New for KAP: The Book of Sires

[MOB]

New for the King Arthur Pendragon rpg - THE BOOK OF SIRES.

Honor thy forefathers …The Book of Sires radically expands the Family History system first presented in the King Arthur Pendragon core rulebook to encompass knights from any of the nine realms: from Auitaine to Cornwall to Cumbria, and many points in between!

Available in PDF from Chaosium: http://bit.ly/2W8NMra
Available in PDF and Hardcover from DTRPG: http://bit.ly/2FH9zRD

[Khanwulf]

My Paypal account grows warm in anticipation!

Horray!

[Luca Cherstich]

This is such a great book!
Just one question: in the old Nocturnal forums there was a section for reporting possible errata ... .what about this forum?

Edited January 24, 2019 by Luca Cherstich

[Scotty]

44 minutes ago, Luca Cherstich said:

This is such a great book!
Just one question: in the old Nocturnal forums there was a section for reporting possible errata ... .what about this forum?

Yes post here for now.

 

[Username]

First, I have to say that I'm excited to see this released. Bought a copy today and it was great. I did notice two things though on the Errata front. The Irish and Cornish sections from chapter 2, Stories of People, are messed up. The Cornish section ends its description early and the Irish section starts with an Irish paragraph then duplicates the Cornish section but has the ending. (P. 27) The other thing was minor, but the decision asterisk markers and comments were missing in a few places, I think, I know the 443 one in the Midlands of Logres was missing. (P. 189)

[Hzark10]

pdf or pod? Just curious whether it is in both.

[Luca Cherstich]

On 1/24/2019 at 1:27 PM, Scotty said:

Yes post here for now.

 

Page 11. Table 1.5.

The "Tribe: Durotriges" of "Homeland: Dorsette" are said to have the following Culture/Religion: R/RC (Roman/Roman Christian).

 

Isn't that wrong? 

Shouldn't that be "C/BC" (Cymric/ British Christina) like the Atrebates of Silchester (same table) who also have a Roman city in their land??

[creativehum]

Deleted

Edited January 30, 2019 by creativehum
I completely misunderstood a previous post and have deleted this response

[Morien]

5 hours ago, Luca Cherstich said:

Page 11. Table 1.5.

The "Tribe: Durotriges" of "Homeland: Dorsette" are said to have the following Culture/Religion: R/RC (Roman/Roman Christian).

 

Isn't that wrong? 

Shouldn't that be "C/BC" (Cymric/ British Christina) like the Atrebates of Silchester (same table) who also have a Roman city in their land??

No. Durotriges are so Romanized that they count as 'Roman'*.

Book of Knights & Ladies, p. 22:

Dorchester (City) [Dorset, Logres], Roman/Roman Chr.

Dorset [Logres], Roman/Roman Chr.

 

* Roman in KAP doesn't mean ethnic Roman, but like it say, Culture: Roman. So the vast majority of the Romans living in Britain are Romanized Britons who retain the more urbanized Roman culture.

[Atgxtg]

26 minutes ago, Morien said:

No. Durotriges are so Romanized that they count as 'Roman'*.

* Roman in KAP doesn't mean ethnic Roman, but like it say, Culture: Roman. So the vast majority of the Romans living in Britain are Romanized Britons who retain the more urbanized Roman culture.

Yes, but they are almost exclusively limited to city dwellers. Dorset and Broadlands appear to be the only places in Britain where the country knights are considered Roman. 

[Luca Cherstich]

I know what "Romanization" is, and the whole academic problems linked with use/misuse of such a word, as well as the concepts of culture/ethnics...etc.... (I earn a living with that kind of things...)...

But KAP is not real history/archaeology and, considering what we have known of Roman Knights/Equites thus far in KAP,  it sounded so odd to me to have country knights defined as Romans since most of the Roman Equites seem to have loyalties to Cities rather than to feudal lords, and therefore I suspected that they had more urban ways of life...

 

But never minds!

As far this is a conscious choice and not an error!

I've noticed that we have also Roman of Caerwent who are Icenii by tribe (Sire page 9, Table 1.3).

I like complexity and variability among the KAP knights!

 

But to have ROMAN knights from countryside I see mechanical problem: the Loyalty (city) passion which they all should have according to BoKaL page 48.

And in particular:

• If I build a "countryside Roman" from Dorset using the BoKaL rules....why should he have a Loyalty (city) passion and not a Loyalty (lord) passion?
• Do we have any clarification about the relationship between the old Roman Loyalty-City and the new Homage passions of Estate/Warlord/Uther books? As far as I remember it was never made explicit.

This is something which is very odd for me...

But again, I have no problems for the Book of Sires to mention coutryside Roman(ized) knights: we just need a note somewhere explicitly telling what their Loyalty passion should be.

[Morien]

I agree with you, Luca.

It took me a moment to see that for some obscure reason, in BotK&L the starting passions are different by Culture, which is odd. It should be by Homeland, surely. A Roman knight born and raised in Salisbury, a vassal knight to Count Roderick, would not have Loyalty to some city but to his Lord. And definitely not to some distant Emperor who basically told the Britons to 'look after your own defenses' in 410. Which lead to 5 years of civil war, anarchy and pillaging by the barbarian invaders, until they finally got their act together, summoned Constantin to be the new High King, and proceeded to kick the invaders out. Surely that experience would have soured the Romano-Britons (AKA Romans in KAP) to the do-nothing emperor, especially since by 480, there is no legitimate Western Emperor! Odoacer deposed him in 476.

So yeah, I think BotK&L got this one wrong.

 

I can see Loyalty (City) if the 'City' is the liege equivalent in this relationship. I.e. whichever magistrate is in charge in this year, can summon the equites of the City to fight. But definitely not the Emperor.

 

EDIT: To add a bit to that... I wouldn't have a problem with a Roman Knight, even if his primary residence is in the countryside (e.g. Dorsette), to still have Loyalty (City) (e.g. Dorchester); just because he lives in his villa/manor doesn't mean that he has cut himself off from the City, and he might still be a 'citizen' of that City as well. But if he has another liege lord, he should have Homage (Liege Lord), too.

Edited January 30, 2019 by Morien

[creativehum]

A glance through the tables in BoKL suggests that Homeland determines Cultures are available for a knight from that Homeland.

In the case of Salisbury, the only Culture available is Cymric.

Thus...

37 minutes ago, Morien said:

A Roman knight born and raised in Salisbury

... is not a Roman knight. He was born and raised in Salisbury. He is Cymric... and can only be Cymric.

(If I've read the tables incorrectly, I apologize.)

[Hzark10]

The idea of BoK&L partly was to expand the type of knight one could play. Originally, you were Cymric and Christian or Pagan. Then along came a newer version where British Christian and other lands became available.  Then even more as BoK&L was published.  YPMV has long been the rule, but think about how much has changed since the game was first introduced and how many more stereotypes have come about.

Personally, I don't think there would be a problem with a knight from Dorsette feeling he is Roman, but having Loyalty (Liege Lord) instead of Loyalty (Emperor).  But then, I might very well be in the minority.  I followed BoK&L for the cultures and Greg never thought to counter my thoughts in this regard.

[creativehum]

For what it is worth, I think it is Cultures that should determine Traits and Passions. 

But, again, in BoKL Homelands determine the Cultures that are available. So it is connected.

[SDLeary]

4 hours ago, Morien said:

So yeah, I think BotK&L got this one wrong.

 

I don't have the book nearby. Are you sure we are talking about British Romans, and not Continental Romans?

EDIT: Never mind, I somehow remembered "Italians" as Romans.

SDLeary

Edited January 30, 2019 by SDLeary
Fixing Oopsie

[Username]

It was the PDF from Chaosium. To Chaosium, I took a screenshot and can send it if it would be helpful. On the errata, will it be an updated PDF or just a release of fixes? I'd personally prefer an updated PDF.

[MOB]

On 1/24/2019 at 10:42 PM, Luca Cherstich said:

This is such a great book!
Just one question: in the old Nocturnal forums there was a section for reporting possible errata ... .what about this forum?

Please post any typos/errors spotted in The Book of Sires in this thread:  

https://basicroleplaying.org/topic/8938-book-of-sires-errors-thread/

 

[Morien]

8 hours ago, creativehum said:

A glance through the tables in BoKL suggests that Homeland determines Cultures are available for a knight from that Homeland.

In the case of Salisbury, the only Culture available is Cymric.

Thus...

... is not a Roman knight. He was born and raised in Salisbury. He is Cymric... and can only be Cymric.

(If I've read the tables incorrectly, I apologize.)

Nope. You inherit your Culture from your parents, see p. 50 of BoK&L. Ha, that same Mixed Marriages box actually gives the answer:

"Naturally, the Traits will be for whatever religion he is raised into, and the Passions will be from the place he grows up in."

The Statistics bonuses depend on the parents, and since that is the primary thing the Culture label is for... Anyway, looks like we have the answer. A Roman-heritage PK in Salisbury would get +1 DEX and +2 APP (Roman stat boni, from memory) and use the Cymric Passions on p. 48. A Cymric-heritage PK in Dorsette would get +3 CON and use Roman Passions on p.48. (Mind you, I still think having Loyalty (Emperor) is silly since there is no Emperor in Rome in 480. This is actually treasonous once you get to the 520s and the Roman War, although past the Roman War, you could claim that Arthur is the lawful Emperor. Easier to just ditch it.)

(As a shameless plug for Book of Sires, the above (characters of different culture and even religion ending up in a new homeland) can very easily happen in Book of Sires.)

(Also, as Greg was fond of saying, Your Pendragon Will Vary. I always took those Culture / Religion descriptions more as guidelines, what the dominant Culture & Religion was. The PKs are individuals, and surely there is room for a Pagan PK even if the region doesn't list that. Admittedly, though, the book itself phrases this more sternly, but I am going to go with the authorial intent here. Besides, forcing the player to play a random Culture/Religion combination is usually not a good thing, in my experience. I have had a couple of players who have stated flat out that they will not play Christians, for example, and I seem to recall similar anecdotes from other GMs, Greg included.)

Edited January 31, 2019 by Morien

[creativehum]

I found your post very confusing... but as long as you're satisfied... great.

In the post of yours I responded to you said you found it odd that a Roman Knight raised in Salisbury could have Roman Passions. I said that wouldn't be the case, he would have Cymric Passions... because if you grow in Salisbury, per the tables in the book, you would grow up in a Cymric culture and have Cymric Passions. The rules you just referenced back this up. Are we disagreeing, or agreeing? Are you repeating what I said in the previous post? I honestly can't tell.

Finally, King Arthur Pendragon is not history, nor is its primary source, Le Morte D'Arthur. The reason there is an Roman emperor is because that's what the story says.

[SDLeary]

2 hours ago, Morien said:

(Mind you, I still think having Loyalty (Emperor) is silly since there is no Emperor in Rome in 480.

Not in Rome itself, Odoacer was <air quotes>"Governor"</air quotes> on behalf of Zeno. So Loyalty would probably be to Zeno, or who ever they heard the last Emperor was. Could be fun to have some merchants come in and burst a PC's bubble telling them the Emperor was gone.

SDLeary

[Atgxtg]

Just about every Roman general who lead Britian was considered to have declared himself Emperor in the HRB and similar sources. Magnus Maximus/Macen Wledig in particular. And King Constatin was a direct descendant of Magnus, indeed that was part of Arthur's justification for claiming the title of Emperor of Rome later on.

It appears that Romanized Britons probably consider the line of Magnus to be the rightful Emperors of Rome, and are Loyalty to them. Constatin, Aurelius, Uther and Arthur do seem to have pretty strong support  from the Roman areas of Britain.  So I think Loyalty (Emperor) is practically the same as Loyalty (Pendragon) but from a Roman viewpoint.

It probably is silly, and also probably a bit of Roman snobbery. They are loyal not just to some King of an outlying province, but to the Emperor of Rome itself! That the Emperor hasn't actually ruled over Britain since 410, and that the Roman Empire doesn't really exist (in the West) anymore are technicalities in their eyes.   

[creativehum]

Hey guys,

i just read a book that pointed out King Arthur never existed and there was no tournament jousting in 5th century Britain.

i'm re-working the game now to take all that stuff out.

I'll post my notes as soon as I'm done.

[Morien]

9 hours ago, creativehum said:

I found your post very confusing... but as long as you're satisfied... great.

In the post of yours I responded to you said you found it odd that a Roman Knight raised in Salisbury could have Roman Passions. I said that wouldn't be the case, he would have Cymric Passions... because if you grow in Salisbury, per the tables in the book, you would grow up in a Cymric culture and have Cymric Passions. The rules you just referenced back this up. Are we disagreeing, or agreeing? Are you repeating what I said in the previous post? I honestly can't tell.

Finally, King Arthur Pendragon is not history, nor is its primary source, Le Morte D'Arthur. The reason there is an Roman emperor is because that's what the story says.

OK, let me try to clarify...

The 'problem' is that BotK&L is using Culture labels, such as Roman in two different things: the family heritage of the character (i.e. the Statistic modifiers), which is what the Culture is in the basic rulebook, and the societal culture (i.e. Passions). I can see why it is doing this, but frankly, the information on p. 50 should have been up front, IMHO.

1.) Bloodline Culture (Statistic modifiers): This is clearly determined by your parentage: if your parents have the same Culture, that is the Culture you will have too, and if they differ, then you roll dice to see which side you favor (see p. 50).

2.) Societal Culture (Passions & Trait modifiers), which is set by your Homeland (see p. 50). This has nothing to do with your bloodline and everything to do where you grow up.

So, a son of Cymric parents would have (Bloodline) Culture: Cymric. This is what would go to the culture box of the character sheet, because that is how Greg set it up originally. However, his Societal Culture depends where he grew up. If he grew up in Salisbury, he would use Cymric Passions and Salisbury Trait/Passion modifiers. If he grew up in London, he would use Roman Passions and London Trait/Passion modifiers.

Does this help to clarify things?

 

As for the historicity of the thing... It is part of KAP history that the Empire washes its hands of Britain in 410. Not only that, we do have the Western Empire falling in 476 in BotK&L and the Ostrogoths taking over. It is right there in the Italian section. These things happen in KAP history, too, even though Uther's Britain bears a much closer resemblance to Norman England of 1100s.

Part of the Loyalty is reciprocity. The liege, the Emperor, abandoned Britain in 410, nor have any of his successors come to try and reclaim their right. Britons elected a High King to lead them instead. Hence, there should be no Loyalty to the Emperor in Rome; the bastards abandoned Britain to the barbarians for over a century before they come back demanding tribute in 520s!

As Atgxgt suggested, I could go with the Pendragons claiming the Imperial Purple, which is what Arthur does at the start of the Roman War, while at the same time rejecting any claim that the (false) emperor in Rome would have on Britain:

"And when King Arthur understood their courages and good wills he thanked them heartily, and after let call the ambassadors to hear their answer. And in presence of all his lords and knights he said to them in this wise: I will that ye return unto your lord and Procuror of the Common Weal for the Romans, and say ye to him, Of his demand and commandment I set nothing, and that I know of no truage nor tribute that I owe to him, nor to none earthly prince, Christian nor heathen; but I pretend to have and occupy the sovereignty of the empire, wherein I am entitled by the right of my predecessors, sometime kings of this land; and say to him that I am delibered and fully concluded, to go with mine army with strength and power unto Rome, by the grace of God, to take possession in the empire and subdue them that be rebel. Wherefore I command him and all them of Rome, that incontinent they make to me their homage, and to acknowledge me for their Emperor and Governor, upon pain that shall ensue."

I could go even a step back* and simply say that the Romans simply use Emperor interchangeably with High King. Simply out of cultural snobbery. 'High King' is, after all, more of a Celtic title. So even while Constantin's bloodline wouldn't officially claim the title of a Western Roman Emperor, their Roman subjects would refer to them as 'Emperor Aurelius' rather than 'High King Aurelius'. Of course, in Uther's time, he is not the High King, which would make a small dilemma with this reasoning. Unless the Roman city folk just decide to continue buttering Uther up by referring to him with the higher title.

* Well actually, like I said before, I would simply eliminate the passion altogether. Much easier.

Edited January 31, 2019 by Morien

[Hzark10]

7 hours ago, creativehum said:

Hey guys,

i just read a book that pointed out King Arthur never existed and there was no tournament jousting in 5th century Britain.

i'm re-working the game now to take all that stuff out.

I'll post my notes as soon as I'm done.

I'm interested in your future post.  So waiting.  Found while doing my own research that many persons could have been the basis of King Arthur.

 

But, in the meantime, I will simply say that there is no historical reference for Picts to have lived in Cornwall, or Berroc Saxons to have been there as well, nor all of the 12 battles occurring in Southern England.  Most rpgs take liberties with history or create whole cloth things like magic or faster than light travel.  KAP also takes liberties.  The idea is to have fun.  King Arthur himself may never have lived at all. He might be completely made up, or, as is normal, is based on some historical figure that grew with each telling.  I've recently seen a post where Tintigal was a roman outpost.  So, where does that leave Gorlois?

Humbly submitted and in no way meant to discredit or flame creativehum.