SOLO scenarios in Winter Phase

[Luca Cherstich]

I like the "Solo" parts in Winter Phase, since it gives some depth + some clues about what has been happening during the rest of the year, without considering the opportunity for a few skill checks.

However, I found this part also a bit lacking in the core rules, and even conflicting with other books.

 

I would keep "Lost in the Woods", "At the crossroads", Lover' Solo (KAP 5.2 p.231-233) for special years/moments, since I was looking for something more repeatable through the years.

I guess that "Vassal Service" (KAP 5.2 p.231) is what applies to most knights, although in the long run, it may be boring.

 

I was checking  "Your Own Land" (KA P5.5. p.230) but, since I use Book of Estate even for basic £10 manors, I found the following problems:

- The "Income" which seems to conflict with Estate model (where manor economy is more stable)

- Step 4 (the "argument") I was considering that maybe this is not happening in the new model, since disputes should be put in front of the Hundred Court...which seems unlikely to be lead by a simple £10 Vassal Knight.

 

I've also checked this homebrew, unofficial table, but only God knows how it is supposed to work!

https://gspendragon.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/pendragoneventssummerwinter1.pdf

 

Any other suggestion?

Any thought?

 

Edited March 10, 2020 by Luca Cherstich

[Tizun Thane]

In my game, I use Lost in the woods when PK lost themselves in the woods. Very useful.
"At the crossroads" can be used in the tournaments period, or with a special request from a lady, but yeah, not usable every year.

I use vassal service, or "your own land" only when the player wasn't there at the session as a quick catch up. It works well.

27 minutes ago, Luca Cherstich said:

since disputes should be put in front of the Hundred Court...

I simply ignore the Hundred Court. I never understood why there were so many pages devoted to a juridical system useless in game.

Justice is the best part of "your own lands", often hilarious, and it would be a shame not to use it. BUT, if you want to use the hundred court, one of your players could be appointed by the count to judge a few cases.

[Username]

30 minutes ago, Tizun Thane said:

I simply ignore the Hundred Court. I never understood why there were so many pages devoted to a juridical system useless in game.

Justice is the best part of "your own lands", often hilarious, and it would be a shame not to use it. BUT, if you want to use the hundred court, one of your players could be appointed by the count to judge a few cases

I totally do the same and it's great. The disputes and arguments are hilarious and give great chances for trait checks even in battle heavy years. I usually try to run a solo adventure for every player every year usually just a hunt, falconry or justice event. Maybe an opportunity at romance.

[Atgxtg]

 

 

2 hours ago, Luca Cherstich said:

Any other suggestion?

First I'd suggest giving knights checks in all the skills in a solo rather than just one. THis is how it used to work in previous edtions and I think it makes more sense. A knight who for some reason doesn't get to go on a advance will get a couple of skill checks in stead on one, and a knight who does adventure will find that many of the checks overlap.

Since you like the solos you could create some more. I could see an "At Your Lord's Court" solo or  a Reglion solo to give player knights more options. Maybe even a "Knight Errant" solo for knights who decide to ride around looking for adventure. 

 

"At the crossroads" is quite repatable once the whole practicle of knights jousting at the crossroads pops up.

 

But keep in mind that a lot of these solos take place in the summer and might not be "available " to a knight who spends a good part of the summer on an adventure or on campaign.

 

2 hours ago, Luca Cherstich said:

Any thought?

The solos in the books came from 3rd edition , which is why the economic model doesn't fit.

I  believe, commons did still put disputes in front on the knight of the manor. The economic model does including running the knight's court. I think the hundred court is more for disputes between manors. 

 

Khanwulf and I had also considered doing up a "Deck of Solos" which in theory could allow someone to generate a mini quest using a deck on standard playing cards. We didn't get all that far with it, but the basic framework might be useful. Mostly the suit determined the type/nature of the adventure (hears would be romance or other passion, diamonds land and wealth, spares warfare and combat, etc) while the opposing value was determined by the values on the cards- usually two cards, but sometimes one or three depending on way the solo was constructed. The idea only go so far, in part because we were undecided on which way to go with it. One idea had little quarter or half  page adventures determined by the cards, and another let the player construct his own quest based upon certain guidelines. Also, were were deciding between multiple tests with difficulty difficulties or using something like the battle intensity to track the overall progress on the quest. 

 

 

[Luca Cherstich]

1 hour ago, Atgxtg said:

I  believe, commons did still put disputes in front on the knight of the manor. The economic model does including running the knight's court. I think the hundred court is more for disputes between manors. 

My doubt started since Book of Estate says:

"It meets every three or four weeks and handles most local business dealings, such as authorizing a peasant transfer of animals or land, and local justice like brawling, petty theft, boundary disputes, and whose cow is whose."

 

These sound like the kind of things which happen in the "Your own land" solo scenario...but the problem is that most £10 manors should be much smaller than a hundred, so I'm still doubtful whether a Vassal Knight can or cannot judge on these things.

 

1 hour ago, Atgxtg said:

Khanwulf and I had also considered doing up a "Deck of Solos" which in theory could allow someone to generate a mini quest using a deck on standard playing cards. We didn't get all that far with it, but the basic framework might be useful. Mostly the suit determined the type/nature of the adventure (hears would be romance or other passion, diamonds land and wealth, spares warfare and combat, etc) while the opposing value was determined by the values on the cards- usually two cards, but sometimes one or three depending on way the solo was constructed. The idea only go so far, in part because we were undecided on which way to go with it. One idea had little quarter or half  page adventures determined by the cards, and another let the player construct his own quest based upon certain guidelines. Also, were were deciding between multiple tests with difficulty difficulties or using something like the battle intensity to track the overall progress on the quest. 

This sounds like an awesome idea!

Edited March 10, 2020 by Luca Cherstich

[Baba]

We are three players rotating GM responsibilities. In any given year, we only give a solo to the gm’s character.

 

We are usually a bit short on time, and we like to do all play at the table, so we have made our own list of shorter solos. We roll a d20 and pick one at random. It involves a short descrption, 0-1 choices, 1-3 tests and give some checks and possible story consequences. Ideally going through it and discussing it should take no more than five minutes.

 

I would post it here, but sadly it’s in norwegian.

[Luca Cherstich]

5 minutes ago, Baba said:

We are three players rotating GM responsibilities. In any given year, we only give a solo to the gm’s character.

 

We are usually a bit short on time, and we like to do all play at the table, so we have made our own list of shorter solos. We roll a d20 and pick one at random. It involves a short descrption, 0-1 choices, 1-3 tests and give some checks and possible story consequences. Ideally going through it and discussing it should take no more than five minutes.

 

I would post it here, but sadly it’s in norwegian.

Post it if you can!

Maybe some Google Translate can help....

Edited March 10, 2020 by Luca Cherstich

[Baba]

Sure! Here it is.

Ignore table c, we only used it during the anarchy.

 

Read «check melee» as «check your relevant weapon skill».

3 Årlig Solo.docx

Edited March 10, 2020 by Baba

[Luca Cherstich]

Baba, your tables are great!

That's maybe what I was looking for! The translator in Word is not too bad (I paste here what I've got).

It just needs a couple of language problems to be fixed, but I can understand and enjoy most of this document.

Thanks!

 

BABA SOLO Homebrew Pendragon TRANSLATED from NORWEGIAN.docx

[Atgxtg]

1 hour ago, Luca Cherstich said:

My doubt started since Book of Estate says:

"It meets every three or four weeks and handles most local business dealings, such as authorizing a peasant transfer of animals or land, and local justice like brawling, petty theft, boundary disputes, and whose cow is whose."

 

These sound like the kind of things which happen in the "Your own land" solo scenario...but the problem is that most £10 manors should be much smaller than a hundred, so I'm still doubtful whether a Vassal Knight can or cannot judge on these things.

It doesn't to me. Generally peasant  (actually serf) transfer was between manors and thus between differernt knights. Also, while many town and cities did have magistrates and such people could always appeal to a higher court, such as the local knight. 

1 hour ago, Luca Cherstich said:

 

This sounds like an awesome idea!

Yes it is and awesome idea. At least I though so when we came up with it.  A pity is isn't a finished one. Like I posted above there were a few different ways to go with it, and it was hard to decide on which one was the best one, not to mention putting the time and effort in to polish it off.  The detailed mini-quests were nice and gave a good feel to what was going on, but the more free form, draw and assign cards method was much more flexible and let the players craft their own story within certain parameters, as well as decide between an easy adventure or a more difficult (and more glorious) one. 

One aspect of the flexible version that I like was that Joker cards represented Merlin or the Lady of the Lake showing up, helping the night at one stage, and then sending the knight on a sidequest. Sometimes this was very helpful and lead to extra glory. Other times it was annoying and made things more difficult.

I can check through the old emails to see where we left it. I think it got put aside when I had to work on the Battle of Charlons.

[Luca Cherstich]

@Atgxtg anything like that would be awesome to have!

[Luca Cherstich]

56 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

It doesn't to me. Generally peasant  (actually serf) transfer was between manors and thus between differernt knights. Also, while many town and cities did have magistrates and such people could always appeal to a higher court, such as the local knight. 

OK, even admitting that interpretation, the "Your Own Land" solo still has the "Income" part which crashes with the Estate system (which is supposed to be more stable economy).

Maybe I'll use the Your Own Land solo but ignoring the Income part.

[fulk]

There would be Manorial Courts, not just the Hundred Court.  Those would cover the Your Own Land bit for vassal knights. 

[Atgxtg]

3 hours ago, Luca Cherstich said:

OK, even admitting that interpretation, the "Your Own Land" solo still has the "Income" part which crashes with the Estate system (which is supposed to be more stable economy).

Maybe I'll use the Your Own Land solo but ignoring the Income part.

THat's what I'd suggest. Keep in mind that the income part of "Your Own Land" was written back for 3rd edition, and was a step up from the way it had been handled in KAP1. If you use Estate then you don't need "Income" section anymore.

[Morien]

26 minutes ago, Atgxtg said:

If you use Estate then you don't need "Income" section anymore.

Yep. See Book of the Estate, p. 3, for example: "If bad weather or incompetent stewardship results in a revenue shortage, the lord simply takes it out of the peasants’ share."

 

[fulk]

Part of the point of BoE was to not have to do a lot of economics. 

That said, Warlord and Estates are supposed to be Early Phase.  Perhaps one day we'll do some sort of later phase supplement.  At one point, Greg had thought about doing a Book of Economics or something like that, which would have detailed changes through time like introduction of the heavy plow/plough, 3 field rotation, increasing $$ required to be a knight, etc. 

[Baba]

5 hours ago, Luca Cherstich said:

That's maybe what I was looking for! The translator in Word is not too bad (I paste here what I've got).

The autotranslate turned out surprisingly well!

I accidentaly uploaded an older version, though.

This newer one is mostly the same, but the rewards are better (we felt the old one was a bit stingy).

 

 

3 Årlig Solo fra 543.docx

[Luca Cherstich]

@Baba Thanks a lot!

And I attach here the new auto-translate result.

There are still a few things which I do not understand (possibly because they are the product of automatic translation).

For example:

• the Critical result of the first line says: "You can choose to turn for a roll of the dice next year, with +5 on the terningslaget. "
• the Critical of line no.12 of Tabe A which says "+2 on beiler throw in winter."

I do not understand these few things....but the document is 95% or more OK!

Very useful, thanks!

Improved BABA SOLO Homebrew Pendragon TRANSLATED from NORWEGIAN.docx

Edited March 11, 2020 by Luca Cherstich

[Tizun Thane]

I really like the tables too! Very usable, thank you!

[BioKeith]

Reposting the translated version with the English cleaned up a bit.

Also - I edited some of the results to make more sense for my campaign.

Solos.docx

[Atgxtg]

17 hours ago, fulk said:

Part of the point of BoE was to not have to do a lot of economics. 

That said, Warlord and Estates are supposed to be Early Phase.  Perhaps one day we'll do some sort of later phase supplement.  At one point, Greg had thought about doing a Book of Economics or something like that, which would have detailed changes through time like introduction of the heavy plow/plough, 3 field rotation, increasing $$ required to be a knight, etc. 

I was thinking about that, and the reality of it seems to be that while the prices went up the relative value didn't change much. RPGs are used to plate costing more, as in most RPGs plate and mail coexist, but in reality the cost to produce plate dropped to less than mail with the introduction of the blast furnace and the ability to press metal. I'm starting to suspect that while the overall prices might have gone up it was mostly the same. Much like how a $1.50 can of a softdrink is the same as the $0.25 can of the same softdrink 30-40 years ago.

[Baba]

5 hours ago, Luca Cherstich said:

@Baba Thanks a lot!

And I attach here the new auto-translate result.

There are still a few things which I do not understand (possibly because they are the product of automatic translation).

For example:

• the Critical result of the first line says: "You can choose to turn for a roll of the dice next year, with +5 on the terningslaget. "
• the Critical of line no.12 of Tabe A which says "+2 on beiler throw in winter."

I do not understand these few things....but the document is 95% or more OK!

Very useful, thanks!

Improved BABA SOLO Homebrew Pendragon TRANSLATED from NORWEGIAN.docx 40.2 kB · 4 downloads

The first one means you get one reroll next year, and a +5 modifier to that reroll.

The second one is a reference to a house rule - it means it will be easier to marry a high status wife this winter.

[fulk]

2 hours ago, Atgxtg said:

I was thinking about that, and the reality of it seems to be that while the prices went up the relative value didn't change much. RPGs are used to plate costing more, as in most RPGs plate and mail coexist, but in reality the cost to produce plate dropped to less than mail with the introduction of the blast furnace and the ability to press metal. I'm starting to suspect that while the overall prices might have gone up it was mostly the same. Much like how a $1.50 can of a softdrink is the same as the $0.25 can of the same softdrink 30-40 years ago.

I think in the end, Greg (we) decided it was too much of a pain and not really what the game was about. Cost does seem to have gone up.  You can see the absolute values of income to "qualify" for knighthood go up historically, but I'm not clear on whether the relative cost really went up.  Certainly, the cost of plate dropped over time. Horses varied a lot, but were often in the range of the annual income for a knight for the better animals.

NT

[Atgxtg]

52 minutes ago, fulk said:

I think in the end, Greg (we) decided it was too much of a pain and not really what the game was about. Cost does seem to have gone up.  You can see the absolute values of income to "qualify" for knighthood go up historically, but I'm not clear on whether the relative cost really went up.  Certainly, the cost of plate dropped over time. Horses varied a lot, but were often in the range of the annual income for a knight for the better animals.

NT

Yeah, it isn't really the focus of the game. From what I recall though, it was something of a zero sum game. There is a website I used to try and research some prices and it appeared that while things went up, pretty much everything went up at about the same rate, except for labor- which shot up after the Black Death.

I could see a case for keeping all the prices the same in the game and just upping the default gear as you go along. That is, a mail hauberk (10 point) would be the standard armor for the stand price at the stat of the game, be replaced by reinforced mail (12 point) during the Conquest Period, for the same price, and eventually become Plate (16), with older armors losing their value over time as better armor becomes available.

[DrPendragon]

On 3/10/2020 at 1:08 PM, Luca Cherstich said:

 

 

I've also checked this homebrew, unofficial table, but only God knows how it is supposed to work!

https://gspendragon.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/pendragoneventssummerwinter1.pdf

 

 

 

All credits for that table to Spoonist, I just put them on my website at his request.

** Yearly Events (Page 1) [= events, not solos]

Roll D20 for upperleft table page 1 and based upon that roll go to the table mentioned (each table is also number for ease of use).

Roll again on that table. Some tables require multiple rolls (together in double lined border, eg table 38 consists of 5 tables of which each requires a roll).

** Summer Solo (Page 2)

Roll D20 for upperleft table page 2 and based upon that roll go to the table mentioned (each table is also number for ease of use).

Some rolls indicate modifier on dice roll directly below title line.

Roll again on that table.

If no Dicetype roll (eg Roll 1D6) is indicated but instead skills/traits/passions are indicated between square brackets (Eg [aware],[Hunting],[Recognize], roll those and count how many succeeded. Look then in table what the result is for that many success. (eg Table 11 (page2), roll [aware],[Hunting],[Recognize] and if two of those were a success/crit, then you should roll on the Fight Table (table 19))