Banestorm and gaining a fief?

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by thom

Thanks Bill, that's how I was leaning. But the bolded part of your quote has me thinking. Do you subtract the Duty from the total cost of the Feudal Rank and Social Status when awarding the fief, to figure out how many points to add to his character sheet?

Well, that's kind of the reverse of how I look at it, but yes, that's the correct result. If accepting the fief means accepting the Duty, then you put the Duty on the character sheet, along with the Feudal Rank and Social Status (and likely enough the Wealth and Independent Income—he does get rents from the fief, doesn't he?). And the character point value is whatever it is after you make those changes. Character points don't restrict the GM's power to create a narrative.

Bill Stoddard

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Lamech

That's the whole reason for "Blind -0". They shouldn't also have their allies nerfed because they got stabbed in the eye. Nor when they go to the party mage and say "give me new eyes" should they need to pay 50 points, yet if their friend started with "blind -50" does the same he absolutely should.

If restoration of sight is commonly available in the setting, then blindness is a temporary condition, and is not worth any points. It's as if the character had suffered crippling injury, but had made the HT roll, indicating that the injury was not permanent. It's just that in this case the treatment is the casting of a spell, rather than something a doctor would do. In that setting Blindness would not even be available as a disadvantage—unless, perhaps, the character had some rare form that magic couldn't help.

Setting aside magical cures (or ultra-tech eyeball regeneration—or prosthetic eyes, which I suppose would be a Mitigator), having one's eyes put out would lower one's value as a character. The character sheet should change. Two characters who have the same traits should have the same character sheet.

As to the Ally problem, the fix I would probably use would be to say that the Ally's traits had not changed because the PC was blind; the Ally would be worth the same number of points. That would now be a higher percentage of the PC's value, and so their base cost as an Ally would go up, and so would their final cost. The PC would now have a higher-value Ally, and would be worth that many more points—and would get the points free.

Bill Stoddard

[cosmicfish]

Originally Posted by thom

OK, so in Banestorm page 45, we have:

A noble title almost always has a fiefdom attached to it...Many fiefdoms, however, are not accompanied by titles, being held by untitled knights (and many knights have no fiefdoms at all). The lowest-ranking title is Baron (Status 4), the holder of a single significant fief.

Soooo...does this seems to imply/allow for GMs to give fiefs to PCs who are only Status 2 or Status 3 and are knights (for example, they have Feudal Rank 1+, since I'm using those ruled from SE)?

Most of this thread has focused on the mechanics, but I just wanted to note that Yrth has landed knights and unlanded knights - so yes, the GM can give a fief to a PC of status 2 or 3, although I believe that Landed Knight has Status 3 in most or all of Yrth so it may involve a Status bump.

I think that, per Banestorm, only Kings can create nobles but any lord can create knights, even landed ones - you are just giving them authority over some of your own fief, under your own royal oath and responsibility.

[thom]

Originally Posted by cosmicfish

I think that, per Banestorm, only Kings can create nobles but any lord can create knights, even landed ones - you are just giving them authority over some of your own fief, under your own royal oath and responsibility.

Well Phil et al, threaded the needle pretty carefully on this. Banestorm page 45 sez:

In exchange for his fief, a noble must swear fealty to the monarch, and a landed knight must swear fealty to a lord. The vassal or liege man swears to do the bidding of his lord and to support him militarily. In return, the lord grants the vassal land, a title, or both, and swears to protect him and maintain him in his honors and station.

I'm choosing to interpret the first "noble" reference to mean "an untitled knight" who gains an "untitled fief" from the crown(assuming that "untitled" fiefs belong to the crown, by default). And the "landed knight" is all the other cases...

And yes, Bill, I figure the PC will have rents from his fief, and that's the next thorny knot for me to tackle! ;)

[Lamech]

Originally Posted by combatmedic

Just so that we are clear: I was answering a question about a fief awarded in play. This has nothing at all to do with vampires.
:)

I think my eyes glazed of the "it,".

[combatmedic]

Originally Posted by Lamech

I think my eyes glazed of the "it,".

Fair enough.

I just wanted to clarify my intent in case my earlier post had seemed murky.

[hal]

If you want to find alternatives for describing manors for use in your campaign, I would suggest the following:

PENDRAGON: BOOK OF THE MANOR

COLUMBIAGAMES: HARN MANOR (Also available as a physical product from Columbia Games)

EXPEDITIOUS RETREAT: A Magical Medieval Society: Western Europe, Second Edition

Note: I've never been happy with the GURPS rules for describing the incomes available to landed knights or what goes into the makeup of a manor as far as people, obligations between the Knight and his serfs, as well as the various price lists for goods in a medieval campaign. As a consequence, I would recommend HARN MANOR in conjunction with the HARNWORLD guides for incomes and various goods. If you sift out the obvious D&D material in A MAGICAL MEDIEVAL SOCIETY: WESTERN EUROPE - it has some good guidelines for setting up manors. Heck, it even has some good material for building a kingdom from scratch using only the population of the land, plus some input from the GM - something that is definitely useful for use with GURPS BANESTORM, as it would fill in how many greater nobles there should be, how many lesser nobles there should be, and how many knights there should be overall.

THE BOOK OF MANOR is also useful, but not one that I favor - however, it is relatively less complex than the other two systems and might be your cup of tea.

[hal]

While I'm thinking about it, you may want to give COLUMBIA GAMES a good hard look at a few more products that you might find useful for running a BANESTORM medieval kingdom with:

Innkeepers - helps exlain the behind the scenes stuff for innkeepers

Households - does for ordinary households, what HARN MANOR does for manors.

Real Estate - helps describe the costs of real estate for medieval towns and cities.

Keep in mind, these are all PDF's - but I have found that these rules can be adapted easily enough for use with GURPS.