I suppose one thing would be to borrow a few cues from our Iron Kingdoms Unleashed campaign. That was, in a sense, a "MonsterQuest" sort of game (most of us were playing "monster" races), and we were indeed clearing out a ruined castle to turn into our new base/lair. Digital_Rampage turned over to me the job of mapping out the castle (while he'd populate it with monster encounters and a few secret-passage surprises), and of coming up with a system for gathering resources and making improvements to the keep.
Each week, we could generate resources, and if we gathered treasure, that could be translated into more. Hard choices had to be made about whether this week it was more important to patch a big gap in the outer wall, or clean up a room so it could be used for habitation, or build a kiln, or make some doors, etc. -- on up to the point where we'd fancy things up further by making a "battle pit" for training warbeasts, stables to hold mounts, animal pens and crop areas, a dedicated library and map room, etc. I basically made a mini-game out of it.
Some things had obvious in-game benefits, as, in order to utilize certain skills, we needed the appropriate workshop to practice them ... or the presence of a wall might give us a little longer to prepare if enemies lay siege to the base. Others offered minor "quality of life" improvements that would be tallied up, eventually offering other bonuses (more people move in, increasing our output; a specialist comes to join our group; our underlings clean up a few rooms on their OWN, sparing us the trouble; etc.) once we reached certain thresholds.
It was kind of fun putting it together ... but it really didn't seem to interest the group as a whole very much. A lot of the decisions for the group fell to ME, which felt a bit wrong to me, since I was the one who had come up with the system in the first place (albeit with Digital_Rampage's approval). Part of the problem was that IKRPG does a lousy job of defining the "economy" of the game: you get starting money, and there is a price list of equipment, but the pricing is a bit goofy. No guidelines are given as to how much the PCs should get paid for a mission, or how much it would cost to hire a henchman, or how much money is the sort of cash you should be looking at as an opportunity to go retire comfortably in the countryside.
There are orders of magnitude between the cost it takes for a warrior to get fully fitted out with the best equipment available, and what it takes, say, a warcaster to get prepped for battle. And then there are warlocks (with their warbeasts) for whom their most valuable resources (warbeasts!) have no price at all; there's no matter of "shopping" for what sort of warbeast you'll have -- you're wholly dependent upon the GM's generosity and discretion in terms of what critter you might be able to acquire, beyond the one you started the game with.
... so, I guessed wrong. There really was not much "loot" for us to acquire. We would make a lot of NO PROGRESS (or at least very little progress) for a long time, and then suddenly the GM would drop an entire advanced forge in our collective lap. (Okay, bad image. But, really, out of the blue we would just GET stuff, largely thwarting the idea of prioritizing things as we went.)
I think it could have some potential, but it was complex enough that it could have used quite a bit more play-testing.
no subject
I suppose one thing would be to borrow a few cues from our Iron Kingdoms Unleashed campaign. That was, in a sense, a "MonsterQuest" sort of game (most of us were playing "monster" races), and we were indeed clearing out a ruined castle to turn into our new base/lair. Digital_Rampage turned over to me the job of mapping out the castle (while he'd populate it with monster encounters and a few secret-passage surprises), and of coming up with a system for gathering resources and making improvements to the keep.
Each week, we could generate resources, and if we gathered treasure, that could be translated into more. Hard choices had to be made about whether this week it was more important to patch a big gap in the outer wall, or clean up a room so it could be used for habitation, or build a kiln, or make some doors, etc. -- on up to the point where we'd fancy things up further by making a "battle pit" for training warbeasts, stables to hold mounts, animal pens and crop areas, a dedicated library and map room, etc. I basically made a mini-game out of it.
Some things had obvious in-game benefits, as, in order to utilize certain skills, we needed the appropriate workshop to practice them ... or the presence of a wall might give us a little longer to prepare if enemies lay siege to the base. Others offered minor "quality of life" improvements that would be tallied up, eventually offering other bonuses (more people move in, increasing our output; a specialist comes to join our group; our underlings clean up a few rooms on their OWN, sparing us the trouble; etc.) once we reached certain thresholds.
It was kind of fun putting it together ... but it really didn't seem to interest the group as a whole very much. A lot of the decisions for the group fell to ME, which felt a bit wrong to me, since I was the one who had come up with the system in the first place (albeit with Digital_Rampage's approval). Part of the problem was that IKRPG does a lousy job of defining the "economy" of the game: you get starting money, and there is a price list of equipment, but the pricing is a bit goofy. No guidelines are given as to how much the PCs should get paid for a mission, or how much it would cost to hire a henchman, or how much money is the sort of cash you should be looking at as an opportunity to go retire comfortably in the countryside.
There are orders of magnitude between the cost it takes for a warrior to get fully fitted out with the best equipment available, and what it takes, say, a warcaster to get prepped for battle. And then there are warlocks (with their warbeasts) for whom their most valuable resources (warbeasts!) have no price at all; there's no matter of "shopping" for what sort of warbeast you'll have -- you're wholly dependent upon the GM's generosity and discretion in terms of what critter you might be able to acquire, beyond the one you started the game with.
... so, I guessed wrong. There really was not much "loot" for us to acquire. We would make a lot of NO PROGRESS (or at least very little progress) for a long time, and then suddenly the GM would drop an entire advanced forge in our collective lap. (Okay, bad image. But, really, out of the blue we would just GET stuff, largely thwarting the idea of prioritizing things as we went.)
I think it could have some potential, but it was complex enough that it could have used quite a bit more play-testing.