Occupation / Pillaging clarification

Dungeons & Dragons BRCS 3.0/3.5 Edition
1

OK, so here’s my confusion.

I invade an enemy province 5. There is a castle 2 in that province. The castle owner, when building, said “I include the temples in the fortification” per the rules. OK, fine.

Now I have wiped out all defenders, and neutralized the castle with a huge army. I want to pillage the province into oblivion.

Can I do that? Or must I wait until the castle is destroyed?

Or, can I pillage the province down to size 2, since that is all that’s protected by the castle?

What about the temples? Can I pillage them down to size 2, since that is all that is protected by the castle? What if there are 3 temples, largest is temple 2? Are all of them protected by the castle?

The rules aren’t clear on this.

Here’s my understanding: You can pillage down the province and holdings to the castle size, but must take the castle to reduce further. If the castle also protects temples, then only 2 levels of temple can be protected, and the castle owner has to designate which 2 levels. The rest are out in the open and fair targets.

2

Are the rules so unclear that no one has an answer? :blink:

3

Hmm, now this is a very interesting problem isn’t it. Here is my thoughts on the question.

As first I saw no reason why (once the castle has been neutralised by your troops) you couldn’t run about slaughtering, burning, and looting until everyone in the province has been driven off. The leaders, safe though they may be in their castle, can do nothing to stop you.

Then I recalled that many castles were designed to also protect the people of the local town from attack as well, so although you may be able to burn down their homes and crops, slaughter their livestock and generally be very nasty, you can’t kill all the people who are safely holed up in the castle.

However, then I considered what makes up a province, so that even if the people are alive and save, the infrastructure, their livestock and crop are still gone, so the province is effectivly reduced to level 0. Once the people rebuild their homes and livelyhood, it can then be ruled up again though.

So I’m thinking again that yes, you would be able to reduce the province level to 0, even if the province and the holdings in that province are protected by a castle. It would be a very nasty evil way to destroy an enemies holdings even if he is safely tucked away in his fortress. In fact, it is almost illogical that a province occupied and pillaged for several months by an enemy army will not be reduced to 0, no matter what percentage of its population is hiding away in the castle. It takes a long time to rebuild all the farm, villages, etc that the army can destroy and loot.

I suppose that you would really need to consider what pillaging is. Is it looting - carrying off any valuables, crops, livestock, etc the army finds (hence the severe taxation), or is it burning down everything in sight, sowing the fields with salt, and slaughtering the entire population. I’m guessing the former, so perhaps you should introduce the ability of an army to raze a province, which is the second option, a truly evil act that leave no building or person standing. So if you pillage a province you would be able to reduce it to the level of the castle, but no lower, but if you raze the province you can reduce the province to 0 no matter the castle level and get a cool name like Baron Gavin Tael, the Bucher of Proudglaive. And thats not even looking at entire cities that have been fortified with walls, etc.

As for the question on holdings, this is easier. All of the regent’s holdings in the same province as his castle are considered fortified up to the level of the castle. So if the regent controls a level 4 province with a level 2 castle and a level 4 law holding, then 2 levels of his law holding are protected by the castle, while the other 2 are based elsewhere in the province and can be reduced by the pillaging of the province.

No as for other, allied holdings (for example a level 3 temple owned by an ally of the regent), they are only protected by the castle if the regent of the holding has made the effort to move his holding (or some levels of his holding) into the castle. He can’t suddenly decide to move them into the castle once the province is invaded though, it must be done before hand. Personally, I would make the temple pay a small cost for this too, perhaps 1/3 the normal fortification cost. Moving a holding can’t just be as simple as saying “I’ve moved my temple holding. It is now protected by Baron X’s castle.”

4

Originally posted by Benjamin@Feb 13 2004, 01:19 PM
Are the rules so unclear that no one has an answer?

Ooo. Harsh. <_<

CM.

5

No as for other, allied holdings (for example a level 3 temple owned by an ally of the regent), they are only protected by the castle if the regent of the holding has made the effort to move his holding (or some levels of his holding) into the castle. He can’t suddenly decide to move them into the castle once the province is invaded though, it must be done before hand. Personally, I would make the temple pay a small cost for this too, perhaps 1/3 the normal fortification cost. Moving a holding can’t just be as simple as saying “I’ve moved my temple holding. It is now protected by Baron X’s castle.”

I’ve always interpreted this rule as such:
“A Provincial Castle can also protect a number of holding levels equal to its level.”

So a landed regent with a L6 Castle in a 6/0 province with law(6) could fortify all of his law holdings. Say we’re talking about a theocracy like Medoere, though…then Suris Enlien might split the castle’s protection between law (4) and temples(2) - the nice chapel in the castle…

It makes no sense, in my mind, to allow infinite overlapping of fortified holdings all for cheap in the provincial castle…it’s too much of a cost dodge, IMO. Keep it simple, I say.

6

what are Forts.

Walled Provs. like the wall thet seperated the roman empire in Brittan from the wild North.

thees fortifications do not fortify holdings in any manner. but prevent invading army to enter undetected. Well the invading army would have to raze the walls. or take a gate somewere to get in. It isint complex. But it will cost some manpower. This truly stops the invading army in its tracks.

simmilar to the wall the israelis are building around them selfes in palistinia to day. And similar to the berlin wall. Thees walls needs to be heavely manned. or othvervise thay arnt of any use.

thay will stop any and all trafic unless othervise noted.

I would treat all elven forrest as thees kind of walls, even thow thay are trees. the elves patrole there is heavy. killing of any smaller group of invaders.

I would rule thees forts to be of lv 0 but still with cost of 1GB per provience thay protect agenst.

Now we have the stronghold,
A stronghold where a noble family lives and opperate, is a castle.
The stronghold a place of survival or refuge.
could be for the pesants, the townfols, or just anyone.

Protecting the lifes of the people, and there comunal props.

The stronghold owner usualy sets taxses upon thows thet are granted the protection of the fort. thay need not have there houses there thow. its just a plase where thay can take refuge.

the Holdings in a provience are not realy buildings, but the people. and if the people are save, so is your influence on them. if the people are dead, well so is your hold on them.

holdings are realy how much hold on thees people you have. and how well thay do in doing what you want them to do.

the 3 difrent holdings, law/temple/guild are realy about the same people. If I have all the law holdings and you have all the temple holdings then the people will respect you in maters of belive and me in maters of law. and if I had a castle, and would bring all my people to this castle so thay would be save from any invading force. then the temple hold would be save as well. For thay are the same people!

Law is the power to order people to do things.
(Build me a Fort)

temple is the power to tell them what not do do
(But dont take it for your selfes)

Guild is the power of what thay sould demand in return for doing what thay do.
(well, then pay us)

Usualy in a provience Fortifications there are several Strongholds of difrent power.

But if there is a seperate stronghold for the Guilders. witch thay build themselfes. Then thay would use its level rather then using the level of the provience fortifications.

Im truly not sure how to represent the facts if we have saved all the people but burned all the workshops. It only reminds me of a story of a danis king. he went with an army south to germany and burnd down comersial town there. ones thet was done, he moved the people to denmark. and told them to bild there town there. where thay could be free and do there comers, and so the people did. under the protection of this danis king, thater then begin unprotected in a burned down town.

I could say thet moving the people will not chanse the hold others have on them. I will still honer my old temple even thow I move. but if the temple management will not see it in there harts to open some service where I have moved. I will be easy pray to any rival temple in the area I have just moved to.

7

One note on pillaging and razing:
One almost always included the other historically, so razing a town would happen after pillaging it; like in, take as much as you can carry and burn the rest to the ground.

Now, a fantasy setting, with LG leaders…

8

I appreciate all the feedback on this. Now I have a similar question. :slight_smile:

I am a temple 2 in a province 2. I fortify the temple to level 2. Someone comes in and pillages the province. They ignore my holdings, they are too tough. After pillaging, the enemy leaves quickly. The province drop to level 1 per the rules.

However, rules for fortified holdings say they can’t be dropped unless sieged away or stormed. I should still have a temple 2.

But a province 1 can only have a temple 1. So the enemy gets a free destruction of one of my holdings by ignoring the fortification?

9

Yes he does. Without the people to worship your temple, then your temple level is going to drop anyway. However, you’d still have a level 2 fortification, it is only the level of temple that drops, not the fortification.

10

Yes he does. Without the people to worship your temple, then your temple level is going to drop anyway. However, you’d still have a level 2 fortification, it is only the level of temple that drops, not the fortification.[QUOTE]

I’ll back Raesene up on this one. Fortified holdings are only useful for protecting against direct pillaging of your holdings. They provide no protection to the overall province’s population, nor to their faith (ex: fortifications are useless vs. a Contest Holding domain action - only actual holding levels and RP provide defense against that).

11

Hmmm. So basically, never spend the gold to fortify a holding, it doesn’t do you any good. Glad I know it now!

Thanks for the info.

12

Actually, if you keep your gold in that holding then yes it is worth it to fortify it. Though I cant really think of another reason.

13

Tsk, tsk.

Yes, you fortify the holding against specific attacks against that holding.
However, now you have a vested interest in not having that province invaded. Here is where you generously ‘gift’ the landed regent several GB to fortify the province with the excuse um, I mean reason that the faithful must be protected. A Llawful and / or Good regent will be honour-bound to repay your generous donation in some other way, hence it will effectivly cost you nothing. If the ‘gift’ was timed so that influential courtiers were impressed and became favourably inclined towards you, the landed regent may have to make a bigger donation just to keep the status quo.
Diplomacy: the skill that allows you to get more than you deserve :wink:

Doyle

14

Originally posted by Doyle@May 27 2005, 03:08 AM
[b] Tsk, tsk.

Yes, you fortify the holding against specific attacks against that holding.
Doyle [/b]

This includes actions by other temples to do military actions (i.e., holy war) and any other regent that atttempts a miltary action specifically aimed at that holding. IMO this inlcudes the occupy province action when the holding itself is targeted since it does not involve swaying of opinion (which would be contest actions) but rather a seizure of assets and destruction/desecration of the site).