Adventure 2 Recap., Part 2

So, here's the adventure I'd planned:

The first section went according to plan: the PCs bit the hooks I'd laid out for them and made very interesting arrangements to travel first to Sharn, then to Stormhome.  They hit all of the encounters I'd planned: mysterious shadow-marked assassins, lots of Emerald Claw, a bit brutal bar-fight.

On the train to Stormhome, I had prepared for them to try and jump the Silver Flame team.  If that'd happened, I had planned on trying to put an end to the fight or call a truce: after all, their leader is just as much a Lawful Good Paladin as Oargev and doesn't want to see anyone dead over some artifact, but I knew that a few of the PCs REALLY hate Thrane.  They didn't go for the fight even a little bit.  I had planned for this, and the encounter wasn't essential.

Here is where things broke down: On the trip to the Frostfell, after encountering the hired griffon-riding Shadow elves, the Airship was supposed to crash on the shores of the Demon Wastes after one of the saboteurs managed to place explosives on the elemental binding struts.  Then the PCs were going to need to fight off sahuagin on the shoreline, venture into the wastes and encounter the Plague Clans while trying to find a fire elemental to rebind to the ship, and hold off both the Sahuagin and Clans while repairs were being made, all the while giving both the Emerald Claw and the SIlver Flame a chance to catch up.  

My PCs were FAR too effective at keeping the saboteurs from blowing up the ship.  That's when I decided to introduce the Fernia Manifest zone...and the PCs basically tackled that with insane skill checks.  I wasn't about to just swat them out of the sky for no reason, and between the new PC who dramatically changed fight dynamics (Elf Essentials Ranger Controller) and the party's focus on skills after Kingdom Building, I didn't manage to challenge them enough.

The original plan was for them to, fairly easily, make it from there to the Frostfell, getting there first, and making their way across a fairly desolate waste with maybe one Frostfell encounter, to help set the stage (the Yeti and Mammoths encounter I ran).  Once they got to the Temple, they were supposed to be caught up with by the Silver Flame adventurers.  There was going to be a likely fight there that would, again, be called off, with both parties hopefully agreeing to take different paths through the Temple and see who got the stone.  The idea was that the Silver Flame would get the stone moments ahead of the PCs, but that the Cardinal in their party would take the stone, give in to the power it represents, and command his crew to kill all of the PCs.  The Paladin was going to turn against the Cardinal and be struck down for in, badly wounded.  I was going to give the PCs a chance to save an enemy, and in doing so, make a VERY powerful friend down the road (Like I said, the Paladin's name was Sir Jared Daron. He has a young daughter.)  

With the PCs getting to the Frostfell so quickly, I had to call an audible.  I crashed their ship once they got to the Frostfell.  I added Frostfell encounters.  I decided to slow them down by encouraging them to find a Fire Elemental in the temple in addition to the Heart of Flame.  Since they were going to be dealing with ALL of the Temple guardians, I figured it would take them longer, and all I needed was one or two extended rests and the Silver Flame could find them in the temple.  

They never rested, they got lucky in choosing their path in the temple and found the Heart of Flame and got out,

Originally, my plan was for the PCs (and maybe the Paladin, Sir Jared) to get back to the airship only to find their ships captured by the Order of the Emerald claw.  There they would have to free the ships and get back home, flying home with no incident.

If the PCs were far outstripping the Silver Flame, the Order of the Emerald Claw had no business up here.  I decided to force the Silver Flame encounter while the PCs were headed back to their ship, but again, my PCs took every opportunity to conceal themselves, and there was no reasonable way for them to be found by the Flame, short of DM fiat, which I hate to use.

So I just added some air-encounters on the way back to Cyre, to reinforce to them that, nabbing a major artifact under the noses of Thrane and the Order of the Emerald Claw is SERIOUS BUSINESS.

Despite my abysmal planning, I think everyone had fun and is enjoying their international rockstar status.  That's what it's all about, right?

At least I still have a team of Silver Flame adventurers to foil my PCs in the future.  

Bonus Material:

My key NPCs are generally inspired by lots of different sources.  The Silver Flame team's inspirations: 

-Daniel Dravot and Peachy Carnehan from Kipling's The Man Who Would Be King (Cardinal Dravot, Silver Invoker and "Apples" Carnehan, halfling assassin)

-Thomas of Hookton from Cornwell's The Archer's Tale (Thomas ir'Hoekton, Thrannish Expert Archer)

-Jackson "Grimjack" Grimwood from our most recent Forgotton Realms Campaign (Jack, a Brute)

-Prince Oargev if he'd been raised in Thrane, and was a few years older. (Sir Jared Daran)

Adventure 2 Recap., Part 1

Last week my PCs completed their second adventure, taking them from level 4 to level 8.  I made some huge DMing mistakes on planning this adventure, and I hope writing about them will help me remember NOT to do the same thing again.

A brief summary of the adventure as it happened: Prince Oargev and the Heart of Flame
The PCs found out about two fortuitous opportunities both taking place in the next month.  First, House Thuranni was selling maps and notes that led to an ancient temple that contained an artifact of amazing, pure magic called the Heart of Flame.  They would sell copies of this information to any and all comers.  Later in the month, House Lyrandar was quietly looking for an impressive expedition to hire out their first for-hire airship expedition.  They specified that they wanted high-profile passengers on a mission of impressive scope.

The PCs decided to take the train, incognito, to Sharn to purchase the information.  While there they discovered that both the Silver Flame and the Order of the Emeral Claw were trying to get their hands on the documents.  They'd already missed the Silver Flame, but they actually arrived at the bar where the contact was selling the info while the Emerald Claw representatives were inside, purchasing.  They killed the Emerald Claw guards waiting outside the bar, they were drawn into a bar fight, which they used as an excuse to take out the Emerald Claw guards inside the bar.  They then let the Emerald claw commander and his bodyguards walk out of the bar, with the info as they went in and bought the info themselves.  On their way out, they were attacked by the remaining Emerald Claw operative, and managed to defeat them, though one messenger got away with the expedition information

They then took the train to Stormhome, the Lyrandar base.  On the Train, they discovered that they shared both destination and goals with a group of Thrannish adventurers, led Sir Jared Daran and Cardinal Dravot.  The Silver FLame party thought they would stand a good chance in hiring the Airship because Sir Daran was the grandson of a much beloved Keeper of the Flame, and Dravot was an up-and-coming Cardinal.  Since Oargev was in disguise, the PCs said their best claim was that they had Istav, the Prince's cousin.  Istav and Sir Daran came to the agreement not to fight it out on the train, and to be adversaries in the pursuit of the Heart of Flame, but whatever happened, to make sure one of their two nations received the Heart, NOT the Order of the Emerald Claw and Karrnath.  The PCs at Stormhome successfully negotiated the rights to the ship and convinced Lyrandar to sneak off without immediately informing the other parties of their departure, giving them a head start.  They sent a best wishes bottle of alcohol to Sir Daran, who, I think, they legitimately liked.

They decide to take, not the quickest route, which would have taken them directly over the capitol of the Demon Wastes, but the next quickest, which skirts the Wastes for a while and then heads north to the frozen isles south of the Frostfell, their destination.  Along the way they fought off Griffon-riding elves with strange shadow abilities who tried to sabotage the ship, they tracked a huge Fire Manifest Zone that, had they entered, would have empowered their Fire Elemental, allowing it to break free, they discovered a mole on board who was sending updates to the Emerald Claw on the ship's location, and finally, they fought against creatures of elemental ice that disrupted their fire ring and caused the ship to crash on the shores of the Frostfell.

The PCs lost no time marching directly to the temple (along the way fighting more ice creatures and a yeti mammoth hunting party), and then rapidly finding their way to the guardian of the Heart of Flame, obtaining the gem, and getting the heck back to the ship.  They stopped for nothing--they didn't even finish exploring the temple.  On their way back to the ship they saw, and hid from, the Silver Flame expedition, having just arrived by boat, making their way to the temple.  They escaped on their repaired ship and flew over Aundair and Breland to arrive directly in Thrane.  Along the way, shadow elves tried to infiltrate their ship once more and Talenta Halfling mercenaries attacked them just out of Metrol.  They arrived vistorious, national heroes.

More Prophetic Poetry

Work is totally eating my face right now.  I'd planned on writing a detailed post-mortem on the campaign's second adventure, which ended last night, but that's not going to happen.

Instead I'll leave you with two more poems of prophecy that are dropping hints at the events that will lead to the Mourning.

Beasts
In the forests of our mighty land
Ran deer, flew birds, stalked wolves, and swam the fish.
More things exist than e’er we’ll understand
And if we understood, well might we wish
To unremember things that we have learned
For there are things no man was meant to know.
But things once seen into our minds are burned
And force us, our innocence, outgrow.
Seek not the secrets locked behind the trees.
Seek not to know the things that nature’s hid.
For seekers will be brought unto their knees
For seeking that which nature has forbid.
But in these days no nature can be found
When forests stand on curséd, mourning ground.

Moons
Above our heads the windows to the planes
Look down and teach us things we’ve not been shown..
Amidst this nation’s trials and campaigns,
They offer comfort that we are not alone.
When we look to Siberys above,
Lighting up the clear and darkling sky,
We see the source of flame, and war, and love,
A home for beasts, for dreams, and those who die.
Even when all allies leave our side
And enemies surround on every shore,
Above is where our allies all reside
And with their guidance we’ll win every war.
The night they turn their faces from our land
Will mark the night our end is close at hand.

My Dungeons and Dragons Edition

Time to put up my list of things I'd like to see in Dungeons and Dragons Next.  A few notes on my D&D background: My 2nd ed. experience is limited to extensive play of the Balder's Gate computer games. I jumped in with both feet on day 1 of 3rd edition during my freshman year of college and played it avidly up until the release of 4th edition.  I played 4th edition from day 1 as well, and still do.  Pathfinder never interested me in the least.  I've also spent a good amount of time playing Mutants and Masterminds 2nd Ed, Iron Heroes, and Star Wars Saga edition.

I know these are all my opinions.  By all means, disagree!

Section 1: Things 4ed does well, I'd like see to maintained.

• Teams:  In 3rd edition I rarely had to pay much attention to what my teammates were doing to be super-effective.  In 4th edition, the better I know my team, the better we are because so many of our powers and abilities synergize.  Keep this a design principle.  Tell the people who trot this out and scream, "MMO!" to sit down, shut up, and appreciate solid game design.
• Defined Team Roles: I want to know, at a glance, what to expect from each member of my team.  I'm fine with certain character classes being able to fill, depending on build, certain roles, but I want to be able to know who should be doing what.  Classes should be as balanced as possible against other classes of their type.
• Easy and Intuitive DM Prep:  I love creating monsters/npc combatants in 4ed.  It is easy.  In 3rd ed, it was a pain in the rear.  Heck, in SW: Saga, Iron Heroes, and Mutants and Masterminds, it was a pain in the rear.  4th ed is the only system I've ever seen where it is fast, plain easy, and still results in fascinating and memorable encounters.  This is the #1 thing that has turned me from a player and reluctant DM to a dedicated DM.  This is the #1 thing I do NOT want to see changed in D&D.
• An Emphasis on Movement and Terrain: A good 4th ed fight is memorable and dynamic.  First of all, because of the monsters, but second of all, because of all the interesting ways the powers can interact with terrain, movement, and obstacles.  I don't want this to go away.
• Constant Updates and Erratum: I want a game that is being looked at and revised from time to time.  Up until the introduction of the web-only character builder, I LOVED the fact that my game had gaming professionals offering me constant support that was easily referenced for my character.  That said, I didn't love the handful of times they decided to go in a completely different direction with certain design principles (Magic Items, Tiefling racial power, and Magic Missile!).  With this slow development involving open and dedicated play-testing, I hope the designers will be able to come up design paradigms and stick with them. 

Section 2: Things 4ed almost did.  D&D next has an opportunity!

• Defined and Unified Power-Source Mechanics: Having a variety of ways to play DnD is awesome. 3rd ed did this pretty well (though the balance side of things was wonky), and 4ed figured this out to some small degree with Psionics and Essentials.  When I heard that 4ed was doing explicit power sources I was excited.  The fact that, in PHB1, all power sources looked essentially the same was a HUGE let down for me.  I want martial classes that work like the Essentials martial classes: an emphasis on at-will abilities augmented with per-encounter utility, damage-add, and special-effect abilities.  I want arcane classes with modified Vancian magic, able to add spells to their repertoire, their bread-and-butter in their daily abilities.  I want Divine classes tied to the gods they serve with powers reflecting their Patron's portfolio, dictating or modifying their power choices.  Your power source should MEAN something to HOW you play the game.  This is the #1 thing I wish 4ed had done differently.
• Non-combat Abilities: Skills are a good way for characters to be able to do things out of combat, and skill powers were a neat step in the right direction for allowing some encounter application to skill training, but I don't think they went far enough.  I feel like maybe most Utility powers should have been tied to either your Power Source or your Trained Skills, leaving your class itself out of the equation.
• Skill Challenges: I love the idea that there is a formalized framework in which to dictate success and failures in complicated non-combat situations.  If you read this blog, you can probably tell.  They should have taken this basic idea and provided expanded rules to use them in lots of ways: running a kingdom, commanding armies in mass-combat, crafting, or whatever seems like a cool thing for a PC to do in an adventure.
• Key Words: They were used.  They should have been used better.  I want to see Monsters, first and foremost, have keywords associated with more of their powers.  I want the relationship between damage and keyword to be clear.  I want there to be more powers and effects that trigger off of a larger variety of keywords.  Make what each PC (and each monster) can do special.  Give it as many good descriptors as you can so it can interact with things in a special way.
• Rituals: I love the idea of divorcing out-of-combat utility magic from combat magic.  The way it was done was a little bit less than perfect and pretty much punished PCs for wanting to use rituals, creatively or otherwise.  I want to find rituals a home somewhere between the abuses of 3ed and the worthlessness (Cost-benefit ratio) of so many 4ed rituals.  

Section 3: Things 4th Edition didn't even try to do, but a new edition should.

• "Advanced" and "Basic" Options: 3rd edition had Core material and everything else.  4th edition has an everything is core mentality.  Core vs. Splat made everything not in the PHB seem optional, which is a very bad business proposition.  Everything Core made it hard for a DM (or players, for that matter) to customize the level of complexity they wanted in their games.  Other games I've seen have their core rules, but frequently have a section for "advanced" combat rules or even advanced overall rules.  I think, if the game wants to make differentiation in levels of product, this is the divide to create. D&D's wealthy, younger cousin, M:tG does it.  D&D once did it too (though, not exactly in the way I am suggesting, as I understand it-before my time.)  Basic-only games could be great for Encounters sessions, tournament play, or for lightweight dungeon crawl campaigns for beginners in the hobby.  Advanced games would be for veteran groups that need something to spice-up a previously basic game or for those epic home campaigns that last for years, have lots of character, and that keep you coming back to the hobby.  This, and all of the ideas below I have related to this, is the #1 thing I feel like D&D Next could do to bring players back to the table.
• "Needless" Symmetry in Design:  I LIKE symmetry.  I think 4ed could have BENEFITED from some symmetry early on.  The 4ed designers called it needless, but I call it elegant.  Having a symmetrical and rigid framework in which to produce classes would have prevented such mis-steps as creating classes that received almost no support because the design space to support them was filled with existing classes (I am looking at YOU Seeker and Runepriest.)  Would it have been so bad to have the Ranger as a Martial Controller (which Essentials did-very well), disabling his opponents with trick shots and precise slashes of his whirling blades?  Could the Druid and Ranger have not just beaten up the Seeker and taken his stuff?  Why wasn't the Runepriest a Cleric build?  Maybe the Arcane classes benefited from redundancy (Warlock+Sorcerer and Bard+Artificer being the big argument in favor) but I still think using a rigid framework to motivate design is a solid idea.
• Obviously Open Combat Options: Even if it's just as a list of "Advanced" options in combat.  "Basic" combat rules say I can move, second wind, shift, or make a basic attack on my turn.  If we are playing with "Advanced" rules, the list can expand to charge, grab, disarm, trip, whatever.  Now, this shouldn't discount powers being able to do these things TOO, the same way you can grab or charge in 4ed, but you can ALSO grab or charge with a myriad of specialized powers that have better reliability, more damage, and more flair. I say give people a chance at doing cool stuff if they really want to go for it.  I feel like this would solve many of the problems people had with 4ed being too "restrictive."
• Optional, Expanded, Modular Rule Sets: These could be marketed as Advanced Options that might not have a home in all D&D campaigns, but could make D&D the default for any conceivable fantasy RP campaign.  Give us modular rule-sets for Kingdom Building, Mass Combat, Naval Warfare, Running a business, Crafting, whatever!  For bonus points, do it within whichever Skill Challenge structure you've already created to introduce ease of learning to players who want to drop these elements into their campaigns.  Can't make money off of these books?  Put them all into the same book with different chapters.  Market it as a DMG.  Still won't work?  Put it in the magazines!  This is the sort of content e-Dungeon should give DMs along with a few modules a month.

There might be other things I don't even realize I love and would be heart-broken if they changed.  There are things from previous editions I would be very put off by going back to that I don't even think of any more.  This list may grow as I think on it, but it's a pretty comprehensive start.  

What do you want in D&D Next?  

Kingdom Building vs. Archetypes 2: Kingdom Building Utilities

The goal with these powers is to give each PC an encounter ability that will actually be useful during Kingdom Building.  Some classes grant a decent amount of skill-useful utilities (I'm looking at you Bard!) and Skill Powers are always great options, but I wanted to offer something special that can ONLY work during Kingdom Building play.

Prince Oargev:
Level 8: You gain the Inspirational Leadership Utility power.
Inspirational Leadership          Prince Oargev Utility 8

When you decide what the focus of the coming months is, you inspire others to work towards that common goal.
Encounter * Kingdom Building
Standard Action
Effect: Pick from the following Kingdom Building Keywords: Information, Domestic, Foreign, Philanthropic, Commercial, Research, or Diplomatic. Until the end of the encounter, you and all allies grant a +5 bonus rather than a +2 bonus when they aid another in a Policy with the keyword you selected.

Cyran Patriot:
Level 8: You gain the Luck of the Common Man Utility Power
Luck of the Common Man          Cyran Patriot Utility 8
You travel in circles in which those of your station were never meant to travel. Others get by on their status, power, and allies. You get by on luck and skill alone. 

Encounter * Kingdom Building
Free Action
Trigger: You roll a skill check during kingdom building and dislike the result.
Effect: Ignore this result. Roll twice and take the better of the two results.

Cyran Noble:
Level 8: You gain the Political Acumen Utility Power

Expert Delegation          Cyran Noble Utility 8
You have managed people all of your life.  When you take the lead, those who work with you are a well-oiled machine.

Encounter * Kingdom Building
Standard Action
Effect: Select one Policy you own, have Supported, or have Pursued. You now know all Advantages the policy may have attached to it. In addition, you may use the aid another action for each ally who is Pursuing or Supporting this policy this round as a free action. You may not Pursue this policy until the next round.

Warforged Servant:
Level 8: You gain the Yes, Master Utility Power
Yes, Master          Warforged Servant Utility 8
Your devotion benefits all of your master’s pursuits.
Encounter * Kingdom Building
Free Action
Trigger: You successfully Aid Another
Effect: If the total result would hit the moderate DC, the success counts as a difficult success.

Dragonmarked Scion:
I recently realized that the Dragonmark feats don't actually give a skill bonus like I thought they did.  Since both my Action Point ability for the Dragonmark Scion and my planned level 8 ability involved a related skill, I decided to assign each Dragonmarked house the following related skill:

Related Skills 

• Cannith (Arcana)
• Deneith (Endurance)
• Ghallanda (Streetwise)
• Jorasco (Heal)
• Kundurak (Dungeoneering)
• Lyrandar (Acrobatics)
• Medani (Insight)
• Orien (Athletics)
• Phiarlan (Bluff)
• Sivis (Diplomacy)
• Tharashk (Perception)
• Thuranni (Stealth)
• Vadalis (Nature)

Level 8: You gain the Let the Expert Take Over Utility Power.
Let the Expert Take Over          Dragonmarked Scion Utility 8
The special training offered by your house makes up for the shortcomings of others
Encounter * Kingdom Building
Free Action
Trigger: An ally attempts a skill check in your house’s related skill and doesn't like the result
Effect: You may immediately make a skill check and use your result in place of your ally’s result.

Foreign National: Level 8: You gain the Outsider’s Insight Utility Power

Outsider’s Insight          Foreign National Utility 8
Your knowledge of how things are done in another country gives you a unique perspective on local affairs.
Encounter * Kingdom Building
Minor Action
Effect: You may support or aid another a policy with the Domestic keyword. You gain a +5 power bonus to this roll.

Sovereign Priest:
Level 8: You gain the Act Through Faith Utility Power

Act Through Faith          Sovereign Priest Utility 8

Sometimes, just praying for a desired outcome is enough.

Encounter * Kingdom Building
Standard Action

Effect: You may pursue, support or aid another a policy. Roll Religion for your check, but you may treat it as any counting as any skill of your choice (this affects aiding another, policy advantages, and limited uses of the religion skill on some policies).

Druidic Initiate:
Level 8: You gain the Where the Wild Thing Are Utility Power

Where the Wild Things Are          Druidic Initiate Utility 8
You have useful contacts throughout the world that can help your friends in need.

Encounter * Kingdom Building
Minor Action
Effect: Any Unit you send on a mission this round may reroll one Observation or Survival check, with a +2 power bonus.

More Rituals

Note: Sorry for my holiday disappearance.  The beginning and the end of semesters is a super-busy time for me, and I haven't had much time to blog.  I hope to be back on a regular schedule soon.

But as for rituals: The more I think about this skill-based ritual system, the more I like it.

I wonder if, while giving rituals a level is still useful, seeing as we should have guidelines concerning at what level they should have these abilities and what the DC for checks should be, divorcing a PC's level from their ability to USE a ritual isn't a good idea.

This makes rituals another great type of treasure.  Using the treasure guidelines of giving out items of up to 4 levels above the PCs can give casters a chance to try a rituals that may be a little too tough for them, but not impossible, and very valuable.  Also, while it would be easy to allow PCs to freely purchase rituals of their level or lower, you could pick and choose appropriate rituals you might want your PCs to have access to for plot reasons.  In a very difficult and potentially deadly campaign, slipping the ritualist a raise dead ritual at level 4 might be useful, and while actually raising the dead could be tough for a little while, it would eventually become pretty much automatic.

Now for an Epic Tier Arcane Ritual!

True Portal

Level: 28

Type: Arcane (Travel)

Initial Component Cost: 5,000 gp (see text)

Aid Another DC: 24

Failure Cost: 5,000 gp (see text)

Market Price: 425,000 gp

Duration: Special

This ritual works the same as Linked Portal, except as noted here.

Check 1: Gather Arcane Energies (Arcana DC 40)

Check 2-4:  You are not limited to teleporting to places you've seen or that have permanent teleportation circles.  However, when performing this ritual, you must describe your intended destination clearly and hold that description in your mind.  "Lord Sommes's Audience Chamber" is sufficient, as is "the nearest temple of Kol Korran."  Your description must use only place names and other static references; you can't say, "wherever Prince Oargev is."  All participants in casting this ritual must seek the same location or the ritual automatically fails. (Nature or History DC 30)

Check 5:  You open the portal at the pictured location.  If the destination is blocked by a warding ritual, the portal opens at a point along the ward's boundary.  You can see through the portal before you enter, and you don't have to step through if you don't want to. (Arcana DC 30)

     You can use an existing teleportation circle as the origin point of this ritual, making minor temporary modifications as part of the ritual.  Using a teleportation circle reduces the ritual's initial component cost and failure cost to 100 gp and grants a +5 bonus to your Arcana checks.


I find myself, when designing these rituals, coming up with a pattern of:

• First Check: Gather appropriate Energy
• Middle Checks: Craft the spell
• Final Check: Execute the spell.

I am considering making this a formal part of the ritual, possibly even requiring the First and Final checks to be made by a caster with the appropriate ritual caster feat, and the middle checks to be made by anyone participating...

Kingdom Building Part 6: Prince Oargev and the Duke of Hazards

This is the write-up I gave my PCs for the mission detailed in the last Kingdom Building post.  By "gave them" I mean they watched me write, real-time, in Google docs, waiting to see what happened next:

How it happened:
Knowing that no one on the council would be particularly excited about the prospect of the Crown Prince leading just over a hundred troops into Karrnath to find and rescue Duke Korlan, Oargev tries to mask his leaving.  He has the members of the Prince’s shield spread word around Metrol and all the way to the northern border that the Prince is embarking on yet another mercy mission to war-torn villages.  Intrigue Roll=18! Anyone who is paying attention to the Prince and his movements assume his northern trip is another mercy mission.
As the the Prince and his retinue camp in the north, they join up with one of the northern army encampments.  The plan is to sneak across the river under the cover of darkness and be deep into Karrnathi territory before anyone notices they’d gone.  Roll=13!  The crew sneaks across the river and moves deep into Karrnath.  They find a copse of trees to set up camp for the evening.
The plan is for the Order of the Prince’s Shield to travel into nearby villages and try to find out where the Duke might be held while the Warforged and Oargev hide in the woods, keeping a perimeter to make sure no one who sees them makes it out alive.  Intrigue=30 and Combat=20.  The order is barely gone one day before they return with very solid information that the Duke is being kept in the dungeons beneath the Fortress of Atur.  The one patrol that comes across your hidden camp doesn’t make it out alive.
The rescue mission moves quietly across Karrnath, through the Karrnwood to get to Atur.  Roll=19.  They make it through silently and make camp again just southeast of Atur under the cover of the mountains and trees.
The Order of the Prince’s shield sneaks into the town surrounding Atur and hits the bars, drinking with the soldiers from the castle, learning what they can about it’s design and defenses.   Roll=13!  They find the soldiers tight lipped, and return to camp, determined to take another approach.  Blade sends some of his best scouts to observe the castle over the next 24 hours, hoping they can find some weakness in their defenses that can be exploited.  Roll=11!  As far as they can tell, the fortress is impregnable.  Amidst all of the waiting, Prince Oargev and Blade discuss amongst themselves old war accounts of Atur, and try to decide on an appropriate plan of action.   Roll=17  Blade recalls a story he once heard about an Aundarian master spy who broke OUT of Atur.  Oargev and blade piece together that story with the small pieces of information the Order and the Warforged are able to deliver and come up with a plan.
The plan is a concerted assault on a hidden sally-gate they remembered from the story that will take them into the dungeon.  There they will kill the guards, grab the duke, and make their way quickly back south to Cyre.  They make the attack!  Roll=15  The fighting is brutal, and in the first assault, many members of the Order of the Prince’s shield are badly wounded, but the warforged press on, making their way into the dungeons.  The dungeon guards, totally surprised, still manage to put up a fight.  Roll=19!  They find the Duke, break him out of prison, and flee the castle back through the way they came, disappearing into the dark woods, taking their fallen companions with them.
They move quickly, hoping to beat any border reinforcements that might be summoned, staying ahead of any pursuit.  As they leave the Karrnwood, they are faced with a patrol that heard them coming.  Roll=19.  The fighting is close, and the patrol manages to contain them, but the Warforged keep fighting! Roll=17, Roll=23, Roll=12.  It looks like the patrol is just biding their time.  It seems that they might be waiting for a larger force to come up and finish the group off.  Roll=8  A much larger patrol arrives, and surrounds the warforged, the Prince, the weak duke, and what is left of the knights.  Roll=9  Things start looking very grim as the army closes around the squad. Roll=9.  The fighting becomes more and more desperate.  Roll=13  The assault from the Karrnath army breaks the circle of warforged.  Prince Oargev is knocked unconscious.

The next the Prince knows, he wakes up in a tent, with Tact and Blade standing over him.  When he asks what happened, he is told by Blade, “In the confusion, Tact and I were able to grab you and slip away from the fighting.  Only a handful of your warforged made it away with us.  We were unable to rescue any of your knights or the Duke.  I apologize for our failure.  We are back in Cyre.”

Your Mechanical Options:

• You can redo Order of the Prince’s shield to recruit a new crew of Prince’s Shield.
• You can also do a Policy of “Purchase and Train Warforged Unit from Cannith” to put together a new warforged unit.  
• The warforged unit you had has now turned into a Hero Unit (level 4) called “Prince Oargev’s Warforged Bodyguards.”  This is Blade, Tact, and 8 other warforged.

Mission debriefing: Talking to the warforged, they tell you that, once it was clear they had lost the battle, Blade commanded most of the surviving warforged to hold the line while they got the Prince to safety.  They also tried to bring out the Duke, but the warforged carrying him was struck down.  You get the sense that Blade is deeply saddened by the loss of the warforged, but not saying anything.  He does ask you if you plan on rebuilding the unit, commissioning more warforged from the Cannith forges.  He mentions he would be more than happy to train new recruits.

A New Look at Rituals

Sorry this post is late.  End of semester stuff got crazy!

Rituals were a great concept in solving the God-mode wizard and cleric problems of previous editions.  That said, I don't love how it was executed.  Making them take some time and costing a little something is a pretty good idea, but overall, I've only ever found a few that were useful.

My idea is to make rituals involve more of the party, working like many ritual-casting systems I've seen in LARPs, take up some time, but more time as detailed in rounds rather than in minutes or hours, and maybe be more affordable--but less automatic.  I'd also like to see the spells a little bit specific to certain power sources, as, right now, Wizards are as likely to raise the dead as Clerics.  This bothers me.

When looking for 4ed solutions, of course, I went to the Skill challenge.  By making each ritual a self-contained skill challenge, you make the casting of these complex spells happen in stages, be difficult, but possible to complete in combat, and allow the whole party to get involved, if they so choose.

First change: the entry feat to a set of feats:
Arcane Ritualist 
Tier: Heroic
Prerequisites: Trained in Arcana; Arcane power source.
Benefit: You can master, lead, and perform rituals of your level or lower whose prerequisites you meet.  You are treated as trained in any skill check you roll during a ritual challenge (granting you a +5 bonus to the check if you are not already trained in it.)  At levels 1, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 you learn one ritual with the Arcane prerequisite for free.  At heroic tier, you may cast 1 arcane ritual per day without paying the initial component cost.  At paragon tier this increases to two arcane rituals and at epic tier, 3.


Divine Ritualist 
Tier: Heroic
Prerequisites: Trained in Religion; Divine power source.
Benefit: You can master, lead, and perform rituals of your level or lower whose prerequisites you meet.  You are treated as trained in any skill check you roll during a ritual challenge (granting you a +5 bonus to the check if you are not already trained in it.)  At levels 1, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 you learn one ritual with the Divine prerequisite for free.  At heroic tier, you may cast 1 divine ritual per day without paying the initial component cost.  At paragon tier this increases to two divine rituals and at epic tier, 3.


Primal Ritualist 
Tier: Heroic
Prerequisites: Trained in Nature; Primal power source.
Benefit: You can master, lead, and perform rituals of your level or lower whose prerequisites you meet.  You are treated as trained in any skill check you roll during a ritual challenge (granting you a +5 bonus to the check if you are not already trained in it.)  At levels 1, 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, and 30 you learn one ritual with the Primal prerequisite for free.  At heroic tier, you may cast 1 primal ritual per day without paying the initial component cost.  At paragon tier this increases to two primal rituals and at epic tier, 3.

     These feats help preserve the classic spell lists without making a character who wants a wide variety of rituals available to him have to spend a ton of feats to cast rituals of multiple types.  All half-elves could easily gain access to two ritual types through their dilettante power.  Most classes have an initial multi-class feat that offers an at-will power as an encounter power, which would also satisfy this requirement.  I am okay with a wizard having to at least dabble in divine magic in order to cast divine rituals.  These feats also alleviate a little bit of the never using rituals because initially getting them and then casting them is so expensive problems.  A few free-bees should make them a regular part of adventuring life.
     I included the bonus to untrained skills because I wanted trained ritualists to be at least decent at all parts of rituals, even those that require non-traditional skill checks (like Endurance to control the arcane energies present, or Diplomacy to bargain with the outsider you are seeking answers from).  That said, a wizard will likely still welcome a mighty warrior to channel the arcane energies through, as his 20 Con+training will likely be superior to the wizard's.  Also, with more checks made towards the casting of the ritual per round, the faster the ritual can be completed (when the caster doesn't have to do it all himself.)  The caster Leading the ritual can take no actions other than maintaining the ritual.  Helpers can contribute to a ritual whenever appropriate, and they don't need to have a ritual casting feat in order to help.  The Leader spending all of his round "working" on the ritual represents him talking the others through their roll in the ritual.

Sample Ritual

Raise Dead
Level: 8
Type: Divine (Restoration)
Initial Component Cost: Special
Aid Another DC: 14
Failure Cost: Special
Market Price: 680 gp
Duration: Instantaneous
     To perform the Raise Dead ritual, you must have a part of the corpse of a creature that died no more than 30 days ago.  You must prepare the body with enough mystic salves equal to the dead creatures level x 25 gp at heroic tier.  At paragon tier it requires mystic salves equal to the creature's level x 250 gp.  At epic tier, it requires mystic salves equal to the creature's level x 2,500 gp.  
Check 1: Petition Divine Intervention (Religion DC 24)
Check 2, 4, 6, 8: Rebuild the Broken Body (Heal DC 24)
Check 3, 5, 7, 9: Survive the Shock of the Body Rebuilt (Endurance DC 12; May only be made by the target of the ritual.  This is the only skill check the dead character can make.  The character may not be aided on these checks).
Check 10: Find the missing soul (Insight DC 12)
Check 11: Bring the missing soul back into the body (Diplomacy DC 12)
Check 12: Reunite Body and Soul (Religion DC 24)
     The subject returns to life as if he or she had taken an extended rest.  The subject is freed of any temporary conditions suffered at death, but permanent conditions remain.  The subject immediately loses 1 healing surge per failure suffered during the ritual attempt.  The number of healing surges lost increases to 2 per failure at paragon tier, and 3 per failure at epic tier.  If the subject does not have enough healing surges to sustain this loss, he loses HP equal to his Surge Value for each healing surge he lacks.
     The subject returns with a death penalty: -1 to all attack rolls, skill checks, saving throws, and ability checks.  This death penalty fades after the subject reaches 3 milestones.
     You can't restore life to a creature that has been petrified or a creature that died of old age.
     The subject's soul must be free and willing to return to life.  Some magical effects trap the soul and thus prevent raise dead from working.
     A failed ritual can be tried again.

This ritual still shouldn't be done in combat, as each skill check should probably take a standard action, and 1 cleric, acting alone, couldn't get it done faster than 7 rounds, spending an action point, assuming no failures.  This ritual will be very hard to successfully perform on low-level PCs, as they may have a hard time hitting the high Religion and Heal DCs.  Aiding another makes this ritual more sure, but still difficult.  That's why I made it so inexpensive for heroic tier characters to be raised: failure will probably happen and have to be factored into that cost.  On the flip side, Epic tier characters pay much more in this system, but should have no problems hitting the DCs regularly.  Plus, Epic tier characters have so many ways to cheat death, it's silly, so it will likely come up only rarely.

My idea for the complexity of each ritual (# of checks required, how many hard DCs, how many built-in advantages) charts directly with how much time the original ritual required:

1 or 5 minutes: Complexity 1 (4 successes, all moderate)
10 minutes: Complexity 2 (6 successes, 1 difficult)
30 minutes: Complexity 3 (8 successes, 2 difficult, 2 advantages)
1 hour: Complexity 4 (10 successes, 3 difficult, 4 advantages)
8 hours: Complexity 5 (12 successes, 4 difficult, 6 advantages)

I decided to ignore the rule that each PC can only get 1 success for a use of any given skill.  To counter that advantage to the PCs, I am also ignoring the rule that PCs get to pretty much pick whichever skills they want to use, giving them a prescriptive order and difficulty of skills.

A failed check would cause whatever complications are involved in the ritual, and would need to be rerolled. 3 failures in a ritual would require the ritual be aborted, the initial components lost, and the ritual begun again.
In the coming weeks, I will rewrite some other rituals using this system.

Kingdom Building Part 5: Missions

Here's the not so well kept secret: in Kingdom Building, Missions, like Policies, are just slightly modified Skill Challenges.

A sample mission:

The Duke of Hazards: Rescue Duke Korlan ir'Varak from Karrnathi imprisonment.
Level 8 Complexity 3 DC 12/16/24
Required Successes (6 moderate, 2 hard)

Intrigue: 1

Espionage: 2

Espionage or Combat: 3

Research, Observation, or Intrigue: 2

Special Rules:

• Two espionage checks vs. Easy DC count as a moderate success.

This follows many of the basic skill challenge guidelines. The DCs and required successes are set exactly as the Skill Challenge rules are laid out. "Special Rules" take the place of "Advantages" but are the exact same thing with a different name. Since Units only have 6 "skills" with which to make checks, I eliminated the rule that allows for limited successes with any given skill; in fact, I codified that rule by outlining exactly which competencies were required, and in what amounts, to win the mission.

I build a challenge by outlining exactly what the mission is supposed to be. If it should be simple for the PCs to send minions to accomplish this, I make it PC level -2. If it should be a moderate challenge, I set it to PC level+1, and if it should be practically impossible, but within reach, I set it to PC level +4. Then, to set complexity, I make a list of things they will have to accomplish to win, i.e how many checks they will need to make. This helps me gain an understanding of how complex the mission needs to be.

In the above sample, I knew that, per The Forge of War, Cyre's elite adventuring/espionage group, the Champions of the Bell, gain fame for saving Duke Korlan, so I didn't want it to be easy for the Prince and his Order to Change history; it could be possible, but not easy, so the difficulty was set at level 8 (Level 4 PC + 4). Then I set the challenges. To win, the adventurers would need to:

1. Make an excuse to be at the northern border or get permission from the Queen to invade Karrnath. (Intrigue)
2. Get out of Cyre without the rest of the military noticing (Espionage)
3. Move past the Karrnathi border patrol without engaging the army (Espionage)
4. Find out where the Duke is being held Prisoner (Research, Observation, or Intrigue)
5. Get to the prison (Espionage or Combat)
6. Figure out a way inside the prison (Research, Observation, or Intrigue)
7. Break into the Prison (Espionage or Combat)
8. Get back out of Karrnath with the Duke (Espionage or Combat)

With 8 distinct tasks, it seemed complexity 3 was perfect. I selected 2 cases of moderate success with hitting easy DC for Espionage checks because the essence of this mission was espionage: I wanted whomever attempted this mission to feel like they could at least compete, even if Espionage wasn't their main deal.

Things I still need to consider about missions:

1. How should I handle missions when a PC wants to send multiple units on a mission together? My initial reaction was to use whichever unit had the best competency for each roll, but to assign failures to both sets of stamina, no matter who made the check. I would consider opening it up, allowing the PC to pick which of the multiple units would make each check, only penalizing the unit who attempting the task, and even allowing aid-another checks, with the drawback that a failure would penalize both units. I'd love to debate the virtues of both systems with anyone who has ideas, and would also appreciate any alternate ideas anyone might have.

2. Can a PC do a mission without being attached to another unit? I have a PC whose unit ALWAYS failed missions, because dice rolls were bad and their math was never quite good enough. The PC wanted to just do the missions solo, but if just the PC were doing the mission, why not just run it? Time constraints and the desire to entertain everyone nixed that idea, but after looking at what some LARPs are experimenting with, concerning how much can be done with in-between game actions, I decided to consider ways to let individual PCs (or small groups of them) attempt missions. Should I just let them make appropriate skill challenges instead of competencies? Should I convert them into "Heroic Unit" stats somehow and let them try the mission the same way an NPC would? Would that allow me to eliminate the attachment rules I am not happy with and just let the PC's "Mission Stats" also go on the mission?

Next time in Kingdom Building: a sample mission, fully executed.

Party Favors!

Two of the biggest policies completed in Kingdom Building were Prince Oargev's planning of his own wedding and Istav's secret planning of Prince Oargev's bachelor's party.  Other than researching rituals to summon Succubus Dancers, inviting all of the young and powerful of Cyre and Breland, hiring the finest caterers, and buying the biggest stash of alcohol Metrol had ever seen, Istav bartered with House Cannith to provide party favors.  These are what Cannith donated as advertisements: 


Level 2 Magic Items: Cannith Fortune Stones

• Stone of Cannith: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack with the Fire keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed. 
• Stone of Deneith: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by a melee attack with the Weapon keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Ghallanda: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack that includes Forced Movement.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Jorasco: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack with the Poison keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Kundarak: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack that targets Fortitude Defense. Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Lyrandar: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack with the Lightning keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Medani: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by a a ranged attack with the Weapon keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Orien: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack that targets Reflex Defense.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed. 
• Stone of Phiarlan: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack with the Charm keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Sivis: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack that targets Will Defense.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Tharashk: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an area attack.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed. 
• Stone of Thuranni: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack with the Necrotic keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.
• Stone of Vadalis: (Daily): Free Action: Trigger: You are hit by an attack with the Cold keyword.  Effect: The opponent who hit you rerolls the attack roll.  If the reroll is a 20, this magic item is destroyed.

Lesser Stone Benefits

Wielders          Benefit

2                    Each ally who bears a stone gains an item bonus to the defense targeted by the rerolled attack granted by their stone equal to the number of allies with stones they can see.

     These were inspired by the Luck Stone magic items from Adventurer's Vault, but at a much lower level, no way to specifically plan to take advantage of them, and with a significant drawback. Still, they seemed useful to keep around.  The copies the PCs got were "experimental" products deemed safe, but unstable.  I had the PCs roll to get a random stone.

Kingdom Building Part 4: Units

Early on in my development of Kingdom Building, I realized that, of my 3 PCs, 2 were very much skill-focused and likely to be very successful in Kingdom building.  However, Prince Oargev was a Paladin with few trained skills and one skill related utility power, and I figured he could use something else to do during Kingdom Building.  It seemed, from that point, that the obvious answer was to give Oargev (and the other PCs, should they wish it) the opportunity to raise armies, units, or other groups and send them to do stuff in their place.


This is what I came up with:

Rule for Units:
Units represent groups of soldiers, adventurers, or other groups that can be commanded to complete tasks on the behalf of the PCs.  They don’t have combat statistics like regular monsters, NPCs or PCs.  They are designed to interact with Policies or Missions.

Competencies:
There are six core Competencies that all units have.  These Competencies are abstractions that represent how good a unit might be in certain types of situations.  Each Competency has a number of related skills.  If a unit is called on the make a skill check (such as when it is Supporting a Policy, it can use this competency modifier in place of a skill modifier.)
Combat: The unit’s ability to fight.  This includes all forms of combat, physical and magical.

Related Skills: Arcana, Athletics, Endurance, Intimidate, Religion

Survival: The unit’s ability to live off the land and endure extraordinary hardships

Related Skills: Acrobatics, Athletics, Endurance, Heal, Nature, Perception

Espionage: The unit’s ability to sneak, set traps, and engage in other clandestine activities.

Related Skills: Acrobatics, Bluff, Diplomacy, Dungeoneering, Stealth, Streetwise, Thievery

Research: What the unit knows and what they can find out.

Related Skills: Arcana, Dungeoneering, Heal, History, Nature, Religion, Streetwise

Observation: How well the unit can perceive and understand the world around it.

Related Skills: Insight, Perception, Stealth, Thievery

Intrigue: The unit ability to negotiate, lie, or engage in other social situations.

Related Skills: Bluff, Diplomacy, History, Insight, Intimidate

The Competency modifier of a Unit is determined by how good a unit is at the particular Competencies.

Specialty: Competency modifier equals ½ level+10 (round down).  At Paragon Tier, and again at Epic Tier, it gains a +3 bonus to this skill check.  

Trained: Competency modifier equals ½ level+2 (round down).  At Paragon Tier, and again at Epic Tier, it gains a +2 bonus to this skill check.  

Untrained: Competency modifier equals ½ level-3 (round down).  At Paragon Tier, and again at Epic Tier, it gains a +1 bonus to this skill check.

I wanted to give Units stats that paralleled the core 6 abilities, but with lots of simplicity. Strength is a PCs ability to exert force on the world, so that became the unit's "Combat" stat. Constitution is a PC's ability to survive, so I converted it to a unit's ability to live off the land and survive in dangerous environments: "Survival." Dexterity is all about a PC's ability to physically manipulate the world, and "Espionage" seemed to be a good equivalent to a unit's ability to break, enter, lie, and steal. Intelligence represents what a PC knows, similarly, "Research" is what a Unit can find out. Wisdom represents a PC's understanding of the world around him, whereas "Observation" represents a Unit's ability to see what is going on. Finally, "Intrigue" represent's a group's social skills the same way Charisma reflect's a PC's force of personality.

Since I wanted these six Competencies to represent what a unit can do, I didn't want a Unit to be very good at all of them, in order to make for differentiation. I also couldn't always decide where to place each skill. The combination of those two factors led me to include every skill in two different lists.

I am not very happy with the bonus levels as I have them now. I want to keep 3 levels of competency, and I want it to level up fairly linearly. Right now, units pretty much always fail Untrained checks and pretty much always succeed at Specialty checks. This makes finishing a complete mission involving a variety of checks next to impossible. I developed these numbers by looking at the standard Easy, Moderate, and Difficult DCs for each level and subtracting 10 from each DC. Then I tried to make a line-of-best fit equation that fit each progression. I had to use a per-tier boost to make the line fit well. I'd love to get suggestions on how to have 3 levels of skill that will be pretty effective in completing challenges of their level.

Level: All units have a level.  Hero units level up after a number of successful missions equal to their level.  Military Units have a starting level related to their size and can only level up once they become veterans.
Starting Military Level
Level 1: 25-79 troops
Level 2: 80-299 troops
Level 3: 300-2,999 troops
Level 4: 3,000-5,000 troops

     I figured military units probably don't gain a lot of benefit from being very experienced, they get better the BIGGER they are.  Heroes, on the other hand, keep getting better and more deadly.

Special Orders: Most units have special abilities or effects that they can be commanded to utilize.

Stamina: How many failures in missions a unit can sustain before it is broken.
Broken: A unit that has failed a number of Competency checks on missions equal to their Stamina rating is Broken.  The exact definition of “Broken” depends on the mission the unit is attempting when it reaches its final failure.  Removing the Broken condition usually involves completing a Policy or Mission.

Training: Each unit has a certain level of training.  Most units have Standard training.  Some, primarily conscripts and peasants, have Minion training.  The best units have Elite training.

Minion Unit: Stamina is reduced to 1.  

Standard Unit: No modifications to stats.

Elite Unit: +1 to Stamina (after multiplier, if any), +1 to any one Competency.  Elite Military Units may level up as heroes.

Type: There are two types of units, Hero Units and Military Units.

Hero Unit: A small groups of heroes (less than 25 members).  These units have 1 Specialty Competency, 2 Trained Competencies, and 3 Untrained Competencies. They have Stamina equal to their level+2.  They may be issued commands to work on both Policies and Missions.  They level up after completing a number of missions equal to their level.

Military Units: Large army units (25-5,000 troops).  These units have 3 Trained Competencies and 3 Untrained Competencies.  They have Stamina equal to twice their base level.  You must have Military Credentials to send them on missions.  They gain one level when they become “veterans,” completing a number of missions equal to their base level.  This only increases their Stamina by 1.  They may not work on Policies.  

This differentiation show the difference between conscripts (military minions), regular soldiers (military standard), and  the units that DO get better the more they accomplish (military elites).  It also shows the difference between what diverse, small bands of adventurers can do vs. what homogeneous military forces can do.

Unit Actions:
Issue Orders (Standard Action):  You command one non-Broken unit you control and can communicate with to work towards a certain goal until they fail, are successful, or until a period of time you have specified has expired.  Orders you can issue include:

1. Complete a Policy:  Only Hero units can be ordered to Complete a Policy.  Each round, they will attempt either the “Support a Policy” or “Aid Another” action once.  They may only work on policies that have already been started by a PC.  They will always make their check using whichever of the policy’s key skills they have the highest modifier in.  If another PC is attempting this policy with the skill they are using (either Pursue or Support) they will aid another.  Otherwise, they will Support the policy.

2. Attempt a Mission:  The unit will make a number of Competency checks to complete their mission.  They make all of their Competency checks at once, not one per round like Policy skill checks.  Missions are developed in a joint effort of the PC and DM, designing mission parameters and objectives.  If more than one unit has been assigned to a mission, they aid another every Competency check.  The Unit with the highest modifier takes the lead, and all Units with a lower modifier aid them.

Split a Unit (Minor):  You may split a Military Unit into two Military Units of one level lower.  The Unit’s Stamina is reduced by two.  The unit’s Competency modifiers are adjusted accordingly.
Resting (Free):  A unit commanded to not given any commands for a round reduces the number of failures they have suffered by 1 at the end of the round.
Attach to a Unit (Free Action):  As the very first action of a Kingdom Building phase, a PC may decide to attach to a Unit.  This offers some significant benefits to the unit.  Compare the number of the PC’s related skill modifiers that are greater than one of the Unit’s Competency modifier.  The unit gains a bonus to that Competency modifier equal to the number of PC skill modifiers greater that the Unit’s Competency modifier.  Do this for each competency.  The final Competency modifier may not exceed the PC’s highest related skill modifier in that competency.  An attached PC cannot do anything but Issue Orders or Split a Unit.  They may detach as the first action of the following round.

I am not happy with the attachment rules right now. They work, but they take too long to calculate.

Example:
Order of the Prince’s Shield (Standard Level 1 hero unit)
Combat: +2
Survival: -3
Espionage: -3
Research: -3
Observation: +2
Intrigue: +10
STAMINA: 0/3
Special Orders: Social Creatures: You may spend a standard action to throw a banquet for the Order of the Prince’s Shield.  If you do so, reduce the number of Failures they have suffered by two.
Replaceable:  If the Order of the Prince’s Shield is broken, you may reform them by completing the Manage Order of the Prince’s Shield Policy at the level of the broken unit.  They return at the same level as they were before being broken.

Order of the Prince’s Shield (Prince Oargev attached) (Standard Level 1 hero unit)
Combat: +5
Survival: +2
Espionage: +1
Research: +3
Observation: +4
Intrigue: +10
STAMINA: 0/3
Special Orders: Social Creatures: You may spend a standard action to throw a banquet for the Order of the Prince’s Shield.  If you do so, reduce the number of Failures they have suffered by two.
Replaceable:  If the Order of the Prince’s Shield is broken, you may reform them by completing the Manage Order of the Prince’s Shield Policy at the level of the broken unit.  They return at the same level as they were before being broken.

Next time, in Kingdom Building, we'll look at how missions are put together, and later, how I'd use Units and Missions to resolve mass-combat in 4ed.