I'm planning a campaign, and part of it will be to capture a small section of territory. After you kill/capture/ransom or whatever you do to a ruler of a barony or something, how would you go about actually showing that you control the land? What sort of things would the player have to do? What sort of management would they have to do, etc? Anything else that would be helpful to know?
There are no real rules for this in 5th edition D&D.
You could try purchasing Matt Colville's 3rd party book, "Strongholds and Followers." I have it, and found it well worth the price. It has very explicit rules for how to build, renovate, own, hold, upkeep, upgrade, and populate strongholds and their immediate surroundings.
It doesn't do full nations, and its war rules are very simple, because there is another book, "Kingdoms and Warfare" coming in 2021 or so.
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Order all banners of the previous rulership taken down and burnt, replace them with your own. Force the nobility in the area to swear fealty to you, have your troops patrol the area to ensure your rule isn't threatened, have those troops bear your symbol on their shields, tear down any symbols/statues of the previous rulership, hold public demonstrations of these so the common folk can see who's in charge, that kind of stuff.
If you’re talking about a typical medieval Europe situation, just generically, they had the feudal system. A very large piece of land was difficult for one person to control, particularly before high speed communication and travel. So they wouldn’t try and set up a management structure. If you were the king, you keep some land (usually the best part) under your direct control. Then you’d partition off bits of it to some dukes and tell them that was theirs. (A duke could be anyone the king wanted. Could be someone who did the king a great service, or someone he owed money to, a child he want to give an income stream, some cousin he’s trying to placate, really anyone) The duke would still owe allegiance to the king and would pay some taxes and other things (such as providing levies, or soldiers, during a war), but they’d be expected to manage the land themselves. Of course, a dukedom was typically also too big to run, so they would carve it up into bits and give those to various earls or chiefs. Same deal, the earl would collect taxes, keep some, pass along the rest up the line. The exact structure of how much they send, or who they’d send it to varied. Also how free a hand they were given to rule in their area varied. And even then, most rulers wouldn’t handle all the details. They’d have different people managing different aspects of the kingdom, some in charge of money, some in charge of keeping the castle in shape. Some were really hands off and just delegated everything to an underlying while they drank the days away, others would get deeply involved in the nitty-gritty of it.
If you go and capture a barony in a feudal society that's an act of war against the next noble up in the chain, so expect everyone up to the King and his army to take a big interest in what you're doing and come calling.
One way you might be able to pull this off is to capture it first then petition the ultimate landholder (usually the King of the country you're in) using an argument like "Well Baron Gubso couldn't hang onto his holding, I'll swear fealty to you as the new baron with all the normal rights and responsibilities." And then if the King decides you can keep your head as he likes your balls rather than feeling embarrassed you might get away with it.
Another way would be to go to the neighbouring King and ask to serve them instead so his army can sort out the original king's army. Unless of course he doesn't want trouble in which case oops. Probably a good idea to sort the plan out with them first.
As for management of your new domain you don't have to worry too much about that if you can hold onto it. You'll employ others to do that for you.
I wasn't referring to 5e rules, I was referring to real world workings. How did people hold control over land once they held a castle or something.
That's extremely variable. In broad terms, you hold control over a territory when no-one of note is contesting your claim. This is generally done by some combination of making an argument for how your rulership is legitimate, making an argument that people will be better off ruled by you than by the competition, and having sufficient military force to beat up people who aren't convinced by the first two.
Well, you need to establish a social contract with the residents; I will defend you and sort out squabbles and you will pay takes to me so I can maintain the army that will defend you.
You will need to visit the popular figures in the area and get them to want to support you as the local noble. This would include mayors (towns), reeves (villages, hamlets), the sheriffs (local civilian law), Manor Lords (minor nobles in charge of farming in a small area) and the army leaders. You can accomplish this with Charisma, Might or some combination of the two.
You will also have to avoid upsetting the next noble up the chain and his boss and so on. The problem is that the one you wish to replace is probably a blood relative of one of the higher up nobles, so be prepared for a world of hurt. Second, you will have a hard time convincing the army leaders to follow you because they also have allegiances up the ladder, so they'll have to check with their bosses who almost certainly won't want to recognize you. You may even have problems with church figures and bards and merchants depending on how you plan to seize control. It is really beyond the scope of D&D to manage this, so you'll have to talk with your DM to see how he wants to manage this with you. In short, it is going to take a heck of a lot of money.
Once you have some expectation that you can get recognition, then you need to cement your authority in the minds of everyone. You want to destroy the images and heraldry of the previous nobles, and possibly the ones before them especially in hereditary societies. You want to make sure the institutions speak well of you and possibly never mention the previous rulers ever again. You also want to be publicly recognized as the ruler by the adjacent nobles. This can be done by signing and living up to treaties for mutual support. If possible, you want to mint your own coinage and get it accepted by the neighboring societies. But never mint a coin in a kingdom with your image unless you are the king. Instead, mint coins with the king's image on one side and some artifact on the reverse side that shows the coin was minted in your barony. Display your easily recognized coat of arms in all official areas. Encourage all your vassals to display your coat of arms in their territories. If you need the love of the people, work for justice for them and protect them. Pay your army well. Be a good friend to the nobles in the adjoining areas. Pay your duties to the next higher noble on time.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
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I'm planning a campaign, and part of it will be to capture a small section of territory. After you kill/capture/ransom or whatever you do to a ruler of a barony or something, how would you go about actually showing that you control the land? What sort of things would the player have to do? What sort of management would they have to do, etc? Anything else that would be helpful to know?
There are no real rules for this in 5th edition D&D.
You could try purchasing Matt Colville's 3rd party book, "Strongholds and Followers." I have it, and found it well worth the price. It has very explicit rules for how to build, renovate, own, hold, upkeep, upgrade, and populate strongholds and their immediate surroundings.
It doesn't do full nations, and its war rules are very simple, because there is another book, "Kingdoms and Warfare" coming in 2021 or so.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I wasn't referring to 5e rules, I was referring to real world workings. How did people hold control over land once they held a castle or something.
I will have to look into Matt Colville's book, Thanks for the suggestion
Order all banners of the previous rulership taken down and burnt, replace them with your own. Force the nobility in the area to swear fealty to you, have your troops patrol the area to ensure your rule isn't threatened, have those troops bear your symbol on their shields, tear down any symbols/statues of the previous rulership, hold public demonstrations of these so the common folk can see who's in charge, that kind of stuff.
If you’re talking about a typical medieval Europe situation, just generically, they had the feudal system. A very large piece of land was difficult for one person to control, particularly before high speed communication and travel. So they wouldn’t try and set up a management structure. If you were the king, you keep some land (usually the best part) under your direct control. Then you’d partition off bits of it to some dukes and tell them that was theirs. (A duke could be anyone the king wanted. Could be someone who did the king a great service, or someone he owed money to, a child he want to give an income stream, some cousin he’s trying to placate, really anyone) The duke would still owe allegiance to the king and would pay some taxes and other things (such as providing levies, or soldiers, during a war), but they’d be expected to manage the land themselves. Of course, a dukedom was typically also too big to run, so they would carve it up into bits and give those to various earls or chiefs. Same deal, the earl would collect taxes, keep some, pass along the rest up the line.
The exact structure of how much they send, or who they’d send it to varied. Also how free a hand they were given to rule in their area varied.
And even then, most rulers wouldn’t handle all the details. They’d have different people managing different aspects of the kingdom, some in charge of money, some in charge of keeping the castle in shape. Some were really hands off and just delegated everything to an underlying while they drank the days away, others would get deeply involved in the nitty-gritty of it.
If you go and capture a barony in a feudal society that's an act of war against the next noble up in the chain, so expect everyone up to the King and his army to take a big interest in what you're doing and come calling.
One way you might be able to pull this off is to capture it first then petition the ultimate landholder (usually the King of the country you're in) using an argument like "Well Baron Gubso couldn't hang onto his holding, I'll swear fealty to you as the new baron with all the normal rights and responsibilities." And then if the King decides you can keep your head as he likes your balls rather than feeling embarrassed you might get away with it.
Another way would be to go to the neighbouring King and ask to serve them instead so his army can sort out the original king's army. Unless of course he doesn't want trouble in which case oops. Probably a good idea to sort the plan out with them first.
As for management of your new domain you don't have to worry too much about that if you can hold onto it. You'll employ others to do that for you.
That's extremely variable. In broad terms, you hold control over a territory when no-one of note is contesting your claim. This is generally done by some combination of making an argument for how your rulership is legitimate, making an argument that people will be better off ruled by you than by the competition, and having sufficient military force to beat up people who aren't convinced by the first two.
Well, you need to establish a social contract with the residents; I will defend you and sort out squabbles and you will pay takes to me so I can maintain the army that will defend you.
You will need to visit the popular figures in the area and get them to want to support you as the local noble. This would include mayors (towns), reeves (villages, hamlets), the sheriffs (local civilian law), Manor Lords (minor nobles in charge of farming in a small area) and the army leaders. You can accomplish this with Charisma, Might or some combination of the two.
You will also have to avoid upsetting the next noble up the chain and his boss and so on. The problem is that the one you wish to replace is probably a blood relative of one of the higher up nobles, so be prepared for a world of hurt. Second, you will have a hard time convincing the army leaders to follow you because they also have allegiances up the ladder, so they'll have to check with their bosses who almost certainly won't want to recognize you. You may even have problems with church figures and bards and merchants depending on how you plan to seize control. It is really beyond the scope of D&D to manage this, so you'll have to talk with your DM to see how he wants to manage this with you. In short, it is going to take a heck of a lot of money.
Once you have some expectation that you can get recognition, then you need to cement your authority in the minds of everyone. You want to destroy the images and heraldry of the previous nobles, and possibly the ones before them especially in hereditary societies. You want to make sure the institutions speak well of you and possibly never mention the previous rulers ever again. You also want to be publicly recognized as the ruler by the adjacent nobles. This can be done by signing and living up to treaties for mutual support. If possible, you want to mint your own coinage and get it accepted by the neighboring societies. But never mint a coin in a kingdom with your image unless you are the king. Instead, mint coins with the king's image on one side and some artifact on the reverse side that shows the coin was minted in your barony. Display your easily recognized coat of arms in all official areas. Encourage all your vassals to display your coat of arms in their territories. If you need the love of the people, work for justice for them and protect them. Pay your army well. Be a good friend to the nobles in the adjoining areas. Pay your duties to the next higher noble on time.
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt