dysjunct
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The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Fri 20 Apr 2018, 21:16

Hi Fria Ligan team,

Just went through the beta chapter for the Stronghold and thought I'd give some feedback.

- Overall it looks great.  Crunchy enough to maintain interest over a long campaign, but not so rules-heavy that tracking everything becomes a tedious bookkeeping exercise (which was my experience after a year of playing Pendragon -- at first the "manor system" was fun, then it became a slog).

- Is the Stronghold Sheet available?  This would go a long way to giving me a sense of what tracking a stronghold is like.

- The functions seem like a good mix.  Nothing overly specialized or uninteresting.

- It is a little surprising that there is no function that generates money.  A trading post, market, or something similar?  For simplicity you could assume that it is goods-neutral (some people buy food, some people sell food, and it doesn't affect the stronghold's stores).  But maybe it could generate a small amount of coin, depending on season and reputation.

- The production chains of the various goods -- in terms of what produces a good and how you convert the good into more useful forms -- are mostly solid but I have a few questions.

E.g. GRAIN --> FLOUR --> FOOD (via fields, mill, and bakery) is great.

Questions:
Iron. Apparently the only use for this is making a dungeon, a forge, or a portcullis.  Can a Smith make weapons and armor?  The Forge function doesn't say this though.  It is also odd that the Vault doesn't require any iron to make -- especially since the description says that the vault has an ironclad door.
- Fur.  What produces this?  Is there a trapper you can hire?  Or should slaughtering cows produce both MEAT and FUR?  (If the latter, considering renaming "fur" to "skins" or "pelts" -- cows are not considered to have fur in English.)
- Milk.  What do you do with this?  Maybe the inn should be able to convert it to food?  (i.e. cheese.)

- Hirelings.  Looks solid.  It would be nice to have a Steward or Seneschal option to manage the household functions while you're away.

- Battles looks great. Easy and fast.  It would be nice to have some function of morale involved.  Maybe if the guards/attackers are paid extra then attack/defense rating is +1.

But overall --great job, can't wait for the finished product.
 
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Fenhorn
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Fri 20 Apr 2018, 21:40

I know that the crafting skill mention that items are either simple or advanced. I guess there will be a larger gear & service list that tells us what resources, talents and perhaps even if a specific function is needed to build it.

My guess on money-making is that when you refine/work-up something it also enhance its value. A player can then sell it or make something with it and that's about it when it comes to money-making. Perhaps a stronghold is to small to hold a permanent trading post. Perhaps the gear & service list will have a price what it cost to hire a trader.
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dysjunct
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Fri 20 Apr 2018, 21:52

Good points Fenhorn.  We will have to wait and see for many of those things.

Also, I thought of a few more things:

- The chapter doesn't explicitly mention a water supply.  It seems too tedious track individual units of water, or being able to build a well.  Is the assumption that any stronghold has a water supply?  Can the PCs fill up their water to capacity whenever they visit?

- The section on Battles doesn't mention siege tactics, although it seems easy enough to extrapolate:  Every person in the stronghold needs one unit of food per day.  So the stronghold can either wait for a rescue, or sally forth and have a battle on a level playing field (where they get one Rating die per 20 guards, like the attackers, and have no benefit of the defensive structures of the stronghold).
 
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Tomas
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Sat 21 Apr 2018, 14:04

Great feedback, thanks!
Fria Ligan
 
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lupex
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Sun 22 Apr 2018, 10:35

Good points Fenhorn.  We will have to wait and see for many of those things.

Also, I thought of a few more things:

- The chapter doesn't explicitly mention a water supply.  It seems too tedious track individual units of water, or being able to build a well.  Is the assumption that any stronghold has a water supply?  Can the PCs fill up their water to capacity whenever they visit?

- The section on Battles doesn't mention siege tactics, although it seems easy enough to extrapolate:  Every person in the stronghold needs one unit of food per day.  So the stronghold can either wait for a rescue, or sally forth and have a battle on a level playing field (where they get one Rating die per 20 guards, like the attackers, and have no benefit of the defensive structures of the stronghold).
I agree, there does need to be mention of a water supply and an overview of how resources work with regards to Hirelings and PCs (and the PCs resource dice), especially as each function creates ‘units’ of food which then can be used to increase a strongholds food resource.  Do hirelings all consume a unit of food per day, and is this included in the payment or does the hireling have to pay for it themselves?
I was thinking that for a stronghold resource dice would be a good way of increasing and tracking resources instead of counting individual units?
And separately - Will the adventure sites have descriptions of what functions are already in place to make it easier for a GM (and players) to use the site as a stronghold?  This might be affected by how the players interact with the site, if they destroy a portcullis for example.
Also, are the rules for building from scratch missing at the stage?  I was expecting to find details of the wooden or stone house, or castle in the list of functions?
And lastly, there isn’t any mention of slaves to maintain the fields.  This might be something that players will introduce to save costs?
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Aegis482
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Mon 23 Apr 2018, 12:52

Hi Fria Ligan team

I checked the Stronghold rules that are currently available, and I would like to give some feedback maybe it would help. 
The system as it is now is solid but I feel they are not well implemented. Since the rules became available I started play testing the system, and the character rules and the combat system is five star, but the stronghold rules ... sadly i feel it rushed and badly implemented. 
But lets start from the beginning. 
I think the current system is very lightly on the definition of "stronghold". Is it a Castle? Is it a house with some palisade wall? A Manson with building surrounding it? 
We do not define the starting building in way at the start. There should be a difference between if you start your "stronghold" in a peon house, or in a castle. Living space, building material, Upkeep cost and needed material, fuel need for heating and cooking. While we can say that these questions could be managed and limited by the GM, there is no any relative mention of it. 
What we have is Dice rolls for the Hirelings and Functions daily work. Lets see the Lumberjack produces 2D6 units of WOOD per Quarter Day. These means that in one Upkeep cycle of the Stronghold (that is a week) we would have 20 Dice roles, if we assumes that he only works during daylight, and have a weekend brake. 20 dice rolls for one Lumberjack /Week. And in default that will produce 60 Wood. A Library cost 50 Wood. I think this is more of some book shelf than a library. 
The Quarry works the same  2D6/worker/Qday. 20 Dice roles there for each week. (A little note here, I asume that the tool requirements are /worker, it is not clarified. It is sad that tools are to build a "function" but in a quarry I think all workers need a pick axe)
But lets step back for one step. Raw materials: Wood, Stone, Iron. These three is used in the system. But what is 1 Wood? 1 Iron? I do not need exact quantity but some representation at least. An Inn cost 500 WOOD or 500 STONE, but a Library 60 WOOD. Ok, so One is a building the other is a room? You need a building that you put the Library in? Can I put my library in my Inn? If I have a castle and dedicate some part of it as an Inn the cost is lowered? These should be marked somehow that what is a building, what is a interior. I hope that the building costs and resource needs will shed some light on it, but currently we handling an Inn on the same scale as a Fireplace. Btw does the Inn have a fireplace or it is needed separately? 
So all these random throws are just pointless. If you have 3 Lumberjack and 2 people work in a mine, you will throw 100 Dice every week!!! For 5 People!! Plus the caffs, sheep, eggs and what so ever. "During the FALL, you can harvest D66 units of GRAIN each month" Guys Seriously? D66 for one field??? 
Cant we just drop the dice rolls and set up some needs and usage systems? It is safely assume that when the party will have 10-30 soldiers, we are moved out of the what we will eat tonight phase of the game. 
There is some strange dynamic of here that aims for a fortified tavern with some extra buildings, but we try to call it as a "Stronghold". 
So how many people do we have? well 10 guard is the minimum. So I assume a stronghold can have a few dozen at least. 
But there are no Barack, Serf hut, servant house. No hunters, fishers, who can bring in meat.  There is a forge, but no weapon workshop, armor workshop Fletcher, Healer hut or Apothecary. No mess hall, kitchen, brothel, that would assumes a war band. We talk about 10 - 50 solders need to be fed, clothed, maintain payed. 
And that brings to the last part the Siege mechanic.
Ok, Lets start with the elephant. EACH adventurer worth 1 Deference Die. That means that a 4 people group that have there little Inn as base,no fortification, have 4 dice. The same amount as 60 strong warband lead by a warlord... Jesus. No amount of this enemy would have any trouble to kick out the team of there little building, if we use character combat rules. Yet in Siege 4 people regardless of there xp worth 61 people...
I would say that the players as a team worth 1 deff. No more. If they have there own little group of retainers, than one person could be considered 1 deff. 
And yes there is a good system here, but the implementation is just questionable at best. 
There is only one Soldier. Every 10 Soldier is 1 Dice. So can I have archers, riders, anything? Nope. 
But it is a simple system, different unit types can't be simulated. Yes, but some creative game rules you can.
Lets say that the Regular Solder is the Militia Spearman. 10 of them is 1 defense dice. 
You can decrease the number of a formation to represent there strength, like Shield Infantry could have a group of 5 as one deference dice. Knights who is 1 or 2 of them are 1 Def. 
You can give the unit types special traits like, modified the crit injures, you roll to be more deadly. Heales that lowers the chance of killed troops. 
There is a lot of options here playing with the numbers, the system provides. 
These would be my first thoughts of the Stronghold system. In the current state it is just a tedious side game, Reaching for a lot of things, and cant grasp any of it. 
Sorry for the heavy thoughts, but I felt I need to comment it after I read the first version. 

 
  
 
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Fenhorn
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Mon 23 Apr 2018, 13:27

@Aegis482

There is probably some good thoughts there but it was a little bit hard to read due to some format issues

I saw that you mention a lot of dice rolls and I can agree that (without having tested it) it seems a little bit to much of that.
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bassraven
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Mon 23 Apr 2018, 22:09

I think this is looking like a great start. Previous comments match my feedback on this. Would also be nice to add in some form of rules where your reputation can attract new 'villagers' to your stronghold. So the more you gain a name for yourself, the more people rally to your stronghold.

As for acquiring the needed raw materials to build, I feel like I am missing something. The stronghold chapter is very specific on resource numbers needed, as an example, a Bakery needs 200 stone, 40 wood and the tools. 

The only place I can find a reference for gathering raw materials is a mention of the crafting talent in the c
ore rules Alpha book. It mentions more details are in the gear section for raw materials, but there is nothing in chapter 7 gear at all for raw materials. Is this information coming?
 
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Tomas
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Tue 24 Apr 2018, 10:20

@Aegis482: Thank you for your feedback. It seems however that you are envisioning a very different kind of system of castle building than we are creating here. The level of detail you are asking for would be an entire game in itself. The stronghold system in Forbidden Lands is deliberately abstract, to keep it adaptable and rules-light. You can put your library anywhere you want. Same thing with battles - it's a system that supports having battles at the stronghold in your roleplaying game, with the PCs remaining in focus. It's not a tactical wargame.

That said, you have some good points regarding the number of units of raw materials used and produced, that's something we're actively looking for feedback on. So if you have some ideas there, shoot! :)

As a side note, if you think the cost in raw materials is low for some functions (such as the library) - the idea is not that you build an entire house. The idea is that you already have your stronghold (be it a castle, a cave, a stranded old ship or whatever you like), and you furnish a library inside it.
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Tomas
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Re: The Stronghold (beta feedback)

Tue 24 Apr 2018, 10:27

@bassraven: costs for raw materials will come in the expanded Gear chapter, in the complete Beta in a week or two.

True, there could be a lot of dice rolling. We'll probably add a provision for opting to pick the average instead of rolling, i.e. 3,5 per D6.
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