jay R
2015-01-09, 11:51 AM
The game you want is original D&D, with Chainmail, once the characters get to high level.

Yora
2015-01-09, 11:53 AM
You can play a comander with every system, but I was wondering if there are any games that have specific rules and guides for those things.

neonchameleon
2015-01-09, 07:37 PM
Apocalypse World might interest you. (Vincent Baker's writing isn't to everyone's taste). Or more accurately, the Apocalypse World Hardholder and Chopper can be warlords and do it very well. It might also be completely not what you are after - give it a look either way.

Kiero
2015-01-09, 08:02 PM
ACKS has an entire, separate mass combat system, Domains@War, into which the characters, their followers and their armies can be plugged. It can do "platoon" scale where there are tens of combatants on each side as well as "division" scale with thousands.

Yora
2015-01-10, 05:47 AM
Lots of games have mass combat and mercenaries, but those tend to devolve into tactical minigames. I am looking mostly for the politics and roleplaying aspects.

golentan
2015-01-10, 06:30 AM
Exalted with the Creation Ruling Mandate rules from Masters of Jade?

Kiero
2015-01-10, 06:30 AM
Lots of games have mass combat and mercenaries, but those tend to devolve into tactical minigames. I am looking mostly for the politics and roleplaying aspects.

Lots of games have very poor, badly-abstracted mass combat systems (eg Exalted). Domains@War is basically a wargame, and a decent one at that. Not what you're looking for, being focused on other aspects, but it's worth pointing out that not all mass combat systems are created equal. Most RPGs do a piss-poor job of "tactical minigames", even at the skirmish level of their regular combat rules.