Morien

Then he should go and conquer Constantinople. Thing is, as BoS already makes clear, the last hurrah of the (Western) Romans was with Majorian around 460. It also makes Arthur's refusal to accept Theodoric as his superior ring more true, in a sense that he is the true heir of Rome, via his great-grandfather, Emperor Maximianus (Magnus Maximus). But to each their own.

Heh. See the link in my response to Username.

See above. In the linked thread, I was originally thinking that the Franks had already submitted to Theodoric before he sent his emissaries to Arthur, but then I decided it would be more fun to have them as Arthur's allies and hence explain why he has to go to war with them again in a decade. If he had stomped all over Frankia, why not liberate Ganis while at it? GPC makes it seem like the Franks/French are defeated easily and actually switching sides in the end, so it should be easy to carve Frankia up. This way, I can save all that for 530s and 540s, depending on what is going on in the campaign. Speaking of Frankia: http://kapresources.wpengine.com/Pendragon Forum Archive/index.php/t-2613.html (EDIT: With BoS out, de Ganis ARE Visigoths, but more of a Visigoth + Roman mix. I might actually end up keeping the Battle of Vouille to kick Toulouse Visigoths out at the historical time, but let Ganis hang on for another decade. This might also serve to explain some of the split between Ganis and Visigothic Hispania. Not that it matters in our campaign anymore, since we are past it.) As you can see, since I opted to make the Franks ally with Arthur, their kingdoms stay more stable. However, when Theudebert inherits Reims, his uncles try to oust him from power. Theudebert has been bitten by the chivalry bug during his stay with Arthur in the Roman War, and it is this event rather than an invasion of Normandy that kicks off the French War in our campaign. At least, that is the plan for now.

Exactly why I decided to push it back. Besides, it fitted into the politics better in our campaign this way. The PKs did some scouting in Brittany and Frankia to find out if there was a WRE (Ostrogothic) invasion army already across the channel and found out that Arthur wasn't the only King getting demands for tribute. Hearing that Arthur wasn't going to submit to Theodoric, the Franks decided to join in with Arthur.

You probably have already seen this, but still: http://kapresources.wpengine.com/Pendragon Forum Archive/index.php/t-2612.html We are actually just in the middle of the Roman War in our GPC playthrough (second group for me). I had Theodoric the Great wanting to revive the WRE, rather than Emperor Lucius. The Franks actually sided with Arthur, as Theodoric sent assistance to the Burgundians for them to fight the Franks off and demanded the Franks to submit to his rule, too. This keeps the Ganis situation under wraps for now since the Franks are important allies to Arthur and Lancelot is just at the start of his meteoric rise. I intend to use the Ganis-French War later.

Thanks for all the responses so far, guys! If I could trouble you with a follow-up, what passions & directed traits and on what values did the grandfathers and fathers pick up?

Slightly off-topic, but just to give a bit more visibility to "Dragons of Britain", a fanzine of all things Arthurian that had 4 issues, including an article from the now Line Editor (not yet then), David Larkins: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/121452/The-Dragons-of-Britain-1?filters=0_0_44536_0_0 Available for free from Drivethrurpg.com.

Some of which are wrong. GPC does say that Ellen is 29... in 496! So she should be only 18 in 485, which means that there is no way she has a 14-yr old daughter. Instead, The Marriage of Count Roderick says that Jenna is born in 484, so she would just be 1 in 485. I don't think Sir Amig's age is explicitly said anywhere. He is called 'an older man', so he might be pushing late 50s already (55 being the cut-off for an old knight in Your Family section). But I wouldn't have a bit issue with him being still in his late 40s. Uther's and Madoc's birth years were changed in BoU, since having Uther father Madoc at the tender age of 6 was a bit too much. Uther is born 436, making him already 49 by 485, because, you know, his father Constantin was already 6 years dead in 446 (Uther's earliest birth year if he was 'almost 40' in 485). Madoc is born 459, so he is mere 26 in 485 (and suitably 21 in 480, by design). You could add a birth year and that way, you could calculate the age directly from it and the current year, making age tracking much easier. Thanks for sharing!

The white rectangle artifacts in France and Ireland on the map. Scroll up to see the picture.

Since we have had some new campaigns and GMs come around, I am replying to this thread to try and solicit some more responses from people who may have used the Book of Sires to do their PKs' family backgrounds.

Just a quick reminder, you really want to use the -10 modifier next year, since it is less likely that she would become pregnant again straight off. But with CON 21, not that uncommon. Looks like you are having plenty of fun!

HRB. Historia Regnum Britanniae. See Atgxtg's earlier comments in this thread. Seriously, though... If you are not already familiar with Monmouth's the History of the Kings of Britain (the English name of HRB), I would strongly urge you to stick to GPC instead. Trust me, it is a monster of a campaign lengthwise to play through by itself, and it is much less work for a new GM. Not only that, anecdotal evidence suggests that some groups run out of steam by Anarchy and never even get to Arthur. That is 25 years from 485 start year and you are suggesting to add 45 years of lead time to it. If your group and yourself are very excited about the prequel idea, good for you, but know what you are getting yourself into. 🙂 (This by the way comes from a guy who thought adapting the 3000+ year history of Gondor into a KAP campaign would be a good idea. I severely underestimated the prep work needed and managed to burn myself out in a year, barely getting to the end of the Second Age. Ok, so I still think that it is a great idea but I have a much better understanding about how much work it is, what works and what doesn't. Also, Tolkien was a master of broad brush strokes of history, but it requires a lot of more colouring between the lines to make it into a campaign. At least BoS gives you a general year by year account!)

Uh... where was that? Do you mean that if you try to get inspired with a particular Passion and FAIL in the roll, then the Passion goes down by one? I admit that I am not terribly happy with that rule, either, since it punishes the low Passions and puts them into a death spiral: once you fail, you are even more likely to fail again. Low Passions are already discouraged by the Disheartened result, which is severe enough penalty to make the Players very hesitant to roll them. So I would actually be in favor for not using that -1 for a failed passion roll. Instead, I would just lower the passion when the PK goes against the passion, such as leaving his liege in danger in order to help a fellow PK, for instance (Loyalty Group winning over Loyalty Lord).

If that works for your group, great. I have 6 players in my current campaign, and we average around 3-4 sessions per game year. The previous one took 5, but we had a 2-session adventure followed by spring court and two big battles and some events in between. The downside of this that it does slow down the generational play down, and means that the whole campaign will take forever, but I figure as long as we are enjoying the campaign, no worries. I urge you to be very careful about insta-raises on anything. One of the most broken mechanisms in the game is the automatic increase by one when you roll a critical in a passion. Once the passion gets high enough, criticals become increasingly more common and it skyrockets. This is a lesser problem if you are in low skills, but then again, those increase easily enough with regular experience rolls anyway. That being said, I am in favor of reducing Traits & Passions 16+ when the player insists on going against them. As for the checks, my rule of thumb is that if I, the GM, ask you to roll something, whether a skill or a trait, and you get anything else than a failure, you are going to get a check (in trait fumble, on the opposite trait, obviously). There are some cases when this is not true, such as if you are fighting with practice weapons. Also, if, for instance, I am asking Awareness rolls to spot an ambush, I would generally only give a check to the one who rolled best, i.e. who spots the ambush first. But I try to be generous with checks. Sometimes I give checks out even if the skill is not explicitly rolled, such as Battle checks since you were part of an actual Battle, or Horsemanship since you were riding to and fro through the year, spending long hours in saddle continuously, or Faerie Lore check for interacting with Faerie creatures/people. I also tend to ask the players to identify a skill or two at the beginning of the Winter Phase, which they feel ought to get a check or where they would get a check. I also usually give out one player-determined trait or passion check, too, although I will veto it if it goes counter to the PKs behavior during the year. In general, I aim for a few trait and passion checks and ten or a dozen skill checks per year. Given the 4-sessions-per-year scheme, I usually don't have to give out so many checks at the end of the year, but if we'd have just one session per year, I would likely be even more generous, especially on skills that seldom get used.

Hi! Welcome to the forum. I'll echo Tizun Thane in wishing you luck; it is quite the tall order to start from AD 439, especially for a new GM. Of course the system stays the same regardless when you start, but you'll have to do a lot more in the way of NPCs and adventures. On the other hand, I have said since the beginning that Book of Sires really comes to its own as a 'prequel GPC': you basically have all the major events happening in the game world from Aquitaine to Cumbria, and a bit beyond (Western Roman Empire and Hispania, in particular) for 439 - mid 460s, and then the rest for Cumbria to 485 and Logres up to 509 (overlapping with GPC). The only 'problem' is that these are the major events, so to play it as a campaign, the GM has to fill in the blanks, and in particular, give the PKs something personal to do rather than just run from one big battle to another big battle. There are some events in there that would work nicely as a PK-centric adventures, depending where they are from. I am being a bit coy as to not spoil things for the players. Another thing is that the society is somewhat different in pre-Aurelius times: the tribe is the main unit, not the feudal liege-vassal relationship, which comes later. Of course, in your own campaign, you are free to ignore that, but I would consider replacing Loyalty (Lord) with Loyalty (Tribe) for the Cymri and with Loyalty (City) for the Romans. Also, the landownership is more likely actual ownership (by the family kingroup), rather than a grant from a liege, due to the above reasoning. If you have Savage Mountains, I'd use that tribal model pretty much for the whole of Britain, although keeping in mind that the heavy cavalry knights wouldn't exist yet (see below). The 'knight' could be the brogerix, in this context, although keep in mind that the Logres tribes and the ancient Cambrian tribes are much bigger than the individual, small 'hill tribes' mentioned in Savage Mountains. Heavy cavalry charge with lances doesn't become a thing (in Britain) until Aurelius, too. I would actually encourage to even limit the starting armor to 8-point chainmail tunic for the most part, and horses to just rouncies to begin with. The knights would just use their horses to ride to the battlefield and maybe to chase routing enemy, but they'd be more likely to fight on foot as elite infantry to stiffen the common foot soldiers, and act like leaders and champions to duel the enemy's elite. Again, Your Pendragon Will Vary, so feel free to ignore everything above. I am just pointing out some things that would make the campaign really feel different from the vanilla KAP, even at Uther's time. Anything you feel like adding, @Atgxtg?

Something I forgot to comment on the Discord, Lando... I would double-check with the GM if he meant that the family history starts from 439, rather than that the campaign itself starts from 439. Because it feels a bit odd that he would tell you to use Book of Sires since it doesn't cover the pre-439 events in detail. Of course, it is possible that the GM doesn't own BoS himself, and just assumed, but then it would be even more odd that he would start the campaign in 439, since then it is even more lifting for the GM to do.

Beyond the scope of the book. Cornouailles (following Greg's spelling, up to David if that gets changed in later editions) is not established as its own kingdom/dukedom until later. Knights Adventurous says: "Duke Hoel is King Mark's man, and is in charge of the recent emigrants to this underpopulated land." Given that KA (and 4th edition that followed) start in 531, this could very well mean 'within a generation', even after the Battle of Terrabil. It is a question to be nailed down when Brittany timeline is detailed more closely. HRB says this: "For Hoel was sister's son unto Arthur, born unto Dubric, King of the Armorican Britons." I suspect that we will not be following HRB in this case, since we are pretty much all out of (half-)sisters. Malory mentions "thy cousin Sir Howell", which, when stretching the cousin definition to include more distant cousins, would be easier to do tracing back to Aldronius and Constantin. It would be a bit more difficult to do it via Ygraine, given the background Ygraine was given in BoS... But given that we have Cador of Cornwall in GPC as a kinsman of Arthur via Ygraine, doing the loop via Ygraine to Hoel would not be that far of a stretch. Like a brother or sister or even a cousin who marries into either Brittany family or within Cornwall, and the son, Hoel, is then appointed as the Duke of Cornouailles. We'll see.

I expect it is an omission error too. I am sure David will chime in soon enough with an authorial answer.

Just talking about our own campaign... I have not seen this issue, and we do not use Cloning (i.e. the son inherits the father's stats, traits and passions), although we still have FC (even though I am thinking of removing it, too). Especially when the FC is something 'useless' like Dancing, the players seldom put any points into it to make it really stand out. It is more of the family history and inheritance that define the generational play for us. Just like your reference to equipment being passed down from father to son, carrying the stories of past heroics with them. Sometimes the son actively rebels against the father's influence. Not only is this good RP fodder, but also gives the player a chance to play a different personality & 'role'. For instance, one player's old character just got retired a few sessions ago due to Aging, and the old PK was an Old Testament fire & brimstone type borderline fanatic Christian. The son is much more mellow & Worldly, and funnily enough, much closer to achieving the peace & love type of Christian Virtues than dear old dad ("slay the men, enslave the women") ever was.

Yep, that would work. Makes it a bit more fun for the PK to arrange his son to squire to a specific knight. Do you want your son to be a courtier? Make sure he is squiring for a courtier, and so forth.

So the difference is this (simplified): Demesne manor (after the one that the PK occupies himself): 10% discretionary funds to the holder, 10% to the Standard of Living of the owner, 1 household knight, 2+1 foot soldiers. Enfeoffed manor: 1 vassal knight, 2+1 foot soldiers. The vassal knight pockets the discretionary funds and Standard of Living increase himself. So if you have 4 extra demesne manors (averaging £10 each), you will get £4 extra to spend per year, +£4 to your Standard of Living (and since the first manor you have as a vassal knight gives you £6, this should boost you to £10 = Rich Knight), and 4 household knights and 8+4 foot soldiers. If those were enfeoffed manors only, you would only get the army part, and those mainly for the muster, too. Household knights are with you 24/7 if you want them to, although for balance and simplicity, you might wish to have them defending home or doing vassal service (since you now owe 5 knights' worth) while you are out adventuring with your pals, the other PKs. Not necessarily. The household knights are not always family members; for instance it might be better to spread the family out a bit, as for instance it is usually much better to be in service of a higher lord. Chances of getting an officership or an heiress are much better if you are serving in the ranks of a Duke's or a King's household than your brother/cousin/uncle of a couple of manors. Also, it fosters relationships with the Lord, even if he is another minor knight lord rather than a higher ranked one. Your family ought to be there for you anyway, but now you have this additional Liege to look after you. Same thing also goes the other way: by taking an unrelated household knight into your service, you are fostering a good relationship with his family, too. Finally, it is possible that many of the original household knights may have died in battle, especially if Elaine's father did. Protect your lord to the last and all that jazz. In which case, it is very possible that Roderick has appointed some other knights for the household knight positions, and might suggest strongly that the PK swears them in when the PK takes over. But if it is part of your plot that Elaine's household knights are all her cousins and uncles, sure, why not. Do note that they are expected to swear homage to the PK who marries Elaine, and even if their Loyalty scores might be low, betraying your liege is one of the worst things to do. Of course, during Anarchy, everything goes. He wouldn't. Roderick is supposed to bring X knights to the muster. If he is keeping some manors empty, then he has to hire mercenaries to make up for that lack. Granted, the King doesn't always call for the maximum number of knights from all of his lords, but as indicated above, Roderick would probably been swearing in some household knights to fill any vacant slots. Even if the PK risks upsetting his liege lord by ignoring Roderick's advice (bad move!), there is probably enough of a natural dying-off in battles (& discreationary funds) that Roderick can easily reabsorb the excess household knights.

No. If the lands were the late husband's, Elaine would be entitled to 1/3rd as the widow's portion (for the rest of her life), but the other lands would go to the HUSBAND'S heirs, not to her. Spouses do not inherit! The heirs are the husband's legitimate children (eldest son first), whether or not by Elaine*, and if there are no children, then to siblings (eldest brother first). Whether uncles or cousins would be entitled depends. I'd say no, since otherwise it will be next to impossible for lands to escheat back to the liege, but obviously in your plot line the uncle at least needs to be able to inherit. * Now if there would be children of Elaine and the husband who inherit the late husband, then Elaine might continue as a steward, but again, in patriarchal KAP society both the widow and the children would become wards of the liege, and he would be the one to decree where they will live. The only way that Elaine has all those 4 demesne manors and can give them to her second husband & the children they'd have together is: 1) Elaine is the heiress of those 4 manors. I.e. they were her father's, and now they are hers, since the grant from the liege is inheritable. Since she is not a knight, her husband would swear fealty or homage to Roderick for those manors, "by the right of his wife", and then be responsible for bringing 4 knights and 8 foot soldiers from those manors when the Earl calls for his army to gather. 2) Elaine cannot have surviving children from the first marriage, since in this case, the eldest (son) of her surviving children (i.e. from the first marriage) would inherit over the younger children of the second marriage.Going with primogeniture, if she has only daughters from the 1st marriage, then any son born from the 2nd marriage would skip to the front of the inheritance order, but you wanted to avoid this. Also, you might be interested in this archived thread where Greg has revised the heiresses (sorry that the quote boxes are missing, making it a bit harder to see who says what): http://kapresources.wpengine.com/Pendragon Forum Archive/index.php/t-2091.html

That is because you have changed the rules of inheritance in your game from the default. Women who are not knights are still able to inherit land in KAP if there are no brothers. The only issue is that if the women are not knights, their lands are overseen by their guardian (usually the liege) or by their knight husband if they are married.

See II.1, II.3 and II.11 in the thread below:

OK, then I can see why Roderick would not want them to go to Blains if Elaine gets disinherited. However, if he can disinherit Elaine, then he can disinherit Blains, too. Even without going back all the way to Blains. If a knight loses his lands due to his crimes, his younger brother can complain that the lands should come to him, but I don't think the liege is beholden to do that: the grant was to the knight and he broke the deal, hence the grant is null and void.