D&D (2024) Dungeon Master's Guide Bastion System Lets You Build A Stronghold

The Dungeon Master's Guide's brand new Bastion System has been previewed in a new video from Wizards of the Coast.

Characters can acquire a bastion at 5th-level. Each week, the bastion takes a turn, with actions including crafting, recruiting, research, trade, and more.

A bastion also contains a number of special facilties, starting with two at 5th-level up to 6 at 17th-level. These facilities include things like armories, workshops, laboratories, stables, menageries, and more. In total there are nearly thirty such facilities to choose from.

 

[Lanefan]

I'd like to introduce a base building system in my current game, the players are starting to ask about things like purchasing a house and so on. My last experience with anything like this was the Pathfinder 1e rules from Kingmaker, and boy, was that a PITA. So maybe something simple is in order. If anyone has suggestions for good rules, however, I'd like to hear them.

It might almost come down to "make something up yourself" if they're going for a house or something else on the small side. Figure out a price for the house, figure out with the players what they want to put in there for staffing and-or defenders, and take it case-by-case if and when they want to make renovations or expansions etc.

If they were going for a castle or keep or something else big then I'd point you to the 1e DMG which has pretty good rules for such.

 

[MarkB]

If it's an individual PC's stronghold, it shouldn't be messed with too much.

But if it's a stronghold or base for the whole party (which IMO is by far the better way to go with these things) then the players/PCs should have to give a thought to its defense as - being powerful hero types - they're going to have enemies and they're collectively giving those enemies a perfect target.

The problem being that the people recruited for your bastion aren't real characters with stat blocks and hit points. Bastion conflicts are resolved with a few simple rolls which determine how many of your defenders live or die.

 

[Lanefan]

Why? That's kind-of the selling point of this system - the player is creating this little world, and the stories of its inhabitants.

Their degree of control will still be limited, not by the DM but by chance - random events drawn on a stronghold turn can result in some of these NPCs coming or going.

But the player controls everything about those NPCs between when they arrive and when they leave?

That seems a bit much.

I mean, in the game I play in we as a company have a stronghold, and said stronghold currently has a standing NPC staff of about 30 people. None of us players control any of the staff; what they do-think-etc. is up to the DM. (edit to add: except when we give them instructions, which they usually carry out as best they can as they were in part hired for their loyalty)

A PC of mine also has her own house in town, with a standing staff of one and otherwise populated by her family; and both the NPC staffer and the family are DM-controlled NPCs...which makes sense when put against the adage "you can't choose your family".

 

[Not a Decepticon]

Why? That's kind-of the selling point of this system - the player is creating this little world, and the stories of its inhabitants.

When no other mechanics support this level of handing off the reins to players, it feels tacked on and serving to disempower the DM and not expand player options. And considering biggest complaint in 5e was already how DM is powerless to challenge the players in any way, taking power away from the DM is the opposite of what people asked for. It owuld be a different story if it was a game that has been expecting this kind of DM-Player collaboration in controlling and shaping the world, like Fellowship or Fabula Ultima. But 5e had clear divide of "Player controls their character, DM controls the world" that Bastions now want you to break just to give players a fancy new toy.

 

[Lanefan]

The problem being that the people recruited for your bastion aren't real characters with stat blocks and hit points. Bastion conflicts are resolved with a few simple rolls which determine how many of your defenders live or die.

Sorry, but everybody in the setting is a real character with a stat block and hit points, even if those stats and hit points etc. haven't been rolled or assigned yet and-or even if those stats etc. are extremely mundane.

That, and a wise party would probably make sure the people they hire to defend their stronghold have half a clue what they're doing (as in, that they have at least rudimentary skills at fighting or healing or some other useful defensive function) before hiring them.

 

[Hussar]

This is just a thinly veiled excuse to have a session where the Party spends the whole time interviewing quirky NPCs played by the DM! Which is prime Critical Role material! Can we ever escape the shadow of Matt Mercer??

IME the actual end result is nothing but frustration from the players as the constantly have to faff around with pointless minutiae on the off chance that this time the dm is screwing with them.

Which in turn means the players will reject these kinds of rules as a massive, pointless time sink monkey’s paw and will simply refuse to use them.

 

[MarkB]

Sorry, but everybody in the setting is a real character with a stat block and hit points, even if those stats and hit points etc. haven't been rolled or assigned yet and-or even if those stats etc. are extremely mundane.

That, and a wise party would probably make sure the people they hire to defend their stronghold have half a clue what they're doing (as in, that they have at least rudimentary skills at fighting or healing or some other useful defensive function) before hiring them.

Then I don't think this system is going to work for you. Which is fine - I don't think it's going to work for me either.

 

[Lanefan]

IME the actual end result is nothing but frustration from the players as the constantly have to faff around with pointless minutiae on the off chance that this time the dm is screwing with them.

Which in turn means the players will reject these kinds of rules as a massive, pointless time sink monkey’s paw and will simply refuse to use them.

Some players might.

Others might lean into this stuff hard.

Not everything in play has to be done at the speed of light.

 

[Arilyn]

The arena for conflict there is "who controls those NPCs". As in, sure the player can decide what kind of NPCs populate the bastion but the specific personalities, motivations, goals, etc. of those NPCs would, one thinks, remain within the purview of the DM.

Which ideally means the player is free to recruit some hirelings for the bastion but the DM is still free to, for example, make one of those hirelings a spy or thief or other form of nuisance.

The hirelings are really just board game meeples with no stats. Players can give then personalities, quirks and desires, except they can easily leave on a bastion event roll, totally unrelated to any personality the players gave them. And yes, there might be some criminalal hirelings, if the event roll comes up. And then it'll just be a random meeple. The Bastion event table was very small in UA. Hopefully it's much larger now because these tables need to be on a d100 roll to be interesting and cut down on repetitive results. In the UA, there isn't even a position for steward. If the Bastion is attacked, just another quickie dice roll. Once again, I don't know about current system, but in U A, all the bastion events happened when players weren't home.

Oh, and if you lose a room or some meeples, they just repair and new meeples reform. That's right, hirelings arrive, without actually being hired. You just don't get any benefits from that area for a turn. It is so abstract. Personally, I would not derive any interest in this at all. I don't see how this gives players a taste of game mastering.

 

[Yaarel]

The arena for conflict there is "who controls those NPCs". As in, sure the player can decide what kind of NPCs populate the bastion but the specific personalities, motivations, goals, etc. of those NPCs would, one thinks, remain within the purview of the DM.

Which ideally means the player is free to recruit some hirelings for the bastion but the DM is still free to, for example, make one of those hirelings a spy or thief or other form of nuisance.

There is no conflict because the player creates and plays all of the bastion characters. While these bastion characters lack a full character sheet, they are a simple form of player characters.