So my party is going to start RRR in the near future and we have already hashed out a rough governmental system. What I would like is suggestions for any possible tweaks to the rules as they stand based on the governmental system, and suggestions for rules tweaks for other systems so as to make this a generally useful thread for groups expanding past the basic monarchy.
The group is going with a Oligarchal Republic in the form of the Roman Republic. The two ruler slots are going to be filled by a pair of consuls, thus negating the need for marriage between rulers and possibly setting them up as opposing forces or political parties. The other leadership roles will be fulfilled by senatorial committee or appointed magistrates. The nation is going to be Lawful Evil, with most vices being legal and regulated by the state. Slavery is likely to be legal and also regulated, confined to criminals and prisoners of war.
What, if any, rules tweaks might be appropriate for such a nation?
And for the side project, suggestions for confederacies, democracies, magocracies, theocracies, etc.?
The problem with tweaking the system "as is" for alternate governments is that the system is built "top down", so if you remove stuff at the top (the way leadership positions work), then you have to restructure everything all the way down.
I've been pondering this lately (over the past five days) and am considering, for my own home rules, rewriting the rules from the bottom on up. It won't take too much work, but it's more than I recommend to anyone who just wants to run Kingmaker.
That being said, if you don't screw with it... at all... you can still pass it off as Kingmaker. You don't even really have to change the names of stuff since what you're going for is pretty medieval. (Although for a LE crew, choosing to go with an oligarchal republic is kind of ballsy, especially in a world where dragons regularly have hundreds of thousands of gold pieces just laying around.)
Slavery being legal I might even call it one of the kingdom's special "resources", and grant them a +2 to Economy, -2 to Loyalty for it. (Although, if you read the River Nations book, slavery goes against one of the River Freedoms - actually, it probably goes against all of them - so they're going to have a lot of trouble coming their way. Actually, that's kind of interesting - a Kingmaker game where
The actual government system in Kingmaker doesn't matter in terms of rules. Whether it's Lord High Marshall, Minister of War, or Very Righteous Reverend of the Swift Sword, there are people in power in positions with stats that affect the rolls of the kingdom.
The hallmark for increasingly democratic systems of government is lack of control. In terms of a tabletop RPG, this generally falls into the Not Fun At All category. The point is to let the PCs develop kingdom more or less as a character. Some degree of "the Senate has declared war on Restov" might be fun, but it would necessarily include "the council has voted 'no' to building a road in that hex. Instead, you are to spend your BP in building another monument. Oh, and you have to tear down that library you built, as the zoning laws have changed. Oh, and the council wants you to take action against the hobgobilns (even though you haven't encountered any). Oh, and that hospital just got privatized, so..."
Basically, doing it well would, as Atrus wrote, would require stripping apart the whole thing and building up a political party based dynamic to make interesting, which sounds like a great project, but better for something else. It's called Kingmaker, after all.
I do see some serious RP fallout from the mother country if the PCs effectively ignore the call of the charter and set out to create their own system of government.
It sounds like a great idea - I love Roman history! I don't know that you'd need to change the rules too much, I think it will be mainly a change in flavour. After all, some of the people in charge have different ideas about how to do things and you end up with a vote on what to do. That's happened in my campaign where we have a typical feudal barony, and I'm sure it happens in every campaign...
It sounds like you would want to spend a bit more time on intrigue and marshalling your voters than normal. Patronage was a big deal in Roman politics and a group of PCs could really work with that. "We'll build you a fine new temple and you can vote for us..." Votes in the senate should be as dramatic as any battle, with characters making impassioned pleas for support, as their rivals muster there thugs outside.
I think you would definitely want a one or more strong NPCs in a leadership role to give the PCs some competition. You could perhaps model them after some famous Romans. Frankly, the more cut throat the politcal rivalry become the closer it will be to Roman history where you frequently had blood on the streets.
You might also have some version of the cursus honorum which was the career ladder in Roman politics. You couldn't be consul until you'd been praetor etc. Perhaps something like you can't be elected general until you've served as warden for a year. You might also limit the number of times that people can hold a particular position, or at least limit consulship to once every five years or something. A successful oligarchy relies on spreading the power around. Historically the Roman Republic stopped working as a political system when individuals got too much power; Sulla, Pompey and Julius Caesar being the main examples.
Hope some of that helps. I'd be fascinated to hear how it goes.
We had a half orc barbarian with an 8 charisma as a ruler, he was also the General as we were a totalitarian militaristic anarchy (CN).
the rules were 1) everything goes as long as you can back it up
2) if all else fails revert to rule number 1
We regularly shared spoils of adventure with the people in the from of lottery.
Although he also exercised toothfairism, the act of leaving random sums of treasure in the common rooms of random peoples houses.
It was fun, we had a ball and poorly ran a country and supplemented the poorly run country with lots and lots of money (primarily through the random treasure give aways and the lottery)
Primarily we just adventured, and we also had 'king for a day' lotteries where the winner got to be ruler while we were gone.
Too funny.