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Yora
2021-02-24, 06:20 PM
I've been quite unsatisfied with the whole dungeon crawling thing that is central to most fantasy games for a couple of years now and find myself much more interested in running the social interaction aspects that can be part of a campaign. I tried to switch from clearing dungeons of monsters to exploring ancient ruins, but puzzles turned out to be even less my thing than combats.

A game that I find really compelling is Blades in the Dark, which does not just have amazing base mechanics, but also this really cool sub-system for building up your thieves' guild, expanding your hideout, and growing your influence. The only downside with the game is that it requires the PCs to be urban villains, which really isn't the kind of setting I want to run.

The idea I got for a campaign in a somewhat wild setting, with somewhat heroic PCs whose "adventures" don't consists of permanent battle to the death, is to set it on a limited size border region that is home to various communities and setlements, where the players are to carve out a section for themselves and turn it into whatever they desire. The campaign would revolve around making allies, dealing with hostile neighbors, securing resources for the base, and managing folowers. Basically the high level endgame of old D&D editions, but without having to spend months grinding dungeons to gather the starting funds.

Are there any fantasy games that go in that direction? Any games with mechanics and systems that cover these aspects? Blades in the Dark's thieves' guilds are the only ones that come to my mind. But now that I think of it, Saga of the Icelanders might also be worth taking another look at.

NichG
2021-02-24, 06:49 PM
The previous campaign I ran was something like this. I think one of the tricky things is how much of the logistics and resource sustain is determined by the system mechanics (and therefore requires someone to spend the time applying those mechanics during game) versus how much is just GM-generated or sort of spot-incidences. For example, in a frontier game you might want to have issues like an early frost damaging crops so you might not have enough food to make it through winter, or the need for people to drop what they're doing and repair fortifications after a serious storm in case the settlement is attacked (and the downstream consequences of that on availability of goods and crafts, just how much of people's time and activities are taken up by that, etc).

If you build that stuff into the system, the upside is it lets players sort of calculate for themselves whether a particular idea would or wouldn't work and it lets you have gradations like 'yes, X idea halfway solves the food problem so lets do it, but it turns out that we still need something else on top of that' which emerge naturally. The downside is that you might spend a lot of time evaluating mechanics which don't actually matter during that session or at that point in time.

So if I were to update what I did before, I'd basically try to build things so that stuff that is working can sort of be boxed off and left alone, with most of the focus of the system being on evaluating what happens only in moments of growth or destruction. So e.g. that would mean abstracting away the idea of stockpiling or preserving food and just say 'X farm tiles and Y storage space for winter supports Z settlers over the course of the year, but we won't worry about when and how units of food come off the farms, enter storage, and are eaten'.

The other thing to watch out for is basically making sure that all of the players have something to do that they're in charge of and that doesn't go through committee. Games with large resources with shared ownership tend to bog down a bit in my experience with every decision having to go to the entire party, and that can make people disconnect if they're more the kind of person who just wants to do their thing. So I think having each character have direct ownership of at least some of the settlement development decisions (even if its only their own house) is probably important.

Yora
2021-02-24, 07:38 PM
I was having a first look at how a hack of Blades in the Dark could start out. And I think that game was designed with similar concerns in mind.

I could see the seven character types with their fields of expertise map quite neatly to different responsibilities in a border fort:
Alderman (Study and Consort): Manages the staff and resources.
Herald (Consort and Sway): Deals with maintaining relationships with allies and rivals.
Marshall (Skirmish and Command): In charge of defenses and leading the troops.
Warden (Hunt and Survey): Keeps an eye on what's going on outside the walls.
Builder (Tinker and Wreck): In charge of new constructions and razing enemy defenses.
Disciple (Study and Attune): Deals with the supernatural.
Sentinel? (Finesse and Prowl): Keeps an eye on criminals and spies on enemies.
For gameplay reasons, any issues will need to be dealt with by all the PCs. If something is attacking the sheep herds in the nearby hills, then the Warden would be expected to charge charge of the party while they deal with it. When visiting another base or having negotiators from other groups come to the base, the Herald would be the one who does the talking, with the other players supporting him in the ways their own abiliites are best suited for. As GM, it would be relatively easy to get a good balance by making issues come up that fall into te field of a player who hasn'r had much chance to make influential decisions recently. And of course, you can also confront them with problems that fall outside the specialities of any PC in the group.

Blades also gives the players different options for the type of criminal organization they want to run, each with their own 5 "upgrades" and 14 "extensions" the party can gain access to. To get one of these claims, the party needs to meet certain conditions, but then also has to do an adventure to secure these claims. Once they are secured, they get the benefit from it and have nothing to do to maintain it, though situations might occure where a rival group tries to take it away.
Instead if running a smuggling ring, an extortion racket, or a cult, I could see the syatem being used to run a border fort, a trade post, a mining camp, or a religious sanctuary. Each with their own sets of upgrades and extensions

I am very much in favor of not keeping inventory of lumber, bricks, and sacks of grain in the storehouses.The flow of goods is something that should run automatically in the background. All that players should have to deal with is getting access to a resource source and then being able to support one new feature of their base in return. Maybe have a system where a source can be under threat or in limited opperation and the feature it support can keep running for one season or year during which the players have time to resolve the issue. After that period, one feature of the corresponding resource has to be retired.

MrZJunior
2021-03-01, 04:55 PM
Could you use the mechanics from older editions of D&D?

NichG
2021-03-02, 06:08 PM
I tend to want to design radical departures from other systems, but I could imagine something where a player's character sheet actually includes aspects of the settlement that their role is responsible for, and that they advance those aspects by spending a separate 'settlement XP' resource.

So the player of the Alderman would be able to spend personal XP on personal abilities that support that role or just make them a good musician or whatever as they like, but as the Alderman they'd receive a certain amount of 'settlement XP' that could only be spent to, say, increase the base skill level available if you were to randomly decide to seek out an 'NPC skilled in X' at the fort, or to direct labor to harvesting nodes to make certain resources universally available at the fort (the Alderman has spent settlement XP to create a work detail at the nearby copper mine, allowing things made of copper to be manufactured and sold in the settlement, etc).

The Herald could autonomously spend Settlement XP to create trade routes, alliances, etc.

Personal XP would be relatively unassailable, but harm to the settlement or failure to deal with problems could take the form of a reduction in Settlement XP gain, or damage to characters' Settlement XP pools). If a character lost their position or went to a new town, they'd leave behind that pool with the role they left but would keep their Personal XP.

Maybe instead of calling it Settlement XP, calling it 'Development' would work?

aglondier
2021-03-03, 09:07 AM
Pathfinder did Kingmaker.
D&D 2nd ed did Birthright.

I've played and enjoyed both many times over the years.

Palanan
2021-03-03, 09:44 AM
Originally Posted by Yora
The idea I got for a campaign in a somewhat wild setting, with somewhat heroic PCs whose "adventures" don't consists of permanent battle to the death, is to set it on a limited size border region that is home to various communities and setlements, where the players are to carve out a section for themselves and turn it into whatever they desire. The campaign would revolve around making allies, dealing with hostile neighbors, securing resources for the base, and managing folowers.

This is exactly what the Kingmaker AP is all about.

It’s designed to start characters at level 1, so there is the usual fighting and leveling—but along the way you explore the region, develop allies, deal with a variety of neighboring powers, and everything else you’re thinking of.

Definitely take a look at Kingmaker.

Garimeth
2021-03-04, 05:39 PM
Kingmaker is definitely about what you are talking about.

I would also say check out the way they implemented the ship stuff in scum and Villainy (made by the makers of BitD).

I personally think the "clocks" system of conflict resolution would work REALLY well for the type of game you are imagining, and the stress system has alot going for it as well.

Downside: You'd have to build it all from the bones up, which you may like or hate. I personally dig that stuff, so for me personally, I would not mind.

Not sure if you'd want to keep the flashback stuff. Might be weird with resource management on a base, seeing as how the "job" portion of BitD would look a bit different in your idea.

Similar, but different: Make them a mercenary company or adventurer's guild instead. They have a charter from the local lord, but they are not in charge. Now there is a bit less resource management, but their logistical survival is based off their good will from the area. You get most of the social and adventure dynamics you want, minus the fiddly bits with the logistics.

Anxe
2021-03-04, 05:47 PM
Kingmaker is a great example where you could use d20 rules.

Pendragon is another game I've taken a look at. The PCs are lords and knights in Britain during the Arthurian legend. The game is meant to cover generations of characters as you play your character's children after your initial PC retires. There are quests, but also border skirmishes, tournaments, and romance subplots. All the social stuff with only a little of the dungeon crawly things.

Saintheart
2021-03-05, 12:54 AM
Small sidenote that while Kingmaker is definitely a good base for doing the 'frontier kingdom' campaign, its kingdom building rules were supplanted by Ultimate Campaign out of Pathfinder ... mainly because there were some pretty unbalancing exploits that you could do with the original rules. But the Kingmaker AP allows you the option of doing the kingdom building in the background as well if you're inclined to that.

Kane0
2021-03-05, 05:11 AM
Yeah Kingmaker is a prominent example but I wouldnt call it stellar in its implementation. Solid though, and can be tweaked.

Democratus
2021-03-05, 08:49 AM
I use the excellent book "On Demenses and Downtime" as a core for my West Marches campaign.

This game uses Old School Essentials as the core rules. The "basic seven" classes are available at the start of the campaign: fighter, cleric, thief, magic-user, dwarf, elf, halfling.

The other 15 classes in the Advanced book are unlocked as the players improve their home town. For example, once they have built a chapel and a fortress, the Paladin becomes available. Once they have a theater the Bard is a playable class.

Stealing from sourcebooks is a valuable starting point. But nothing beats DIY when you have a specific idea of what you want your campaign to be.