I finished Edge of Anarchy a few weeks ago, and then spent two sessions of "down time," when a few different players couldn't make it, covering two to three weeks of in-game time between the end of EoA, and the sinking of the Direption to start off Seven Days to the Grave. I used the "fluff" sessions to give the players a better opportunity to become familiar with the city itself (the Guide to Korvosa is invaluable for this).
One of my PC's is a member of the Korvosan Guard, who stopped showing up for his shifts when the riots broke out. His first character was eaten by Gobblegut, and so his current character (friend of the dead character) bumped into the remaining party just as the riots were getting going, late in the evening. The party went the next day to recover other PCs' bodies (and gear) from the ship tied to Gaedren's warehouse (two died to the Drain Spiders), and in the process, the Korvosan Guardsman & other party members took a bunch of Strength damage.
Due to that, and a few other issues, the party did not want to brave the riotous streets until they were back to full Strength, and so did not return the brooch to the Queen, and then go meet Cressida Kroft until 3.5 days after the riots had broken out. Thus, he was not in Kroft's good graces from the get-go.
Anyway, after finishing EoA, during the fluff sessions I ran a few encounters with the Guardsman working a few shifts (getting back into the Field Marshal's good graces). In the first of those, he and his patrol (I had the other players playing as other guardsmen for a half hour; I made little character sheets for them) were searching the Shingles for Trinia, the fugitive (as the intro portion of 7DttG mentions the Guard doing). In the process, they fought a few chokers, and ended up looting a thousand coins, and a scroll (yay random treasure rolls). In another encounter (during a shift a "week" later), they killed some street thugs that had murdered someone during a mugging (showing the rising crime wave that 7DttG mentions). There was potential loot from that encounter as well.
Then the question came up of what happens when fighting things while "on duty?" Presumably the muggers would have their gear turned over as evidence (they killed one mugger, and a second one surrendered), thus the party couldn't gain it as loot. But what about monsters? And what if all the humanoid criminals refuse to surrender, and are killed?
I've done an internet search to see if this issue has come up in threads before, but I'm not finding anything. A quick perusal of the books doesn't seem to turn up any mention one way or another. Without any other guidance, I'm tempted to go with "the Laws of Korvosa apply to humanoids and other relatively intelligent creatures" (thus, imps and pseudodragons may have protections under the law), but the Law doesn't care about menaces like Chokers (intelligence 4), and they can be killed & looted at will.
Thoughts? Should I just put the demarcation at humanoids being protected under the law (thus imps & pseudodragons could be killed on a whim with no legal repercussions)? Anyone have a lead on any reference in the books to rules about members of the Korvosan Guard getting loot from killing people and/or creatures while on duty?
Well, it's a GM call, although it wouldn't make sense that guardsmen on duty could just loot everything they find, certainly not in a lawful city.
I agree it wouldn't make sense to let the guardsmen loot people they've killed/arrested. But I'm thinking of letting them do it for monsters.
Any suggestions on what becomes of the gear guardsmen take to Citadel Volshyenek along with any dead criminals? Presumably the Guard would use it or sell it. Maybe let guardsmen buy such things from the Korvosan Guard at half price? It still allows for possible corruption (purposefully killing someone under color of authority, as a means to legally obtain what they have), but I'm not sure what the Korvosan Guard would do with such stuff otherwise.
I agree it wouldn't make sense to let the guardsmen loot people they've killed/arrested. But I'm thinking of letting them do it for monsters.
Any suggestions on what becomes of the gear guardsmen take to Citadel Volshyenek along with any dead criminals? Presumably the Guard would use it or sell it. Maybe let guardsmen buy such things from the Korvosan Guard at half price? It still allows for possible corruption (purposefully killing someone under color of authority, as a means to legally obtain what they have), but I'm not sure what the Korvosan Guard would do with such stuff otherwise.
Well - apart from stuff that was stolen from someone (in that case it should be returned to them) - if it is money, it could flow back to the city's coffers, but items could either be sold (I like your idea of offering to members of the guard for half price) or redistributed. In the last case, the Field Marshal gives special items to those who deserve it.
If the PCs retrieve stolen stuff, they might be paid a finder's fee by the owner (let's say 10 %).
|
Well, Korvosa may be a lawful city, but that doesn't mean that the guards would neccesarily work the way that police work in our world. Keep in mind, the Korvosan Guard is an army, not a police force. They happen to be in Korvosa and they happen to reinforce the law, but there might not neccesarily be laws forbidding them from looting.
In fact, that may be one of the incentives for the Korvosan Guard to protect the people, that they get to use the wealth they acquire to exert control over the city or retain the loyalty of their fighters.
So, I would say that for players whom are part of the Korvosan Guard, I would say that they should probably be encouraged to think of the Korvosan Guard as their family that needs their maintenance in the form of funds, but not outright commanded to turn over all that they find.
The Korvosan Guard isn't neccesarily in the business of collecting evidence either. They might bring criminals to court, but they don't have to collect the evidence for it. In medieval times, things like murder were considered a private matter to be resolved between the involved families. The guards might facilitate those matters, but they aren't neccesarily expected to 'solve' the murder.
They just keep the peace. So they strongly encourage a settlement be reached, no matter what actually happened and a judge might become involved if the case/feud gains enough notoriety to require an unbiased observer to settle matters.
I think that the book states that the players are incentivized to go after criminals because they get to keep whatever they find. I remember my DM telling me that I wouldn't be allowed to approach people as a guard, because I was basically a fixer for the guards. None of my actions, even on duty, were meant to be reflective of the guard and in exchange, any gains I made I would be allowed to keep. I ended up still investing in the Guard as a fellow member, but I wasn't required to.
TLDR: The Korvosan Guard is a peace-keeping force. Laws in Korvosa aren't neccesarily comparible to those IRL, so they can swing to being more modern or being more medieval. For the central conceit of CotCT, I recommend swinging towards the medieval side of things, where the Guard maintain the peace and enforce the law, but they don't litigate or collect evidence. Without it specifically being stated otherwise, the Korvosan Guard can do whatever it feels is neccesary to maintain the peace, which includes confiscating wealth, either for those doing the confiscating or for the maintenance of the guard.
The Korvosan Guard is, in a sense, above the law, unless they are held accountable by the Sable Company or the Hellknights. But they are much more close-knit and loyalty to the Guard and the Guard's ideals and interests in the city keep them from being outright corrupt.
TLDR2: Leave it to the player's discretion whether they will fund the Korvosan Guard with the loot they acquire. If the players ask how much they would be expected to fund the Korvosan Guard with in these circumstances, I would go with 10% to 20% of their share.
There may have been pressure to maintain their fellow soldiers with confiscated goods before, but Cressida specifically absolves the players, even her own guards, for these series of missions she has in mind, to better equip them for missions to come.
... There may have been pressure to maintain their fellow soldiers with confiscated goods before, but Cressida specifically absolves the players, even her own guards, for these series of missions she has in mind, to better equip them for missions to come.
All excellent points, thank you. I think I will implement a somewhat more medieval perspective in a general sense.
That said, I should make clear that I was looking for this information for some "down time" guard shifts the Guardsman character played through (during the few weeks down time between Edge of Anarchy and Seven Days to the Grave, when the Guard is looking for Trinia, and there is a rising crime wave), not for the actual published adventure "missions." For the actual published adventure missions, he is treated as being on detached duty (keeping the ragtag group of mercenaries in-line and on-task), and gets to loot to his heart's content along with the rest of the party.