| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
Expanded Kingdom Rules: Courtiers
This is an idea me and my players came up with, to help solve a few of the kingdom rules' problems, and to do something interesting with the menagerie of NPCs they've collected. Essentially, the companions and important NPCs you meet can be recruited as members of the royal court. This becomes vital, as every kingdom action now requires a courtier to complete for you. Of course, courtiers have their own skills and specialties, which can help shore up a kingdom's weaknesses, but they are limited in number, and are never more skilled than a kingdom's specialties.
Some of the problems my group has with the kingdom rules:
* After the early game, the DCs for untrained skills become impossible to meet. In a party, this is fine because you have allies with their own skills -- but there's only one kingdom. This can lock away essential actions if you're not careful, or at the very least locks your kingdom into a certain direction.
* Many actions and buildings are locked behind skill trainings. Many buildings can only be build when trained in Industry, and you must be trained in Statecraft to send a diplomat (a prerequisite for trade agreements).
* Events have a single skill requirement, so eventually some events become instant failures. There's also no choices to be had with events.
Our solution is the Courtier System.
Courtiers are skilled NPCs that attends court when held by its leaders. Each Courtier is trained in two Kingdom skills, and has one special trait which grants them a bonus and/or penalty in certain situations. To complete any Kingdom Activity, you now must assign a Courtier to complete it. That Courtier's skill proficiency can be used for any Activity's proficiency requirements, and that Courtier's skill bonus can be used instead of the Kingdom's for that Activity. Once a Courtier has been used, they're unavailable to be used until the next Kingdom turn.
For example, your leaders decide to Trade Commodities, and are trained in Industry. They must send a courtier, but that courtier's skills don't necessarily matter since the Kingdom already has a high Industry rank; they decide to send Tristian. The leaders roll the skill check as normal.
Were they not trained in Industry, they could choose to send Jubilost instead. Since he's trained in Industry, the rulers can roll using Jubilost's bonus rather than the kingdom's. Though, if he's the only Courtier in the court with Industry, they might decide to hang on to him so they can use his proficiency to meet the requirements of a foundry.
Courtier Rules
Courtiers have courtier levels, which don't necessarily correspond with their character level (similarly to how a Barrister, a Creature -1, is considered a 4th-level challenge in legal matters). They also have an Ability Score Modifier of +2 (meaning they will never be better at the skills that are focused by the kingdom). They are trained in two kingdom skills; at 3rd level, one of these skills becomes Expert; at 7th level, that skill becomes Master while the other becomes Expert; and at 15th level that skill becomes Legendary while the other becomes Master.
Each also has one special trait which grants a +2 circumstance bonus to applicable rolls. For example, Amiri gains that bonus when dealing with Barbarians. This might be Warfare checks against Barbarians, trading with Barbarians, or hiring Barbarians as adventurers. GMs should try to let PCs come up with narrative reasons why a bonus might apply.
When choosing to use a Courtier's skill modifier, no Kingdom bonuses (such as item bonuses from buildings) apply; however, penalties such as Unrest DO apply.
At the start of your kingdom's creation, you begin with at least 8 courtiers in your court (even if that "court" only starts off as a couple logs around a campfire), and you can gain more as you progress through the story and befriend new people, or as the GM feels necessary. This pool is made up of Companions from the Companions guide, important NPCs you've met along the way, visiting representatives from other factions, future questgivers found in the book, backstory NPCs like family and friends, or just made-up-on-the-spot NPCs. Not everyone can be a Courtier; they must have some reason for being trained in a Kingdom Skill, but otherwise there is no limits to the number of Courtiers that a court can support.
At every kingdom level up, you gain two levels to give to Courtiers. A Courtier can't be levelled up beyond the Kingdom Level. In addition, players can choose a new "Kingdom Feat 3: Courtier Training. You gain four levels to give to Courtiers; this cannot level a Courtier above the Kingdom's level." The limit to levels means that keeping an eye out for new and talented Courtiers is always important.
Some example Courtiers
(Companions are set to Level 4 as it's assumed they're about the PCs level when the kingdom starts.
Amiri, Level 4, Warfare (Expert), Exploration (Trained). Bonus vs. Barbarians.
Linzi, Level 4, Arts (Expert), Magic (Trained). Bonus dealing with rumours.
Valerie, Level 4, Defense (Expert), Warfare (Trained). Bonus defending against attackers.
Nok-Nok, Level 4, Intrigue (Expert), Wilderness (Trained). Bonus vs. monsters.
Tristian, Level 4, Folklore (Expert), Scholarship (Trained). Bonus against curses.
Ekundayo, Level 4, Exploration (Expert), Wilderness (Trained). Bonus against giants and ogres.
Akiros Ismort, Level 3, Warfare (Expert), Folklore (Trained). Bonus against religious zealots.
Keston Garess, Level 3, Warfare (Expert), Defense (Trained). Bonus dealing with mercenaries.
Mikmek (Sootscale representative), Level 2, Intrigue (Trained), Engineering (Trained). Bonus with traps.
Chundis (Swamper), Level 1, Boating (Trained), Agriculture (Trained). Bonus in swamps.
In my player's kingdom, they have a few NPCs based on their backstories.
Eikadam Stonesplitter, dwarven niece of the ruler, trained for courts. Level 3, Politics (Expert), Statecraft (Trained). Bonus with laws and regulations.
Gramps, retired farm owner and warhorse trainer. Level 4, Wilderness (Expert), Agriculture (Trained). Bonus with trainable animals.
Andary Marsholm, de jure mayor of the capital. Level 3, Agriculture (Expert), Engineering (Trained). Bonus with residential districts.
Events
With these rules, you can also change up the Events system. In my game, we move random events to happen before the rest of the Kingdom Turn, while all Courtiers are active. I roll the events beforehand, make sure I come up with a specific narrative for it, and come up with a few ideas that Courtiers might have to solve them that don't necessarily use the same Kingdom skill that the event usually calls for. These solutions might even change the results or the difficulty of the roll. The players can choose which Courtier to send, or even come up with their own ideas.
For example: Nature's Blessing. A flock of rare red-breasted eagles has been spotted near the capital.
Linzi (Arts): Such beauty! Lets encourage painters to use eagle motifs as they make houses!
Tristian (Folklore): I know of a few deities which revere these birds. Let us celebrate those faiths for our people to see.
Amiri (Warfare): Huh, these used to be important to my tribe. We could make them a symbol for our troops. [+1 Event difficulty] (On success, gain a bonus instead to Loyalty instead of Culture)
Example 2: Monster Activity. A nomadic tribe of goblins has been raiding travelers through our woods.
Valerie (Defense). I will not allow this to stand. If they will not relent, they will fall to my blade.
Ekundayo (Wilderness). I can get us behind these goblins and scare them off, simple. [+1 event difficulty]
Nok-Nok (Intrigue). Hey, I think I know these guys! Maybe if I can get close enough without getting stabbed, I can get them to work for us [+2 event difficulty](On a success or critical success, you gain one goblin courtier).
Conclusion
What do people think? Having a handful of trained characters means a kingdom isn't locked away from things it isn't good at, and choosing which courtiers to send around to do various actions makes for a bit more dynamic kingdom turns.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
High praise from one of the kingmaker greats! Thanks!
This is an interesting approach, what happens to additional actions over what the (possible) 8 courtiers can do? if some are disposed of, etc? like if you instead use some to build specific structures. Or when the kingdoms get (3 per PC) 12 actions a month due to a Town Hall.
I'm assuming they would simply make kingdom actions ("as normal") without benefit of a courtiers skill set.
regardless, these are great ideas which could improve gameplay and has lots of potential.