I’m a player in a kingmaker campaign that is using the ultimate rules more or less.
I missed a session the other players jacked up the control DC, and in the last session nobody would listen to me when I warned the checks were nearing autof-fails.
A bad event later, we, have 5 unrest, 1 build point. Economy requires rolling a 21, Loyality a 26, Stability requires rolling a 19.
Consumption exactly equals bonus income.
**I don’t see how we can escape a death spiral.** We probably have items we can liquidate to 10 pr 15 build points.
We have plenty of hexes we can loose with nothing of value in them, but loosing a hex increases unrest— if I understand things right it doesn’t improve out situation new unrest gained balances the amount the control DC is lowered.
I’m unsure exactly how many buildpoints we can scrape together, and I rather expect things will need to go every further down the hole before the other players can be convinced to sacrifice all the savings. Even if we did get an influx of BP, I don’t really know how to spend it to solve this.
Should we prioritize economy, loyalty, or lowering unrest?
Advice?
My group hasn't really run into this problem yet (in large part because I ran the venture capital idea so they had bonus BPs to start). That said, do keep in mind that you can earn BP at the end of every kingdom turn by collecting taxes. If you spend a couple turns not building anything, that should build up your BPs. Remember that you collext based upon the roll, its not a pass/fail. Doesn't per se help with the unrest in and of itself though.
Next thing you can do is lower taxes IIRC (lowering taxes I believe reduces unrest but would have to double check since my party hasn't touched taxes since they were initially set). Also keep in mind that the warden can try to reduce unrest each month (though it is still based on the DC). Jettisoning a hex will lower DC, though the unrest is still a thing (but may be able to be offset elsewhere).
Finally, if you build up some BPs you can then have a festival which I believe also reduces unrest and can help get you out of the cycle -- especially if you can jettison some more hexes temporarily. Don't forget to build farms to balance out the consumption, etc.
All that said, a kingdom can go south really fast if you are not careful. Sorry I can't give you more specifics right now but am at work and thus, away from my books. :p
That said, do keep in mind that you can earn BP at the end of every kingdom turn by collecting taxes. If you spend a couple turns not building anything, that should build up your BPs.
OK, Thanks, that's important. Just this session the GM was complaining that the rules were ambiguous and He considered it a more generous house rule that you get the all the bonus income, but no taxes when you fail a roll-- instead of getting no taxes and no bonus income.
But it is pretty clear on the PFSRD that the success/failure of the roll is not relevant to tax collection. Maybe he was looking in the adventure path rules?
Anyway, I may be able to convince him to change that, which would make a huge difference.
Next thing you can do is lower taxes IIRC (lowering taxes I believe reduces unrest
No, it slightly increases loyalty.
Also keep in mind that the warden can try to reduce unrest each month (though it is still based on the DC).
But with our numbers he is guaranteed to fail, and permanently reduce loyalty instead.
Generally I've found that to be bad option. When you really need to decrease unrest, using the royal enforcer is more likely to make things worse.
The GM points to this line Under Edict Phase Step 7.
Jessica realizes that an average roll for her Economy check would be a failure (10 on the 1d20 + 52 Economy – 4 Unrest = 58, less than the Control DC of 60), which means there’s a good chance the kingdom won’t generate any BP this turn..
So it looks like collecting nothing is an intended possibility-- just that the rules are poorly written.
Ahh, thanks for the correction on reducing taxes.
I don't recall what the AP said about collecting taxes at the end, but I know Ultimate Campaign has it as make an Econ roll (d20 + econ bonus) and divide result by 3 (I believe off the top of my head) and that is how many BPs you get. Certain improvements like mines can then add to that. So even if you roll a 3 (like the Treasurer in my game likes to do :p) you still get some BPs.
You can then take those BPs and build buildings that will reduce unrest, which can certainly help offset the unrest generated by siphoning off hexes. Still should probably only do one hex at a time though. This will lower your DC and help a lot.
Also don't forget your bonuses to kingdom attributes from the leadership positions. As your PC's attributes go up, so do the kingdom attributes (in certain cases). Make sure you keep that up to date too.
I would also recommend taking an audit of your kingdom. Check to make sure that you have every bonus being applied. It can get pretty complicated pretty quick, so its easy to miss a +1 here and a +2 there. Every little bit helps though. In the end, it might be worth it to spend a several months worth of kingdom turns concentrating on earning BP and reducing unrest/contracting the kingdom. Once you get the DC back under control, that should help. For the most part, if you are careful with your expansion, you should be able to increase your kingdom attributes alongside your DC, even outpacing it a bit.
If I may ask, where in the AP are you currently?
> I don't recall what the AP said about collecting taxes at the end, but I know Ultimate Campaign has it as make an Econ roll (d20 + econ bonus) and divide result by 3 (I believe off the top of my head) and that is how many BPs you get.
Yeah, I can see how the rules give that impression, but I talked to my GM about it, and looked at the rules, and he's convinced me that the poorly explained RAI is you only get any income if you succeed the econ check. Right or wrong that's how he is running it. But he is allowing the bonus income from mines and such.
Unfortunately Consumption eats all of that but 1 BP per month. So I don't see saving up to build helpful things as being able to outstrip the unrest death spiral.
> I would also recommend taking an audit of your kingdom
That's what I'm doing now. So far we had missed the effect of Cathedrals on edicts.
> Also don't forget your bonuses to kingdom attributes from the leadership positions.
That's a good point. Unfortunately It's all NPCs and and retired PCs in those positions now, so no rapid level ups.
> If I may ask, where in the AP are you currently?
Whatever opens up the Hooktounge Map is next. Though we will probably finish exploring the Varnhold sector and fix the kingdom before triggering that content.
Huh, just went back and reread the section in Ultimate Campaign, and it does seem as though your GM is right. Though you kind of have to back track a bit from the actual collect taxes part to get that based on an earlier example.
Gotta say, that seems harsh assuming it hasn't been errata'd and seems to make for extreme swings -- especially later on. In the example given, if the PCs make the check, minimum they can gain is 20 BP but one off means zero.
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Ok, I think I see my way forward.
We need to abandon hexes. While the unrest cancels out the benefits to the control DC, it does lower our consumption, so we have an opportunity to gain bonus income.
A nice affordable way to turn GP to kingdom stat bonuses is to buy the NPC leaders cloaks of charisma and stuff.
Availability is random, but at worst we can donate the adventurer’s items.
The good news is that there is a cheap, affordable way to lower your Unrest, which wouldn't require much BP investment: Houses.
A House may not boost any of your rolls, but it does lower Unrest by 1. At a cost of only 3 BP, it may not hurt to abandon some Hexes so you can lower consumption, then spend a couple Kingdom Building turns building Houses to get the Unrest back under control.
A lot of people ignore Houses unless they need one for a building that boosts Kingdom stats, but when Unrest is high and BP is low, they make for a quick, affordable way to lower Unrest.
Good call. Abandon a Hex and then build a house and you negate the unrest and lower the DC.
As I recall, there really wasn't a reason to expand into more hexes until we were already passing all checks on a 2.
Of course, this basically breaks the 'game' of kingdom building.