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View Full Version : IDEA: "Investiture" granting levels by legal-magical ceremony "Brevet levels"



johnbragg
2015-01-18, 08:13 AM
TLDR: To match the levels of NPCs in the DMG tables, NPCs should be able to gain class levels by community award, somewhat like being knighted for service or promoted from Bishop to Archbishop or Colonel to General.

EDIT: I think "brevet levels" is an easier term to use than "investiture"

If there are the amount of mid- and high-level folks around that the DMG suggests, and if they leveled up by murderhoboing, then there would have to be enough XP-fodder monsters out there to bring an end to humanoid civilization. But if there aren't enough monsters to quickly overrun civilization, then how did the 12th level High Priest of the city get to level 12? (There's not that much XP to be gained in running ceremonies and scribing TPS reports.) "How many higher-level characters are/should be out there" is a debate that goes back to the earliest days of D&D worldbuilding, from the "Gandalf Was A Fifth-Level Wizard" arguments, etc.

The fluff about the gods says that they depend in some nebulous way on their worshippers for power. So if the allegiance of millions can be a magical power source, why not treat the Kingdom (or whatever stable, legitimate* political structure is in the area as a quasi-deity, granting powers in the form of class levels to chosen servants? So when the Baron Eric of Botany Bay gets promoted to Count Eric of Caramora, there's a ceremony with the proper notables in attendance, the ritual is performed, and Eric is invested with a level of Aristocrat or Expert or Fighter or whatever homebrew class best fits your kingdom. And when Brother Karl gets promoted from Pastor of Hommlett (Cleric 3) to Under-Cantor of Verbobonc, he gets invested with a level or 2 of cleric.

This makes perfect sense for fighter levels for commanders, cleric levels for high priests, and wizard levels for mage-guild leaders. (Fluff it that being promoted politically is the reason that apprentices muck about being apprentices instead of the faster-but-riskier path to arcane mastery of murdering sentient monsters.) The City of Townsville is big enough to have a 7th level cleric, so their High Priest is 7th level even if he only actually has 3500 xp.

* "legitimate" in the political-science-textbook sense, in that the government has some moral right to rule and to command obedience and respect, in the opinion of the large majority of the populace.

Glimbur
2015-01-18, 09:18 AM
Interesting. I like it, my only concern is that sometimes PC's are granted titles for heroic deeds etc. You'll want to consider what happens then. I would have the powers overlap i.e. they probably get no mechanical benefit for it.

johnbragg
2015-01-18, 09:38 AM
Interesting. I like it, my only concern is that sometimes PC's are granted titles for heroic deeds etc. You'll want to consider what happens then. I would have the powers overlap i.e. they probably get no mechanical benefit for it.

I wanted to get feedback on the idea in general first. Because my main idea is explaining why the head of the Wizard's Guild and the town High Priest is 7th level and the Captain of the Guard are all 7th level, when your 4th level PCs are the ones out there facing death and being Big Damn Heroes--the high-level NPCs are like Dark V, wielding power they haven't really earned and don't really know what to do with in combat. Sure they can cast Restoration or Remove Curse for the PCs, but they have the tactical combat experience and instincts of a dead herring.

It naturally leads to the idea though of a Magistrate or Notable prestige class, so that the mayor of the dinky village would be an Expert 2-Notable 1, maybe with some minor spellcasting or healing abilities. But I don't think a level of Magistrate should be optimized at all for PCs. Would it be unbalancing to give your PCs a free level of Expert or Aristocrat with their knighthoods? Even if you threw in a free Skill Focus (Sense Motive) and a +2 to Diplomacy checks on citizens of the kingdom, and a handful of cantrips/orizons as SLAs?

EDIT: Somehow I just saw the implications that PCs could get a free PC class level by being knighted. You could handle this in one of two ways:
1. Give them the level as a story award. This isn't the worst idea, but it is a step on the road to Monty Haul-dom, the kind of 2e campaigns we ran in high school
2. The level isn't for being knighted. The "free level" isn't free, it's part of the "equipment" you need to do the job--Captain of the Guard, High Priest, Grand Vizier--and these are full time jobs, so you'd have to retire from murderhoboing and basically give up being a PC.

steelsmiter
2015-01-18, 11:28 AM
But if there aren't enough monsters to quickly overrun civilization, then how did the 12th level High Priest of the city get to level 12? (There's not that much XP to be gained in running ceremonies <snip>.)
I've always been opposed to the idea of not gaining XP for ceremonies. Even mundane ones like marriages. I would let them grant EXP for the CR of the pair they marry off at least.

Still, you wanted general opinions, and generally, I opine that Investiture Rituals should be a thing.

johnbragg
2015-01-18, 11:57 AM
I've always been opposed to the idea of not gaining XP for ceremonies. Even mundane ones like marriages. I would let them grant EXP for the CR of the pair they marry off at least.

Still, you wanted general opinions, and generally, I opine that Investiture Rituals should be a thing.

I'd say in a fantasy setting, there's no such thing as a mundane ceremony. In a setting where magic largely replaces physics, everything is magical to some degree. In other words, the "fluff" coronation ceremony for the new king, logically should have some kind of "crunch" effects. So if the ceremony is not performed correctly (the bad guys capture the king and a doppelganger gets crowned instead) there are crunch effects (the coronation was a false one, so the doppelganger doesn't get the kings usual powers--but neither does the rightful king.)

But that's a sidetrack from gaining XP for ceremonies. I'd argue that you should, but the amount of XP is trivial compared to what you'd need to get past 2nd or maybe 3rd level. If you handwave 10 level-appropriate encounters to get from 1st to second, and call a marriage 1/2 of a 1st-level encounter, you're looking at 120 marriages to get to 3rd level. (Maybe the first time is stressful enough to rate as a CR 1, but after that the difficulty goes down dramatically.)

Admiral Squish
2015-01-18, 12:04 PM
I like the idea, I admit. I'm not sure about legitimate-government-as-deity idea, though. Perhaps it's more of a communal thing? Like, the group performing the investiture gathers XP from the community, a few points here and there, which add up to a sizable total, and then grants those XP to the target of the ritual. Maybe they get it passively, just gathering it from the positive opinions of the populace, or perhaps it's attached to something physical, like a collection box or a statue, or maybe it's something the community has to voluntarily contribute to as part of the ritual/preparation for the ritual. They would only get a few points here and there from the various commoners and maybe larger contributions from some more powerful individuals.

Regardless of the method, you'd have to be very certain to make sure the players couldn't just do this to themselves/each other, or found an organization to further their own power in this way. Though, I suppose that there are organizations that are set up solely to benefit the leader of said organization...

johnbragg
2015-01-18, 12:34 PM
I like the idea, I admit. I'm not sure about legitimate-government-as-deity idea, though. Perhaps it's more of a communal thing? Like, the group performing the investiture gathers XP from the community, a few points here and there, which add up to a sizable total, and then grants those XP to the target of the ritual. Maybe they get it passively, just gathering it from the positive opinions of the populace, or perhaps it's attached to something physical, like a collection box or a statue, or maybe it's something the community has to voluntarily contribute to as part of the ritual/preparation for the ritual. They would only get a few points here and there from the various commoners and maybe larger contributions from some more powerful individuals.

Regardless of the method, you'd have to be very certain to make sure the players couldn't just do this to themselves/each other, or found an organization to further their own power in this way. Though, I suppose that there are organizations that are set up solely to benefit the leader of said organization...

That's about right. I was using "deity" as an analogy, for a repository of the XP or ki or mojo or devotion of a sizable community, which then becomes a resource that can be tapped to power various effects. You could DM-handwave it, or you could rule that sages have studied the matter and come up with a rough idea of the math.

I'd say it's not passive, exactly. I'd say it's part of the magic of the rituals of citizenship. Every year you have holidays, and on those holidays you have ceremonies, with the high priests and chief wizards and captains-of-the-guards standing in the right spots and saying the right words and the townsfolk/countryfolk taking off their hats or wearing their finest hats and pledging allegiance to the kingdom, renewing the bonds of citizenship for another year.

As for the players doing it themselves, the players would have to figure out how to set up a situation where a kingdom is pledging allegiance to them. How that works depends on the campaign setting at the start. Using Forgotten Realms as an example, I could maybe see Elminster convincing the people of the DAlelands for form a ki pool. But I really don't see the PCs convincing people to replace an existing community like the Kingdom of Cormyr. (Maybe they take over an existing community, but they'd have to earn it. Sure the party could dipomancy the king into appointing the wizard as Court Magician, but then you're tied to the palace.)

Option:
That's why the civilized (Lawful) Kingdom of Generica gets to invest a 4th-level clerics as a Level 14 High Priests while the best the disorganized orc hordes (with the same population) can do is boost someone up to Priest 7, maybe 9 if the Eyes of Gruumsh are whipping up a crusade. The orcs don't have that level of trust in each other and their institutions, so they can't ki pool as effectively. And maybe the hyper-lawful dwarves and hobgoblins can bang out a 14th level High Priest with half the population of the mostly-human Kingdom. It only works if the community as a group believes it's going to work--that's where "legitimacy" comes in.

johnbragg
2015-01-18, 01:58 PM
I like the idea, I admit. I'm not sure about legitimate-government-as-deity idea, though.

Well, there is real-world precedent. Imperial Rome mandated sacrifices to the goddess Roma and/or to the cult of the Emperor. Translate that into a magical world, and you have a massive power source.

Americans pledge allegiance to the flag, and to the Republic for which it stands, rather frequently. H.G. Wells argued about a century ago that the nations of Europe were the true gods of the 20th century, able to move people in ways that Christianity no longer did. (He disapproved of the directions that it moved people, but that was his argument.)

If you can be a cleric of a philosophy or an idea, I fail to see why you can't be a cleric of the idea of the Kingdom of Aquitaine, upholding Peace, Order, Prosperity and Law throughout the kingdom.

TheTeaMustFlow
2015-01-20, 01:15 PM
Well, there is real-world precedent. Imperial Rome mandated sacrifices to the goddess Roma and/or to the cult of the Emperor. Translate that into a magical world, and you have a massive power source.

Americans pledge allegiance to the flag, and to the Republic for which it stands, rather frequently. H.G. Wells argued about a century ago that the nations of Europe were the true gods of the 20th century, able to move people in ways that Christianity no longer did. (He disapproved of the directions that it moved people, but that was his argument.)

If you can be a cleric of a philosophy or an idea, I fail to see why you can't be a cleric of the idea of the Kingdom of Aquitaine, upholding Peace, Order, Prosperity and Law throughout the kingdom.

I like that idea. It'd bring the ideas and systems of magic much closer to the mundane of the game world; in a lot of D&D settings, you have this rather awkward separation of arcane, divine and mundane power - mostly conventional kingdoms/nations with magical stuff bolted on the side.

It'd also provide a pretty good way of doing clerics in a magical alternate history game - the domains you get aren't primarily determined by whether a cleric is, say, Christian or Muslim, but by whatever nation, organisation, or ideology he serves - so you have a cleric of the Kingdom of Aquitaine, a cleric of the Teutonic Order, and a cleric of the Fraticelli sect, all worshipping the same God.

Seerow
2015-01-20, 01:35 PM
This is actually a really cool setting idea. Imagine a world where there is a pretty fairly "set" amount of energy/experience to go around. It's not just that you go through a ritual and bam you're level 10. It's that you go through a ritual and you inherit the level 10 capabilities of the guy who had the position before you. Every generation a small amount of exp gets added to the total passed down, so over a thousand years and multiple generations you end up with people who have fairly high levels, but for the most part the levels stay static.

But every now and then, something weird happens. An inheritor dies without having declared an heir and the potential is dispersed. A god takes a special interest in current events. Someone wins the genetic lottery and has unlocked the ancient potential. A human makes a deal with the devil to gain potential to move beyond their lowly station. Whatever it is, these events result in your player characters. They are special and rare. They are the only people who can go out and gain experience/levels in the way we consider typical, and are considered special for it. In a generation a couple dozen of these individuals might appear. Many die with that potential still untapped, and thus the status quo remains. But for those who do make something of themselves, they are the primary way in which the world grows in power over time, because when they feel it is time to retire, they can pass on their abilities to someone else, and the capability they develop essentially creates one more permanent high level individual in the world.

You can dig deeper into it with how different cultures perceive both the Invested individuals and the Potential individuals. Some cultures might perceive the Invested as a holy boon, passed generation to generation to children. Others consider it a right of office, with those who gain political power gaining access to the investiture. You can have cultures that will revere the Potential characters and others who look upon that potential in the hands of an unknown person with fear. You can have Kingdoms that buy and sell these powers as an alternative high end currency. Those that will try to control or recruit the players.


It actually sounds like quite a lot of fun. I may need to spend some time fleshing this out and running another campaign.

steelsmiter
2015-01-20, 02:20 PM
someone said something about favorable attendees. It got me thinking that a town could feasibly just give 1 XP per favorable attending citizen to the ceremony's recipient(s). Maybe modify this up for Lawful and Good societies by +10% (per) to represent trust in the institution, and down for Chaotic and Evil societies for the opposite reason. feel free to play with the numbers.

johnbragg
2015-01-20, 09:56 PM
I like that idea. It'd bring the ideas and systems of magic much closer to the mundane of the game world; in a lot of D&D settings, you have this rather awkward separation of arcane, divine and mundane power - mostly conventional kingdoms/nations with magical stuff bolted on the side.

I didn't start thinking of this in terms of spotlighting the power of politics and societies in the campaign world, but I also like where it's gone. It definitely helps fluff out why some societies are stronger than others--strong bonds of community suddenly have a game-mechanical effect besides a morale bonus in mass combat. In Stickverse terms, Gobbotopia is a stronger society than the Vector Legion puppet-states because the goblins have a real allegiance to Gobbotopia--so if we were writing the STickverse as a setting, Gobbotopia would have tbe ability to invest, say, Jirik with levels.


It'd also provide a pretty good way of doing clerics in a magical alternate history game - the domains you get aren't primarily determined by whether a cleric is, say, Christian or Muslim, but by whatever nation, organisation, or ideology he serves - so you have a cleric of the Kingdom of Aquitaine, a cleric of the Teutonic Order, and a cleric of the Fraticelli sect, all worshipping the same God.

If you're doing that, you can also add color (and crunch) by picking different signature weapons for different orders, something like the late-medieval English longbowmen and Swiss pikemen. The Order of Plain Fellows maybe gets Weapon Focus: Quarterstaff as a free feat, while the Brothers of St Brendan the Navigator get Exotic WEapon Proficiency--Trident.


This is actually a really cool setting idea. Imagine a world where there is a pretty fairly "set" amount of energy/experience to go around. It's not just that you go through a ritual and bam you're level 10. It's that you go through a ritual and you inherit the level 10 capabilities of the guy who had the position before you. Every generation a small amount of exp gets added to the total passed down, so over a thousand years and multiple generations you end up with people who have fairly high levels, but for the most part the levels stay static.

But every now and then, something weird happens. An inheritor dies without having declared an heir and the potential is dispersed. A god takes a special interest in current events. Someone wins the genetic lottery and has unlocked the ancient potential. A human makes a deal with the devil to gain potential to move beyond their lowly station. Whatever it is, these events result in your player characters. They are special and rare. They are the only people who can go out and gain experience/levels in the way we consider typical, and are considered special for it. In a generation a couple dozen of these individuals might appear. Many die with that potential still untapped, and thus the status quo remains. But for those who do make something of themselves, they are the primary way in which the world grows in power over time, because when they feel it is time to retire, they can pass on their abilities to someone else, and the capability they develop essentially creates one more permanent high level individual in the world.

You can dig deeper into it with how different cultures perceive both the Invested individuals and the Potential individuals. Some cultures might perceive the Invested as a holy boon, passed generation to generation to children. Others consider it a right of office, with those who gain political power gaining access to the investiture. You can have cultures that will revere the Potential characters and others who look upon that potential in the hands of an unknown person with fear. You can have Kingdoms that buy and sell these powers as an alternative high end currency. Those that will try to control or recruit the players.

It actually sounds like quite a lot of fun. I may need to spend some time fleshing this out and running another campaign.

That's a very cool direction you took it in. Nice.


someone said something about favorable attendees. It got me thinking that a town could feasibly just give 1 XP per favorable attending citizen to the ceremony's recipient(s). Maybe modify this up for Lawful and Good societies by +10% (per) to represent trust in the institution, and down for Chaotic and Evil societies for the opposite reason. feel free to play with the numbers.

I haven't started to contemplate what the math looks like, exactly. I'm a little bit lazy sometimes, and can see myself taking a hard look at the DMG tables and making kludgy adjustments from there. On the other hand we have Excel spreadsheets now, so maybe I'll find out if there is some actual math behind the tables and monkey with it from there.

The Mentalist
2015-01-23, 07:20 PM
This is actually something I've toyed with mechanically for some time. Granting feats, levels, abilities, and such. RoC in his Libram Eternia has the Godking who levels up his followers. I've toyed with sacred shrines hidden in ancient crypts that could grant a very limited spellcasting list, or a book that could drive you insane or make you a level 1 Xenotheurge, but also allowing higher level PCs to take feats to train their plucky squire/acolyte/apprentice. For example, at 6th level you can take a feat to grant a character a 0lvl spell slot with an hour a day over 3 weeks. Or a sacrificial dagger that grants anyone shedding blood with it the ability to bind Vestige X or Y. I'my away from notes right now but I'll get details to you of my own ideas as soon as possible.

There's also something presented in the 3rd party supplement "The Practical Enchanter", a substance that holds experience points and grants them to the owner while he owns them. The crown jewels or bishop's miter might not just be symbols of office but give you the power of the office. On the other hand they also allow you to enchant songs or poems so the title may grant the experience. One of the interesting things in addition to that was an enchantment that allowed a ruler to gain 5% of the XP gained on his land or to levy a small xp tax. Total up an empire of a million souls each donating 1xp a year and you can form quite a powerful organization.

johnbragg
2015-02-26, 10:24 PM
Bumping the thread because I have a better name for the practice: Brevet levels.

Brevet commissions were granted to officers in the US (and other) armies, sometimes for what would now be a service or other medal, sometimes to fill a job that required a higher rank. So in the Civil War, a Captain of the Regular Army might be given a brevet commission as a Colonel of Volunteers. (It's complicated, and disputed, but I think it's a better name than "Investiture")

So a 3rd level cleric, Aelred, might be "brevetted" to a 5th level cleric post, gaining 2 "brevet levels." And a 2nd level cleric Bjorn might be "brevetted" to 3rd level to fill Aelred's old post.

Almarck
2015-02-26, 10:35 PM
3 + 3=5?

How does raising a 3rdclevel cleirc by 3 levels result in 5th?

Also good to see your idea is working along. Any other news on what else youve been brain storming?

johnbragg
2015-02-27, 05:20 AM
3 + 3=5?

How does raising a 3rdclevel cleirc by 3 levels result in 5th?

Also good to see your idea is working along. Any other news on what else youve been brain storming?

Editing mistake.

As for brainstorming, looking at the DMG tables for how NPC spellcasters in a town to look at how many caster levels are supposed to be in a town of size X, to get a handle on
1) how many brevet levels are available and
2) how much energy is available for "public works magic" powered by the society.