I'm curious, because looking around online I haven't found a SINGLE other source that has gotten very far on the timeline. Most are either in the Uther period or the Anarchy period. They all seem to be on their early sessions.
My own campaign has been going, year by year, till its now at the year 533 (Romance Period). It can't seriously be the longest-running GPC Pendragon campaign, can it??
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My longest running KAP4 campaign ran from about 490 (just before Uther's death), through about 2 years after Arthur disinters Bran's head. I was using Boy King, however, not GPC, since GPC was still some 10 years from publication. :)
That one ended because
(1) the players prevented Arthur from disinterring Bran's head
(2) the players had prevented Mordred from being a total rat-bastard fuckhead
(3) the players put Mordred on the throne
(4) One of the players successfully wooed Guenivere, and married her.
But I've not run KAP in 2 years or so.
So what the fuck happened to Arthur?
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Madness when Excalibur refused to cut the man who stopped him.
Based upon some arthurian bit I'd then recently read, I'd decided Excalibur was a +5, ignores armor, but won't harm a man being unjustly punished for a just act.
So Sir Coelric Stays Arthur's hand from opening the grave. I decide to check on Arthur's passions and traits for how Artur reacts. Loyalty (Vassals): Nat 20. So arthur is decidedly NOT acting in loyalty to his vassals.... then Arthur rolls a nat-20 on his merciful... then crits the vengeful, Rolls to inspire on vengeful, crits, and takes a swing at Coelric. The sword cleaves into his chain... and bounces off his neck. Arthur runs off screaming about treachery by the table round... by nightfall, Arthur is dead, and the table knights, Sir Coelric amongst them, bear him back to Guenevere.
This just made me want to run Pendragon...=(
I don't think I presently have the right set of players for it right now, though.
Kind of insane. For starters, I don't see how anyone other than pagans could have even imagined that digging up bran's head was a bad thing. Second, anyone trying to intervene to STOP arthur would have had to have had a damn low Loyalty:Pendragon, and for that kind of disobedience would have lost a shitload of honor (treason).
And why would the rest of the Round Table knights there present have done nothing?
Beyond which, Mordred at that time was a nonentity, he wasn't even a knight yet, and no one knew he was Arthur's son. The King of Malahaut was on the verge of rebellion, and Galeholt was at full power. I think that Logres would have broken up at Arthur's death, with civil wars all over again. The angles would have become a major power, saxon invasions would have started again, the King of Malahaut would have taken the north. Galeholt might have taken wales, and King Mark would have stayed strong in Cornwall. Later, maybe Loholt or Borre might have shown up and made claims to Arthur's throne (though without Arthur around it would have been tough for them to support their claims).
I just don't see a nice clean resolution coming from the situation you describe.
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Quote from: RPGPundit;309273Kind of insane. For starters, I don't see how anyone other than pagans could have even imagined that digging up bran's head was a bad thing. Second, anyone trying to intervene to STOP arthur would have had to have had a damn low Loyalty:Pendragon, and for that kind of disobedience would have lost a shitload of honor (treason).
And why would the rest of the Round Table knights there present have done nothing?
Beyond which, Mordred at that time was a nonentity, he wasn't even a knight yet, and no one knew he was Arthur's son. The King of Malahaut was on the verge of rebellion, and Galeholt was at full power. I think that Logres would have broken up at Arthur's death, with civil wars all over again. The angles would have become a major power, saxon invasions would have started again, the King of Malahaut would have taken the north. Galeholt might have taken wales, and King Mark would have stayed strong in Cornwall. Later, maybe Loholt or Borre might have shown up and made claims to Arthur's throne (though without Arthur around it would have been tough for them to support their claims).
I just don't see a nice clean resolution coming from the situation you describe.
RPGPundit
(1) the PC knights in question are mostly pagans
(2) King Mark of Cornwall was indebted to them. Deeply. Several ransoms owed. And them not collecting. He'd sworn to Arthur the year before, due to PC influences, in exchange for his freedom. (they'd captured him.)
(3) In order to act at all to prevent it, a bunch of rolls on traits must succeed
(4) the disinterrment marks the end of a phase, and it's AFTER the unification; as long as bran's head is interred, the dragons can not attack England. Arthur doing so is essentially arthur's pride running way the hell over the top. Pretty much ONLY the devout christians should
not have a problem with Arthur disinterring Bran's head, and thus inviting the dragons to come for a fight.
All my PC's were well over 25,000 glory; the low PC was about 26K, the peak was about 40K. I'd have to check to be certain, but ISTR it was about
Ok, fair enough. Suffice it to say, in my campaign none of the knight PCs did anything about the disinterrment, not even Jong's ultra-pagan character. They know its not their place to question the king, much less oppose him.
RPGPundit
My players had been present for arthur's drawing the sword. They were Crown Vassals, bannerets of the King. They also had talked down to many Pennaths, and one was Guenevere's brother (by random roll...).
They were, shall we say, powerful members of the court by that time, and used to seeing power as something to be manipulated, and Arthur as a tool. (In several senses of the term...). All too often, THEIR tool, to be weilded against their enemies.
The problem with long running pendragon games is that PC's can become incredibly powerful.
Quote from: RPGPundit;309228I'm curious, because looking around online I haven't found a SINGLE other source that has gotten very far on the timeline. Most are either in the Uther period or the Anarchy period. They all seem to be on their early sessions.
My own campaign has been going, year by year, till its now at the year 533 (Romance Period). It can't seriously be the longest-running GPC Pendragon campaign, can it??
I've read some awesome campaign reports on Greg Stafford's Pendragon mail list. (http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/King_Arthur_Pendragon/)
Our campaign got as far as the Anarchy and floundered. To be fair, this was mainly due to party chemistry issues, but it was exacerbated by the fact that the GM wanted the campaign to be a bit more sandboxy during the Anarchy period, but at the same time didn't want to make it so sandboxy that we had the potential of derailing the timeline, which is a tricky balance to hit.
Quote from: aramis;309304My players had been present for arthur's drawing the sword. They were Crown Vassals, bannerets of the King. They also had talked down to many Pennaths, and one was Guenevere's brother (by random roll...).
They were, shall we say, powerful members of the court by that time, and used to seeing power as something to be manipulated, and Arthur as a tool. (In several senses of the term...). All too often, THEIR tool, to be weilded against their enemies.
The problem with long running pendragon games is that PC's can become incredibly powerful.
Unless they're nobility (ie. Barons, Counts, Earls or Dukes) it doesn't matter who the fuck they are, they're just minor courtiers.
I think you had failed to consider the strict social hierarchy that exists in the medieval world.
In my campaign, in fact, it was something important I pushed on the players; they had (naturally) forgot it during the Anarchy period when there was basically no higher nobility running the show. When Arthur came along, a lot of the players were still acting like he was Countess Helen, trying to jump in, giving him advice, etc. and being positively insufferable to the nobles. When one of my players dared to mock a Duke (the player was absolutely RIGHT, and the Duke absolutely, wrong, BTW, but when you're a vassal knight and he's a motherfucking
Duke of The Realm, that doesn't matter), it cost him his character's life.
Never mind what might happen to anyone who acted that way to Arthur himself.
RPGPundit
Quote from: Warthur;309336Our campaign got as far as the Anarchy and floundered. To be fair, this was mainly due to party chemistry issues, but it was exacerbated by the fact that the GM wanted the campaign to be a bit more sandboxy during the Anarchy period, but at the same time didn't want to make it so sandboxy that we had the potential of derailing the timeline, which is a tricky balance to hit.
Hmm. Yes. I told my players outright: "This is the story of Pendragon. In this game, you will have less ability to radically alter the future of the big things". They understood that from the start certain things are pre-ordained, and don't seem to worry too much about that.
After all, the PCs are knights, they're not nobles or the King.
RPGPundit
by definition, crown vassals are essentially barons, even when only bannerettes. Direct access to the crown, as direct vassals. One PC was a baron, but not a member of the Table.
Characters old enough that aging mattered. Yes, I'm WELL aware of the strict social structure. But when you've held a king for ransom several times, certain rules break.
I suppose its possible. I also would imagine that the characters should have ended up reviled throughout England and have had anyone with a "Loyalty(Pendragon)" above 15 trying to kill them from then on. They should not have gotten to live very long after dethroning the rightful king.
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