House&Player character building

[Igordragonian]

Ok. Here we will continue.


House Details:

Name:
Symbol:
Motto:
Age: Recent. (100-150 years)
Founding event- Scandal.
History:



Stats-

Defence 28- Defensible, with at least one fortified town or castle. Roads and trails are present, and rivers or ports are likely

Influence 26- Maximum Lord's Status 4. A small minor house. Examples

include House Mormont and House Westerling.

Lands 21- A modest stretch of land or

medium-size island, such as House Frey.

island or small portion of a larger island, or a large city and

its immediate environs, such as House Mormont.

Law 30 -The typical level of Law throughout much of Westeros.

Crime is common but not out of control.

Population 31- Modest population. At least one town and several small

hamlets.

Power 30- A modest force of soldiers, including some trained troops.

Wealth 29- Common. Your family has enough to get by.


The Household Characters:
Lord Of The House:
Lady Of The House:
Heir(?):
Noble Children:

Master At Arms:
Castelan:
Steward:
Septon:

SPOILER: Click to show

{Household Characters}

Maester:
Master Of Horse:
Master Of The Hunt:
Kennelmaster:
Vassal Knights:
Squires:
Guards:
Servants and Maids:


 

[Igordragonian]

Geography- To discuss our location.

Here a short summary-

Review Of The Stormlands
)Geography focused)
Cold. Rough. Wet.
Those words are used the most, by travelers to describe the Stormlands.
It's north border just south of King's Landings
. On the east, a very rocky shores shape the land, which combined with the often and harsh winds give it the name "Shipbreaker bay". This bay has killed King Robert's parents, Steffona and Cassana Baratheon. Beyond the bay there are some islands, which are also sworn to House Baratheon, most noticably is Tarth. The eastren it is, the more stormy the land is.

At the south, there are the Dornish marches, which were battleground between the Stormlanders and the Dornish for centuries, right below the red mountains of Dorne. The climate is much warmer. The Dornish Sea connect between the Stormlands and Dorne.

on the west, the Stormlands border the Reach.

Despite the Stormlands being fertile enough, the stormlanders don't build big cities, out of fear of invasions, specifaclyy dornish raiders, preffering to spread into villages and small towns- how ever the castles are very formidable. Most famouse is of course the legendary Storm's End.

The population live in awarness of how likely a war is, and the harsh sea design a very tough sailors and soldiers.



---
Main Houses-
It's likely our house serve a secondary house to Baratheon's. We can make up of course, or pick a cannon was-
like the house of Selmy for example. (Yes. of Barristan Selmy)

[Zero Prime]

While I certainly agree with Rax's assessment, I tend to see a player's d6 contributions as something that they, personally, are invested in.  As I plan on building my character around an aspiring military commander, or knight of worth, I think I will contribute to our power, providing our House with a more stable military force.

Power: 29+uzrkvnzM1d6=30

As a side note, maybe I should avoid rolling anything for our house, ever again!1d6

[Rax]

It’s punishment for ignoring my advice. 😉

[Zero Prime]

We're already setting a dynamic in place, you're obviously the older brother who gives wise council that your younger,  hot headed brother, ignores.

[Igordragonian]

Alright! 
But any thoughts of the house's history and location?

[Rax]

I think it would be helpful if two things are made clear before we decide on a location for the house.

1. What stories we want to play out. If we want to fight or engage in intrigue with lots of Dornishmen, placing our house in the south or in the Dornish Marches is a good idea. If we want to be more bound up in the intrigues of King's Landing, being situated in the north or north-west is logical. If we want to sail the oceans, battle pirates, and maybe conquer some new land, we should be on the coast somewhere, preferably near the Stepstones.

2. We should determine our house's domains. If we decide we want hills, mountains, and mines, we should be placed among or near the southern mountains. If we want a port, we need a coast, so we should be next to the sea (or in it if we buy an island). And so on and so forth.

As for our history, since our house was found during the Blackfyre Rebellions, the scandal which our house was founded to cover up could be related to the Rebellions. For example:

1. Our "founding father" was a hedge knight in the service of one of the traitor houses involved in the Whitewalls conspiracy (the Second Rebellion). He was in love with the daughter and only surviving child of the treacherous lord. Our founding father was instrumental in revealing the conspiracy. The lord was executed or forced to take the black and as a reward our founding father was allowed to marry the lord's daughter and found a new house. The new house received some of the old lord's lands and titles, but most of them were distributed to other loyalists.

2. Our "founding father" was a Targaryen loyalist of modest standing, either a landless knight or a son with no hope of claiming the title of his house. He married the daughter of another loyalist house who had conceived a child with one of the Blackfyre pretenders or perhaps their enabler Aegor Rivers. This was ostensibly due to rape. Thanks to the standing of her father's house, she was allowed to keep the child on the condition that she married our founding father. Together, they were allowed to found our house.

3. Completely unrelated to the rebellions - our founding father won his castle and titles gambling. The king of the day found it both amusing to confirm his nobility, but instead of letting our founder keep all the lands he won, he received portion of them (along with a new lordship) and the king sold the rest back to the foolish lord who had lost them gambling. The scandal is thus the actions of the lord who lost his lands gambling and the circumstances our our founding father becoming a lord.

4. Our house was founded in the same way as Bronn's rise to power. He did an important service for the king, was knighted, and then schemed/slept his way into control of a minor house.

In most of the cases above, we don't need to have direct royal intervention if we don't want too. It could be the liege of the Stormlands who raised up our ancestor.

[HorizonsDream]

Zero, stay away from the dice.


I'm having a hard time deciding if I want the house in the south or in the north. I like the idea of having to deal with Dorne raiders in the south, but I think I'm leaning more towards the northern coast. Now that I think about it, since I live in the Pacific Northwest of the United States, of course I would pick the northern rocky coast of the Stormlands. That would mean that our House deals with the intrigue of King's Landing, but it also opens the possibility of dealing with pirates and stuff like that. Since I'm picking the coast, I would say that the house has some sort of small port.

Out of Rax's ideas for the House History, I like the 3rd and 4th idea the best.

I do have a question though. All of our characters are going to be apart of the same House, so does that mean they are all related? I'm not exactly sure how this works.

[Igordragonian]

Well at the south there is the Dornish Sea.

and a good question.
Some of you may be related.  Most probably wouldn't be. But there are roles- The Master At Arms, who is effectivly the military commander. Or the Maester.
Septon/Septa.
Maybe the cynical grandma of the lord.
a red priest who the Lord is favoring-
a singer.
Maybe some noble ironborn hostage like Theon Greyjoy.
anyone with a position of some power, with an intresting story to tell.


I can offer the premade archetypes if this would help

[HorizonsDream]

I don't actually have an idea for a character yet, but I think that is mostly because I don't know how characters are made in this setting just yet. Though, knowing that they don't have to be related even if they are in the same house is helpful.

[Igordragonian]

if it of any help, there are archetypes with premade stats:
Anointed Knight
Godsworn(Religouse figure)
Heir
Hedge Knight
Maester
Noble/schemer
Retainer
Scout
Squire.



General ideas for roles with cannon examples:

Expert: someone who is expert in narrow selection of specialities
People like Syrio Forrel, Maester Luwin

Fighter: 
People like Brien Of Tarth, Barristan Selmy, Sandor Clegane, Jaime Lannister


Leader: People who command and guide others.
people like Tywin Lannister, Edward Stark, Daenrys Targeryan

Rogue: Unlike experts, rogues diversofy their specialities prepared to deal with diffrent situations.
people like Arya Stark, Davos Seaworth,Tyrion Lannister


Schemer-Masters of intrigue
people like Peter Baelish, Cersei Lannister, Varys The Spider.

Mystican- Someone who is follow force beyond mortal understanding.
people like Bran Stark, Melisandre, Beric Dondarrion


those roles of course could be mixed.


there are also fun tables to roll paers of the character's personality.

[Daos]

It might also help to know what exactly we're going to be doing in this game.  I assume this isn't like Dungeons and Dragons, where we'll be wandering the countryside, getting into fights and looting corpses, exploring forgotten ruins or dungeons, etc..  What exactly does a typical game look like?

[Igordragonian]

That a good question as well.
That why I watch and read gameplays of the game.
In some senses it's a sandbox game.
Every character has her or his own goals that they pursue.
The House is a shared "playground"
the players may or may not work together, considering their goals, loyalties and princples.
They react to situations and create others.
Wonderful "adventure" example is a tournament.
Knights get to fight settle old grudges, start new ones, or maybe attempt to cheat their way into gold and glory.

The squires might notice hints for some conspiracy, hints for other knights cheating- maybe they will expose the very knights they serve. Get into squabbles with squires of rivals, or being manipulates into acting against their knight.

Maester get to heal, and give support to investigations and etc. They also control the raven communication.

the heir might try to get a marriage pact with a beneficial house-or just a spouse they desire.

and the results of such a tournament could create tensions that would linger for the rest of the story.
Between "adventures"/chapters the house will be managed and it's situation will inform the challenges- maybe a plague require asking of other houses to send their Maesters for aid.
Or would they simply burn away all the sick? And etc.

[Zero Prime]

I still believe that Daos has a final d6 to add to our House in whichever category they wish.

I want to thank Rax for coming up with some possible solutions for the Scandalous founding of our house.  My order of preference is #2, then #1.  #4 is my least favorite because of the direct relation to book characters, which makes me slightly uncomfortable, heh.

As far as characters, I like the idea of being a second son to the House's patron.  As second son, he is not in the direct line of succession, so he has concentrated his efforts in earning honor & glory in the field of combat, to elevate his status and that of his House.  So somewhere between Fighter & Leader, and could easily have a sibling rivalry with #1 Son.

[Daos]

I guess I'm still unsure where to put the d6.  I don't really have the context needed to guess what changing any of those numbers will actually do.  For instance, if I put it into Lands, that will increase our lands, sure, but...what does that mean, exactly?  How does having more lands affect the gameplay?