Where does one find stronghold rules in TSR/WOTC products?

[Lancelot]

D&D Rules Cyclopedia (i.e. Basic/Expert/Companions/Masters D&D).

In my opinion, the simplest and best rules to date in any D&D version for: 1) building a stronghold; 2) staffing it with troops and retainers; 3) establishing a dominion (incl. resources, population growth, taxation, etc); and 4) generating dominion events (such as natural disasters, banditry, etc).

Also of note are the War Machine rules included in that book, which are still one of the most elegant and comprehensive ways of running mass battles. They include tactical and heroic elements, all types of troop factors (training, equipment, special abilities), and have additional rules for situations like sieges.

 

[loseth]

D&D Rules Cyclopedia (i.e. Basic/Expert/Companions/Masters D&D).

Those are the Companion and Master sets I mentioned in my opening post.

 

[loseth]

Thanks for all the recommendations guys.

I've managed to find a public domain version of the 2e Castles guide (WOTC released it to the public domain sans art, but it's the text I'm after anyway).

I've got Magical Medieval Society, and like it very much, though the one thing that bothers me is the odd mix of massive oversimplification and high detail. I don't mind one or the other, but the two mixed together don't sit right with me. Even so, I think it's an excellent product.

The last thing I'm wavering on is purchasing either the Strognhold Builder's Guidebook, or Mongoose's version thereof (Strongholds and Dynasties, I think it's called). My remaining fears are that these books will A) have a system where detailed planning and book-keeping is required and/or B) focus entirely on the stronghold as a military structure to be defended from a DM who throws constant enemies at it, rather than as a source of income and personal power & prestige. Are my fears justified?

 

[Blackrat]

I seem to recall that Sword and Fist had some stronghold rules in it as well, didn't it?

Yeah. In the end of the book there was few ready strongholds with costs to build them.

 

[Psion]

"Stronghold Builders Guidebook" was one of my least favorite 3.0 books.

Mine as well. I was put off buying several books after the release of SBG, fearing it a sign of product quality drop off in 3e.

There's a third party stronghold book by Mongoose that some might consider as an alternative. (It didn't do much for me, but then, I'm not all that interested in the topic.)

 

[Delta]

Cheers Delta. Does the 1e DMG give any mechanics for running/building a stronghold, or just for how many followers you get and how much you have to pay various employees?

Admittedly the rules are a bit lightweight. The 1E AD&D DMG section on "Construction & Siege" (p. 106-110) is purely about building times & costs, siege engines, and how to damage constructions (in "defensive points"). There's a separate section on "Territory Development by Player Characters" (p. 93-94) which is mostly about physically exploring, encountering, and ejecting monsters on a 1 mile-per-hex scale. It's definitely presumed that the DM fills in all the larger-scale details himself. (The only thing about finances is way back in the PHB under the Fighter class description where it says they get 7 silver per inhabitant each month if they run a stronghold. That's it.)

Truthfully, I've never seen stronghold rules that fully satisfied me. My attitude is that they need to be a concise and cohesive game in their own right, and I've never seen that done properly. (Example: I ran PC strongholds with the Companion rules once, but in practice it's totally unbalanced and creates an overwhelming flood of gold coming at the PCs every month.)

Anyone ever played the PC D&D game "Stronghold"? Boy, I thought that rocked at the time. If there was a set of pen-and-paper rules that recreated that I always thought I'd be all over it. There was also the "Fantasy Empires" game set in the basic Known World which was pretty sweet. I've always been on the lookout for a really concise well-balanced set of stronghold rules (among other things).

 

[jgbrowning]

I've got Magical Medieval Society, and like it very much, though the one thing that bothers me is the odd mix of massive oversimplification and high detail. I don't mind one or the other, but the two mixed together don't sit right with me. Even so, I think it's an excellent product.

I really like that quote! Something about it is just making me laugh. Probably because it's right. MMS:WE is more and less than what I wanted, as well.

What can I say? My head is one massive oversimplification coupled with high detail.



joe b.

 

[Claudius Gaius]

Wards Major

Well, that seems to be most of the TSR/WOTC stuff that I can think of except for the (extremely abstract) stuff in the Birthright rules (at least most of its been released for free download). There's lots of third-party stuff of course. Way of the Daimyo for Legend of the Five Rings d20 has a reasonably useful section. There are a few items for building and a section on building enchantments in The Practical Enchanter (shareware version linked in the Sig). Outside of d20, the original Marvel Superheroes game had an interesting approach, in that you just bought "packages" of things for your base, but it would take an awful lot of adapting. Champions has base rules of course; that would have the interesting approach of making a base sort of a character feature. I suppose you could simply award so many points to put into a base per Feat expended. Outside of that, I can't think of much that hasn't been mentioned already.

 

[Wik]

Pathfinder #3 also has a bit on maintaining Strongholds, but not really about building them.

 

[Pale Master]

I've been over this ground a bit myself. I favor baronies or small fiefdoms for characters -not JUST a castle, but also not an entire country. I don't know what level of detail you may be looking for but here's my two coppers on the books I own:

Stronghold Builders Guide was one of my favorite D&D 3.0 books. It gives a lot of options for a PC stronghold builder but it doesn't focus on the realm-management aspects or accounting. I would use this book if I wanted to build a house or manor, especially if it had a lot of magical acoutrements. (Or if it was a flying or underwater stronghold). It also has templates and descriptions of typical rooms and layouts, which is handy for those who don't know everything there is to know about medieval fantasy architectural conventions.

Strongholds & Dynasties (which is third party, so may not meet your criteria) puts less emphasis on magic use in stronghold construction and magical enhancements to the stronghold. The Dynasty system is focused more on a small kingdom (multiple fiefdoms / provinces).

Birthright was a more abstract approach to ruling a "domain" which some may prefer. Also interesting because it divides between religious, magical, economic ("guild"), and law holdings. However the domain system could be almost a game in itself, and of course the system resembles nothing in 3e. I highly recommend the Book of Regency even if you don't use the birthright system - it was available at one time as a free download, and may still be. Try googling birthright book of regency.

Magical Medieval Society (also third party) provides a good system for running a very specific type of smallholding (an agricultural, western-european style fief), but the amount of detail may be too much for some. Also despite the term "magical medieval" the focus is more on the latter (it is, to my mind, more like history with a thin veneer or magic, unlike, say, Ptolus, which is a more "integrated" scheme). However anyone trying to run anything other than a western european-style manor will be left out in the cold (okay, so this is the income for barley and this is the income from rye - what if I want to run a fishing village?)

Way of the Daimyo is nice but very setting-specific. It assumes Rokugani social system and economy, which is great if you're running a Rokugan game, otherwise, not. The differences are least apparent for military lords and most apparent for arcane casters. (It would be an excellent resource for a monk PC stronghold builder, though).

Castle Guide almost completely ignores the role of magic and is of very little use in terms of ruling a domain.

So I recommend the Stronghold Builder's guidebook without reservations. The others will depend upon how macro you want your approach to be & how big of a domain you plan on running.