Restitution: Heroic Community Service!


Homebrew and House Rules


In a previous thread I had plans to spice up a chapter of my campaign that took place in my custom Kingmaker city of Agrowan. The original plan was that the PCs would need to redeem themselves for their crime (they fought themselves out of an insane asylum run by the big bad and have been branded maniacal murderers) by allying with a powerful group, possibly a criminal organization. My kingdom is the Nation of Second Chances, and it follows this ideal through a special procedure called the Right of Restitution. This goes as follows:

1. The accused must commit acts that serve the kingdom in equal or greater capacity than their sins, depending on how grave the offense.
2. The accused must not only possess evidence but the act must be known well enough to the public.
3. The accused will be hunted by the law until their capture.
4. On capture or turning themselves in, the accused must declare to exercise the Right of Restitution. They are held in custody and their evidence must be fully submitted to the court record.
5. There is a Trial of Restitution held. An incriminator appointed by the city attempts to trump the restituent's arguments.
6. Restituents may be sponsored by one of the city's factions. This grants them bonuses to finding evidence for their crimes and a safe haven to operate from, as the Right of Restitution prevents retaliation against a sponsor until the trial is over or if the sponsor helps the restituent to escape the country.
7. If the restituent succeeds, they earn celebrity status not only for their heroics but also for embodying the ideal of redemption in Agrowan, though depending on their crimes they may still have enemies among those they wronged unless they made true amends somehow, such as resurrecting a family member they murdered. Their sponsor likewise enjoys increased popularity, influence, and riches proportional to the scope of the restitution. Should they fail, however, the restituent's punishment tends to be doubly harsh and their sponsors are shamed or may even share the restituent's fate in the case of its leadership.

Restituents begin with a guilt pool. Usually, the pool is dependent on the gravity of their crime. It is usually:

Soul Trading: 50 per soul traded.
Murder: 20 per victim, more if murders were particularly gruesome.
Rape: same as murder.
Theft/Vandalism: 1 per 50gp.
Racketeering, smuggling, and other illicit business practices: 10 per year of operation.

These can be considered guidelines for other crimes subject to DM interpretation.

Things that reduce the guilt pool:

Saving or resurrecting a wrongly dead individual: -15
Donating to the city, wronged parties, or beneficial organization: -1 per 1,000gp.
Stopping a dangerous criminal or monster: -1 per total CR, potentially more of the creature was infamous or particularly brutal and elusive. In the case of bounties, -1 per every 1,000go in the bounty, rounded up.

Activities relevant to the crime, such as resurrecting the victim murdered by the restituent, grants a 50% addition to the amount of guilt reduced.

The Trial is treated with the social combat rules in a location affected by Zone of Truth. Evidence can be brought up to increase an argument from +5 to +10 so long as the evidence aligns with the argument and rhetoric used. A smart and/or ruthless incriminator can turn evidence into an argument in his favor, allowing him to gain the bonus instead. The same goes for the restituent.

This practice is Agrowan exclusive, but seeing as it's a DMs world out there, the system could be used as a less legal and more unofficial. Means of reducing the guilt pool would also depend on the nation.

Final note: falsified evidence will Usually result in an immediate defeat for either party, though in the case of the incriminator this does not mean victory for the restituent, but rather replacement and likely disbarment. However, crooked officials can always be bribed or blackmailed, and such actions can bring victory to the restituent, but often such obviously rigged results leave a bad taste in the mouth of the public, resulting in unfriendly reactions and no benefits beyond acquital from charges.

Tl;dr: Made Phoenix Wright for Pathfinder. Yay.


Hmmm.

First, to "redeem" themselves, a character must make clearly public acts while in the meantime trying to evade capture by the law ? Wouldn't that make any civilian saved by the character forced to report him or risk charge of complicity ? It seems so stacked against the character that most people will probably flee the country rather than trying to do that.

Second, if you steal 50gp, you have to repay.... 1000gp ? That's pretty much impossible for any non-noble, non-adventurer. On the other hand, a person can get away with murder at the price of a warship or a +5 weapon; that's high, but not that impossible for the high ranked nobles.

Given that, small-time criminals and the poor have simple no chance do benefit from this system, while rich and the powerful gain a get out of jail free card. It is, in fact heavily skewed, and probably only a public facade for a bribery system.

That's how I see this system. I'm sorry.


It is a fair criticism to make, and I will address it accordingly.

The act must be publicly known, but not necessarily done in public. A serial killer whose body is left at the doorstep of the police station with a note crediting someone is a good way to make the fact publicly known. The police could try to take credit for it, but that is why you hold on to a piece of evidence, such as a piece of the killer (which can be verified in court to belong to them with divination and forensics if it is not obvious).

You're right inasmuch as the price is concerned. I will up the theft to be 1 guilt per 1000gp stolen. Anything less than that is considered petty, though still punishable and easily redeemable, usually on a 1-1 repayment and a sincere explanation and apology.

The system is meant to squeeze good out of a horrid crime. Let's say a noble does murder a poor person, then donates 20,000 to that person's family. The moral objectivity of this is controversial, but the benefits are undeniable. With this sort of money, a poor family can quickly catapult themselves to become successful businessmen and women, feed their children for life, and in general have a better standard of living for a full generation. They would probably also use the money to save themselves from other things that generally claim the lives of the poor, such as famine and disease. 20k is nothing to scoff at. Even the very wealthy note what a huge dent this is in their wallet, and that is just for one murder. A noble who tries to abuse this system to essentially pay to kill will likely find himself on the streets soon... Streets full of very angry commoners with a vendetta to claim, because essentially this sort of nonsense is likely to get them no popularity. Of they act fast, they can pay for a cheap res, some restorations, and compensate the rest. This gives the family back their loved one, a healthy amount of money, it is cheaper than paying out of pocket, and the noble doesn't take a popularity hit. In fact, that is what usually happens, so commoners often see restitution as a chance to get aid that the bigwigs would otherwise deny.

Also helps that Agrowan is a democracy, so there are no "nobles" and even a commoner could gain place in office, get political power, and then leverage that to get justice on some murder crazed rich sicko.


Also, as far as fleeing the country, yes, that is an option, sort of. But at least in Agrowan's case, it is the Nation of Second Chances, and its somewhat strange laws that absolve any immigrant's sins committed outside of the kingdom's borders and protects them from retribution for such crimes means anyone who leaves Agrowan with a bounty on their head is someone you REALLY do not want to help, even in the criminal underworld. And if you have the money to pay for an expensive identity change that fools even divination magic, you can probably afford restitution unless you SUPREMELY f*cked up.

Additionally, most commoners might not have the means to afford restitution, but their lack of resources also means they don't generally have the means to commit too many serious crimes, with the likely exception of murder and rape. That said, there's means aside from money that can grant restitution. Even a commoner can brave a burning building to save a mother and her child. And to top it all off, commoners are popular targets for sponsors because not only does aiding them make them popular ('heroes of the people' and all that), which becomes important when THEY get in trouble and need popular support, but such restitutions are RARELY ever too expensive or impossible. In this way, a spirit of altruism is cultivated and the rich and poor can both learn to rely on each other in times of need.

Lastly, Agrowan is a Chaotic Good nation, which means most citizens are culturally inclined to follow their own moral compasses, and the law knows this well. This is why sponsorship is important. A restituent who is popular with the people I.E. has convinced most he's the real deal or whose crime seems to be undeserving of incarceration when compared to his good deeds can be harbored by any supporting individual or faction. These people can keep the person inside and not turn them in to the cops by declaring their sponsorship in the Right of Restitution. This makes them accountable if the restituent turns out NOT to have done enough to be redeemed, but all this does is encourage and aid them even more in achieving redemption. The fact that there's usually a potential reward in the end for them, either from the govn't or the restituent, for their services rendered makes individual sponsorship happen often. Indeed, in its Golden Age, the less serious of restituents and the people would sometimes treat it as a ridiculous game of tag or hide and seek... probably because of the influence the fey had on the culture. Nowadays, though, Agrowan treats restitution with cynical bitterness of a better age and an ideal that is sick but refuses to die.

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