Tuarheivel PS, Personal Guards,

[Matthew M. Colville]

Jonathan Picklesimer wrote:

> How do you all as GMs handle the personal body guard of a regent or of
> any armed troops that are traveling with a party?

Only one of the 3 blooded PCs in my party is a regent, and he's an
Unearthed Arcana Cavalier, so splitting up his xp would have meant being
1st level for a million years.
Additionally, the PC has *an army* and recruited some faithful,
competant lieutentants with sufficient talent, so what would have been
the purpose of body guards?

> Does anyone use the war cards battle system on a regular basis?
> I really like the land based rules, but the sea rules, from hte Cities of
> the Sun expansion or the Sea something are a bit unweildy, especially
> regarding the markers. I digress. HOw do your players react to the war
> card games? How do you keep a large party entertained, especially when
> one member of the party is politically dominant in the setting?

My group has for over a decade used a battle system of our own
devising. It's pretty simple. Troops are assigned a combat value which
is modified by several factors (Defending homeland, Mercs not paid,
elves in forest, well supplied, foraging for food, etc. . .) leaders
have a certain value, all values are added up, then percentile dice are
rolled and a chart is consulted which yields victory results, number of
troops lost by both sides, chance of leader being captured, etc. .
Not only is it simpler, it's more detailed. And, oddly enough, it was
designed for a campaign in which there were many of the same Human Types
as occurr in Cerilia, like Steppe Nomads and Mongols.

-Matthew

-

[Brian Green]

Salutations!

I've been lurking on the list for a bit. I just wanted to stir up a bit
of conversation about my favorite AD&D setting: Birthright! :)

First, let me introduce myself. I've been a GM for about 4 years now,
and have mostly done home-brew settings. I started a political campaign
a while ago, and then Birthright came out! I loved it! It took a lot
of the things I was working with and simplified it (like the GB costs,
instead of listing everything in thousands of gps, the war cards, etc)

Currently, I don't use much of the published information, I've created
my own kingdom in which the characters adventure. I use the information
in the various expansions to give me ideas for my own Kingdom. I'm
developing it as I go.

I had each person be a regent, but under the guidance of a central King.
They each controled one province within the kingdom. The kingdom is
comprised of a strong Rjurik population in the north, a settled Andurian
population in the middle, some Elves there, too, to make things
interesting, and a large Brecht kingdom to the south.

I had a mysterius "necromancer" to the north that kept invading with
armies of Undead. This was the main enemy for the PCs. It kept them
from attacking each other (or the King ;).

The system worked rather well, I think. A problem I had with the game
was that there were large armies. If two or more people joined forces,
they would have a HUGE army, and the battle would get messy fast! Also,
magic was very powerful in these battles, since you usually had to
"stack" the armies to get them to all fit.

Currently, I have gone away from the political setting (my players
wanted something a bit different). I had the necromancer cast a HUGE
spell to winterize the whole continent. Civilization as they knew it
was crushed, and people focused into small villages to survive. (I wish
I could have had the tribal rules from the Rjurik book before I set up
the structure of the village :) The PCs had to destroy the Necromancer
in order to restore the cycle of the seasons.

I also had the "old" gods come back. :) I had them only go dormant
instead of being totally destroyed. The power within the blood of the
regents kindled them back to life. :) I'm currently planning on there
being some serious backlash due to this, perhaps to the point where the
gods must either leave or fight again (Battle of Desimar (sp?) part II).
A few of the PCs were chosen as the "focus" for each old god. For
example, the Cleric of Nature was chosen by Reynir to be his
representative in the lands. It made for some fun role-playing and
story development.

If I can fix what's wrong with my account, I'll have some information
about my old campaign and some about my new campaign in the Birthright
setting on my WWW pages. Somethings wrong, and I think it's with the
University's WWW server. Check it out in a bit, if you are interested.
I'd appreciate any feedback I could get about this setting!

Just as a side note, I think Thak's campaign sounds cool, too. :) I
for one wouldn't mind if he kept us updated on the happenings of his
group. I think I could get some good ideas from him.

A question for everyone: The Player's Secrets packs were discussed
here. I've only bought the Elven and Dwarven domains, because I wanted
more information about the two races. Are any other of the Player's
Secrets a must-have? I don't use them much for the campaign since I
don't base it in Cerillia, but I would like any additional information I
could incorporate into my world.

Comments welcomed. :) I do enjoy hearing the discussion about this
wonderful setting! I hope to hear from others soon!

"And I now wait / to shake the hand of fate...." -"Defender", Manowar
Brian Green, pchild@iastate.edu aka Psychochild
|\ _,,,---,,_ *=* Morpheus, my kitten, says "Hi!" *=*
ZZzz /,`.-'`' -. ;-;;,_ "If you two are so evil, then why don't
|,4- ) )-,_..;\ ( `'-' you just...EAT THIS KITTEN!"
'---''(_/--' `-'\_) - "The Tick", Saturday morning cartoon.
Check out: http://www.public.iastate.edu/~pchild to find out more 'bout me!

[Scott Parrish]

Matthew M. Colville wrote:
> Jonathan Picklesimer wrote:
> My group has for over a decade used a battle system of our own
> devising. It's pretty simple. Troops are assigned a combat value which
> is modified by several factors (Defending homeland, Mercs not paid,
> elves in forest, well supplied, foraging for food, etc. . .) leaders
> have a certain value, all values are added up, then percentile dice are
> rolled and a chart is consulted which yields victory results, number of
> troops lost by both sides, chance of leader being captured, etc. .
> Not only is it simpler, it's more detailed. And, oddly enough, it was
> designed for a campaign in which there were many of the same Human Types
> as occurr in Cerilia, like Steppe Nomads and Mongols.

I'd be interested in hearing more or seeing that system. I've been
desperatly trying to get something in between War Cards and Battle
system. I'd like alittle more control over what kinds of troops I hire,
and I think the BR prices are too much.


- --
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* "Clothes make the man. Naked people have little *
* or no influence on society. -- Mark Twain *
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* Scott M Parrish sparrish@fc.hp.com *
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