Ondath
Hero
Hey all!
This is something that's been bugging me for a while, but I crunched the numbers only recently so I'm hoping to get feedback — either from those who use the A5E rules, or hopefully the ones who designed the Stronghold rules themselves!
Thing is, there is a clear discrepancy between Rural Strongholds and Buildings when it comes to bang for your buck, and I'm not sure if this was intentional. I made a thread about it way back in July, but I got tumbleweeds in response, so hopefully the discussion can be slightly more lively now that I can contribute something to the table.
If You Go Rural, You're Getting Scammed
So, when you build a Stronghold in Level Up, the costs depend on the stronghold's size. For Buildings, each square foot of building costs 1 gp. For Rural Strongholds, each acre costs 500 gp. For prices in the middle, paying the same amount of gold gives you a Stronghold of equal Grade: 500 gold qualifies either for a Grade 1 Building a Grade 1 Rural Stronghold, 7500 gold for a Grade 3 Building or a Grade 3 Rural Stronghold, etc...
But, at the highest and lowest costs for each Grade, Rural Strongholds are simply a bad bargain. Take the Stronghold pricing table in Adventurer's Guide (as well as the a5e.tools website, here), flip the scale so that it shows not Stronghold area but Stronghold cost thresholds for each Grade, and the pattern becomes obvious:
In each bolded price point, Rural Strongholds give you less for more. Some of this is due to the 500-gold increments, but most of it is not: 2500 gp gives you a mid-sized Grade 2 Building, but for Rural Strongholds it stays at Grade 1. 28000 gold pieces would get you a Grade 5 Building, but only a Grade 4 Rural Stronghold, and 55000 gp gets you a Grade 6 Building while the Rural Stronghold still lags at Grade 5.
This goes beyond the base pricing, too. Rural Strongholds also get fewer staff members when they increase their Furnishing and Staff quality.
Is This Intentional?
Given the evident pattern where Rural Strongholds need to pay more both for their base construction and for their furshing and staff, I can't help but wonder if this was a conscious choice. Maybe a simulationist decision made to represent the difficulty of maintaining an open area compared to plopping a building inside a city. Maybe a game design concern in order to balance the stronger features of Rural Strongholds. However, I see nothing that points to these:
A Fix?
Going with the assumption that Rural Strongholds were not supposed to be pricier than Buildings, we can easily correct this error. Here are two alternative tables assuming that Buildings and Rural Strongholds should cost exactly the same in each regard:
Table 1: Rural Stronghold Size
Table 2: Rural Stronghold Furnishings by Staff
There we go! A lot of pontificating for a minor quibble with Level Up's rules. What do you think? Does it make sense to make Rural Strongholds in line with Buildings? Or is there an obvious reason for making Rural Strongholds more expensive that I'm missing?
This is something that's been bugging me for a while, but I crunched the numbers only recently so I'm hoping to get feedback — either from those who use the A5E rules, or hopefully the ones who designed the Stronghold rules themselves!
Thing is, there is a clear discrepancy between Rural Strongholds and Buildings when it comes to bang for your buck, and I'm not sure if this was intentional. I made a thread about it way back in July, but I got tumbleweeds in response, so hopefully the discussion can be slightly more lively now that I can contribute something to the table.
If You Go Rural, You're Getting Scammed
So, when you build a Stronghold in Level Up, the costs depend on the stronghold's size. For Buildings, each square foot of building costs 1 gp. For Rural Strongholds, each acre costs 500 gp. For prices in the middle, paying the same amount of gold gives you a Stronghold of equal Grade: 500 gold qualifies either for a Grade 1 Building a Grade 1 Rural Stronghold, 7500 gold for a Grade 3 Building or a Grade 3 Rural Stronghold, etc...
But, at the highest and lowest costs for each Grade, Rural Strongholds are simply a bad bargain. Take the Stronghold pricing table in Adventurer's Guide (as well as the a5e.tools website, here), flip the scale so that it shows not Stronghold area but Stronghold cost thresholds for each Grade, and the pattern becomes obvious:
| Grade | Building Price | Rural Stronghold Price |
| 1 | 100-1000 gp | 500-2500 gp |
| 2 | 1001-5000 gp | 3000-5000 gp |
| 3 | 5001-10000 gp | 5500-10000 gp |
| 4 | 10001-25000 gp | 10500-30000 gp |
| 5 | 25001-50000 gp | 30500-60000 gp |
| 6 | 50001-100000 gp | 60500-125000 gp |
| 7 | 100001-250000 gp | 125500-300000 gp |
| 8 | 250001+ gp | 300000+ gp |
In each bolded price point, Rural Strongholds give you less for more. Some of this is due to the 500-gold increments, but most of it is not: 2500 gp gives you a mid-sized Grade 2 Building, but for Rural Strongholds it stays at Grade 1. 28000 gold pieces would get you a Grade 5 Building, but only a Grade 4 Rural Stronghold, and 55000 gp gets you a Grade 6 Building while the Rural Stronghold still lags at Grade 5.
This goes beyond the base pricing, too. Rural Strongholds also get fewer staff members when they increase their Furnishing and Staff quality.
Is This Intentional?
Given the evident pattern where Rural Strongholds need to pay more both for their base construction and for their furshing and staff, I can't help but wonder if this was a conscious choice. Maybe a simulationist decision made to represent the difficulty of maintaining an open area compared to plopping a building inside a city. Maybe a game design concern in order to balance the stronger features of Rural Strongholds. However, I see nothing that points to these:
- If this were a simulation/flavour decision, I imagine there would be some reasoning given in the section on Strongholds that explained the price discrepancy within the game universe's rules. Something like "Unlike obtaining the lease for a small building inside a city and building your Stronghold there, maintaining a large swath of land as your Stronghold is costly. This is why PCs planning to build Rural Strongholds should be prepared to pay a higher premium." But no such text is in the Strongholds section.
- The reason I doubt it's a balance decision is the fact that some Strongholds can be either Rural or a Building. This means you can get the benefits of say, a Menagerie, in either form. In such a case, Building it as a Building is the obvious superior option, and if balance were of concern, the Rural version of a Menagerie would probably give some benefit to offset this. Furthermore, other, Rural-only Strongholds (such as Farms or Encampments) don't seem to provide anything superior to Buildings of similar Grade to justify an increased cost.
A Fix?
Going with the assumption that Rural Strongholds were not supposed to be pricier than Buildings, we can easily correct this error. Here are two alternative tables assuming that Buildings and Rural Strongholds should cost exactly the same in each regard:
Table 1: Rural Stronghold Size
| Grade | Rural Area (cost = 500 gp/acre) |
| 1 | 1-2 acres |
| 2 | 3-10 acres |
| 3 | 11-20 acres |
| 4 | 21-50 acres |
| 5 | 51-100 acres |
| 6 | 101-200 acres |
| 7 | 201-500 acres |
| 8 | 501+ acres |
Table 2: Rural Stronghold Furnishings by Staff
| Quality | Staff by Rural Stronghold Size |
| Frugal | 1 per 2 acres |
| Average | 1 per acre |
| Luxurious | 5 per acre |
| Legendary | 5 per acre |
There we go! A lot of pontificating for a minor quibble with Level Up's rules. What do you think? Does it make sense to make Rural Strongholds in line with Buildings? Or is there an obvious reason for making Rural Strongholds more expensive that I'm missing?
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