[PF / Golarion] Conquering Mivon

[Firechanter]

The other day I chatted with a fellow player about our current situation in our campaign (Kingmaker). We remembered something we had mused about in the past, but didn't have the opportunity yet to pursue it further: seizing control of the City of Mivon and adding it to our kingdom (or principality, to be precise).

https://pathfinderwiki.com/wiki/Mivon

As it says in the source,
[the mayor] claims that the city will pass to the hands of whomever can defeat him in a duel; first, though, a challenger must pass through the lesser lords of Mivon, fighting his way up the List of Suitors. As Selline grows older, a young skilled swordlord named Gaspar Tellick, has voluntarily declared himself Selline's inferior. Thus, anyone wishing to take the city's government must first pass through Tellick.

So, wouldn't that be cool? I'm sure we could get the DM on board if we do some prep work. However, I couldn't find anything on how these duels play out. Does anyone have any further information, or is that space intentionally left blank for the individual DM to flesh out?

- Are these highly formal duels, or free-for-alls? In particular,
- Is any weapon allowed, or only the Aldori Dueling Sword?
- What about Armour? The Swordlord description says they prefer light or no armour - but what if you come to the duel in full plate?
- any limitation on magic items or spells?
- What are the victory conditions of such a duel? In particular, since Swordlords seem to be fond of that technique, what happens if one fighter gets disarmed? What if you just wear a Locked Gauntlet?

My line of thought is, if Swordlords are so proud and convinced of the superiority of their technique, they shouldn't be afraid of a challenger in heavy weapons and armor. I mean, what good is a school of combat that can be shut down by an 8gp item?
Then again, the idea of a more formalized duel where equipment is standardized and rules are followed also has some aesthetic appeal.

If no official information exists, and if I were DM (or otherwise responsible for setting up that gig), I would probably set the game-mechanical rules something like this:
- a regular successful attack does not draw blood as long as the duelist's HP are still in the double digits - those HP count as stamina
- a critical hit draws blood
-- Or we could use the "Bloodied" rule, i.e. dropping to 50% HP draws first blood
- a disarm does not end or interrupt the duel
- victory conditions are:
-- opponent concedes
-- opponent falls unconscious
-- opponent suffers three critical hits

So with these rules, if you get disarmed you can pick up your weapon again, but probably draw an AoO.
A different approach might be to count points, such as "normal hit 1 point, disarm 1 point, critical hit 3 points, 10 points win"
Or scratch the "3 crits" rule and only end the duel when one side is knocked out or yields.

Any input?

[Lestrange]

You could always give these rules (https://aonprd.com/Rules.aspx?Name=Performance%20Combat&Category=Mastering%20Combat) a shot. Since you're hopefully trying to win the heart of the city, not just beat one guy, you might want to impress them during the fight.
Since you're not the GM, who knows how the lieutenant would react to a locked gauntlet, but if he tried and failed to disarm in combat it could give you a psychological advantage.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Firechanter
- Are these highly formal duels, or free-for-alls? In particular,
- Is any weapon allowed, or only the Aldori Dueling Sword?

I remember this setup from my brief time in Kingmaker several years ago. As I recall, the duels were extremely formal, with an elaborate protocol much like knightly jousting. The only weapon allowed was the Aldori dueling sword, and there was a complex system of ranking for the contenders. The duels were not to the death, and social status was directly tied to any given noble’s current standing in the lists.

In our game, moving one of the PCs up the list was the only real option to advance certain elements of the plot. But much of this may have been my GM’s invention, since he tended to build out from the basics provided in the AP, to the point that he estimated only 30-40% of his Kingmaker campaign was from the AP itself. Whether your DM would want to develop the duels to the same degree is another question, but it was a strong element in our campaign.

[Firechanter]

Yeah, certainly it would be a series of duels, working our way through the lists.

Spoiler: I happen to know that in KM as printed, neither Mivon nor Brevoy appear at all (your former sponsors from Restov let you know they can't be associated with you anymore). But I know of several groups that conquered Brevoy while they were about it. ;) I might shoot for that if the mass combat rules didn't suck so hard.

So anyway, props to your GM for adding that element and fleshing it out in such detail. Provided he managed to make it fun and not a drag. ;)

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Firechanter
So anyway, props to your GM for adding that element and fleshing it out in such detail. Provided he managed to make it fun and not a drag.

The group had other issues, which is why I left, but the DM certainly put 80 tons of effort into developing his own take on the world.

In his version of Kingmaker, we were trying to fend off encroachments by Mivon, which seemed to be militaristic and expansionist. I haven’t read the actual Kingmaker chapters, so I’m not sure how much he was expanding on here. But we were justifiably concerned whenever we brushed up against Mivon, since they had some heavy hitters with them.

[Firechanter]

That sounds pretty cool, really. ^^
Trying to figure out more things about Mivon I found a thread on the Paizo boards, but unfo it turns out that everyone in that thread had confused Mivon with Ft Drelev, a one horse town on the western frontier. I.e. in the original AP you get attacked by Ft Drelev, but it's an amateurish assault that's easily repelled, and instead of invading with an army you just retaliate commando-style, bashing down the castle's door and kicking the baron's ass. It's nice but it's kinda the work of an afternoon if you have competent PCs (and players).

I've been bouncing ideas back and forth concerning Mivon and its swordlord society. I'm kinda wondering how these swordlord builds actually function. They are clearly intended as Dex builds wielding Dueling Swords (the fluff says so), but if you take the Swordlord PrC you have to wait until level 6 to get Dex to Damage because then of course Slashing Grace would be a waste. Stumbling about for a full five levels doing 1d8-1 dmg with no other competence is incredibly frustrating.

Beside hitting things with a stick, they seem to go for disarm and/or demoralize. I could also imagine getting some mileage out of Spring Attack, Step Up, and Lunge, but it's probably kinda a one round trick. I'm not sure if Fear Stacking would be acceptable -- easy enough to accomplish, and once you get your opponent Frightened they have to flee, effectively conceding the duel. However, making a contest of who can say "Boo!" better certainly goes against the spirit of a swordmanship duel. The way around this would probably be to make "fleeing" impossible.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Firechanter
Stumbling about for a full five levels doing 1d8-1 dmg with no other competence is incredibly frustrating.

Well, three levels of unchained rogue will get you Dex to damage, in addition to some other fine features. If sneak attack doesn’t fit with your concept of an honorbound warrior, you can take the Phantom Thief archetype from Ultimate Intrigue, which trades sneak attack for an expanded skill list—including all Knowledges as class skills, which could be handy with some of the Swordlord skill requirements.


Originally Posted by Firechanter
However, making a contest of who can say "Boo!" better certainly goes against the spirit of a swordmanship duel.

If you view intimidation as the manifestation of a swordsman’s spirit, then it works very well as a clash of wills, which fits perfectly into a formal duel.

On a much higher level, I wish there was a way to encapsulate the “duel of the mind” which was fought in Hero, in which two opponents fight each other with their spirits without ever crossing blades in the physical world. That was too nuanced and complex for a single check; it would need some other mechanic or subsystem, but I’m not sure what would work best.

[Firechanter]

Of course there are a few ways to get Dex to dmg earlier -- my point is that if you go for one of these and want to take the Swordlord PrC, you have a redundancy, or in other words a wasted ability.
On the other hand, Dexing with the Dueling sword is so terribly feat intensive without class features: EWP, Weapon Finesse, Weapon Focus and Slashing Grace, so four feats just so you can wear light armour, so you do need some other features to make it worthwhile.

--

That said, I managed to find some official rules on Mivoni Dueling:
- Challenges are typically presented in the form of insults, carefully crafted to force a response, but (typically) not warranting a fight to the death
- the challenged party chooses weapons and armour
- both parties need to agree on the victory conditions, such as "first blood", "disabled", "concedes" etc
- both parties have to agree on the stakes - money, position, spot on the list etc
- only Aldori are eligible to win governmental positions
- you may fight a maximum of 3 duels a week, and a duel may last no more than 15 minutes

[I would probably suggest to define "first blood" as "50% HP".]

So, these rules throw a couple of wrenches in our gears.
First off, since the ultimate goal is to seize control of the city, we'd have to find a way around the Aldori-only rule. What makes a person an Aldori anyway? But suppose we could fill that requirement somehow, after all, we're not in a rush.

Our idea was that my character would do the fighting (my friend's character is total rubbish at fighting and the other players aren't any better suited), so I will have to invoke the challenges, at least until I've made a name there. Shouldn't be a problem mechanically since I have good Diplomacy and Intimidate.
So the question is, does the _insult_ itself count as challenge, or does the insulted party challenge me? As you can see from the weapons-and-armour clause, this makes a world of difference. If the other party has to challenge me (to demand satisfaction for my insult), I just need to say "Greatsword and Full Plate" and those Dexers are all outta luck. :smallbiggrin:
If however the insult itself counts as challenge, I'm in a bit of a spot. My character is a Str based Paladin, so in light armour my AC is rubbish, though I won't have to worry about HP thanks to LoH. I basically need to avoid fighting to "first blood". Also, getting disarmed could become a real problem, since the armour clause would probably rule out Locked Gauntlets as well as Armour Spikes, which I would intend to use as backup weapon.

Snatching that city might not be as easy as anticipated. xD

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Firechanter
Of course there are a few ways to get Dex to dmg earlier….

Besides unchained rogue, Slashing Grace, and Aldori Swordlord, what are the other options?

I vaguely recall a scarfy thing, not sure what other feats or class features are out there.


Originally Posted by Firechanter
That said, I managed to find some official rules on Mivoni Dueling….

Where did you find these?


Originally Posted by Firechanter
I would probably suggest to define "first blood" as "50% HP".

I've never seen that definition before. Usually first blood means just that, the first strike to draw blood, frequently just a token wound. In game terms, a successful attack that deals any damage would be considered first blood. Taking someone down to half hp usually involves a lot more blood.


Originally Posted by Firechanter
So the question is, does the _insult_ itself count as challenge, or does the insulted party challenge me?

In this context, you probably wouldn’t insult a deadly swordsman unless you intended to fight him, so it seems pretty clear that the insult serves to initiate the challenge.

And no, there's no reason why snatching the city would be easy. Entrenched elites, by definition, are experts at giving themselves the home-team advantage.

.

[Firechanter]

Besides unchained rogue, Slashing Grace, and Aldori Swordlord, what are the other options?

Upon double checking, not really that much. Swashbuckler's Dervish AT gets it permanently, and beside that Swash also can activate it round-wise. And of course there's the Agile enchantment on your weapon. I don't think I heard of the scarfy thing.


Where did you find these?

Guide to the River Kingdoms. It does have a chapter on Mivon.


I've never seen that definition before. Usually first blood means just that, the first strike to draw blood, frequently just a token wound. In game terms, a successful attack that deals any damage would be considered first blood. Taking someone down to half hp usually involves a lot more blood.

Well, haven't we been taught time and again that Hit Points are not just flesh? ^^ Seeing how high attack bonuses get in PF, and how limited AC is, just "first hit" seems impractical to me -- that would basically mean "whoever wins initiative wins the duel" and they wouldn't even last 6 seconds. With a sample Swordlord build I've drawn up, which isn't really optimized (yet), I get to +19 attack at level 9 and a flat-footed AC around 19 or so.

I got that 50% thing from The-Edition-That-Must-Not-Be-Named -- dropping below 50% there makes you "Bloodied". We've actually imported that into our home game for verisimilitude.

That's why in my first post about the matter, I suggested counting only critical hits as "real" hits that draw blood. Of course that makes it kinda weird that any 18-20 weapon, e.g. scimitar or rapier, is definitely better for dueling than the dueling sword.


In this context, you probably wouldn’t insult a deadly swordsman unless you intended to fight him, so it seems pretty clear that the insult serves to initiate the challenge.

Fantasy settings such as Golarion often try to be pseudo-historical, so we basically need to figure out if historical duels should be used as a template here or not. IRH, the pattern was that the offended person would demand satisfaction by challenging the offender to a duel. Over time, the process does get streamlined, but I don't think they forget that the offender is not the challenger.

We see a nice example of this in one of the first Sharpe episodes (the tv show): two bad guys try to trick Sharpe into fighting a duel, which is forbidden in wartime and would get him kicked out of the army. So they flog a woman who's under Sharpe's protection. This however does (for some reason) not give our hero the right to challenge the perpetrators directly -- he has to insult them and one of them has to demand satisfaction for the insult. So he rushes into the officer's casino, and without saying a word, takes a glass of wine from a tablet and pours it into the first guy's face. He responds "I don't fight duels over whores". Sharpe repeats the process with the second guy. He says "I do."

Also, at least in 19th cty Germany, you could refuse a duel by claiming the other party was "incapable of giving satisfaction", but I don't know how widespread that was in other regions and eras. So here the pattern would be: A offends B, B challenges A, A refuses with above retort, which of course is another insult as it implies B is not an honourable man.


And no, there's no reason why snatching the city would be easy. Entrenched elites, by definition, are experts at giving themselves the home-team advantage.


Of course. It's actually nice because it adds some consistency - and explains why not any random level 10+ adventurer just walks by and snatches the city.

--

Back to the mechanical aspect:
The problem, of course, is that this fighting style - singleton with ADS and light or no armour - sucks. You sink feat after feat into being competitive with your finessed weapon, and still hang behind on the AC side. I can't figure out a trick where a Fighter is better off not just donning a Full Plate and beating his opponent to pulp with brute force.
The Swordlord AT gets a trick where he deals damage on a Disarm attempt. That's nice, but it also bumps back his Weapon Training to level 9, so if you want to PrC you'll never get WT and thus lose out on the class benefit of Dueling Gloves. That's a +3 to attacks and CMB that you're sacrificing so I'm highly doubtful it's worth it.

I did find a Swordlord handbook on the net but so far it only confirms my aforementioned thoughts. I'm not quite done reading though, maybe there's something yet to come.
https://docs.google.com/document/pub?id=15XhwLBdzgG12Zrs-whbe04lIUE4ktp_DsjZ_ZUn47Yc

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Firechanter
Fantasy settings such as Golarion often try to be pseudo-historical, so we basically need to figure out if historical duels should be used as a template here or not.

Absent any more detailed guidance from Paizo sources, I'd say that at this level of detail it's entirely up to your GM.