Trade route actions

Dungeons & Dragons BRCS 3.0/3.5 Edition
1

I’ve been batting around ideas with various people and have 3 issues with the existing trade route rules:

1.1. At present rulers, temples, even mages, often seek to take over guild holdings in order to set up a few trade routes and see the gold roll in. This makes playing a guilder quite difficult and poorly represents the situation - ruling or ministering to the faith was a full time job, extorting money from merchants is one thing, becoming one another.

1.2. Trade often results in a lot of money sloshing around the system, which makes it ubiquitous in developed areas, by contrast it is almost entirely absent (seas aside) undeveloped areas, ideally it should be possible but just one of many strategies available to rulers.

1.3. The BRCS rules also make it irrelevant what size the province is - only the guild holding size affects income (unlike 2e where guild size was irrelevant and province size dominant). I’d expect larger provinces to be more profitable - outgoing goods will be worked and thus more expensive, while incoming goods find a larger market helping them avoid low prices.

How about the following alternative:

2.1. Create trade route doesn’t set up an automatic series of caravans, ships etc - it just builds the desire for trade, makes the necessary contacts, ensures that the road is passable / port tariffs are manageable, etc.
2.2. To actually make money, the guild regent needs to spend an action - during which they are amassing the caravan, negotiating with town mayors, etc to allow passage trade, etc.
2.3. Income is based on province size (volume of goods, quality of goods, size of market, etc), but the number of trade route actions is dependent on the guild holding size - since each action needs organising, the holding only has the manpower to run one route per holding level.
2.4. Income could be capped at holding level unless the guilder succeeds well, is high level, or has the support of the ruler, law holders etc - that way the city of Anuire is not automatically a cornucopia.
2.5. Trade can be between provinces which have a connecting road/river, or are on the coast or - to help undeveloped areas, simply share a border. Should trade be able to bounce between road/river/coast without needing a separate trade routes each time?

Questions:
3.1. court, realm, or personal action?
3.2. how much income? Average of province level at each end? Terrain/resource dependent?
3.3. should income from the route be deferred?
3.4. should the action be automatically successful or need a roll, if a roll, should the outcome affect the income generated?
3.5. would the need to spend actions deter non-guild regents from branching out? (They would only get the base income, not trade route income as they are busy elsewhere)
3.6. Should the income include maintenance for roads, ships, ports etc?
3.7. Does a trade route create income at both ends?
3.8. Does the trade route take up a ‘slot’ at each end with each province only having goods/services for one trade route a month/season/year per level?
3.9. Should trade be between regions/domains or provinces?
3.10. If trade is between provinces, should it be simply different terrain/culture, or should each province be assigned produce and needs with trade possible wherever there is a match?

Notes.
Trade routes come in the following types:
4.1. The basic route. Province A to province B, both fairly nearby
4.2. A long or difficult route, but otherwise similar - but should the income, deferral of income, etc be different?
4.3. A chain - Province A to B to C to D - each leg being individually a basic route / the whole chain being a route with unusual income.
4.4. The grand caravan - multiple trade route actions between province A and B carried out as a single action.
4.5. The wheel - multiple trade routes of caravans carrying similar goods from the same province to different provinces as a single action, or gathering similar goods from multiple provinces for a single province as a single action.
4.6. A route ‘to the far ocean’ - no need for a friendly guild at the other end.

I can see these either being different actions, different DC’s, feats or open to higher level characters. Should the income be different?

What do people think? Should we aim for income similar to 2e, BRCS, higher/lower? Will this leave guilders doing nothing but trade actions (boring) or still leave them scope for other actions?

2

Except that the size of a province determines the max size of a guild and the number of guilds potentially present.

So IMO it is not irrelevant at all - it is much more directly tied to province level and to the amount of effort that was put into the guild in the first place.

A large province with undeveloped guild holding should not be able to produce a large amount of trade (like was done in 2nd ed). The guild holding size is a reflection of the infrastructure necessary for the guild workings (and thus those available to support trade).

3

The original ruleset assumed that there was a great deal of activity not covered by “holdings” - the array of noble familes (some blooded) that aren’t powerful enough to possess Law holdings are the equivalent of the lesser merchants and the low-level activities that permit the economy of a province to function even if it has no regency-granting Guild holdings. In terms of trade routes, there’s even the little-known rule giving a default income for a seaport whether or not any Guild regent has opened a formal trade route to it: profitable trade carries on whether or not a blooded regent wills it or gains from it.

The converse problem to the one you point out is that the Guild-only stance skews results against the creation of Renaissance-style “factories” / trade bases in major centres of trade. Exporting to a level 1 Guild in a level 1 province (with as few as 2000 people spread over 1500 square miles) becomes every bit as profitable as exporting to your level 1 holding in the greatest metropolis and trade entrepot in Cerilia, the City of Anuire… yet surely dominating the significant economic interactions of 10,000 residents of the greatest city on the continent has to offer more chance of making a good sale than controlling the internal trade of a couple of thousand rustics. Again, this idea was built into the original ruleset, with the increasing income granted by holdings in higher-level provinces.

As a slight compromise between the two stances, I’ve seen DMs use a few closely related options:

  1. Average of the province levels, but there must be a guild holding (owned by the regent, or another regent’s holding acting under formal agreement) to receive and handle the goods at each end of the route (and, if road-and-sea routes are permitted, at the port provinces as well).
  2. Average of the exporting Guild and the receiving province levels.
  3. Average of the exporting Guild and the receiving province levels, with the requirement of a “receiving holding” (as in option 1).

Things swing back in the favour of Guild regents, thanks to the extra time and effort involved in setting up holdings or forging agreements - and the latter becomes more attractive thanks to the paranoia regents tend to have about other regents of the same type creating holdings in their territory.

To turn to the original post…

The overall feel looks a lot like the major long-distance trade expeditions of the Renaissance and early Modern periods - the fitting-out of a grand company of travellers and guards who will escort a single large shipment of goods over long distances.

That’s wholly appropriate to the “feel” of Cerilia, in my opinion… but it doesn’t cover the shorter-distance networks of regular, sustained trade. Most in-game Trade Routes won’t take months or years to traverse: even those by water are usually matters of connecting ports at most a few hundred miles apart - and often less (e.g. Endier to the Imperial City).

Particularly if the unblooded, faceless NPC merchants can trade long-distance through seaports without taking RP- or court-based Actions (and do so in such numbers that they grant appreciable profits in customs and berthing fees to port regents), short-range trade routes ought to be possible to create and maintain for those with access to greater resources, without the need for a full action every round.

Of course, if you’re running with the BRCS, the various grades of action can greatly reduce that worry… Perhaps the longer-distance the trade route, the more effort (in terms of number of court actions / a higher grade of action) it requires to keep things ticking over from season to season? After all, it should presumbly take less effort to monitor subordinates that make the round trip in a week than it does to monitor those gone for seasons at a time…

As for linking land and sea into a single route (so that, say, a province in Eastern Ghoere can export by road and river to the Imperial City) - yes, definitely, but perhaps treat it like building a ley line in sections? You end up with one usable route linking source and ultimate destination, but opening up the overland portion requires one set of tests and actions, and setting up the river portion requires another… and each stage provides opportunities for other regents to get involved to support or oppose you.

Whatever’s done, I’d back making trade routes more involving for the guild regent’s player - make them a matter of on-going diplomacy, something to monitor, something that can involve cutting deals with other regents of all types. Too many of the options I’ve seen either make trade routes prohibitively expensive and awkward to set up (even to an allied realm), or make them a dependable source of endless GB and RP for guild-rulers.

4

I see your point, but if I am trying to build a L1 guild in a L1 province, the law holder can’t give much help, if I’m trying to build a L1 guild in a L5-6 province the law holder can make a major difference to the success by supporting the action. So it actually takes less effort (if possibly more diplomacy) to create a guild in a highly populated area as long as the law holder is supportive. Similarly, as exile noted, trade with L10 City ofAnuire, or L1 Bjondrig gives the same income - yet the City is a source of technological wonders, the greatest art, science, etc of all Anuire - while Bjondrig is proud mostly of its salted fish exports and unusually shaped vegetables.

From my perspective guilds should actually reduce the income of a province by creating monopolies, cartels, and other anti-competitive practices. This would not seem the case to the perspective of the guilders involved (modern competition is good for the consumer, not so good for the producer and distributor) and similarly the nobility would see the focusing of the wealth by guilds as ‘creating wealth’ simply because wealth held by commoners tends to be invisible (if a peasant works half an hour more a day, does the lord notice? Probably not, but they will notice the cumulative impact on the tax take!).

As such A L5 province with a L1 guild may actually be wealthier (measured across the whole society) than a L5 province with a L5 guild - certainly both must be producing significant quantities of goods and importing others in order to survive. The guild primarily concentrate wealth in the hands of key individuals (much as other holdings focus wealth and influence in a similar select group) so although they may provide some economies of scale, expand the market range, etc, I’d say it would not be reasonable given medieval organisation capabilities that guilds multiply wealth significantly - certainly a L5 province should be significantly wealthier than the L1 province even if it had no guild holdings - ignoring the impact of population on trade route income thus is in my view incorrect.

My suggestion effectively makes the income for a province geometric rather than arithmetic - a large province can support many trade routes, each of which is more profitable than in a smaller province. That makes trade centres like the City of Anuire, Endier, etc very desirable for a guilder. It also however allows the guilder to be ‘distracted’ into not having sufficient actions to monopolise the trade possibilities.

Exile. Again I agree with your point - there is much less effort in moving goods short distances, and I was looking mostly at the old guild caravan / trading fleet. I suppose you could adjust the DC by the distance, with short distances having very low DC’s, mix that with the creation of trade routes for higher DC’s and you get many nearby routes for the price of one long route. It would still need an action but given the income from trade routes a few court actions should not be an issue. I was thinking about court actions btw - in 2e you’d need to make the ‘action’ implicit in the guilders court somehow I guess.

I also like the idea of a holding at each end - but would say it should only need to be an allied holding, not necessarily the guilders own holding - if they don’t mind splitting the income. Of course the recipient gets income without spending an action, but they lose a ‘slot’ in their province - and high level provinces would also only really want to trade with other centres - assuming that they have complimentary goods.

One problem is that with action = money, the court goes from a cost to a profit centre, and guilders would be strongly incentivised to have a court equal in size to the number of their trade routes, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing - and it doesn’t help 2e at all.

The other problem is that a lot of guilder’s actions could be eaten up by trade - indeed the consumption is a key ‘design feature’ - but does my method produce overkill where guilders spend 50%-75% of their time on such actions? And if so, is that a bad thing?

5

I prefer to keep things abstract (and therefore explainable in story terms in many different ways) and simple. To that end, I consider trade routes their own holding type, similar to guilds. Each level of trade route grants 0.5GB and possibly 1RP for the trade route regent–merchants/peddlers/caravaners. They are created an ruled as any other holding. Other non-source holdings can apply their levels to influence them, but they otherwise are fairly independent, using the same Create and Rule actions as any other holding. Multiple trade routes can therefore be created to each province, and even frontier provinces with no formal guilds can support trade routes, since the farmers trade their basic goods for the peddlers’ wares.

This separate system makes trade routes into a sort of sub-holding. Since, like other non-source holding types, they can be created by anyone, province/law regents may arrange them, as could temples and guilds. This creates more trade routes cris-crossing the land and encourages competition and contestation, but remember, they have to be ruled up like other holdings–which means slots don’t fill up as fast.

As alternative rules that I tend to like but aren’t necessary, I don’t consider Roads to be necessary for trade. They instead act as Fortifications for the trade routes that run on them, and for me, holding fortifications apply their level in any Contest and Agitate actions (for or against) and cost nothing to maintain (they permit the generation of bonus income sufficient to cover their own maintenance costs). Roads act as fortifications equal to the trade route level. Ships likewise act as fortifications for sea trade routes; if you don’t own ships, you hire them, and hired ships are both more vulnerable to the effects of contestation (being hired away, captured or destroyed, warned away, whatever) and don’t give you naval power.

Also, I allow trade with no restrictions among provinces. Trade at least 3 provinces away across different terrains, however, generates an additional 50% GB; trade across cultures generates an additional 50%GB, with a max therefore of double income from trade routes across cultures linking provinces of different terrain.

6

Rowan,

 I like many of the ways you treat trade holdings.

  • Having to grow them like any other holding does certainly add to the competitive nature of trade. This might too much of a boost to landed regents money flow because I can’t imagine them not forcing their will and trying to control all trade routes.

  • I would also think guilders should have some sort of bonus to creating and maintaining trade routes.

-BB

7

I’ve made trade another holding type than can be ruled at half cost if you have a guild of equal or higher level in the same province. Trade holdings can’t be protected by fortifications.

This is different from the BR rules, but it is simple and works well enough.

8

Beau, thanks. Green Knight, to take a cue from you, perhaps the benefit to Guilds is to make creating Trade Routes such a normal part of their function that it doesn’t cost anything for them to do so. Beau, if you’re afraid of the landed rulers forcing their will over trade, maybe only allow the law holdings to add their level to Contest actions, not to helping them Create or Rule Trade Routes. Perhaps that’s only a bonus for the guilds.

What I like about the system is that it makes trade and commerce a bit more prominent, recognizing that these make up the bulk of activity in any realm and are not so easily overshadowed by law, province, and temple holding concerns. It also provides a great way to let non-regent PCs grow into a regency role, as they take over or create a caravan company–fitting for their traveling adventures–and begin to grow their fortune.

Green Knight, this may not matter to you, but my Trade Route system doesn’t really have fortifications in the sense of the other holding levels. Highways primarily exist to make it harder to contest a trade route. Though due to the small fortifications along its route, I think it can act as a full holding fortification. Caravans and ships are, after all, moving targets; to destroy these holdings militarily would take some effort, akin to destroying a fortified holding (of course, Contesting them to prevent them from operating for a while and generating income is much easier, since the route may well not function with hostile troops along it, or hostile magistrates and other officials).

9

I haven’t been following this too closely, but I think I like the idea that operating a Trade Route should take some effort (action) from the guilder, such as a Court Action.
IMO, some trade is included in the operation of a guild holding.

A second thought, would it be worthwhile to create a Caravan unit, which would function similarly to a ship, just overland? It could be moved into/through provinces that do not have roads, but not as many or as far.

10

Hmm, blending some ideas. Max income is the holding level, but you have to ‘rule up’ your potential to get there - so when you first start the trade route it only generates 1 GB - that would deter ‘round one trade route’ syndrome albeit at a book-keeping cost.

A guild could start at the guild level instead of 0 reflecting the preexisting trade network’s ability to readily locate customers/goods, arrange shipping, etc.

If you don’t want to use actions for routes, for every guild rank over (half the province level+1) the guild holding could do 1 free trade route a season (monopolies are a wonderful thing) - which could also encourage guilds to form cartels not just compete. I.e L2-3 could do 1 free route, L4-5 could do 2, L6-7 could do 3, etc.

I like the idea of roads and ships protecting against contests by increasing the DC, but don’t think they should protect against military romp and stomps - those are always terrible for trade. Romp and stomps should be punished by riots and rebellion, its a bit tense for anything else.

If trade route was an action, rather than the local ruler being able to simply ban the route / not, would it make more sense for the law holding to affect the DC of the action?

11

Some thoughts on trade:

  1. Empty provinces: There is money to made at trade, you need people for that, but the BR materials are full of this notion of the guilders harming the land through resource extraction. So the guilders must be attracted to these low level provinces to get timber, ores, and other natural resources.

  2. Distance: In trade, two things will drive up the price of the goods I have to sell, rarity and distance transported. These interact. Selling Roesone hill products to a Roesone plains province is nothing like selling items from the Khinasi Island States in the Anuirean Western Coast.

I’ve never liked the idea that you can set up a trade route on adjacent provinces just because they have different terrain types. Making extra money from trade should involve doing something special, not moving cattle a few days to market. The cattle haven’t gained much value for the guilder.

I require trade routes to move at least from region (Western Coast) to region (Heartlands) before they are worth anything. And the amount of value is more a function of distance traveled (1GB per region boundary) that the size of any particular province.

12

… to extend on Ken Gauck’s comment on empty provinces and distance; I always wondered if Nomads in the Rjurik Highlands could not better represent what a few refered to as non guild-dependant traditional trade routes (i guess a nomad regent could have one of Green Knight’s “Trade holdings”.)

In order to bring nomads into a more palatable role I wanted to allow them to establish trade routes that do not need roads (perhaps without guilds), linking similar peoples/terrains; and creating revenu based on distance; Agreed this might end up a recipe for disaster but it would go exactly with the idea that goods can be obtained from empty provinces (think fur trappers) and that bringing goods to/from distant/exotic places creates larger profits.

A long muddy trail in the fresh snow meant that nomads had passed through Hvarliik again this spring. New buckskins pilled up by Dane’s cabin: the cobler had material to last rest of the year; The women of the homesteads had new furs for next year’s winter; and Farmer Laners had two new work horses, strong heavy animals to make-up for his blunt plow. With them the nomads had taken small metal tools, salt, and dried fish, to bring back north where they would spend the summer… until next season then old friend.

13

AT, I do think Law holdings should apply to trade route DC’s. I usually allow all holdings to influence it; medieval through renaissance “temples” (European monasteries and churches) held quite a bit of trade influence as well, since they actually owned and cultivated land and produced a lot of goods.

As for fortifications, I think the explanation in terms of holding out (for just a couple of months) against military forces that fail to take them directly (like assaulting a fortification rather than just besieging it) is simply the running of blockades. They can even smuggle, or just travel from one sheltered spot to another to try to get their goods to market.

Caravan units could mimic ships (units with some basic movement and combat and cargo capacity statistics) in terms of military conflict–you need to actually either defeat the units (capture or destroy) or deter them enough that they willingly decide not to run the route in order to destroy the route. Even then, I suggest that routes could just be suspended, decaying only at a rate of 1 level per season.

I should mention that for me, each level of trade route could actually be a new route to a different province, or it could just be increasing the size of a single route. So a level 4 Trade Route could represent 4 different routes to 4 different provinces, one large level 4 route, or any combination (2 level 1 routes, one level 2 route). The GB income is the same unless you take advantage of some of the boosters (cross-cultural, etc.).

Ken, I agree that distance and scarcity matter most. I included a smaller income for closer routes because I do believe that provinces can trade with nearby provinces–they need not be homogenous in the products they produce or the skills of their services. Income can double if connecting to more diverse locations that also require more risk.

Your rule is a simple one (a virtue in my eyes), but how much do inequities in actual distance come into play with your cross-regional rule? i.e., Ilien to Ghoere is farther (and entails risk because it goes through other realms) than Roesone to Ghoere.

14

I don’t see trade as going from a province to a province, but rather from a trade center to a trade center. More like South Coast goods to Calrie, or Ilien, or City of Anuire, then to Endier, then into the Heartlands (Haes/Lofton, Ghieste, Ruimache). Goods that cross from northern Roesone to southern Ghoere are part of guild holdings, not trade routes.

15

Exactly! Trade center to trade center - in fact, before I used trade holdings I used a system where I had Anuire divided into trade centers, and the value of said trade center was related to the value of those provinces associated with it. Was more complex though,so I abandoned it.

Guilds = local “everyday” trade
Trade = long-distance trade

16

Which is pretty much what the “guild holding” involved in a trade route represents, IMO. A developed trade center - the more developed it is the more it can process.

Guild Holdings (like all holdings) are deliberately “abstract” in what they represent.

17

I often think that one of the big flaws in BR is the lack of law holdings held by temples - the legal power of many churches was quite high in medieval times - and this should be reflected by law holdings under Br mechanics. Personally I’d like to see them with law for political power / legal force, temple for piety and income, source for magic potential, but that all gets a bit dominating.

Agree, my point on occupation forces affecting DC was a start in this direction - the DC modifier could be quite big, especially for very mobile disciplined troops - but it would give guilds a chance to resist long enough for the inevitable rebellion.

One aspect of separating having the route, and running trade in it, is that the occupation only ever suspends the action - I am increasingly thinking that occupation could make ruling or other actions near impossible, but not actually reduce the holding (although occupation followed by contest would be very effective since the occupied territory produces less income and cannot effectively use influence).

Ken
Trade between neighbouring provinces could be seen as simply the standard guild income - as you note if it is easy and quick, the margins are slim. That would then force trade routes to be long distance.

Under a regional trade route system would you suggest:

  1. Maximum of ‘x’ trade routes, based on population, wealth, accessibility?
  2. First come first served for routes in the area or opposed rolls to make routes?
  3. Is there any scope for ‘key’ or ‘rich’ resources?
  4. How are distances measured? Over land, sea, around hostile realms?
  5. How do military blockades and trade barriers work?
  6. Would the route be automatic once founded, or use a system like I suggested of the route gives access, but actions are needed for the cash?
18

Sure. But the purpose of that abstraction should be to save the appearances. We know how trade works, we know some cities, like Florence, Genoa, or Venice are much more important to trade and much richer than Milan, Rome, or Naples. Why? The abstractions neither reflect this reality unless the DM is the only one playing the game and can set and keep the guild holdings in Milan to the point where I can use your explanation. If a PC maxes out the guild holdings of Padua and Verona and already holds Venice, Padua, and Verona isn’t about to produce an income anywhere like Venice.

Turning another city into a Venice or Florence cannot be described by guild holdings alone unless severe limits are imposed on ruling up guilds in the same fashion that people have talked about for population limits on ruling province levels. That seems both heavy handed (since it need not apply to temple or law holdings) and unnecessary, since Venice can be made special by the use of trade holdings.

Instead of regarding guild holdings as the big whatever, I think the critical way to distinguish between Padua and Venice, Pisa and Florence, is to focus on trade routes, not guild holdings. You can be abstract with trade routes too. Florence was a banking center much more than a trade center, but can be represented by trade routes just as well as Venice.

So true. I think that the leading powers anywhere should have the law holdings (or have a hand in them). Some realms -Avanil- are the great powers and should hold most of the law. Other places -Dhoesone- the guilds should hold (and do, but its exceptional) a good part of the law, probably more. Still other places, it should be the temples. Now, where we have theocracies, the materials often say that the temple runs the law. So Talinie and Medoere, fine. The temples seem so strong in Tuornen (and Alamie and Mhoried too) it certainly seems sensible that the temples hold some law, especially when the landed regent holds so little.

The medieval world knew the feudal law of landed powers, the canon law of the Church, and the commercial law of the cities and towns. The lack of temple and guild control of more law holdings seems to be an oversight and a realm focus that I regard as misplaced.

  1. Population and wealth track together, consider how a town’s GP limit climbs as the town grows. So I would use population has a baseline, and special wealth as a modifier.
  2. Opposed rolls
  3. as a modifier if desired, its easy to get too complex here, and the point irdeggman makes as a general principle is well advised. This is really just the wealth modifier mentioned in section 1, and I’d use it sparingly.
  4. The books give us good regions, South Coast, Eastern Marches. As a general rule you draw a route through as few of these regions as possible from the starting region to the ending region. The precise starting and ending points are irrelevant. To some degree the answer is “several” so trade between the Khinasi plains states and the Anuirean South Coast is from Adaba (Aftane), Ariya, Zikala, Turin, and Ber Dairas to Calrie, Ilien, Endier, City of Anuire.

Don’t try and figure out which particular routes are break even and which are the profit centers. Medieval didn’t have the math/accounting techniques to calculate rate of return, only profit not profit. Because of competition and trade barriers, goods in Zikala and Turin may make you a tiny profit compared to the goods from the other cities. The trade is region to region, trade center to trade center, not Ariya to Ilien.
5) Any barrier to trade, whether legal, competitive, cultural, military, or even geographical should be a modifier to the roll to establish or maintain the route.

Consider Storm Holtson attempting trade with the Khinasi Plains States. You have a cultural difference (base -2 to check, but good diplomacy and a knowledge check to -1), fantastic success here might even reduce this to -0 or might help with another part of the check. This is why its so important to describe what the character is doing and not just roll dice. The Straits of Aerele are a zone with Mieres corsairs, and possibly a bit of independent piracy. Give Storm a chance to take a penalty or try and negotiate passage or pay tribute. There is the Seadrake. Unless Storm has purchased a domain wide benefit like good captains or superior ships this penalty is a fixed -2 to the check, if he has the benefit, -1. Perhaps Storm has no contacts, no friends or allies in the Plains States eager to receive his goods, and he certainly has no holdings. -2. Good Diplomacy here must establish a trading partner to reduce or eliminate this penalty. Having a small holding here (say a single level 1 in Zikala) would reduce this to -1. Having decent holdings could eliminate it. Say 4x level 2’s, depends on the circumstances.

If Storm just wakes up one day and wants to try a trade route to the Plains States, the full -8 (or worse if other obstacles exist) is imposed on the check. A fun guilder adventure might start with Storm accompanying the first expedition to alter these circumstances - encounters at Mieres, Binsada, Zikala, Ariya, and Aftane, perhaps a stop in Boeruine, fun on the South Coast, and then extensive diplomacy in skill challenge type situations in each target realm. Depending on results you can keep the -2 culture penalty or reduce it, establish trade relations or not. You have 4 states to consider, so you have the full range to help you set a right penalty. While its possible for Storm to have amazing success and become everyone’s new best friend in the Plains states and eliminate all penalties, its more likely he’ll have some kind of mixed success.

  1. I like your suggestion, but I also think that treating trade routes as holdings works too. As long as you have to attend, pay money, use actions, and keep up the route in the face of competition, I think you have a good system. If you do it once and its a cash cow until the second coming of Azrai, I think something is missing.
19

Oh, the intention was always for it to be possible to utilise an allied holding. That’s part of the point of the system - it encourages guild-only regents to take an active role in diplomacy and politicking, forging connections with regents in other areas. After all, many PC guilders tend to either take over a state or become a “state-approved” guild in some particular realm; it makes a great deal of sense for rulers of other territories to ally with their own local guilders in keeping such overtly biased groups out of their lands… but a suitable agreement can permit trade to pass between the domains without the need for holdings to be created where they’re not wanted. It even opens up the option for a minor guild in a rich trade centre to operate precisely as a forwarding agent, making its money by taking a small cut of various trade routes owned by other regents.

As for a lack of temple law holdings: that’s a complaint I’ve heard before, but one I think that misses part of the nature of the BR setting. There are very, very few “state” faiths - and even some of those that do exist are pantheistic. In medieval Europe, there was at least nominally a single head of a single faith, with a long string of wars fought locally and internationally over Papal claims to the right to affect (and then to dominate) the political affairs of the lords and kings. It’s worth bearing in mind that rulers and local prelates alike often found it worthwhile to oppose those claims and assert their freedom of action. Most attempts by the Papacy to control the actions of distant rulers failed; diplomacy served it far better than the issuing of orders.

In Cerilia as written… there isn’t even a figurehead pontiff, and there are a whole range of rival churches serving any given deity, never mind the more extreme option of a change of deities if one temple becomes too aggressive in its demands for power. Quite appropriately, some temples have not only demanded power but have won it - but it makes sense in the setting for realms like Talinie to be real aberrations, of which most landed regents will be somewhat wary.

There’s also the simple question of game balance - there are four primary character classes in BR’s original conception, and four primary types of holding (or five, if you count the universally-accessible and valuable province). Especially given the clerical access to Agitate as a free action in the base rules, never mind the power granted by realm spells and the potentially critical role of Investiture, I’m yet to see many priest regents find themselves politically weak, let alone irrelevant. A class with the ability to kick off five Agitate actions in a single turn (Free, Lieutenant, and one per action round) has a heck of a weapon in its arsenal even without doing anything supernatural or adventurous.

As it is, temple and guild holdings already enjoy many of the benefits associated with medieval rulers - the acquisition of substantial incomes and the ability to raise troops certainly spring to mind.

Clerical and guild wealth is represented by the income of their holdings - tapped only by those rulers willing to use Law claims (something often further penalised by GMs beyond any PC repercussions that might arise). Law holdings - the ones usually associated by players and DMs with nobles - provide no direct income whatsoever. They’re merely a means of “getting away” with higher taxes, raising troops, or attempting to tap the incomes of temples and guilds. Would it really be appropriate to give priests and guilders even more power than they already hold, when they enjoy many of the benefits of Law-based regents, and have access to unique powers as well?

20

There are lot more than you think.

In Anuire alone:

Theologic rulers include (these are just off the top of my head):

Talanie and Moedore of course.

Known places with state religions include:

Diemede, Avanil, Ilien and Roesone.

All of the Rjurik Highlands are “state faiths” pretty much as are Vosgaard.

The Brecht and Khinasi lands are more diverse.

But there are several provinces ruled by paladins in Anuire and Khinasi (hard to make a real distinction there).

All dwarven realms have one religion (well the non-Azrai influenced ones anyway).