@packrat said in Alternative Lords & Ladies Settings:
One thing that I do feel is valuable in a Lords and Ladies set up is a large population of NPC nobles and society. Then you can have people with social stats or plots influence things, or social pressures be applied, etc, without having to rely on player characters entirely.
Another consideration, for me at least? Player characters almost always have 'above average' stats and skills for good reason but if player characters then make up the entire structure of an inherited noble caste? That starts to create a world in which those of noble birth are inherently superior even if that was not the intention.
I am to be honest a big fan of making that kind of thing based on 'level' of nobility also, if you are a knight/dame? Be really good at stuff! There might well be thousands of NPC gentry and you are one of the people who stand out. Somebody is playing a duke or duchess? Have them given points to be statted like a vaguely kind of competent person because they are going to get plenty of spotlight and agency from their position and power. They do not also need to be a master duellist or peerless tactician or unmatched courtier, actually if they are merely decent at stuff then they have much more reason to want to recruit, retain the loyalty of and have to delegate power to other player characters.
I agree with this. Rank, honestly, should be a purchasable ability, not something you get just by saying 'I want to play a Duke'. In most L&L settings, it comes with too many inherent bonuses for people to ALSO get full stats/skills/other abilities. Particularly when you add in personal wealth from being nobility, it's very easy to have Nobles Who Do Everything - they're warriors with the best equipment, they're researchers with the greatest libraries and assistants, they're diplomats with the ability to pay massive bribes, AND they receive an ongoing source of income and their own armies.
However, if you do that, I'd also recommend standardizing and being specific about the privileges of nobility: at X level, you have access to Y personal troops, X ongoing wealth, Z bonuses to social interactions with people beneath you on the chain, etc. And instead of letting people change rank (unless you have a setting that allows that), let people gain and lose temporary titles. Many royal/imperial courts had loads of minor titles JUST so that they could award good service (or punish someone who fell out of favor) in ways that were under their control. It's one of those things that a lot of games don't bother with, and it's a shame. 'The Keeper of the Royal Bedchamber' doesn't sound like an exciting title until you realize that in some places, the monarch took personal audiences in their bedchamber and it was the Keeper who decided who got in.
That said, looking at other alternatives: I'd love to see a game that played around with something along the Imperial Exam system. Blue Rose does this in part: you have to past tests of nobility, the last of which is the scepter test. But you could go more into an Imperial Exam kind of thing where your scholar class ARE your nobility, and the 'noble families' are the ones who push their children to study, take the exams, and get bureaucratic postings, including things like governorships. It also gives you characters who may be raised to wealth and privilege, but failed the exams or didn't take them, and now fill different positions for their family.
Also, @Songtress - it's a nice thought, but people do not pretend bang animals because they just don't have a humanoid form for that character they're in love with to bang. They pretend bang animals because the idea of getting ridden by a wolf, or cat, or whatever REALLY turns them on.
