Running a scene of conflicting duties

[NeilNjae]

How would you run a scene where a player knight is torn between duty to two lords? What Traits or Passions would you call for alongside player choice in what to do?

The situation: Great Pendragon Campaign, Uther period. Sir Albert (PC) was a household knight of Lord Roderick of Salisbury; his father's still a vassal knight there. Albert's just got married to the daughter of Sir Charles, a banneret knight who's vassal to Lord Blaines of Levcomagus. Albert has moved into one of Charles's manors.

Sir Jaradan, vassal knight of Lord Roderick, decides to go raiding into Levcomagus lands. He picks another manor of Sir Charles's manors (because Sir Jaradan is a troll). Sir Albert, the PC, hears about the raid and is first on scene to defend it.

Sir Albert has both Homage (Salisbury) and Fealty (Charles) passions. He also has a lot of options on what to do next. (Attack Jaradan, persuade Jaradan to leave, look the other way, get paid to look the other way, ride off to get more help, watch and wait until more help arrives, join in the looting, etc.)

If you were GMing this scene, what Trait or Passion rolls would you call for? When would you call for these rolls, depending on what the player wants Sir Albert to do? (Assume Albert has no Famous Traits or Passions.) Would you start with some rolls to guide the scene, or wait for the player to decided then ask for rolls to see if the character can follow through?

Thanks!

Edited 17 hours ago by NeilNjae
Clarity

[Morien]

29 minutes ago, NeilNjae said:

How would you run a scene where a player knight is torn between duty to two lords? What Traits or Passions would you call for alongside player choice in what to do?

The situation: Great Pendragon Campaign, Uther period. Sir Albert (PC) is a household knight of Lord Roderick of Salisbury. He's just got married to the daughter of Sir Charles, banneret knight who's vassal to Lord Blaines of Levcomagus. Albert has moved into one of Charles's manors.

My main issue here is that it would never happen in my campaign. 🙂

You say the PK "moved into one of Charles' manors". Why? Is he now a vassal knight of Charles? If so, I cannot see him continuing as a household knight of Count Roderick, since being a household knight is 24/7 job. He cannot serve two masters, so this issue should not arise. He would have to get released from service in Salisbury before swearing Homage to Charles for the manor. 

Did he just move in to shack up with the wifey? Then there would not be any fealty, but also, this is hampering his household knight duties. Roderick could allow it, but why?

Now, if he were a landed knight both in Salisbury and in Levcomagus, I could see this situation happening. In that case, since Sir Jaradan is acting by himself, the PK has no passions towards him, but has a passion towards the liege whose lands Jaradan is raiding. Fealty [Charles] impels him to kick Jaradan's butt, or at least to convince Jaradan to leave. Now if it were a raid led by the Count Roderick himself, things would get dicey. By feudal custom, Homage should win. However, if Fealty (or Love Wife) is famous and the Homage is not, I could see it going the other way...

[NeilNjae]

I mis-spoke, sorry. Albert was a household knight of Roderick; Albert's father is a vassal knight of Roderick and Albert will inherit that manor when his father dies. In the meantime, Albert has taken up a manor in the neighbouring county so has left Roderick's immediate service. 

But as for the detail of how to run the scene in question. Would you allow Albert's player free choice in what Albert does? Would you require any Trait or Passion rolls to before Albert chooses, perhaps restricting the choices Albert's player can make? (This is a separate question from "What would a good knight be expected to do?": maybe this is when we discover that Albert isn't a good knight.)

If Albert decides to attack Jaradan, Albert can be inspired by his Fealty (Charles) passion. That's fine. Maybe he needs to pass Valorous or Battle to persuade some of his farmers-with-pitchfork followers to join in. 

 

[ArkSvid]

First thing that needs to be cleared up is that if Albert has left Roderick's service then he should no longer have the Homage (Salisbury) passion. Homage indicates the primary lord they're serving, which in this case sounds like it would be Charles.

Regardless of the homage, Sir Albert would be free to choose what he wants to do. Even if he did still serve Salisbury, he doesn't owe any loyalty to Sir Jaradan. Like Morien said, if Roderick himself was leading the raid then an obligation to Salisbury would complicate things, but Jaradan's seems to be acting on his own. Albert technically isn't even obligated to defend the manor; as a landed knight he only owes one season of military service to Sir Charles. Although since Albert already ran off to defend the manor it would reflect poorly on him if he decided to change his mind and do nothing while the village was raided in front of his eyes, even if he technically wasn't obligated to. Some sarcastic comments at court asking why he bothered showing up if he wasn't going to help, Sir Charles snubbing him in some minor way.

For running the scene I'd suggest not letting him be inspired by his loyalty to Charles. Firstly because you don't want to set the precedent that players can be inspired by loyalty any time they act on behalf of their lord or they'll spend the game perpetually inspired. Secondly because defending a random manor his lord owns shouldn't be enough to drive him into an emotion fueled frenzy (or worst case scenario, failing to defend one random manor shouldn't drive Sir Albert to madness). Save being impassioned by loyalty to your lord for instances where the lord's life/honor/family are in danger, where it makes more dramatic sense for such an emotional response.

[Morien]

1 hour ago, ArkSvid said:

First thing that needs to be cleared up is that if Albert has left Roderick's service then he should no longer have the Homage (Salisbury) passion. Homage indicates the primary lord they're serving, which in this case sounds like it would be Charles.

Exactly. Albert should have Homage [Charles] and that is it. 

1 hour ago, ArkSvid said:

Albert technically isn't even obligated to defend the manor; as a landed knight he only owes one season of military service to Sir Charles.

I'd push back a bit on this. The 40-day obligation is for going off to war. But if your liege's lands are under attack, you are supposed to come and help (to the best of your ability, of course). Willful failure to do so would definitely cost Honor and Homage in my campaign. 

Edited 9 hours ago by Morien