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[Kilojoule Proton]

GUILDED RAGE

Gleaming Astice, city of craft and commerce and home to powerful guilds, straddles the River Crevisce. It and its teeming inhabitants have enjoyed centuries of independence from the bloated Reman Empire and years of peace and prosperity following a most glorious victory against the honorless city of Moneleti on the next river over. All is not well, however, and there are whispers of discontent and upheaval. Local Remanists claim to have found documents stating in no uncertain terms that the grant of Astetian independence is due to expire in less than three years' time, and although their supposed provenance has yet to be confirmed, rumors suggest that the Reman Emperor accepts these documents' claims as valid. The damnable Doge of Moneleti has more recently somehow wiped out an entire Astetian mercenary company in his ill-timed, ill-planned, and very much ill-managed expedition against river pirates of all things. To make matters worse, the vital port city of Sesari, situated downstream and long a close, trusted partner of Astice, is currently courting closer relations with the Moneletines of all people. Landlocked Astice stands to lose much should this partnership decay.

Not everything is perfect even within the ancient walls of Astice. The Astetian Guard is currently locked in a feud with the notorious Guild of Assassins over excessive assassinations and has already lost three promising captains but is making gains in this vicious campaign. While a Guard victory would be good for the guild heads' personal safety overall, it would set a bloody precedent for any other guild daring to challenge the Guard's authority. On the other side of the city, a rash of unlawful non-guild businesses infests the lawless streets pending your resolution from the upcoming meeting of the Tribunal of Merchandise, and some of the more brazen artisans among them are even petitioning the Doge himself for an end to guild exclusivity. It is a dark time to be an Astetian guildmaster, but there is a light at the end of a tunnel (and it probably isn't a train because trains haven't been invented yet).

Guild sheet:

Code: [Select]

Guild name: (E.g. Guild of Judges and Notaries, Guild of Wool, Guild of Woodworkers)
Patronage: (E.g. Judges, lawyers, and notaries; woolworkers and merchants; carpenters and woodcutters)
Values (up to three slider shifts total):
    Innovation < - - - O - - - > Reliability
    Cohesion   < - - - O - - - > Membership
    Security   < - - - O - - - > Wealth

Leaders: (3 by default, +1 for every point toward Membership and -1 for every point toward Cohesion (with a minimum of 1 leader))

Leader sheet:

Code: [Select]

Name:
Description (optional):
Personality (required): See spoiler
Stats: (3 points)
 - (Insert guild-specific skill): 0
 - Diplomacy: 0
 - Martial: 0
 - Stewardship: 0
 - Intrigue: 0
 - Learning: 0


Spoiler: Personalities (click to show/hide)

-1-point personalities, i.e. choosing this one gives you an extra point to spend on a stat:

• Filthy coward: Will not participate in dilemmas but likewise cannot be targeted by them. Greatly reduces personal combat skill.

Free personalities:

• Dove: Will always choose cooperation even if doing so would be detrimental.
• Hawk: Aggressive and hypercompetitive, will never choose to cooperate even if it comes at a high personal cost.
• Unpredictable: Arbitrary, and makes choices no one can even try to predict.

1-point personalities, i.e. choosing these reduces the number of points available on stats:

• Generous: Compassionate and caring to a fault, seeks to maximize rewards for the other party (even if this puts them or the other party in danger).
• Greedy: Always looking for an advantage, will always choose the greatest reward even if it's extremely risky.
• Spiteful: Seeks to minimize opponents' possible winnings in every gambit.

2-point personalities:

• Balanced: Leads with cooperation, but pays like for like in full.
• Crafty: Leads with offense and reverts to tit-for-tat on retaliation or random behavior on cooperation.
• Forgiving: Leads with cooperation and will forgive an isolated offense but will nevertheless retaliate to repeated wrongs.
• Grim: Will always cooperate until the first sign of defection, at which point vendetta is declared on the offender and the offender's organization and progeny for all time.
• Learner: Will repeat a winning option and switch away from a losing option regardless of the magnitude of alternatives.
• Slow: Chooses whichever option would have maximized guild winnings in the last gambit.
• Somewhat forgiving: Leads with cooperation and typically immediately retaliates if wronged but has a small chance of forgiving opponents instead of retaliating.

Spoiler: Disorganized blurb about gameplay/mechanics until the rules are somewhat finalized (click to show/hide)

Players manage guilds by participating in the Tribunal of Merchandise and assigning leaders/members to appropriate tasks/missions to amass money, members, and power their guilds (and possibly the city as a whole). Leaders are effectively autonomous agents that, once assigned to a mission, will auto-resolve dilemmas according to their personalities. Success is determined mostly by their available skills and choices. Leaders can be lost and gained, and losing more than half of a guild's starting number of leaders will cause bad things to happen.

Victory conditions vary depending on a given guild's alignment, but here are the drafted ones:

• Astetian hegemony: Subjugate Moneleti and secure relations with Sesari. Draft partnerships with other cities in the region.
• NGO minus the N: Depose the Serene Doge of Astice in favor of some sort of guild council.
• Status quo: Survive a Reman annexation attempt without gaining or losing power, influence, or guilds.
• Imperial victory: Astice rejoins the Reman Empire (whether peacefully or by force).

It's possible secret actions will make up a significant fraction of all actions. Here are some guidelines on what should and shouldn't be secret:

• Must be secret: Assigning leaders for missions/dilemmas, Tribunal verdicts
• May be secret: Initiating plausibly stealthy missions, schemingtalking to other guild heads in secret, backing someone else's bid for free stuff from the Tragicommunity Chest
• Must be public: Public actions, Tribunal prosecutions, Tribunal resolutions other than verdicts (proposing and voting), bids for free stuff from the Tragicommunity Chest, opposing someone's bid for free stuff from the Tragicommunity Chest

The Tragicommunity Chest is a bountiful source of supplies that represents underutilized Astetian assets like money, arms/armor, supplies, raw materials, and contracts that would surely be better off under guild management. Loot from the Tragicommunity Chest can be used to rapidly improve guild/leader stats. Sadly, the Chest isn't bottomless, and overdrawing from it for too long can have long-lasting effects on the city's health, defenses, treasury, population, or a variety of other things. Any guild can publicly bid for stuff from the Tragicommunity Chest, and in the absence of opposition, it only takes the (possibly secret) approval of another guild to succeed. Any opposition at all to the bid spawns a small mission relating to taking from the Chest.

[Kilojoule Proton]

Reserved

[Naturegirl1999]

Reserved

[Stirk]

Guild name: Hunter's Guild
Patronage: Hunters, trappers, associated butchers, the occasional very confused fisherman.
Values (up to three slider shifts total):
    Innovation < - - O - - - - > Reliability
    Cohesion   < - O - - - - - > Membership
    Security   < - - - O - - - > Wealth

Leaders: (3 by default, +1 for every point toward Membership and -1 for every point toward Cohesion (with a minimum of 1 leader))

Name: Pecus Hunter
Description (optional):A stubborn old man who has somehow managed to hold on to both his guild position and hunter physique despite the grey in his beard. Wears fine furs that he insists he caught himself from the river, including a tall fur hat to cover up his balding head.
Personality (required): Crafty
Stats: (3 points)
 - Outdoorsmanship: 1
 - Diplomacy: 0
 - Martial: 0
 - Stewardship: 0
 - Intrigue: 0
 - Learning: 0