To the best of my knowledge, the only official set of rules for a high-level PC to build a stronghold and manage a domain at high level is the TSR D&D Companion set, reproduced within the D&D Rules Cyclopedia.

Of course, OSR-wise, there's ACKS (fantastic but very hardcore) and there's An Echo, Resounding (easy to plug in but fairly abstract). There may also be others that I don't know of.

However, at least one other edition -- AD&D 1e -- makes specific provisions about high-level characters gaining followers and establishing strongholds.

Since this board has a fair share of AD&D 1e fans, I'd love to hear out (a) whether you've ever actually had a PC build a stronghold and/or claim a domain, and (b) how did you handle it (or if it never happened, how would you handle it). Do you extrapolate from another system, wing it as you go along, or what?

I wrote this thinking of AD&D 1e and AS&SH, but if anyone's had strongholds and domains in another edition without explicit rules for such things, feel free to chime in!

I've never had the right combination of the campaign lasting long enough and PCs surviving to let it happen.

Not in DnD in any form, but in Rolemaster they had a Castles sourcebook, which was really good, which I used.

You could build a castle and domain etc and it had rules for management of it and so on.

Well, I used to DM my older brother and his character built a tower etc.  I've games where it was less tied to level.  Indeed one of my Chivalry and Sorcery third edition characters was the exiled king of a small nation and that at first level.  But more recently I ran a GURPS Bane Storm campaign that centred around intrigues between two barons in Megalos with one of the PCs being the baron.  No realm management rules there though.  GURPS really lacks anything of the sort.  No city stats doesn't cut it I want a campaign supplement to Mass Combat.

I think the Chivalry and Sorcery realm rules are about the gold standard.  Rolemaster's okay but it's very far into the gold pieces per square foot mode of thinking where the real issue is man-power.

OD&D also has such rules.

Quote from: Old Geezer;792966OD&D also has such rules.

Right.

Does it come up in your games, players wanting to build strongholds and control a domain? How do you handle it? How was it handled back in the day?

Quote from: The Butcher;792934To the best of my knowledge, the only official set of rules for a high-level PC to build a stronghold and manage a domain at high level is the TSR D&D Companion set, reproduced within the D&D Rules Cyclopedia.

Of course, OSR-wise, there's ACKS (fantastic but very hardcore) and there's An Echo, Resounding (easy to plug in but fairly abstract). There may also be others that I don't know of.

ACKS literally is BECMI/Rules Cyclopedia with some of the terms/numbers fudged a little. Maybe not the Domains of War combat rules, I don't have that, but in the basic rules the economic stuff is completely cribbed from it, in some cases the tables are nearly verbatim.





(I could do that again and again. Not to sound like a loon, but I get so tired of ACKS being constantly praised when it's literally just a rehash of the rules that already exist)

It hasn't come up, but several players in Gary's and Dave's original games built strongholds as did a few players in my early games.  They cleared land, they spent money, they built castles.

I'm not sure what else you want to know.

Quote from: JeremyR;792983ACKS literally is BECMI/Rules Cyclopedia with some of the terms/numbers fudged a little. Maybe not the Domains of War combat rules, I don't have that, but in the basic rules the economic stuff is completely cribbed from it, in some cases the tables are nearly verbatim.

[snip images]

(I could do that again and again. Not to sound like a loon, but I get so tired of ACKS being constantly praised when it's literally just a rehash of the rules that already exist)

Well that was illuminating.

Now I know that I can put ACKS on the back burner of my wish list now. I might as well focus on the AD&D 2e content already plentiful. Thanks! Saved me  purchase disappointment; I now have more reasonable expectations of ACKS.

It comes up fairly often IMCs. I just use a version of the Mentzer Companion Set rules, with some input from 1e. For my 4e game I've been using the Follower numbers from the Pathfinder version of the 3e Leadership Feat to give initial manor/domain populations, then go from there.

Here is the Wardship of the North, the Player Character domain in my 4e Forgotten Realms campaign:
http://frloudwater.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/north-manor-travys-manor.html

There is some rules stuff at the bottom. One change I make to Mentzer is to have both income & population growth be annual, and population growth is tied to the Dominion Confidence Level. Net Income, Population, and Confidence Level are normally assessed annually in Month 6 - slightly later than IRL, where the tax year ends Month 4/April in both US & UK, but month 6 seems to work best for this campaign. Month 4 makes sense though, as it gives the monarch his money in the bank ahead of raising his troops for campaigning season, traditionally M5-M7.

Here is the most important rules bit adapted from Mentzer:

Dominion Confidence Levels & Annual Growth
450+: Ideal +10%
400-449: Thriving +8%
350-399: Prosperous +6%
300-349: Healthy +4%
270-299: Steady +2%
230-269: Average +0%
200-229: Unsteady +0%
150-199: Defiant -2%
100-149: Rebellious -4%
50-99: Belligerent -6%
0-49: Turbulent -8%

Economy & Taxation
Economically active persons are 40% of total population. Each economically active person produces on average 50gp worth/year GDP, or 100gp/1000sp per household of 5 (2 active, 3 inactive).  This breaks down into 5gp/month per person labouring, with average 10 months of labour each year, and 2 months inactive.
Therefore total annual GDP averages 20gp/person
Up to 1/3 of GDP is taken in taxes:
10% coin - 2gp per person
10% non-coin levies - milled flour, textiles etc
13% in labour - 40 days service per active person

Coin Taxes average 2gp/person
20% to High Lord (0.4gp)
20% to Reeve (0.4gp)
60% to Warden (1.2gp)
Most of the Coin Tax is levied following the harvest, with levy completed by the start of the following year (M1).

In AD&D yes. One of my few Magic Users to make it to such lofty stage did set upon the path of building himself a tower in a region where he had negotiated some very good relations with a local gnoll community.

The tower took forever to build due to hostilities with a neighboring Hobgoblin kingdom. Wed build it up, theyd knock it down. But in time the thing was assembled and building completed. Then the surrounding area was worked on.

This carried over into 2nd ed and became a Spelljammer spaceport.

In BX it was one of my few Fighters to ever make it that far who built a castle and retired.

In Star Frontiers the group wheeled and dealed to purchase and outfit their own decomissioned Battleship

Not very 'rules-y', but relevant: my first 5E group playing the Phandelver adventure took over the ruined manor and is clearing it out and improving it as a fortified base. They intend to take over the area as a kind of rough-and-ready baronial possession. I'm sure I'll think of people and creatures who will eventually challenge their right to do this, but at the moment of the adventure there is actually a pretty big power vacuum in the 10's of miles around that village, so why not?

We did this all the time in AD&D, emulating the text game on the computer, you could come up with some pretty cool situations.

Quote from: Opaopajr;792987Well that was illuminating.

If you consider bullshit illuminating.

I recommend reading or playing the game for yourself rather than letting some random interwebblet make your decisions for you.

ACKS was indeed based on BECMI (correction: B/X) but claiming it's 'literally a copy' is a flat out lie. This isn't the first time Jeremy has tried to spread disinformation about an Autarch product either.

um... totally off topic but... The example tables in that pic say otherwise at least on the tables side. Ive seen one of the other pieces from that and it too looked like a copy-paste from BECMI too. That doesnt say anything particulatly good about the product. And if they are selling it. Then it says nothing good.

Maybee those are isolated instances. But they still dont bode well.