D&D 5E Those poor farmers!

[Celebrim]

I think we have different ideas of how a downtime activity is run. In my mind, the downtime activity rules are there so you can handwave away whole categories of endeavors that don't require in-character interaction between the PCs and the DM and are mostly outside the story. It seems to me that resolving downtime activities should take about the same amount of time at the table as figuring out how much gold and how many days it took the wizard to make a potion. My personal opinion is that options like carousing (and maybe running a business) are there so that every player at the table can say they are doing something as you go around to check on how they intend to use their downtime.

I completely agree. Speed of resolution is always - regardless of what the rule is intended to do - a major factor in evaluating whether it is a good rule.

But it's not the only factor.

Some other factors:

a) Does the rule have a purpose? If the rule offers insufficient reward for the cost of performing the task, no PC will ever do it (except perhaps the few times necessary to see that it doesn't offer a reward). If you print a rule that is specifically designed to discourage someone from doing something, that's probably a bad rule. If you print a rule for something that isn't important to the game, its a bad rule. Conversely, printing a rule suggests that it is important to the game.
b) Is the rule balanced? This is the opposite of the first point. If the rule offers too much reward for the risk, then a player with the aesthetic motive of play of 'winning' will be motivated to only make that 'play' - and so will both break the game and be bored and feel its the games fault. And frankly, he will be right. So often I see apologists for rules saying, "So what if the game is unbalanced. Just don't play that way.", and these people just don't get it.
c) Is the rule sufficiently associated with the thing it abstracts? Every rule is an abstraction of a more complex reality, but if rule doesn't associate with the imagined reality it loses its power to create believable narrative. It's something of a matter of taste how strong the association needs to be, but it needs to be there at least a little. In the case of rules for combat simulation, at the minimum it needs to make the character that is more skilled at combat more likely to win the combat (rather than counter-intuitively less likely). In the case of an economic simulation, I'd expect the same sort of concept to be present - the more skillful you are supposed to be at the task having economic value, the more likely you are to turn a profit. So for example, if I own a tavern and my character has proficiency in Craft (Brewing), Craft (Cooking), Perform, Knowledge (Math and Ledgers) or whatever the system provides for, then I would expect to turn profits more consistently than a character that was inept at these things. The more level of detail, the more different inputs might be accounted for, but even minimal inputs only require about a sentence of reference and calling out a bit of minimal DM judgment.

One additional point can be made by highlighting a sentence in your above quote: "In my mind, the downtime activity rules are there so you can handwave away whole categories of endeavors that don't require in-character interaction between the PCs and the DM and are mostly outside the story."

You are exactly right. And because you are exactly right, the same rule should work as well for PCs and it does for NPCs - not because the rule intends to create a simulation of the world or needs to or any other straw man argument people keep throwing up - but because if NPC activities pretty much exactly fall into the category of things that can be handwaved, don't involve interaction between the PC and the DM, and are mostly outside the story. If the rule doesn't work for NPCs in this situation, you can be pretty much assured it doesn't work for PCs either. And any rule that would work for NPCs in this situation, would work for PCs with only the minimum amount of adjustment depending on how much rules were shared between them. In 5e case, with regard to economic activities, the answer is sufficiently close to 'all of them' that the rules could be insensible to the difference.

I don't necessarily see the accuracy of the economic rules for running a business (especially as a downtime activity that doesn't really happen in-game) as very important.

You keep saying that sort of thing as a defense of the rule. I'm baffled, because from my perspective you keep damning the rule.

In the DMG, one doesn't necessarily expect to find something as complicated as the stronghold rules in Pathfinder's campaign guide. But to the extent one expects them to show up at all, it's reasonable to expect that they should have the same design intentions as the rules in the Pathfinder campaign guide.

 

[Korgul79]

And where do you start with strongholds?

I'd personally start by making the players sketch a map for the stronghold they're building.

What kind of rules do you feel you need? It's an honest question. It really depends on the type of campaign you're running. Dettailed rules on the costs unkeep cost? Siege rules? Dettailed cost for building it wall by wall? A list of bonus it can give for a miniplay of strategic/economic managemant? Structural point of the various part of the building? Probability that it get harrassed by villains or monster, or some random table of accidents and adventure seed linked to the owning of it? Other types to bonuses to the pc that owns it? Probability of attracting followers?
I think that some of this things could be rather interesting, depending on the group and on the campaign, but I feel they are quite too marginal and specific to be discussed on the core books.
The idea that at some point the character may want to have a stronghold (or buy a trading post) it's likely enough to deserve the inclusion of some very basic guideline like an indicative price or building time, but what you need after that it's too dependant in your game to be treated in the except maybe the inclusion of some suggestion.
I'm quite sure that in many campaign a stronghold don't need more rules than a rope, a carriage or a garden.

 

[Celebrim]

Property: read a book on the history of religious orders and the relationship between church, nobility and property, then make decisions about your gameworld. I can recommend RI Moore, The War on Heresy.

You can recommend it, but I wouldn't recommend starting there. Moore's work is revisionist, and its best I think to start with more conventional works so that you at least know what evidence and narrative he's revising against before getting a one sided broadside that cherry picks even more than usual. Moore's work is good for providing some nuance and doubt, but I don't think I'd start there. But, for the general notion that people almost exclusively make war on their neighbors to acquire their neighbor's property while saying (and even believing) that it is because they find their neighbor's opinions risible, with that I can't really argue.

On the other hand, none of that answers the question, "Why would you want property in the first place?", which is the substance of the question you are answering with spurious scholarly references.

 

[Derren]

What kind of rules do you feel you need?

General size of the stronghold, best with examples (Small keep, large keep, etc.), best with example descriptions. (Sensible) Income/produce examples given for commercial buildings and advice for all building types what they represent is game worlds (FR is default, but when you have space also for alternative settings), what impact they have onto the settings and adventure seeds, best with different levels of spotlight.

 

[Celebrim]

What kind of rules do you feel you need? It's an honest question. It really depends on the type of campaign you're running. Detailed rules on the costs unkeep cost? Siege rules? Dettailed cost for building it wall by wall? A list of bonus it can give for a miniplay of strategic/economic managemant? Structural point of the various part of the building? Probability that it get harrassed by villains or monster, or some random table of accidents and adventure seed linked to the owning of it? Other types to bonuses to the pc that owns it? Probability of attracting followers?

One important point is that the writers of the DMG cannot know what sort of campaign the purchaser will be running. So the question becomes, if I'm going to make reference to strongholds of any sort, what sort of generic information can I provide that will be useful to every DM that uses the book? The information may be insufficient for the particular DM's campaign, who may desire detail that can't be provided in the space available, but it ought to be sufficient to get started with.

For example, the 1e DMG provides very simple rules for constructing strongholds piece meal from component castle pieces without really laying out why you'd want a stronghold. It doesn't need to lay out why a character would want a stronghold, since the Player's Handbook has already provided one solid reason for wanting a stronghold in the description of the 4 core classes - Fighter, Cleric, Thief, and M-U. Player's will want to build a stronghold at name level to lay claim to land (and with it tax income) and to acquire followers. So the DMG focuses on questions like, "How much will it cost to build a stronghold?" and "What will the stronghold look like (as on a map)?" Together with some simple siege rules, this provides a small but complete rules set which also usefully integrates with the Monster Manual (which among other things, describes humanoid tribes like Orcs as occupying simple castles with a number of siege engines).

I think that some of this things could be rather interesting, depending on the group and on the campaign, but I feel they are quite too marginal and specific to be discussed on the core books.

You may be right, but if that is the case, why are they here?

The idea that at some point the character may want to have a stronghold (or buy a trading post) it's likely enough to deserve the inclusion of some very basic guideline like an indicative price or building time, but what you need after that it's too dependant in your game to be treated in the except maybe the inclusion of some suggestion.

The character may want it, but note that unless the game provides in game reasons for wanting it - like 1e's tax income per peasant, followers, and presumable defensibility against attackers - why should the character want it?

I'm quite sure that in many campaign a stronghold don't need more rules than a rope, a carriage or a garden.

Perhaps. For ropes one minimally needs to know its physical features (weight, length, strength), cost, and how it interacts with general rules related to objects (hit points, AC, break DC, etc.). Exactly how much detail for objects is enough is a matter of taste (do you need to say that ropes are immune to cold damage? do you need to say that cold damage temporarily makes ropes more brittle? etc.), but if you put 'rope' in the basic table of gear and don't say how much weight rope can bear, then in my opinion you've too few rules for rope. In this thread though, I've seen far more objections that amount to "bad rules are good", than defenses of these rules. I'm more annoyed by the suggestion that bad rules are good rules than I am by the particular rules themselves. The rules themselves are probably less objectionable than some of the nonsense that has been said defending them.

 

[Beleriphon]

Perhaps. For ropes one minimally needs to know its physical features (weight, length, strength), cost, and how it interacts with general rules related to objects (hit points, AC, break DC, etc.). Exactly how much detail for objects is enough is a matter of taste (do you need to say that ropes are immune to cold damage? do you need to say that cold damage temporarily makes ropes more brittle? etc.), but if you put 'rope' in the basic table of gear and don't say how much weight rope can bear, then in my opinion you've too few rules for rope. In this thread though, I've seen far more objections that amount to "bad rules are good", than defenses of these rules. I'm more annoyed by the suggestion that bad rules are good rules than I am by the particular rules themselves. The rules themselves are probably less objectionable than some of the nonsense that has been said defending them.

I think some generic rules for a business fall into the same category as the carousing table for downtime. Its not meant to be a focus of the game, but rather a way find out what happened while the character wasn't stabbing orcs in a cave somewhere. Its the same level of abstraction is for running a business or spending your hard earned loot on wine, company and song. That obviously doesn't work for everybody, but I can see what the rule is meant to be used for and if it looked at in the light of a quick downtime roll then it works just fine, as an economic simulation it obviously fails.

As for strongholds I'm not entirely sure they need more rules than the fact that they are owned, and how long it takes to build. I also suspect we'll see some more detailed rules once we get mass combat rules published.

 

[Hussar]

I'd point out that the DMG does provide rules for why you'd want a stronghold and specifically calls out the downtime rules - the rules for Factions and Renown on page 22-23 in the DMG call out using the downtime rules. You'd build a stronghold presumably to increase your Renown with various factions in the setting. Certainly an Abbey would fit here as well.

Again, why would you bother using these rules for NPC's? The DM simply rules by fiat whether a business or whatever is prospering or not. It's not a straw man to say that wanting PC and NPC rules to follow the same mechanics is a sim based idea. That's precisely what you are asking for [MENTION=4937]Celebrim[/MENTION]. NPC's don't need downtime rules because NPC's don't have downtime. It's as simple as that. Why would you add mechanics to something that will never, ever use it? Do farmers have down time? Does an inn keeper need downtime mechanics?

 

[weldon]

I completely agree.

a) Does the rule have a purpose?
b) Is the rule balanced?
c) Is the rule sufficiently associated with the thing it abstracts?


You are exactly right. And because you are exactly right, the same rule should work as well for PCs and it does for NPCs

I'm a little uncertain where we disagree.

A) The rule has a purpose
B) It's balanced (and there is no obvious exploit)
C) It is sufficient

I think it works just fine for NPCs as well.

You keep saying that sort of thing as a defense of the rule. I'm baffled, because from my perspective you keep damning the rule.

To be clear, this is the first time I've said that the details of the economic simulation aren't that important. I say that in defense of the rule because I don't want something more detailed for the running a business downtime activity. The level of detail presented is just fine for me and it's not important to make it more complicated.

 

[Celebrim]

I'm a little uncertain where we disagree.

I'm being somewhat coy here. I'm not sure we do disagree. In point of fact, I think it would be possible to demonstrate the rules have purpose, are balanced, are sufficient, and work well enough for both PC's and NPC's. However, what annoys me is that instead of addressing the original poster in that way, the thread has become filled with a bunch of highly spurious, illogical arguments that amount to thread crapping and accusations of badwrongfun. In short, my real interest in the thread is not so much in declaring this particular rule to be bad, but in attacking the notion advanced so often in response to the OP, that bad rules are in fact good rules. Very little attention has been in fact paid to the argument that these rules are in fact good rules. Instead, a bunch of unreflective crap about DM fiat, rulings rather than rules, and 'this isn't a sim' have dominated the conversation.

 

[Hussar]

I'm being somewhat coy here. I'm not sure we do disagree. In point of fact, I think it would be possible to demonstrate the rules have purpose, are balanced, are sufficient, and work well enough for both PC's and NPC's. However, what annoys me is that instead of addressing the original poster in that way, the thread has become filled with a bunch of highly spurious, illogical arguments that amount to thread crapping and accusations of badwrongfun. In short, my real interest in the thread is not so much in declaring this particular rule to be bad, but in attacking the notion advanced so often in response to the OP, that bad rules are in fact good rules. Very little attention has been in fact paid to the argument that these rules are in fact good rules. Instead, a bunch of unreflective crap about DM fiat, rulings rather than rules, and 'this isn't a sim' have dominated the conversation.

Well, considering the OP is applying the downtime rules, which ONLY apply to PC's to NPC's, he's flat out using the rules wrong. Claiming that the rules are good, bad or otherwise actually has to address the situations where the rules actually apply don't they?

The only ones claiming badwrongfun here seem to be you and Derren.