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View Full Version : Idea for highly-political, game-of-thrones style political roleplay. Which system?



Madeiner
2015-05-22, 09:32 PM
Hey there.

Tonight i had a crazy idea.
I'm envisioning a highly political roleplaying campaign, full of intrigues and scheming.
Something like game-of-thrones the tv series, where there is intrigue, fantasy, scheming, etc. However, the players do not roleplay single characters, but their family, or rather a few members from that family or related to the family.

I'd like something like this:
- each player creates his own family. Each family should have traits, negative and positive ones. Maybe your family has a warrior tradition and a strong army, but gold is scarce and your citizens are close to revolting. Another family is rich and powerful, but suffers from heavy infighting, etc
- each player plays one or two starting characters from that family, or related to it. With time, the roster will expand and include other members, especially as some of them get killed, fall in disgrace, or are imprisoned. Each session would be about one group of characters, one from each player, doing things together. This is probably the hardest part: organizing sessions where each player can participate with at least one member.
- maybe, each player can also play one character from another player's family. It could be a traitor, or problematic in someway, or a spy. Or maybe just a sibling that looks to overthrow the bigger brother for power, or a father that doesn't trust his sons.

I'm thinking of a gritty atmosphere, similar in spirit to game of thrones. Each family would have a different agenda and tries to "win", not by combat, but by political power. Combat should be sparse, but extremely deadly. Magic would be limited and dangerous, but powerful. Characters would mostly participate in roleplaying scenarios, scheming against other families, forging alliances. And when they find themselves in a fight, it's probably an assassination attempt rather than an open combat.
Each family should also have armies, and positioning should be important.
Battles should be won or lost strategically rather than tactically, and alliances would be very important.

Can something like this work? What system would work for it?
I think the most important aspect is social mechanics for PC to PC interaction, and PC to NPC.
Should also be mechanically simple, since players might change characters multiple times in a single evening.
Rules for armies and wars would also be very nice.

However, i think the single most difficult point is arranging adventures or social situations where 4+ members of different families are doing things together, without leaving players out with nothing to do.

Aedilred
2015-05-22, 10:59 PM
Have you considered the A Song of Ice and Fire roleplaying game? It sounds like pretty much what you want...

NichG
2015-05-23, 12:07 AM
Well, I guess I can pitch my own system here. It's designed for three-scale play: deities, clans, and individual heirs. Here's the thread. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?394358-Dynasty-Multi-generational-civ-building-hero-adventuring-god-game).

Yora
2015-05-23, 03:35 AM
However, i think the single most difficult point is arranging adventures or social situations where 4+ members of different families are doing things together, without leaving players out with nothing to do.

A campaign in which the players have different goals and reason to regularly split the party rarely works out well. Having them all serve the same goal and shared interests seems much more practical.

Rakaydos
2015-05-23, 10:58 AM
I suggest checking out Ironclaw: squaring thr circle. Ignore the furries on the cover- its an easy patch to replace "species" with "house" as thsts pretty much what the fluff treats it as anyway.

Beneath the fuzzy exterior, though, its a flexible, lethal system where pc plot armor is an explicit 1/session ability you as the gm can remove from your game. If you want combat to be feared,theres few better systems for political intrigue than Ironclaw.

Eisenheim
2015-05-23, 11:04 AM
Fate, with your character being a house rather than an individual, fate can run well at any scale.

Or REIGN, a one roll engine game designed for playing nations.

BWR
2015-05-23, 11:44 AM
The aforementioned ASoIaF rpg is a natural place to start.
Ars Magica could easily be hacked for this. Play up the Covenant (altered to be a house/clan rather than covenant) and grog/companion aspect, play down/remove the magi. With the correct splats you have a fairly detailed mechanical system of social interaction.
You could probably hack Pendragon for this since it already is designed to follow family over time more than individuals, but I'm not overly familiar with the system so there may be issues I'm unaware of.
L5R has a great deal of setting emphasis on family and clan politics across many years, but the mechanics are practically non-existant for anything above one-v-one interaction. However, they do have interesting ideas for how to implement courtiers (political talky people) and their interaction.

The major point of contention, as you've hit upon, is having players work at different, possibly cross purposes yet give everyone something to do all the time.
Ars Mgica's troupe style of play is probably the best thing you could introduce no matter what system you end up choosing. In short, everyone has one major PC who is important and Does Things. Traditionally this is a magus but you could easily dump that in favor something else. Everyone usually has a secondary character, called a Companion, whose personality is detailed and can do things that magi can't be bothered with. Then you have the grogs (which is where the fun is). They are basically minor N/PCs whose control goes to whoever wants to take them. They are disposable, they aren't nearly as detailed personality- or mechanically-wise, they are often a bit exaggerated. So each adventure generally has one primary PC as the focus, possibly a Companion who works with them and the rest of the players play grogs. Grogs can be shoved in whichever story is appropriate. In ASoIaF terms, characters like Podrick, Bronn, Hodor, Sam Tarly, Shae, the Mountain and most other minor characters would be grogs. They may be good at what they do, they may be great characters to play and interact with, but they are ultimately disposable and insignificant to the greater outcome.
Characters like Varys, joffrey, Cersei and most other semi-powerful characters are Companions. They are important to the story, can alter outcomes and are famous and influential to the story.
Primary characters are Danaerys, Jon, or anyone else who has a real story revolving around them. Killing them is usually a major upheavel, and they often do great things.

Jay R
2015-05-25, 09:52 AM
Can you use the Paranoia rules in a fantasy setting?

"You should trust the Author. The Author is your friend."

BWR
2015-05-25, 12:55 PM
Can you use the Paranoia rules in a fantasy setting?

"You should trust the Author. The Author is your friend."

"Are you unhappy, citizen? Unhappiness is mandatory. "

neonchameleon
2015-05-25, 01:11 PM
Suggestions:

Fate
Apocalypse World (no, really)
Urban Shadows (an attempt to do the WoD right)
Smallville (again serious suggestion)

LibraryOgre
2015-05-26, 10:20 AM
Ars Magica's troupe style play (not necessarily the rules, but troupe style play) definitely offers some unique options. You might set up your competing families, and have each GM handle stories involving a specific family... so Bob always GMs the stories about the Andersons, and Steve always GMs stories about the Martins, and Ray always does the stories about the Williams clan. Each player has a major character for each family, and a good chunk of "grogs" (supplemental characters) who might get involved because it's not appropriate for someone's main to come along on a particular adventure.

For rules? There's a lot of options. I would probably raid 1e AD&D's Oriental Adventures and 2e's Birthright for stuff to use, but depending on my setting, might go with any number of settings. Fading Suns explicitly accomodates this kind of things, for example.

BootStrapTommy
2015-05-26, 04:49 PM
*Shameless GURPS plug*

GURPS is an incredibly easy d6 system with a focus on heavy roleplaying with a plethora of unique advantages, disadvantages, quirks, and perks to create incredibly interesting and thoughtful characters with their own unique set of values, fears, and dreams.

Mute precog? Check. Honor bound lancer? Check. Sex crazed sellsword? Check. Unscrupulous business man? Check. Sorcereress with a heroine addiction and crippling arachnophobia? If you can think it, you can make it. Easy.

And it does combat quick, easy, and tactical, if you need that too.