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My players discovered the value of the magic item economy early on in their kingdom's life. The first 10-12 months of kingdom building were a bit rough while they saved every BP to buy their first magic item producing building, but those early turns quickly paid off. Now, some 50 months into things (kingdom size of 102), they produce 8 major items and 28 medium items, and have 13 city districts in which to sell said items (well, 13 items at least). Barring the odd under-4000gp items which pop up, selling items generally nets them 100+ BP per turn.
While this has created explosive growth in the nation, this isn't the problem. I'm more than willing to roll with the players loving their growing kingdom (they're having more fun than they were when they were struggling to buy a graveyard...). The problem is that they managed to get a loyalty score 72 above their command DC, mostly through building lots and lots of monuments.
I didn't see this coming at all. They kept building monuments to all the NPCs I killed, and after running Carnival of Tears set in their capitol city, there were a whole lot of dead NPCs.
So now I'm facing this scenario:
Kingdom Building turn 1: Don't bother expanding (much). Collect BPs by selling magic items. End turn with buffer of over 120BP.
Kingdom Building turn 2: Limited expansion. Wait until withdrawl phase and withdraw 52 BP with absolutely no chance of failing the loyalty check (command DC + BP withdrawn < Loyalty + 20). Then, use your 110,000gp to buy the major items sitting in the shops.
Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
Since I'm not using XP in the game, I can offset this a bit by keeping them at a lower level then recommended. And considering that the players are at the mercy of my random item generator, the munchkin potential is somewhat limited.
It's way too late in the campaign (just finished the 30th session) for me to change the magic item economy, but in a few sessions I think I'm going to be desperate to stuff this genie back into the bottle.
Hmm. well aside from the joy that your PCs are having, which IS of course important, this development is obviously bothering you so let's look at it.
I'd look at the choices their making. Imagine your a person living in this city. Monuments everywhere but nowhere to live, rulers who are taking reasources (and remember the term Treasury is a misnomer, BPs are more than just gold in the bank, they're economic energy in the system that they're turning to thier own ends) from the city to buy things that the city produced but NOT buying anything that expands the cities cities capacity to be productive in any of the ways that cities need to be. magic items are great for adventurers but what good are they for a family trying to put food on the table.
You could also make a rule that those sold off magic items have a chance of just ending up back on the shelves filling magic item slots. It's not like OTHER PEOPLE are buying those items, the rulership is taking money from the till to buy them then selling them right back so put them right back on the shelves to be bought again.
I don't know what other people thing but I see angry people wondering where their taxes are going, angry shopkeeps wondering why they're forced to buy back their own magic doodad that they just built a month ago and angry nobility wondering why they can't just do the same thing as the leadership. Start having nobles using public funds to buy magic items to force people to buy back at a profit or even have a few just taking the items and forcing other merchants to buy them back for a profit.
I mean, imagine a real city where the governor of the state took public funds to buy cool highend stuff and then forced the same salesmen to buy their goods back to make a profit for the state. Sounds like a investigation to me.
However, I could be wrong. Maybe the people of that land like living in a city of monuments.
Remember, a natural 1 always fails. It won't stop the abuse of the magic item economy, but 52 points of unrest when they fail will makes things interesting.
Otherwise, running the magic item rules without majorly cutting the selling prices is ripe for abuse.
Imagine your a person living in this city. Monuments everywhere but nowhere to live, rulers who are taking reasources (and remember the term Treasury is a misnomer, BPs are more than just gold in the bank, they're economic energy in the system that they're turning to thier own ends) from the city to buy things that the city produced but NOT buying anything that expands the cities
And that's the thing. Prior to this, every decision was made with the populace's happiness and well-being in mind. This is a totally recent development that came about when they built a city district specifically to honor the masses of dead from Carnival of Tears (which, I might add, is a very cruel module to run in Kingmaker). This new district ended up with a cathedral, a temple, a park, a graveyard, and a whole lot of monuments.
Considering the absolute hell I put them through over the last few sessions, and the amazing last session we had (quite possibly the best one in 30+ years of GMing), I may just let this new district slide.
Start having nobles using public funds to buy magic items to force people to buy back at a profit or even have a few just taking the items and forcing other merchants to buy them back for a profit.
Now that's a good idea. Since there are seven NPCs in rulership positions, I imagine they'll want to get their cut as well. The players will likely back down from this tactic after the NPC rulers demand some high-value magic items.
Remember, a natural 1 always fails.
Oh ho. And so it is. That makes this a much bigger gamble. I can never keep track of what always fails on a natural 1.
Oh ho. And so it is. That makes this a much bigger gamble. I can never keep track of what always fails on a natural 1.
Attacks, saving throws.
That's it, that's the entire official list. Everything else is just a house rule (though "EVERYTHING fails on a natural '1'" seems to be an incredibly popular house rule).
Oh ho. And so it is. That makes this a much bigger gamble. I can never keep track of what always fails on a natural 1.Attacks, saving throws.
That's it, that's the entire official list. Everything else is just a house rule (though "EVERYTHING fails on a natural '1'" seems to be an incredibly popular house rule).
Except he's playing Kingmaker, so that list should be:
"Attacks, saving throws, and kingdom checks." (Should those be kingdom saves, since they work more like saving throws than skill/ability checks?)
These Kingdom rules are sort of an experiment, and DM's are highly encouraged to houserule things that get out of hand.
Put a limit on how much they can take out even with a successful loyalty check. Realistically no matter how good of a ruler you are the people will still only take so much borrowing(embezzlement).
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There are two house rules I *highly* recommend when it comes to magic items and the cheese.
1. Do not allow the players to build a new district unless they cannot build the building they want in any other district within that city. I have heard talk about how some groups will build a single district for one magic item shop just to have the extra chance to sell one per turn, and it is ridiculous. Both from a game standpoint and a roleplay standpoint. Just nip that one in the bud.
2. Change magic item sales to be "you get 1 BP for every 4,000 GP of item sold", turning it into a much more similar system as the Deposits. Having a single potion be worth the same 2 BP as a +2 sword is just silly. Of course, if you do this, it's also recommended to have the extra 'carry over' from time to time. I do this by having an excel sheet just add up everything they sell, and each time it hits 4,000, they get a BP.
These two combine make kingdoms a bit more of a challenge to really get going, but ultimately prevent a lot of the problems I am seeing.
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Oh, and in regard to withdrawals? Just make them a lot more threatening.
3. Withdrawing 2,000 GP per 1 BP results in an automatic gain in Unrest of 1d4 per BP withdrawn. With a successful Loyalty check, this can be reduced to 1 per BP, but no further below that. There will always be Unrest from the leaders taking the kingdom's supplies for their own use. Always.
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Meh.
My group is just getting to this point. If there's a problem with having high #'s, I haven't come across it yet.
All the mooks get the Advanced template, and any groups of enemies get extra #'s to match or exceed the #of PC's.
If your players are invested in the process, and happy, I fail to see a problem.
Sure, having that Staff of Fire or Cloak +5 will make some encounters easier, but that really only makes them feel like superheroes. The bbeg encounters & all will still be super awesome, even with their new shiny toys.
The only real limit I placed on their crafting was to enforce the CL requirements for weapons & armor, and make them travel for selling/buying high ticket items.
If the players are selling lots of decent magic items to generate BP, who's buying those items? You could come up with a sub-plot involving where a lot of those items are going, perhaps an enemy kitting out some nasty elite agents of his own.
Sure, they could generate a lot of wealth selling magic, but magic sold is out of their control and could come back to haunt them...
Of course that will probably come back to bite you, when the PC's go and kill the guys who bought their magic items and take that stuff for themselves, so that they can sell those items once more.
This thread confirms some fears I had for the kingdom building rules and magic item crafting and I will very probably forbid the PC's crafting items and taking stuff out of the economy ( unless they are buying it outright ). My players can unbalance the game mechanics very easily anyway, no need to give them more tools to do so.
Well, it's good to know that something quite valuable for the normal party activities can actually be squeezed out of kingdom's rules. Even though magic item massproduction like this is very silly.
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We just finished Stolen Land and have just started kingdom building. I plan on using the sold magic items right away. I am going to give a couple of bad guys the magic items. This will let the PCs know that when they sell the magic items that they may come back to haunt them. Hopefully this will curtail any abuse in the future.
You're the GM. Just say "no". They essentially have infinite downtime, the wizard can craft his ass off, and everyone will eventually have almost 2x Wealth per Level. No need to abuse the kingdom-rules.
Natural 1 is always a failure on any of the three kingdom checks.
Kingdom events are at the GMs discretion. Say, the recurring event when the Dweomercrafters' Guild (you know, the ones that MAKE all the magic items ... oh, yes, here's our letter of introduction ...) puts a stop to all item crafting in the kingdom until they are satisfied that the crown is not robbing Peter to pay Paul ... Unrest from this event initially starts at, say, +10 ...
Although even with Loyalty waaay over the Control DC ... if that natural 1 crops up and juuust the wrong moment, the entire kingdom goes up in flames ...
And there is no way the population will ever embrace them - well, with anything other than imported guillotines, torture devices and fire - as rulers again in the next ... aeon, let's say.
As an addendum: just when you think that autofailure on nat 1 cannot be any more stupid, you always find some rule that proves you otherwise.
That's the best solution, I think. Remind them that they should probably have a standing army at this point. That will drive down their bank and force them to convert items into BPs to pay for it. As well, the 20 unrest rule should be highlighted.
Does the situation feel "realistic" to you? If not, take a step back from the adventure path's mechanisms for loyalty and economic growth. Don't chain yourself to charts and tables: Add authentic details that engage and challenge your players. (Please forgive me if any of my comments don't make sense for the situation: I haven't read the AP.)
Real economies are dynamic and subject to change. If the land's leaders depend too heavily upon one industry or resource, they're vulnerable to problems with that resource.
First, consider the "Law of Diminishing Returns": As the market for a commodity becomes glutted, demand will drop. Have their workshops flooded the local market for magical items? Raw materials needed for crafting may grow scarce, driving up materials costs. The party may need to negotiate with guild leaders and powerful merchants to secure supplies of needed materials. A block of merchants may also try to secure a monopoly on some items, dictating prices for their own profit.
The PCs may want to develop other, more distant markets, opening them to conflict with powerful interests in other regions. They might also choose to encourage other types of economic growth.
Unfortunately, the loyalty of the people does not "stay bought". When they hear of the PCs demanding vast amouunts of wealth for their own purposes, they're likely to ask what's been done for them lately. Monuments and other gestures should only increase loyalty in the short run: In the long run, people begin to take things for granted, complaining and demanding more.
It sounds like the area is currently undergoing a "boom" economy. Although the vast majority of the populace is happy, unrest may result in some quarters from shortages of common items. Malcontent springs up from nowhere when bread or or other food costs more than the "fair price".
Possible "encounters" for your land:
* The PCs don't have a standing army? A disreputable band of mercenary soldiers (a "Free Comapny") shows up, looking for work. Little better than brigands, they make nuisances of themselves if they're hired. If they're not hired, they make nuisances of themselves until they're driven away.
* Someone tries to organise guilds and unions among the workmen in important businesses, expecting concessions and threatening strikes.
* Some other region exiles a band of misfits and malcontents, dumping them into the PCs' lands.
* A prominent cleric leads a revival movement among the populace. Although he's quite loyal to the heroes of the land, he becomes increasingly demanding as his flock grows larger.
I personally recommend everyone throw this problemsome step out of your system. I was lucky enough to read the forum and hear all the complaints about this step. So when I ran Kingmaker, I just removed it. I allow my players to cycle out the magic items if they so can find one they want to buy. But that is it.
It did not cause trouble in my games, so I am against the "everyone" statement. My advice is to what you need to do for your group. Some will try to cheese the system, and some won't.
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I personally recommend everyone throw this problemsome step out of your system. I was lucky enough to read the forum and hear all the complaints about this step. So when I ran Kingmaker, I just removed it. I allow my players to cycle out the magic items if they so can find one they want to buy. But that is it.It did not cause trouble in my games, so I am against the "everyone" statement. My advice is to what you need to do for your group. Some will try to cheese the system, and some won't.
As some mentioned above, it seems that when you get to armies you need the magic items BP badly in order to sustain your forces... the question is, realistically, what happens after the kingdom wins the war? do they become a super magical empire where every farmer has a wand of magic missile and a decanter of endless water in the kitchen? magical supplies required to make a magical item costs gold, which you can only get by farming/logging/mining etc. Sure you can plunder the land for gold, buy lots of magic items, then stop farming/mining/logging and just sell magic items TO OTHER LANDS... but until you reach that critical mass you need basic supplies... even if you forego farming and become crazy rich, you still need to eat so you'll have to buy food from other lands, which may inflate prices to keep you in check, etc. If everyone gets a ring of sustenance, I'm sure somekind of necromancer will develop an artifact to make everyone become undead overnight, but you never know... the ring of sustenance could very well be the unbalancing factor here which would cause a magical empire to grow like a cancer... I wonder if kids can grow if you give them a ring of sustenance at birth? (i.e. it's call "sustenance" not "nourishment" and could thus just "maintain" your body at actual levels and not provide the nutritional surplus required for child growth)
Plus, in fantasy, all magical empires who cut their roots to basic farming / hunting / land exploitation invariably all fail at some point due to some kind of magical cataclysm... :)
The problem is that they managed to get a loyalty score 72 above their command DC, mostly through building lots and lots of monuments.
This is the crux of your problem. Others have had similar problems with graveyards. I imagine Paizo will eventually amend the kingdom building rules to prevent abuses like this, which come from understanding and abusing the math behind the system in ways the designers didn't foresee and that make no sense. Building a monument or a few monuments makes people proud and happy. Filling entire districts with them while ignoring the more practical needs of your population will probably produce more unhappiness than anything. Ask Saddam Hussein.
Similarly with graveyards. The city needs enough to bury its dead, but honestly, does building more than that really provide any benefit (unless you are an evil kingdom based on necromancy)?
The kingdom building rules are brand new, and this is essentially the beta test. So if it is disrupting play, just fix it. In my campaign, building multiples of a particular building eventually produces diminishing returns.
I would recommend talking to the players and seeing if they think it is a problem, too. If they don't, and it isn't interfering with your own fun too badly, then you can always just roll with it. Cheesy it may be, but some folks like cheese.
And I highly recommend "the rule of 1". Just reminding the players of that could bring this practice to a shrieking halt. After all, the law of averages would mean their kingdom would fail and dissolve on average once per twenty months.
In the hope of nipping this and related problems in the bud, I have created the following house rules for my Kingmaker campaign; a couple of them are a bit "gamey", but they don't seem to bother my PCs and they do help.
1) A city district can only have one of a given building. Exception: A building that halves the cost of another building also allows the district it is in to have up to three of the building whose cost it halves (unless that building is further limited to one per city/kingdom - see below).
2) The following buildings are limited to one per city (individually, not as a whole): Any building that halves the cost of another building, and any building that provides a major magic item (Note: Currently all major item producing buildings are National Landmarks - see below - but this is in case I decide to introduce new building types at some point.
3) Any building with a BP cost of 20 or more takes two kingdom turns to construct (counting as a "build per turn" on each of those turns). Any building with a BP cost of 50 or more takes three kingdom turns to construct.
4) The following buildings are National Landmarks: Academy, Arena, Black Market, Castle, Cathedral, Magic Shop, Waterfront. National Landmarks provide +1 to all kingdom stats in addition to their listed bonus, but are limited to one per kingdom unless taken by force from another kingdom. At the end of each Upkeep phase, a kingdom loses 1 unrest for every 3 National Landmarks it possesses.
5) A city has consumption equal to two times to number of districts it has, minus one. So a single district city is consumption 1, a two district city is consumption 3, three districts is consumption 5, etc. Cities also increase control DC by an amount equal to their consumption, instead of the usual amount.
6) Withdrawing BP is Bad. Withdrawing BP instantly causes an increase in unrest equal to the number of times BP has been withdrawn in the past year (counting the current withdrawal). The kingdom must then make a Loyalty check, with the DC increased by the amount of BP they are withdrawing; failure adds an additional point of unrest for each point of BP withdrawn.
7) The DC to sell a magic item is equal to the kingdom's current control DC, +2 for each 5000gp in the item's base price; items that cost less than the base value of your highest base value city do not need to roll and sell automatically. Instead of providing BP, each sold magic item adds +1 for each full 1000gp in its price to the current turn's Economy check to generate income.
8) Vacant item slots are only refilled if they were not sold during the previous kingdom turn. Additionally, only a maximum of one third the total magic item slots of a given type (rounded up) may be refilled in a single turn. For example, if a kingdom has 5 minor magic item slots, 3 of which are empty, only two can be refilled in one turn.
Reasoning: These changes encourage building diversity instead of flooding a city with nothing but monuments because you need loyalty. They also put a cap on the amount of building bonuses you can get relative to the number of cities you have. They add incentive to have multiple cities instead of one huge city. They give players a nice bonus for saving up for big buildings and allow more RP attachment to them - in my game, for example, the PC's Academy is specifically a branch of the Mages of the Arcane Order. And, in my opinion, they fix the broken "magic item cycling" mechanic.
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stuff...
Why not just save yourself the extra rules and tell your players straight up, "This is not for you to make gold, money don't grow on trees. Build your kingdom with responsibility and as if you were trying to establish a stable kingdom that would survive for millennium. Do not build a magic item and gp creator."
That's what I did. I told my players straight out that the kingdom was not there to just give them stuff, but was an additional aspect of the roleplaying. And that if they couldn't handle it, I would run their kingdom for them in the background and they would just be talking heads when they met people in their kingdom.
I'm going to be honest- i've glossed over every reply since the OP. But to the OP- when you say 13 districts, did you make them fill each district up before they erected a new district?
They have 11 cities. Only their capital city has more than one district.
Why not just save yourself the extra rules and tell your players straight up, "This is not for you to make gold, money don't grow on trees. Build your kingdom with responsibility and as if you were trying to establish a stable kingdom that would survive for millennium. Do not build a magic item and gp creator."
That's pretty much what I did. I explained how much more work it was to balance encounters for PCs with ridiculous wealth for their level and the players all agreed they wouldn't use their ridiculously high loyalty bonus to grab items.
I really didn't want to invoke the rule that a 1 is always a failure, since it essentially becomes a save or die effect for an entire campaign.
Preach it Brother!
I told my guys something similar last Monday evening, when we finished the next to last session of my LoF campaign, before starting Kingmaker. "The Kingdom Building rules can be abused, but they won't be here." I am going to copy what you said below to my Kingmaker cheat sheet and remind them when the time comes. Thanks for the good words.
-- david
Papa.DRB
stuff...Why not just save yourself the extra rules and tell your players straight up, "This is not for you to make gold, money don't grow on trees. Build your kingdom with responsibility and as if you were trying to establish a stable kingdom that would survive for millennium. Do not build a magic item and gp creator."
That's what I did. I told my players straight out that the kingdom was not there to just give them stuff, but was an additional aspect of the roleplaying. And that if they couldn't handle it, I would run their kingdom for them in the background and they would just be talking heads when they met people in their kingdom.
I really didn't want to invoke the rule that a 1 is always a failure, since it essentially becomes a save or die effect for an entire campaign.
But they created the effect, and continue to play the Russian Roulette, let them die!!! this seems like an affront to a well run kingdom.
as the Player running the kingdom for the group i've done what these players did, saved up to build a water front, then kicked ass from there... the only time i pulled out money from the kingdom was to buy a scroll that we wanted to keep around, but couldn't afford and didn't want the spot take up (it was a major magic item slot).
It's never too late to chuck the whole 'sell magic items for BP' rule out the window. Just ignore that rule and force your players to run their kingdom on the taxes collected by the economy roll and things become much more reasonable.
If, as some have suggested, ditching the magic item economy works fine up until you have to pay for armies I see two solutions. First, scale the system of armies down so you raise regiments or companies instead of armies. Second, allow the kingdom to nationalise the magic item economy in times of war. I haven't sat down and gone over these solutions so everyone should feel free to point out any obvious flaws in my logic.
I honestly don't see that raising armies causes that much of a problem without the magic item sales. The assumption is a CR 11 equivalent army on the PC's side which would probably be formed by 2 CR7s and a CR9 army (or something like that). Based on the samples given in the text, the total consumption for such armies is only 3+3+4=10. Let's say that you have at least enough farms to cover their consumption when not in the field. That means you only need to come up with another 30BP each month to pay for them. Since you need to have a Kingdom of size 100 for CR7 armies (and 150 for CR9 armies), your econ bonus should be at least 120 or 170 respectively. With an average roll of 10 you're looking at making between 26-36 BP each month. Even with all these armies in the field *and* no magic item sales, you're still showing a profit each month! Sure, you can't expand the kingdom or build new buildings but you certainly aren't hurting. It is war-time after all.
I did in fact tell my players something much like that. But I also don't want them to feel "limited by good will". I don't want them to shy away from doing awesome things because they don't want to break the system.
So patching the holes in the system ~along with~ telling my players to be reasonable fixes the problem from both ends, while still leaving my PCs the freedom to do the weird things that only PCs can come up with.
EDIT: And I will admit, some of the rules are as much to fix what I see as gaping holes in realism as to fix any real exploit.
I must have gotten lucky. I didn't give the rules to my players, nor even the stats of the buildings to them. They got general indicators of what would be helped, but not specific information. A hire city engineer is giving them specific info on a number of buildings equal to the number of hexes they can claim per turn.
As of month 27, they have three cities, only one magic item creation place (temple to Erastil) and, despite the complaints of the populace, still not a major center of industry.
Particularly not magic item industry.
I will be interested to see where they take it from here, as they just took out some greenies to the southwest of Candlemere and came back to a smoldering capital city (I love cliffhanger endings to a session!).
I like the idea of current Control DC +2 per 5k to give a bonus to Econ checks. My current idea is percentage-based, with all items having a percentage, tripled for the item that is promoted for that month. And of course, BP only comes from the "pushed" item.
Having great fun with the players not knowing the mechanics, and being mature enough to learn as they go along instead of searching them out on here. :P
I gave them the rules. I just let them know that BP was not going to be gold. The Kingdom is better because of it.
PS:I did not want to help with the kingdom planning anyway, even though I didn't mind doing the rest of it so handing them the rules made my life easier. I actually gave them tips on what to build because the kingdom was growing to slowly for them.
PS2:I am not rallying anyone to go against your idea. I almost did not give the rules out also.
As Baron Malthir of the Kingdom of Kardas it is my duty to protect the people of Kardas, not use the Kingdom for my personal piggy bank. If I abuse the people's trust in this manner I would expect them to rise up and overthrow my reign. Using Kingdom funds in this manner just feels wrong and is not worth the chance of throwing the Kingdom into anarchy.
Out of character, this feels like metagaming to me. Even if we were to get our kingdom to that level we wouldn't abuse the rules in this manner. The BP from magic is the main manner in which to build a strong and stable kingdom. They should have built a better mechanism with trade, but we have to work with what we have. You better believe that Kardas will have a standing army as soon as it is logically feasable even though it isn't the most optimal build.
Even though it is only a 5% chance per turn with their withdrawals, I would hope that foreshadowing would make them think twice about dismantling the Kingdom due to their greed. People taking to the streets, merchants complaining about the conditions of the roads, etc
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As Baron Malthir of the Kingdom of Kardas it is my duty to protect the people of Kardas, not use the Kingdom for my personal piggy bank. If I abuse the people's trust in this manner I would expect them to rise up and overthrow my reign. Using Kingdom funds in this manner just feels wrong and is not worth the chance of throwing the Kingdom into anarchy.
Out of character, this feels like metagaming to me. Even if we were to get our kingdom to that level we wouldn't abuse the rules in this manner. The BP from magic is the main manner in which to build a strong and stable kingdom. They should have built a better mechanism with trade, but we have to work with what we have. You better believe that Kardas will have a standing army as soon as it is logically feasable even though it isn't the most optimal build.
Even though it is only a 5% chance per turn with their withdrawals, I would hope that foreshadowing would make them think twice about dismantling the Kingdom due to their greed. People taking to the streets, merchants complaining about the conditions of the roads, etc
the opposite position could also be made.....
As Duke John of the Duchy of Paranda it is my duty to protect the people of Paranda. Doing so is a dangerous task and my people have seen firsthand how dangerous that is as I have returned home, battered, bloody and carrying the corpses of my brave companions.
My loyal subjects know that I serve them with all my body and all my spirit and frequently risk my life to keep them safe and to enable them to prosper. If doing so requires some expenditure to make that job easier, why would they complain? They would not complain about the duchy's funds being spent to equip the military, why would it be any different in equipping the Duke and his stalwarts companions?
If it is done sensibly the risk is low but being greedy is risky - as per the rules about increased unrest if you fail your loyalty check.
Just think of Henry the Fifth preparing to head over to France for another stanza of the Hundred Years War. On his way back from the finest armourer in London, who just made Henry the finest set of plate armour available in the kingdom, Henry is bailed up by a bunch of rowdy commoners who have maxed out their skill Knowledge (Forensic Accounting) who demand to check whether he used his own cash for the armour or raided the Royal Treasury.
I think it is the fact that they amount that is being withdrawn per the rules could completely unhinge the Kingdom with unrest if a 1 is rolled, that tells me in of itself that it is something very risky to do and negative for the Kingdom otherwise why would the kingdom come apart and there be such negative reaction to it. Its the kings will that keeps them all in line until they have had enough and rebel.
Plus a rich kingdom like that one, with no standing army, it would be ripe for the pickings to sack. Hmmm, new event, barbarian horde sacks the kingdom!
Anyways to each his own...
...serve them with all my body and all my spirit and frequently risk my life to keep them safe and to enable them to prosper. If doing so requires some expenditure to make that job easier, why would they complain? They would not complain about the duchy's funds being spent to equip the military, why would it be any different in equipping the Duke and his stalwarts companions?
A similar argument could be made of any "save the world/kingdom" campaign. You still get any help monetary wise. Now from a RL point of view if there were a group of people trying to save the world I think people would be more than happy to help, but from a game balance point of view I think the players should do it on their own.
A similar argument could be made of any "save the world/kingdom" campaign. You still get any help monetary wise. Now from a RL point of view if there were a group of people trying to save the world I think people would be more than happy to help, but from a game balance point of view I think the players should do it on their own....serve them with all my body and all my spirit and frequently risk my life to keep them safe and to enable them to prosper. If doing so requires some expenditure to make that job easier, why would they complain? They would not complain about the duchy's funds being spent to equip the military, why would it be any different in equipping the Duke and his stalwarts companions?
There are actually lots of people trying to "save the world" in RL: NGOs like Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, Worldvision; international organizations like UNICEF and the WHO; even politicians claim to be making the world a better place. All of them raise money by asking for it, and some people voluntarily give. However, an awful lot of people would (and do) complain if the government attempted to "save the world" using their tax money.
After all, we Americans firmly believe in the never-ending free lunch, that we can continue to have huge entitlements, the world's largest and most technologically advanced military (by orders of magnitude) and all the other government programs we like without paying the taxes necessary to support them. Both parties are scared stiff of even mentioning raising taxes because they know we'd vote them out of office if they did. I don't think our attitude is that diffeent from what any normal population's would be. Governments viewed as taxing too heavily or misusing the people's money (my best definition of government waste is any money the government is spending on someone other than ME) will face unrest, eventually.
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Now, some 50 months into things (kingdom size of 102), they produce 8 major items and 28 medium items, and have 13 city districts in which to sell said items (well, 13 items at least). Barring the odd under-4000gp items which pop up, selling items generally nets them 100+ BP per turn.
How LONG does it take to generate all of those items? This is the problem I am running into, interminable hours spend rolling back and forth on the horrid charts. My guys are just getting rolling here, but it takes up a lot of table time to just generate 7 minors and 2 mediums.
Is there a generator out there that speeds this up? It's getting to the point where we just don't care enough about the kingdom to go through the pain of generating all the items. If we were trying to do 25+ items, when would we get to play Pathfinder?
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Now, some 50 months into things (kingdom size of 102), they produce 8 major items and 28 medium items, and have 13 city districts in which to sell said items (well, 13 items at least). Barring the odd under-4000gp items which pop up, selling items generally nets them 100+ BP per turn.How LONG does it take to generate all of those items? This is the problem I am running into, interminable hours spend rolling back and forth on the horrid charts. My guys are just getting rolling here, but it takes up a lot of table time to just generate 7 minors and 2 mediums.
Is there a generator out there that speeds this up? It's getting to the point where we just don't care enough about the kingdom to go through the pain of generating all the items. If we were trying to do 25+ items, when would we get to play Pathfinder?
Got you covered. :)