Kingdom Building and Tenements

[Hyper Pink]

I was building a city for my PC's when I came across the tenement building again. I'm having difficulty realistically ever seeing one built by PC's. I've ran a few kingdom games now and I've never seen them voluntarily build one. Saying they're "three times cheaper" is misleading taking into account how cheap both are in the grand scheme of things.

The only time I could ever see one getting built is very early game where their economy is too poor to be able to handle those two extra build points. But if that's the case, their poor economy certainly isn't strong enough to take a -2 hit from the unrest it brings.

For only saving 2 build points gaining 2 to unrest doesn't seem worth it. Especially since a house reduces unrest by 1!

Thoughts? Ways to make tenements more appealing?

[wakedown]

My players built them.

I kept the exact details of the Kingdom Building rules abstract from the players beyond the relative costs and the high level benefits.

I also suggested that they needed sufficient housing to keep up with the growing population, and the kingdom building rules are a bit lacking on that. Failing to have enough housing, I had a "tent town" erect itself on the shores/beach while people waited for more housing.

When they'd build housing, the demand was so much greater than the supply, only the rich folks waiting in tent town were able to afford them.

This led to them quickly turning to the tenements as an option to get housing made to get people out of the tents, particularly aimed at the folks in the lower class.

Now, folks are living there (the poor and destitute of course) and the baron wants to tear them down for something more glorious (maybe a temple to Abadar or something along those lines?).

In our game, we go off the rails a lot, so there's been a lot of urban adventuring within their tenements which is not part of the Kingmaker AP at all. They've been a great asset for a GM's creative license. If you go "beyond the rules" and kind of work out what's going on in a kingdom, it should make sense to build low income housing, as a fledgling kingdom needs somewhere for folks earning low wages to live.

[Hyper Pink]

wakedown wrote:

~shortened~

This makes sense. Having some population growth that the players have to keep up with puts a bit of pressure on them for these sort of things. But if tenements are needed, why the 2 unrest?

[Majuba]

Game terms, his "tent towns" that were spontaneously built may have given -4 or -5 unrest, so the tenement would be an improvement.

[Hyper Pink]

Majuba wrote:

Game terms, his "tent towns" that were spontaneously built may have given -4 or -5 unrest, so the tenement would be an improvement.

Well if that was true then why not build a bunch of houses on top of them? Take care of the unrest that way?

[wakedown]

Unrest isn't really that big of a deal in terms of mechanics.

Our group had already built some housing and a barracks prior to constructing their tenements, so they didn't even notice the +2 unrest when they were constructed.

They were also holding festivals, so eventually a fairgrounds made sense after they had some roleplaying encounters in their town where the aftermath of their festivals resulted in litter/waste through the town's main square. The fairgrounds took another dent out of unrest.

I forget the exact formula I adopted in terms of "housing requirements" but they just made common sense. You can figure many merchants work above their shops and some folks live in the abstract "outskirts" of towns (and work hex improvements). Even still, the population was outpacing housing if they didn't keep building housing or tenement every so often. I believe the stock rules allow for building housing in tandem with other buildings too, so trying to encourage more housing felt natural.

[Hyper Pink]

wakedown wrote:

Unrest isn't really that big of a deal in terms of mechanics.

Our group had already built some housing and a barracks prior to constructing their tenements, so they didn't even notice the +2 unrest when they were constructed.

They were also holding festivals, so eventually a fairgrounds made sense after they had some roleplaying encounters in their town where the aftermath of their festivals resulted in litter/waste through the town's main square. The fairgrounds took another dent out of unrest.

I forget the exact formula I adopted in terms of "housing requirements" but they just made common sense. You can figure many merchants work above their shops and some folks live in the abstract "outskirts" of towns (and work hex improvements). Even still, the population was outpacing housing if they didn't keep building housing or tenement every so often. I believe the stock rules allow for building housing in tandem with other buildings too, so trying to encourage more housing felt natural.

My group has always felt very different about unrest. You start losing hexes at only 11 unrest, and many random events can quickly add 4 or more unrest. They try to keep unrest at 0 and actively work to keep it there. Sure, 2 unrest is hardly noticeable. But that doesn't mean they're going to take it willingly.

[ZomB]

The Overlords Guide to Kingdom Building