Black Sheep Of the Royal Family

[DemiBenson]

I have a player who wants to play the black sheep of the royal family.
I’m unsure how to properly stat up the meta-trait to represent everything the player wants

• Some starting wealth and status (I’m forcing this on her, as anyone in line for the throne would need a minimum status and wealth)
• Independent Income (as a small royal allowance)
• Combinations of Duty/Patron/Enemy to represent the various court/royal factions that sometimes remember she exists
• Various mental/social disads that only occur when forced to use anything beyond the II wealth, to represent the familial obligations and/or court machinations she has to deal with

The only one I’m having trouble with is the last one - how do I allow limited or conditional access to something like wealth?
Pact might work.
Temporary Disadvantage might work, although that’s iffy because it’s for non-constant advantages.

Thoughts?

[Icelander]

The Wealth and Independent Income are the private assets and income they have without complications.

Patron and Duty together would cover complications. Patrons can give you resources, access to real estate, etc.

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Patron and Duty together would cover complications. Patrons can give you resources, access to real estate, etc.

It looks like what DemiBenson wants is Duty. If you have a Duty, this gives you access to the resources you need to accomplish that Duty. Being a guard with a Duty, for instance, gives you access to the places you guard and the right to carry the equipment that guards use. In this case, having a Duty to handle court machinations and familial obligations means the character has access to the family wealth to accomplish these things.

A Patron, on the other hand, is someone who helps you in your own endeavors. If the character has access to the family wealth or resources to accomplish her own goals, that's Patron. It doesn't sound like this is what she wants.

[thrash]

Originally Posted by DemiBenson

Some starting wealth and status (I’m forcing this on her, as anyone in line for the throne would need a minimum status and wealth)

Is a "black sheep" necessarily in line for the throne? Historically, there were plenty of reasons for members of the royal family to be excluded from the succession -- bastardy and being female being two prominent examples.

Would removing her from the succession while keeping her technically in the royal family reduce the minimum status and wealth you require to the point they are no longer a problem?

If you want to keep her in the succession as a plot point, there are also historical examples where the rules were changed after the fact when something went wrong (legitimate successors all died out, mostly, although sometimes also when the legitimate successor happened to be the head of a foreign nation).

[whswhs]

Would Social Stigma (Disowned) be relevant?

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

It looks like what DemiBenson wants is Duty. If you have a Duty, this gives you access to the resources you need to accomplish that Duty. Being a guard with a Duty, for instance, gives you access to the places you guard and the right to carry the equipment that guards use. In this case, having a Duty to handle court machinations and familial obligations means the character has access to the family wealth to accomplish these things.

A Patron, on the other hand, is someone who helps you in your own endeavors. If the character has access to the family wealth or resources to accomplish her own goals, that's Patron. It doesn't sound like this is what she wants.

I think we want both. Having a distant father who is that wealthy is a big deal, even if they don't have the power to start a war (which they might have). I'd use a low frequency of appearance to reflect that the black sheep's requests are often pushed to the side.

[DemiBenson]

Originally Posted by thrash

Is a "black sheep" necessarily in line for the throne? Historically, there were plenty of reasons for members of the royal family to be excluded from the succession -- bastardy and being female being two prominent examples.

Originally Posted by whswhs

Would Social Stigma (Disowned) be relevant?

The PC is distantly in line for the throne, like 17th. That’s a point the player wants, and I think it will be interesting. So, not disowned or anything similar; she’s just an annoyance who doesn’t like to deal with the royal court (she prefers being an academic), and they mostly reciprocate.

Originally Posted by ericthered

I think we want both. Having a distant father who is that wealthy is a big deal, even if they don't have the power to start a war (which they might have). I'd use a low frequency of appearance to reflect that the black sheep's requests are often pushed to the side.

The way the player proposed is to have Duty (Royal household), Enemy (Court factions), and Patron (Royal household) all with the same frequency and when it comes up, I get to decide which one/many of them comes up.
I’m still mulling that over. But so far I’m thinking:

• Duty/Enemy can come up randomly, in which case they just happen
• If the PC requests aid of the Patron, then a Duty or Enemy action either happens, or has a higher chance of triggering

[Polkageist]

Originally Posted by DemiBenson

I have a player who wants to play the black sheep of the royal family.
I’m unsure how to properly stat up the meta-trait to represent everything the player wants

• Some starting wealth and status (I’m forcing this on her, as anyone in line for the throne would need a minimum status and wealth)
• Independent Income (as a small royal allowance)
• Combinations of Duty/Patron/Enemy to represent the various court/royal factions that sometimes remember she exists
• Various mental/social disads that only occur when forced to use anything beyond the II wealth, to represent the familial obligations and/or court machinations she has to deal with

The only one I’m having trouble with is the last one - how do I allow limited or conditional access to something like wealth?
Pact might work.
Temporary Disadvantage might work, although that’s iffy because it’s for non-constant advantages.

Thoughts?

I think it depends on how that access is granted. Clearly the black sheep already has access to some level of resource without any issue, but that's probably only a small slice of what's truly possible if she wasn't being restricted from the family coffers.

At the very simplest the character can go to their relations and ask. This is the game of Mother-May-I? with the GM, but not terribly unreasonable in this case because it's RP'ing out the player's backstory mediated by the GM and needs of the plot. The wealth becomes a story hook and just another tool in the toolbox.

Patron advantage gives more agency to the player on the resources they can access. The catch is that you as the GM have to respect when the player calls on the patron and if available provide some kind of support. There's definitely wiggle room in terms of the patron helping out in other ways other than just writing a check, but it's amusing have the PC go to Aunt Royal and ask for money and get the reliable response of "yes dear, please spend it wisely". Limiting access is as easy as having the frequency dialed down (as mentioned above), reducing the power level (they're just that low on the ladder now), or looking at some of the limitations. "Minimal Intervention" might be a good one, it calls for a reaction roll which would read as the PC's ability to sweet-talk the family into helping out, and it states that the Patron provides "what they think the PC needs, not necessarily what they want" which fits in with a patronizing royal family that has their own ideas and agendas.

Ally is also in this space if you want it to be just one person and their Ally point build would simply splurge on wealth, status, and other accoutrements.

Duty is more of a one way street(ish), I'm not sure that it necessarily implies that you're also given the resources to carry out your duty. The responsibility for getting the resources necessary are yours and while you can call up the rich family members and ask them for help that's back in the realm of GM fiat rather than the defined access that something like Patron or Ally provides. Still, it's probably a good idea to facilitate executing the duty unless there's a good/fun reason not to.

I wouldn't worry about disadvantages only occurring in certain circumstances, that's very common throughout the disad collection. Greed only manifests when money's involved, Bloodlust only if there's a fight, and so on. So if they have Duty, but you only want it to come into play when she's trying to access wealth, well that's the parameters of the disadvantage. Don't want to mess with Duty, don't dip into the royal cashbox.

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by Polkageist

Duty is more of a one way street(ish), I'm not sure that it necessarily implies that you're also given the resources to carry out your duty.

I don't mean that. If you're a medieval landowner with a Duty to fight for your king, you have to provide your own weapons and armor. But if you're a Solar Patrolman with a Duty to the Patrol, you don't have to provide your own atomic gun and spaceship: the Patrol assigns them to you, and you have a right to use them for Patrol work. Whether you get anything, and exactly what you get if you get something, depends on the Duty.

So if DemiBenson's player's character is called upon to, say, settle a feud between two nobles, she might accomplish this by paying off one or both of them out of the family's treasury, with the family's agreement. Or she might host negotiations on the family property as neutral ground under circumstances she can control. She wouldn't have access to these things if she weren't acting under her Duty. And if she can't use the treasury or the property for her own goals, Patron doesn't apply.

[Donny Brook]

I'm not sure how far down the line of succession you want to go, but certainly when you're past 40th there are many who have no formal Social Status higher than 1.

QV:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Succes..._of_succession