D&D 5E How do you do Bastions?

[Horwath]

If it's a coastal or island hopping campaign, then a large ship would be great as bastion and mobile power center.
Like PeE2: Deadfire

 

[Shiroiken]

My next campaign is going to be 2024, and I'm expecting to use the bastion system. The general assumption of the campaign is that they're going to work for a faction in the Free City of Greyhawk (I have a couple in mind), and I'm figuring the party will be given the bastion by the faction as a reward. They'll share the bastion, with each player getting their own section, but what it looks like will greatly depend on which faction they work for.

 

[Tonguez]

My biggest need is more random events and/or tables for the Bastion turns!

with AI generating random events its pretty easy to get customised tables now

 

[Shades of Eternity]

when it comes to building games, I usually end up cribbing from one of my favorite computer games: Master of Magic.

Not only is it a build-a-town game, but it has so many events that it would be interesting to see what could be scaled down to the bastion level.

 

[Piperken]

In the past, I've let players build a base or modify a structure they've cleaned out. This can happen at any time, depending on the group's wishes and money. They have always build a joint structure.

All I want from a Bastion system is a sample list of costs and some ideas and costs for more extraordinary additions, like an alchemy lab or strange mushroom garden. I prefer it grow naturally from the fiction. And that event table should be huge, full of interesting, mundane and weird. The GM should also tailor it according to the stronghold and its location.

I thoroughly dislike the WotC Bastion system. It's too abstract, mechanistic and just plain boring.

I found I quite liked how Castle Gyllencreutz works in Vaesen. I took inspo from that for the Dragon Heist campaign I'm running.

e.g. If the party manages to upgrade their privies, they receive a bonus to gather information at their bastion, because customers are more willing to stay longer at a drinking spot that doesn't require them to leave to go in a ditch, or an outhouse outside.

 

[Uni-the-Unicorn!]

At first glance: I don't much care for how they work the event system; and I'm a bit skeptical or at least iffy on the prospect of PCs receiving bastions without at least SOME level of baseline personal cost or time investment. But the power level seems appropriate and the simplicity of the system seems pretty good for an initial foray into personal stronghold building. Nothing that can't be tweaked to personal taste.

Waiting to see how well they function in (prolonged) play.

Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I believe there is a cost requirement for A bastion. I haven’t looked at the official rules in detail, but there was definitely a cost in the play test rules.

 

[MNblockhead]

Other than a brief glance when skimming through the new DMG, I'm not yet familiar with, and haven't used, the new Bastion system.

But in my last D&D campaign, I used MCDM's Strongholds and Followers, which I thought gave rules with the right level of crunch and interesting, but not gamebreaking, abilities tied to the PCs' strongholds.

This was in a 5 year Rappan Athuk campaign where I used GP for XP. It gave them something to spend money on, tied them to the location, and made them more invested into to campaign. It started with them clearing out goblins from an old crumbling castle that one of the party members had rights of inheritance to. I just used the rules in the campaign book for the cost of fixing it up, but then used the Strongholds & Followers rules for them to build it out and for each PC to build their own place in or near the castle. "Stronghold" in S&F is just used as a general base of operations. So, the castle was the ranger's "keep", the cleric had a temple, the rogue has an "establishment", the wizard a "tower", etc.

As they increased in the level a town began to form around the area.

What also made it work well is that I also homebrewed a faction and reputation system in integrated politics from the borderland provinces where they were located.

While the adventure was primarily a mega-dungeon crawl, the strongholds and town became the glue of the campaign.

But this is the only campaign I've done this with. Other campaigns are more wide ranging. It all depends on the setting and the type of adventures I'll be running. In my current campaign, if the players wanted bastions, I would have to have a conversation about the type of campaign that they want to play, scrap the current one, and either start from scratch with a new campaign, or keep with the current PCs and make a campaign based around a specific region.

 

[Sulicius]

How would you do Bastions?

The most important thing for a DM is to build the campaign around the concept of the players returning to their bastion often. If you don't prepare for this, the system won't work as intended.

I have been running a bastion based on the playtest rules for about a year and they work really well. Important to note: our bastion is on a ship, sailing in the MTG setting of Ixalan.

What are your underlying assumptions of what they should do?

It should give the players a clear and easy way to build their base as they see fit, with utility. Note that I don't really care for the gold coming in or going out.

Would it be an individual or group location and why?

I prefer group location, because I think it works better narratively. In my coming Sigil campaign, I might actually give the players the option to have individual locations.

How do you use it to drive stories?

For the bastion on a ship I am running, it is their transport. The stories come from the hirelings, which I run as a DM, so there are lots of little low-stake conflicts between the crew.

What should it do?

Same question as earlier? But it should give me a lightweight system I can tinker with. I prefer something simple that works over something complicated that might be better.

Should they be portable and how? (I don't know about you, but I'd save up good money for my own Baba Yaga's dancing hut).

Should? Maybe. I did it, and it's fun!

What I like is that the mechanicst only really happen once every couple of sessions, and there is no micromanagement. I still attack the bastion from within and without, so I ignore any notion that it's "hands off" for the DM. My players really enjoy having their own space and hirelings they can build relationships with.

For what it is, it works really well this way.

 

[jayoungr]

Why? I mean why is there vitriol towards bastions at all not why are you curious.

The only complaints I've seen/heard are about the "DM is not allowed to attack or destroy the bastion" part of the rules.

 

[MGibster]

The only complaints I've seen/heard are about the "DM is not allowed to attack or destroy the bastion" part of the rules.

I've looked, but I'm missing that rule.

Most importantly, a Bastion is a creative playground for a player and a shared storytelling space in the campaign. Be as permissive as you can with the stories players tell in their Bastions, but players should know their control might be limited by the campaign's larger story, which you strive to make fun for everyone.

I'm not going to set out to kick over a player's sandcastle, but if their Bastion is located in a city that's sacked by invaders, well, that's the campaign and their Bastion is going to be sacked unless they're able to prevent that somehow.