After looking at the buildings presented on page 15 of the Kingmaker Player's Guide and the Kingdom Sheet, I have a few questions.

1) I know that Buildings will help the Loyalty, Stability and Economy as it says on the Kingdom stat sheet, but will the buildings be able to do anything else as well? I would imagine that the Graveyard certainly does not increase Economy...

2) Do all the buildings have a very different effect or are some of them just better versions? (Like Shop and Market, which I guess should increase Economy.)

After looking at the buildings presented on page 15 of the Kingmaker Player's Guide and the Kingdom Sheet, I have a few questions.

1) I know that Buildings will help the Loyalty, Stability and Economy as it says on the Kingdom stat sheet, but will the buildings be able to do anything else as well? I would imagine that the Graveyard certainly does not increase Economy...

2) Do all the buildings have a very different effect or are some of them just better versions? (Like Shop and Market, which I guess should increase Economy.)

Buildings will do more than help base stats. Some will reduce Unrest. Some will INCREASE Unrest. Some will reduce the cost of other buildings. Some are prerequisites for other buildings. Some will increase the city's base value. Some give you the ability to sell and buy magic items.

The buildings all have different effects and different prices. A shop and a market are similar, though; it's better for your economy to have a marketplace than a shop, but it's even BETTER to have both.

I suspect that there's going to be a point where a city has SO many buildings that things might actually go over the top, actually. It's a pretty new rules set, after all...

Buildings will do more than help base stats. Some will reduce Unrest. Some will INCREASE Unrest. Some will reduce the cost of other buildings. Some are prerequisites for other buildings. Some will increase the city's base value. Some give you the ability to sell and buy magic items.

The buildings all have different effects and different prices. A shop and a market are similar, though; it's better for your economy to have a marketplace than a shop, but it's even BETTER to have both.

I suspect that there's going to be a point where a city has SO many buildings that things might actually go over the top, actually. It's a pretty new rules set, after all...

That sounds pretty cool... are there going to be additional buildings included later or are the 43 buildings included in the Kingmaker Player's Guide the lot of them?

Maybe some rules for making new buildings?

That sounds pretty cool... are there going to be additional buildings included later or are the 43 buildings included in the Kingmaker Player's Guide the lot of them?

Maybe some rules for making new buildings?

We have no plans to officially add new buildings or provide guidelines for making new buildings... but I'm sure that won't stop the community! :-)

43 buildings is an awful lot, though. Should be more than enough to do the job.

Hey James, here's something I'm kind of curious on. A friend and I were chatting about how to go about telling the party the 'rules' of building a kingdom when it gets to that point. His recommendation was to be as 'rules light' as possible, not even letting the players know how much a building cost in BP and keep everything else abstract. I don't know the rules yet (GIVE ME KINGMAKER #2 :D) but thought that a more balanced approach might be appropriate, maybe giving each building a tiered cost (Low, Medium, High, Very High) based on a range the BP cost fell into.

Anyhow, long story short, how do you recommend going about it?

A. Let them see the rules. Explain the benefits of every building, the benefits of each alignment, all the mechanics involved.
Pro: The players won't be confused with anything when it comes to kingdom building.
Con: The players might make some metagamey decisions when it comes to building. I heard that some buildings might make others cheaper once built, for example, so if the players know *all* the rules than the most effective way to do things is to build the buildings that make others cheaper first.

B. Don't let them see any rules, be abstract. Tell them if they can afford a building or not but otherwise try to keep things as 'in game flavor' as possible.
Pro: The story has a more roleplaying feel to it and the players might make decisions based on pure 'we want this in our kingdom' factor instead of based on a mechanical decision.
Con: The players might end up confused on some issues, or even get upset that a building does something mechanically they really didn't expect and/or want.

C. A mix. Don't let them see the rules, but still try to describe the rules in an abstract fashion. Explain that one building can make another easier to build, but don't say how much. Keep values in abstract forms.
Pros and Cons: Kind of a mix of the above.

And if a more abstract recommendation is involved with the second Kingmaker, does the book give ideas on how to outline things for the players in place of just reading the hard rules?

IME, that depends greatly on the group and GM goals. Is the GM to busy to keep track of the BP bank? Give the players more control. Do the players not care about the rules and want to focus on the story, let the GM handle it.

I think a GM should think of what would work best for their group and act accordingly.

I'd also go slow. If the players get quickly confused, don't give them anymore. If they take to it like a duck to water, give them the rest.

Honestly, I'd say it depends on your group. Personally, I'd let the players see the rules but when I was running the actual building and city management, I'd run it in a narrative style. If there's a player who insists on making unrealistic choices just because he thinks he found a flaw in the rules... you can correct those flaws as needed by roleplaying out the result of, say, building nothing but brothels on the overall feeling for the nation. Keep it organic, and don't be afraid to change the rules in play to adapt to your style of gaming, and don't let micromanagement of numbers get in the way of having fun.

If you have a group of hard-core number cruncher players... it's probably a better choice to NOT show them the rules and instead run the entire thing through you, the GM, as a filter. In this case, you should introduce some sort of adviser NPC to help the PCs make tougher choices as you think they should be made.

And finally, once folks start running the kingdom building stuff, keep an eye on these boards to learn from other people's attempts. I'm kind of as curious as anyone else to see the reaction! :)

Thanks James! I'm looking really forward to running this. We have to finish LoF 5 and 6 first and then we're onto the next campaign, although I think the current votes are still leaning towards Council of Thieves, but we'll see. There is something to be said about waiting till an entire AP is out before starting it.

If there's a player who insists on making unrealistic choices just because he thinks he found a flaw in the rules... you can correct those flaws as needed by roleplaying out the result of, say, building nothing but brothels on the overall feeling for the nation.

Just reading this makes me want to play the AP more than GM it!

I'm looking forward to seeing how some crazy person decides to play Civilization/Colonization/SimCity with the city building aspect and lays out their town/budding metropolis. Bonus points for doing it in 3D.

I'm looking forward to seeing how some crazy person decides to play Civilization/Colonization/SimCity with the city building aspect and lays out their town/budding metropolis. Bonus points for doing it in 3D.

I got that vibe too as soon as I looked at the icons..and I just know the guy who is playing the rogue in my party(who ants to be treasurer is going to want to reserve city planning all to himself)

He is basing his character on Montgomery Burns...look out for the Springfield Chronicles coming to the Campaign journals soon

You missed:

Greater Wall (100’ high (30’ below ground, 70’ above ground) x 50’ wide), 26,400,000 cubic feet of granite per mile; Total Weight per mile: 2,006,400 tons; 125,400 lb Gold/mile; Quarry Cost: 6,270,000gp/mile

While it affords you the sort of Status that the City of Brass might incur with its 12 mile long perimeter walls (inner and outer separated by Moat) I would suggest it consists of some serious work and expenditure.