A Ransom System for AD&D...

Inspired by my previous post on the subject of ransoms, what follows hereafter is a basic system of ransom for use in 1e AD&D. I've decided to go for 1e AD&D from the outset, so that things keep fairly simple for now. This is also a first draft, so somewhere along the line it may get rewritten, adjusted, etc.

Ransoms

Players may find themselves in a situation where they have captured someone of value to another person, society, place etc, and that this can be used for financial gain in some way. This doesn't always mean that the players are involved in a form of absolute extortion - they may be well justified in seeking ransom for some past wrong-doing. The idea of ransoming a person for money (or some other equivalent form) may appear abhorrent to some players and character types. For example, would a Paladin really indulge in such measures? Well, possibly. A ransom could be seen as a way of paying pennance or a method by which a grievance is settled. Ransom could be a system through which another party is being forced to pay for the misdeeds of the captive. Of course, the players may end up in a situation where they themselves are the captives, and so this system could also be used to measure their apparent worth.

Step One: Market Forces, basic values

The basic price on the head of any given character class could vary from place to place, depending on the apparent worth of that person's class. For example, the players may be adventuring in a place where more value is given to those persons engaging in magical practices. A town that is a haven for thieves may place greater value on one of their own kind than, say, a magic-user. That said, we can perhaps start from some simple premise of a baseline value (in gold pieces) for each character class at 1st level:

Cleric 20
Druid 20
Fighter 30
Paladin 40
Ranger 30
Magic-User 30
Illusionist 20
Thief 10
Assassin 10
Monk 15
Henchman 10
Hireling 10

Of course, 1st level characters will probably not be of much worth to someone else. Other factors will affect their value. Henchmen and hirelings are included on this list because they also have some basic value to other players, NPCs etc and therefore the following steps may also apply to them.

Step Two - Level multiplier

A level multiplier is then applied to the base number above.

Example: a 5th level Paladin is worth 200gp (5x40gp).

Step Three - Status multiplier

Status denotes the apparent value an individual has in terms of social standing, if relevant. This will of course vary from place to place, depending on how the person is viewed by others. If we take the idea of some form of community role or nobility as an example, we could apply these multipliers:

Local mayor x2

Minor nobility x3

Direct descendant of local king x5

Local king x10

Example: a 5th level Paladin who is the son of a local king is worth 1000gp (5x200gp).

The Dungeon Master would have to exercise some reasoning here with regard to henchmen and hirelings - for example, an expert blacksmith in a city that has other blacksmiths may not have a much status as one who is the only blacksmith for miles around. Out in the wilds, a whole area may rely on his or her skills. Thus, the city expert is akin to a x2 ('local mayor'), whereas the rare and valuable blacksmith is x5 or possibly even x10.

Step Four - Fame multiplier

Fame is another form of social standing that may also supercede that individual's social status. What drives that in terms of overall value is how well the fame is known over a distance. A village hero of great worth to his local people could be unheard of in a town 50 miles away. The following multipliers could apply:

x2 (the person is known to the local population)

x3 (the person is known to the local area)

x5 (the person known to a kingdom)

x20 (the person known to whole land)

A local area, land, or kingdom may be relatively small - what matters is how many other people know the the person's fame and how important it is to them a whole. Even the ruler of one kingdom may be of little value to another, depending on their perceived worth. A leader of an army of thieves might be famous across a whole land within which lie several kingdoms.

Example: a 10th level Thief king who is known throughout a whole land is worth 20000gp - 10gp x 10th lvl =100gp, x10 (local king) = 1000gp, x20 (known to a whole land).

Non-Human Followers

It's possible that certain high level players have non-human followers, and that those followers may also have some level of status and/or fame. If so, take the non-human's hit dice, multiply it by the gp value below, and then apply Steps Three and Four if required:

Centaur 200
Hippogriff 200
Pegasus 300
Brownie 100
Pixie 100
Pseudo-dragon 350
Satyr 300
Sprite 200
Copper Dragon 500
Storm Giant 1000
Treant 300
Werebear 100
Weretiger 100

This reflects that apparent worth due to their various abilities, magic, and other powers - not to mention the fact that they may also potentially be harder to take as captives.

Like I said, this is a first stab at some form of system. It is somewhat more fluid than the Medieval system which inspired it, as the world of D&D is not so entrenched in terms of heirarchies, social mores and social values. This system should be fluid enough to deal with most circumstances, but please feel free to try it and provide some feedback and critiques!

Medieval warfare had a well-organised 'ransom market'

The capture of the French king John II at Poitiers in 1356 (Source: Wikipedia)

 

This interesting article appeared today on the BBC website. It seems that there was a system involved which governed what happened to prisoners of war in the Medieval period, and that it could be a lucrative source of income for those doing the capturing. Also of note is the fact that a captive could be taken back to their home in order for the ransom to be paid.

Treasure is always an good incentive for play in fantasy RPGs, and the idea behind this system shows that it could be possibly adapted as a set of rules. Aspiring adventurers could always develop it as an interesting sideline to their adventures and campaigns.

Demonagerie - the strange world of Medieval art

Fantasy RPGs can tend to draw on the Medieval period for influences, but at the same time miss out slightly on the sheer oddity of that period's worldview. Even Ars Magica seems to have skimmed past this, which is a shame. Instead, for the most part, we tend to get presented with the Conan-style fantasy angle which to my mind has never been a particularly good influence. Why? Well, I've never been completely sure that it's not been conflated with the horror that is the Renaissance Festival...

Is this because of a somewhat peculiar take on the Medieval period, combined with a vibe that owes more to Hollywood films than it does to an understanding of European history and culture? Hmm. Possibly.

However, should one want to tap into the actual period one would discover that it is full of odd imagery that wouldn't look too out of place in, say, a D&D setting. For example:

This picture comes from an excellent site called Demonagerie, over at Tumblr. There's lots of demons, dragons, monsters, knights and a variety of other images and symbolism that may help to inform or flesh out your fantasy campaign. Huzzah!

Something for your Paladin...

Over at the excellent Bibliofind blog you can see various interesting examples of heraldry from the Medieval period. These range from the quite simple (i.e. in the image above) to the more ornate. They could perhaps be a source of inspiration for your group's Paladin, or those of various other knightly persuasions. Bibliofind has also collected other examples - check the links at the end of the blog post.

Happy crossbows... I mean, Christmas...!

Before I sign off the the holiday and disappear into the wilds of Somerset, I thought I'd point you at this interesting clip on Youtube:

I gather that this demonstrates the use of what could be called an Arbalest, as this seems to be what we can see in the footage. These would be what D&D would call a 'heavy crossbow', and seems to be a bit more dangerous than the D&D version. That said, there are accounts of brigandine being able to provide protection against crossbows - although what type of crossbow and at what range, I'm not sure.

See you in the New Year - providing I haven't suffered death by cider...

Taking breastplates too literally...

As I've said before, the way women are depicted in many fantasy RPGs is usually pretty poor. I was going to consider how this tends to revolve around the artists apparently being obsessed with showing cleavage no matter what, and that the depiction of women in armour was not immune from this. This was then going to segway into the impracticality of such designs - but someone has beaten me to it.

As that article points out, the type of armour shown in the above photo would cause problems to the wearer should she fall forwards. Even with a padded jack underneath, the amount of damage caused by blunt trauma wouldn't be at all pleasant. You also don't really want to have anything that acts as a handy channel for weapon strikes against vital organs. Traps and channels on armour, shield bosses and weapons are there to snag or interfere with the path of an attack in some way. Ideally that means that the attack is kept away from the vitals, limbs, etc. A similar principle occurs with another armoured thing - tanks. Certain parts of a tank can, if not designed correctly, act as 'shell traps' for incoming rounds. Sometimes this traps those rounds near vital areas, such as the drivers position. Not good.

The article makes note of female armour in Mass Effect 2, but I'd say that that's also barking up the wrong tree. First and foremost, it's pointlessly sexualised in a way that the man's armour is not. If the same thing was done with the man's armour - say, the inclusion of a large, protruding armoured codpiece - most people would say 'That looks ridiculous'. But for some reason this sort of silliness generally isn't pointed out when women's armour is sexualised. Secondly, it's not at all practical for someone who may need to lie prone when firing a weapon, take cover, crawl, etc (and the same rule would apply to the armoured codpiece). Take an illustration from modern body armour - here, for example. Note that there's no mention of women needing an armour that both seperates and supports. It just needs changing in a few key areas to better match the anatomical differences. The same factors would apply to women wearing armour in a fantasy RPG setting. 

What does this mean for an artist wishing to avoid the common cliches? Well, the simple fact of the matter is that there's pretty much little difference in the way that men and women look whilst wearing armour. This is especially so with plate armour, and if a full-face helmet is worn. However, that doesn't mean that there aren't subtle visual cues. If we consider the fact that, even in a fantasy RPG setting, men and women fighters would have had to have trained with their armour since an early age we could perhaps take our cues from modern imagery. One possible consideration could be male and female athletes from the same sports. There are similarities in their body shapes to a certain extent (depending on the sport), but there are also differences. At the end of the day this boils down to a couple of factors. One: an understanding of anatomy (hint: breasts aren't solid masses). Two: observation of how things can look in real life and drawing on that for inspiration. Three: developing an understanding of what's being observed (for example, how is the armour constructed? Is it part of a layered suit?). Whilst I might hesitate to say that many RPG artists lack such skills, it does seem that they are willfully abandoning them in order to follow a more hackneyed approach. That doesn't ultimately send out the right sort of signals, both about the outlook of the artist nor whatever RPG is using the artwork.

One other factor that seems to feed into this is the way women are portrayed in other fantasy art. I'd say the main culprit is comic art, of the super hero variety. Super heroines tend to wear 'boob socks', and it seems that the fashion has been translated into armour somewhere along the way. Maybe with a nod towards being slightly less silly, but silly nontheless.

But it's not all doom and gloom. We don't have to be stuck with chainmail bikinis and those breastcup cuirasses. There are depictions out there of women in armour that aren't rubbish. For example...

The above image is of Theresa Wendland, and comes from here

A nice example from LARPing...

Sourced from here

Some lamellar armour...

Sourced from here

Some more plate, this time worn by Virginia Hankins...

Sourced from here

And if you want something with more of an RPG flavour, there's this...

Sourced from here

And here's a more naturalistic pose (okay, it's not armour but there is a weapon involved)...

I wish I knew where this originally came from. I dug it out from Tumblr somewhere and haven't been able to find it via Tin Eye...

See? All pretty good! And not a chainmail bikini in sight. Okay, so perhaps some of the above are a little stylised. What if we consider how a woman might look when engaged in combat with a sword or other weapon? Here's one interesting video, featuring Theresa Wendland:

Their training weapons are a bit heavier than actual fighting versions, but you get the idea. Note the stances, attacks and parries used in the above clip - all apparently sourced from actual fighting treatises from the Medieval period. And a tad different from the sort of fighting stances one sees women posed into for RPGs. Here's something a little more florid, although equally of interest and featuring Virginia Hankins:

Hopefully all of the above demonstrates that we don't have to keep treading the well-worn Dreaded Path of Ye Olde Fantasy Clichés. Artists can chose not to go down it, and hopefully one day more of them will. Women don't have to be dressed up in silly 'armour' and costumes for RPG settings. It just takes a bit of time and effort, and less of a closeted mindview as to how women are depicted.

On the Physiology of... the Otyugh - Part Six.

Moving around

As I've previously mused on whether the Otyugh is more like some sort of slug, a question arises as to how it moves around. Originally I imagined that it had a slug or snail-like 'foot' - a sort of large pad which skimmed along a film of mucus. However, I wasn't sure that this was veering away too slightly from the whole idea of it being an animal which is fairly tough all over.

As it's a creature that needs to burrow into its food in some way, one idea was to make its underside flat but ridged so that it has some grip. That dovetailed into my previous ideas about the Otyugh being a mixture of rubbery hide and harder, mineral-like features. All of this combined into this scribble:

This shows a cross-section of one area of the body.

This shows those ridges, but also the teeth-like 'nails' it relies on for grip and perhaps also extra burrowing power. If we zoom in a bit, we can see how this might look in greater detail:

One idea driving this is that the underside is like some sort of toothed conveyor belt. With that in mind, a question arises as to how it might look when moving - I guess it could either move solely by the underside rippling along, or instead perhaps the whole body arches and rolls along in a caterpillar-like way. Here's a scribble showing how the muscles controlling this under the hide could look:

The idea is that they're ropey tendons attached to the main mass of the spine plates.

My various posts on the Otyugh will hopefully combine soon into a more detailed picture. Watch this space!