Level Up (A5E) Clarifications on Strongholds and Followers

[lichmaster]

So I finally finished reading this part. In general it's quite clear, but there are quite a few things on which I need some clarifications

• Is the surface just the plant area independent of the number of layers/stories, or should I divide it? Eg if I want a 2 stories house with 2500ft plant area, should I buy 2500ft or 5000ft?
• Who benefits from the ASI and features of a stronghold? The text is quite vague here, as it says that there's only one deed, but then it says that other characters might benefit from the features (with the example of the training hall). Is this left at the Narrator's interpretation?
• You cannot benefit from multiple strongholds for the ASI benefit. Can you gain benefit from the other features with multiple strongholds, though?
• Broken Bottle Tavern: it's 4000ft^2 surface, and average quality (x1), but somehow manages to cost 8000gp. Is this a typo?
• In general the multiplier for Luxurious or Legendary is 1staff/100ft^2, which means 1 person every 2x2 squares on a battle map. This seems ridiculously overcrowded to me. Am I misunderstanding something?

Regarding followers:

• they are supposed to stay in the background and can die with a single hit, so the idea is that basically they do not exist during combat. But how should I deal with them when the party has particular vehicles or mounts, or can fly/teleport? Should this be presented as a logistical problem for the party to handle, or just handwaived? What about supplies? What if the party goes to some elemental plane or Hell, a place so inhospitable to be nearly unlivable and that could cause damage over time if one is not protected? Would followers die?
• If a party hires a smith, does it mean that every weapon gains +1 damage, or only 1 character? Same for Squire, ministrel, etc.

 

[Morrus]

Yikes that's a lot of questions. Here goes....

So I finally finished reading this part. In general it's quite clear, but there are quite a few things on which I need some clarifications

• Is the surface just the plant area independent of the number of layers/stories, or should I divide it? Eg if I want a 2 stories house with 2500ft plant area, should I buy 2500ft or 5000ft?

The square footage is just like when you buy a house in the real world. Basically it would be the total of all the rooms, etc.

• Who benefits from the ASI and features of a stronghold? The text is quite vague here, as it says that there's only one deed, but then it says that other characters might benefit from the features (with the example of the training hall). Is this left at the Narrator's interpretation?

Only the owner benefits from the ASI. The features can vary, and it says so in the feature who can also benefit.

• You cannot benefit from multiple strongholds for the ASI benefit. Can you gain benefit from the other features with multiple strongholds, though?

Yes, cannot benefit from the ASI. Nothing there stops you benefiting from features.

• Broken Bottle Tavern: it's 4000ft^2 surface, and average quality (x1), but somehow manages to cost 8000gp. Is this a typo?

I'd have to look it up and do maths, so can't answer that quickly on my phone now. Will check in later.

Edit -- it says 8000 sq feet on my copy. So it should be 8000gp.

• In general the multiplier for Luxurious or Legendary is 1staff/100ft^2, which means 1 person every 2x2 squares on a battle map. This seems ridiculously overcrowded to me. Am I misunderstanding something?

I'd have to check, but I'll bet that supposed to be ft-squared not square feet.

Regarding followers:

• they are supposed to stay in the background and can die with a single hit, so the idea is that basically they do not exist during combat. But how should I deal with them when the party has particular vehicles or mounts, or can fly/teleport? Should this be presented as a logistical problem for the party to handle, or just handwaived? What about supplies? What if the party goes to some elemental plane or Hell, a place so inhospitable to be nearly unlivable and that could cause damage over time if one is not protected? Would followers die?

You'd count them in a vehicle, and you'd have to protect them in inhospitable environments. They still count as a creature, and can still die. But no, you won't micromanage them during combat.

• If a party hires a smith, does it mean that every weapon gains +1 damage, or only 1 character? Same for Squire, ministrel, etc.

The party doesn't hire a smith, a character does.

 

[lichmaster]

Thank you @Morrus for your detailed reply! Much appreciated! So:

Yikes that's a lot of questions. Here goes....

Yes, I know, I condensed them as much as I could

The square footage is just like when you buy a house in the real world. Basically it would be the total of all the rooms, etc.

Ok, so you buy an amount of ft^2 and then decide how to arrange them, eventually in multiple stories.

I'd have to look it up and do maths, so can't answer that quickly on my phone now. Will check in later.

Edit -- it says 8000 sq feet on my copy. So it should be 8000gp.

Sorry, I rechecked and my copy says the opposite of what I wrote: it's 8000ft^2 but costs 4000gp. It should be frugal quality but it is reported as average.

I'd have to check, but I'll bet that supposed to be ft-squared not square feet.

Sorry, I'm used to the metric system so the Imperial units conversion I did could be wrong.
But as I understand 1 sqft is 1ft*1ft, or 1ft^2. So a single 5ft square on a battlemap has a surface of 5*5=25ft^2. Thus 100ft^2 is 2x2 squares.
If my conversion is right and the multiplier is 1 person every 100ft^2, it seems to give very crowded strongholds. Otherwise there's an error either in my conversion or the multiplier is wrong.

You'd count them in a vehicle, and you'd have to protect them in inhospitable environments. They still count as a creature, and can still die. But no, you won't micromanage them during combat.

Ok, so no handwaiving. They'll have to have their own vehicle (to be bought by the PCs), protection, etc.

The party doesn't hire a smith, a character does.

Ok, so all the benefits go to the character that hires them, unless it's specifically stated otherwise (like for the seasoned cook)

 

[Stone Dog]

I understand that only the owner of the stronghold gets ASI from it, but I assume that sub-strongholds might be able to "belong" to other characters?

Say the Marshall owns the castle as a whole, but could the Cleric have the Temple attached to it?

 

[Morrus]

I understand that only the owner of the stronghold gets ASI from it, but I assume that sub-strongholds might be able to "belong" to other characters?

Say the Marshall owns the castle as a whole, but could the Cleric have the Temple attached to it?

There aren’t any rules about the location of strongholds with respect to each other. If you want to configure two characters’ strongholds so one is ‘inside’ the other, that’s fine.

 

[Faolyn]

I understand that only the owner of the stronghold gets ASI from it, but I assume that sub-strongholds might be able to "belong" to other characters?

Say the Marshall owns the castle as a whole, but could the Cleric have the Temple attached to it?

I'd guess that's more a case of there actually being two strongholds, rather than one stronghold with a sub-stronghold. That's how I'd do it, at any rate.

So, if the castle was, say, 90,000f^2 and a temple was 20,000f^2, it would count as one level 6 stronghold and one level 4 stronghold, not as a single level 7 stronghold.

 

[Stone Dog]

So as an example, Robin Hood and Friar Tuck can both be PCs, but Sherwood Forest is Robin Hood's Stronghold even if they put a church in it for Friar Tuck to do services in. Friar Tuck would need to build his own church to get stronghold benefits and if that happens to be in Sherwood Forest it doesn't interact with Robin Hood's stronghold.

 

[peivolrivas]

Hi there Morrus!
I feel kind of silly asking about the answer about the staff ratio per square feet, but as lichmaster I'm not used to the imperial system and I get lost with this answer:

• In general the multiplier for Luxurious or Legendary is 1staff/100ft^2, which means 1 person every 2x2 squares on a battle map. This seems ridiculously overcrowded to me. Am I misunderstanding something?

I'd have to check, but I'll bet that supposed to be ft-squared not square feet.

I don't get the difference between ft-squared and square feet.

Besides that, I agree with lichmaster, for me it feels like a lot of people per surface.
That leads me to another question, Is there any problem to have a reduced staff for your stronghold?
I'm designing a Laboratory of 2.000 sqf that should have luxury quality and thus about 20 staff. It seems a lot of people calling this place home for such area...

Thanks in advance!

 

[Sword of Spirit]

I'm designing a Laboratory of 2.000 sqf that should have luxury quality and thus about 20 staff. It seems a lot of people calling this place home for such area...

Yeah, 20 people for a 45 x 45 room seems pretty crazy packed.

 

[johna_thr33]

Yeah, 20 people for a 45 x 45 room seems pretty crazy packed.

10 ft^2 is roughly the size of a standard bedroom, so if you split up the space into equal, but individual rooms, each staff member would get an entire bedroom’s worth of space to themselves.

For further context: the average commercial kitchen is roughly 1,000 square feet, and that restaurant might have as few as 6, or as many as 20 staff (not counting servers) in the back of house depending on type of restaurant and how much business they do