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Alexander Moonbeam said:
In my experience, 1st-level adventures where the PC's meet an authority figure typically have that figure be a local lord. The modern equivalent wouldn't be a meeting with the Queen of England, it would be meeting a small-town mayor or police chief.
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If we are talking faux-medieval, the local lord probably wasn't there. Odds are he was at one of his other 10-20 manors, in one of this other villages, if we wasn't at the capital paying tribute to the king or taking care of other business, or on campaign fighting the king's war, or visiting friends or relatives.

In this case the small town mayor or police chief equivalent would be the village reeve or bailiff, or a vassal knight who held his lands from the lord. Maybe a castellan if it was a great lord with more than one castle. In any of those cases, they are still beholden to a higher aristocrat who is usually not the king. In England you might have had a sheriff ("shire-reeve") or constable, who were law enforcement officials who (I think) represented the king but might be appointed by cities/towns or "counties" (which I assume means by the local earl). The titles and duties vary from region and period to period, and I may be misremembering some of the details, but in general medieval society had a lot of layers, and the lower your standing, the lower the layer you would be dealing with.

The1True said:
That said, I agree it's a drag dealing with irreverent/socially awkward players who don't want to roleplay due deference to an authority figure in the game because they're banking on your, the DM's, lack of desire to throw them in the donjon/mob them with tower guards for lèse-majesté before the adventure even gets started. Everyone thinks they're Han Solo.
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Actual quote from a campaign in the 80s, when a 1st level PC was faced with a 14th level druid: "I go up to the druid, and I poke him!"
 
squeen said:
This is a fairly newbie action, but I've seen the like before too. It's a reluctance to immerse, and at some point a decision has to be made to play or to quit.
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I had been playing with the guy for a few years at this point. Some people just like to watch the (paper) world burn.
 
I usually see players attempting random destruction as an expression of frustration to having no clue what's going on. The players know the GM is waiting for them to do something, but they can't think of anything in the scene they could interact with. Attacking an NPC who is percieved as an obstacle to moving on to a fun part of the game happens when they have no idea what else the GM wants them to do but refuses to say.
 
ACKS shines since it's very clear what the social status of a player character or local magnate is on each level and how much wealth X gp actually represents. A rule of thumb inferred from the Battle rules is that people deal directly with others within 2 levels of themselves (3rd level characters act as liutenants to 5th level characters, 5th level characters act as lieutenants to 7th level characters etc.), otherwise delegates it to a servant.
 
Two orcs said:
ACKS shines since it's very clear what the social status of a player character or local magnate is on each level and how much wealth X gp actually represents. A rule of thumb inferred from the Battle rules is that people deal directly with others within 2 levels of themselves (3rd level characters act as liutenants to 5th level characters, 5th level characters act as lieutenants to 7th level characters etc.), otherwise delegates it to a servant.
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I like this idea, and it would be easy to import given 1e NPC rules regarding ranks of sergeants, lieutenants, captains (not to mention "lord" level).

The one thing that bugs me is that in D&D and clones rank always seems to be accompanied by combat level, which is fine if everyone gets their domain by carving it out, but makes no sense if your setting includes any kind of hereditary nobility.

Like, in 3e you have NPC classes, so you can take levels in the "expert" class, for instance, and become a better lawyer or minstrel (or whatever). But even there you also get better in combat as you level, and I can see no reason why your average experienced weaver would be better in a fight than the city guard. 1e was a bit like this with sages, who got tougher the more immersed they became in their scholarly pursuits.

In my game I've actually started tracking ability in combat and ability at various skills separately for my NPCs. So most of my NPCs are effectively "0-level" for combat purposes, but an aristocrat may have an effective diplomacy or history skill as if he was a higher level character, or a stable hand may be highly skilled at handling animals. So your diplomat may be a 0 level fighter but have the equivalent of 8th level in diplomacy.

4e also has a class (the warlord) that is good at supporting allies in battle, so instead of making all commissioned officers tougher than their sergeants, they can just have different roles on the battlefield.

So to differentiate rank in my game I consider the hereditary position (and other social modifiers) but also the character's effective level in the skills that are relevant to their position. Plus (and I have discussed this before) I treat having social position as if it were a magic item that gives bonuses to relevant skills during social interactions. So you may be tougher than the king, but he has more money, political power AND is probably better than you at certain social skills.

You may be able to beat up that ageing 1st level watch sergeant who is shaking you down, but he is more streetwise, and is usually more convincing when he lies than you are when you are telling the truth - as reflected in your relative bluff vs. diplomacy (or persuasion) bonuses when you are trying to convince a magistrate. This is, by the way, where a system that includes social skills shines: when you and your opponent are wielding your skills like a weapon, and you let the dice be a neutral arbiter of success, based on your relative skills and situational modifiers.
 
I read a whole thing last year (I can't find it now :( ) about medieval English guild apprentices practicing at arms regularly and frequently engaging in armed inter-guild bloodshed. I'm willing to accept that, at the very least, the higher you rise in an organization, the harder you become to kill (as evidenced by the devil protecting his own out in the world of politics (you go ahead and insert the polarizing figure of your preferred faith party here)). But in a world where the king could muster the fyrd to fight off invaders, men practiced at arms. The longer you practice, the better you get. Maybe not as much as a trained fighting man, but enough to get better at soccer brawls and bar fights.
 
Beoric said:
I know a professional weaver. I'm confident I could take her.
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That's because weaving includes very repetetive motions. You can essentially "dark soul" a weaver by learning their moveset and defeating them easily.
City guards on the other hand are much more chaotic (being corrupt and drunk most of the time) so their moveset is much more erratic.
:P
 
The1True said:
(you go ahead and insert the polarizing figure of your preferred faith party here)
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I am going to henceforth always refer to the Left and Right as faith-parties! :P
I know it wasn't your intent, but it's still freakin' brilliant.
 
The1True said:
I read a whole thing last year (I can't find it now :( ) about medieval English guild apprentices practicing at arms regularly and frequently engaging in armed inter-guild bloodshed. I'm willing to accept that, at the very least, the higher you rise in an organization, the harder you become to kill (as evidenced by the devil protecting his own out in the world of politics (you go ahead and insert the polarizing figure of your preferred faith party here)). But in a world where the king could muster the fyrd to fight off invaders, men practiced at arms. The longer you practice, the better you get. Maybe not as much as a trained fighting man, but enough to get better at soccer brawls and bar fights.
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Once you are talking guilds, you are already into the middle class, and are probably excluding weavers. Training and equipping oneself means having sufficient resources and leisure time to do so. That is going to exclude most people.

IIRC, during the middle of the feudal period, ie before the age of plate, it took an entire village to produce and supply 2-4 men-at-arms for the lord (which is part of the reason the lord needed a lot of villages and manors). And hunting by the peasantry was generally illegal. Plus if your vassals are unfree oppressed people it is risky to train them and arm them for combat. So odds are your 8th level baker of farmer doesn't have a lot of combat training.

But certainly, at a time when taking aim at the competition could be literal, I could see the merchant class investing in a bit of training for themselves and their retainers.
 
Dude, English yeoman throughout the middle ages were badass motherfuckers. Poorly equipped, sure, but heavily trained as a matter of national policy. That's why they punched WELL above their weight class in the Hundred Years War.
 
The1True said:
Dude, English yeoman throughout the middle ages were badass motherfuckers. Poorly equipped, sure, but heavily trained as a matter of national policy. That's why they punched WELL above their weight class in the Hundred Years War.
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The yeoman archers were only in the 14th and 15th centuries, and were freeborn. Under Edward I they were shit conscript archers; after that they were professional contract soldiers who had to have some wealth because they were required to supply their own horses. They eventually became part of the lower gentry.

So again, not unfree peasants, but people with the money, time and motivation to train.
 
Robin Hood is 12th century. The use of quarterstaff and longbow was like the Canadian hockey program (pre-institutional ickiness). Subsidized and strongly encouraged.

I will fight you on the 100 yrs war thing. I'm shitty at debate, so I'm just going to get ugly about it though. You are partially correct, in that serfs who lived and farmed directly on church or noble estates were essentially slaves, but yeomen enjoyed rights going back before the Norman conquest but were expected to train for and serve in the military when called upon. Tradesmen were not some kind of middle class nobility and did take pride in their training. They certainly were not professional soldiers though.
 
The1True said:
Robin Hood is 12th century. The use of quarterstaff and longbow was like the Canadian hockey program (pre-institutional ickiness). Subsidized and strongly encouraged.

I will fight you on the 100 yrs war thing. I'm shitty at debate, so I'm just going to get ugly about it though. You are partially correct, in that serfs who lived and farmed directly on church or noble estates were essentially slaves, but yeomen enjoyed rights going back before the Norman conquest but were expected to train for and serve in the military when called upon. Tradesmen were not some kind of middle class nobility and did take pride in their training. They certainly were not professional soldiers though.
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According to legend, Robin Hood was an aristocrat. His merry men were outlaws and poachers.

The 100 years war was 14th to 15th century, which is exactly the period I am talking about above. Prior to that, yeoman (as opposed to yeoman archers) were either landowners or middle-ranking servants of an aristrocrat's household.
 
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Beoric said:
According to legend, Robin Hood was an aristocrat. His merry men were outlaws and poachers.
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There are two major legendary origins for Robin Hood. One where he is a yeoman from Loxley, the other that he is Earl Robert of Huntingdon. The earliest ballads paint him as a yeoman.

Take your pick.
 
robertsconley said:
There are two major legendary origins for Robin Hood. One where he is a yeoman from Loxley, the other that he is Earl Robert of Huntingdon. The earliest ballads paint him as a yeoman.

Take your pick.
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That would still make him a landowner or middle-ranking servant of an aristocrat. And then an outlaw and poacher. None of that supports the argument that ordinary folks received combat training throughout their lives.
 
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