Arelith

Posted: **Sun Dec 26, 2021 11:57 pm**

From the wiki on trade:

Settlements have yearly requirements of resources and so maintain supplies. The settlement Quartermaster NPC lets citizens and leaders interact with these things. Yearly required items include food, wood, cloth, metal and stone and how much is needed depends on the amount of registered citizens and exiles. Larger settlements will need substantially more resources each year. Settlements that fall below these requirements will suffer reduced tax income and salaries.

If the balance of any of the base resources (cloth/stone/food/etc) reaches zero then salaries (if any) will stop being paid, the exile list will be cleared (see below) and the current leaders are removed from office.

Following this the wiki says:

NOTE: Cordor is exempt from the above.

If this is correct I don't see the point. If anything it seems like it should be easier to lose Cordor than other Settlements since it is both the most profitable settlement and most often controlled by pvp centric factions by extension of its voting blocks typically drawing primarily from the guard/military and its profitability making control of it highly sought after. Exempting it makes no sense balance wise and adds nothing to the rp of the settlement.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:25 am**

IIRC, this is due to trade treaties with the mainland that give them a hugely expensive but viable alternative to their stockpiles.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:35 am**

Sincra wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:25 am IIRC, this is due to trade treaties with the mainland that give them a hugely expensive but viable alternative to their stockpiles.

Hugely expensive how? Do they have to pay out of the treasury? As it stands it just sounds like a bailout.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:53 am**

Cordor has historically had “plot armor” in regards to maintaining its hegemony on the island.

I am actually interested to hear from the team: is this still the case as it was years ago, or has anything changed? Will the amnian navy show up off the coast of anyone challenges Cordor or is that a thing of the past with the addition of Guldorand as a “second city”?

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:00 am**

Arienette wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:53 am Cordor has historically had “plot armor” in regards to maintaining its hegemony on the island.

I am actually interested to hear from the team: is this still the case as it was years ago, or has anything changed? Will the amnian navy show up off the coast of anyone challenges Cordor or is that a thing of the past with the addition of Guldorand as a “second city”?

It just seems silly since this isn't something that affects Cordor at the plot level. It's purely the pc facing mechanics. And as it stands it looks like the best settlement to own is also the most protected for no reason.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:15 am**

the pc's may run day to day, but at anytime they get out of hand the Palace will and have stepped in to remove them. Might be a very subtle thing, or it might be squads of palace guards interjecting the desired result by direct action in the name of King Edward.

no other settlement is like this and its mainly because Cordor is the default newbie start zone.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:21 am**

Ebonstar wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:15 am the pc's may run day to day, but at anytime they get out of hand the Palace will and have stepped in to remove them. Might be a very subtle thing, or it might be squads of palace guards interjecting the desired result by direct action in the name of King Edward.

no other settlement is like this and its mainly because Cordor is the default newbie start zone.

This would be the opposite of having them removed though. This would be forcing them to stay in office as an alternate course of action plays out.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:56 am**

I wish Cordor had multiple government factions like Anundor TBH. Could be like the guard, the docks/slums to validate some lower class RP and the temples.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 5:15 am**

Ebonstar wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:15 am the pc's may run day to day, but at anytime they get out of hand the Palace will and have stepped in to remove them. Might be a very subtle thing, or it might be squads of palace guards interjecting the desired result by direct action in the name of King Edward.

no other settlement is like this and its mainly because Cordor is the default newbie start zone.

I don't know if no other settlement has NPC interferance.

Guldorand and Andunor have NPC interferance in politics often enough.
Sibayad has had it a handful of times.
Wharftown had it.
Skal has it.
Sencliff has had it.
It's happened in Bendir, too.

DMs can take control of NPCs to push a narriative in any settlement.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 12:17 pm**

Pc Leaders should be to be fired for letting stockpiles hit 0, otherwise why create writs?

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 2:54 pm**

Eyeliner wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:56 am I wish Cordor had multiple government factions like Anundor TBH. Could be like the guard, the docks/slums to validate some lower class RP and the temples.

Are you thinking of the Age of Barons when the city was broken into districts and each was run by a different PC faction?

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:09 pm**

Cordor has always been (and most likely will be) less "sandboxy" than other settlements.
The bulk of the political RP in Cordor seems to constantly revolve around the struggle between authoritarian vs liberal views (with a sprinkle of FR flavor of the week) and the ability of the electorial victor to shape their settlement into their own image is considerably diminished by the setting there when compared to other settlements.

That's why I think that it does make a lot of sense for Cordor to enjoy certain freedoms with regards to the settlement system, even if it might seem slightly counterintuitive at the first glance.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 4:44 pm**

-XXX- wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:09 pm Cordor has always been (and most likely will be) less "sandboxy" than other settlements.
The bulk of the political RP in Cordor seems to constantly revolve around the struggle between authoritarian vs liberal views (with a sprinkle of FR flavor of the week) and the ability of the electorial victor to shape their settlement into their own image is considerably diminished by the setting there when compared to other settlements.

That's why I think that it does make a lot of sense for Cordor to enjoy certain freedoms with regards to the settlement system, even if it might seem slightly counterintuitive at the first glance.

It benefits being most profitable and leaders should use said profits to make jobs to get resources.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 5:58 pm**

it's okay for settlements to be different

also resource bombing is extremely lame and the only reason I see this even being brought up. in fact quartermasters won't even sell beyond a certain amount now because of people doing this. moreover, I imagine the cost to get "help" from amn is prohibitive

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 7:21 pm**

I wholeheartedly agree with this post.

It makes no sense that Amn would willingly bail out a failing government time and again. If that's the case, then Amn law should be Cordor law, elsewise it just makes no thematic sense they'd put up with so much.

Laws in Cordor get changed like the rest of us change socks, and that's not something I can see Amn taking lightly. So if Cordor gets to enjoy that kind of freedom, I would very much like their actions to also have consequences.

Besides, the bailout means bad actors have a sandbox to play in with no consequences to their actions, and they can keep messing up over and over and over again, with daddy Amn bailing them out. Yeah, not okay, and Amn, a nation so bent on profit and capital, should not be okay with that either.

And from a new player perspective, it's not a good outlook either. It doesn't teach new players how to be responsible stewards of settlements.

Posted: **Mon Dec 27, 2021 9:10 pm**

To echo Zavandar, it's okay for a settlement to be different!

However, there's not much in-game about why it's different, or any repercussions whatsoever for continued aid from a notoriously profit-driven society in Amn. If it's Amn bailing out Cordor time and again, how many decades, and in some races' case lifetimes, worth of debt and leverage do they need before making a major move on Cordor? If it's for story reasons, we're well due for the story to move to the next step. Any DM's up to the challenge?

If there are concessions made to Amn for this constant financial support, I think we should see them more clearly. Maybe impositions of Amnian laws, or special export quotas. Maybe some of the darker gods of Amn be made permanently legal in Cordor, or there is free flow of some of the more questionable goods in the world. Maybe Cordor guards slowly get replaced by Amnian ones to reflect their growing influence. There are probably lots of other, better ways to implement a cost for the coin. I'm just spitballing a way for it to be different, but still engaging.

If there's just no good way to reflect why Amn dumps massive amounts of coin into a foreign city, then yeah, it should probably function like the rest of the settlements. I bet something can be done, though.

As for Cordor being a 'beginner' town, I'd argue that it is, but it also absolutely isn't. Just look at the long established mansion owners, and the auctions to get shops and homes because of the massive demand for them.

Anyway, my two cents.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 12:19 am**

Kriegos wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 9:10 pm To echo Zavandar, it's okay for a settlement to be different!

However, there's not much in-game about why it's different, or any repercussions whatsoever for continued aid from a notoriously profit-driven society in Amn. If it's Amn bailing out Cordor time and again, how many decades, and in some races' case lifetimes, worth of debt and leverage do they need before making a major move on Cordor? If it's for story reasons, we're well due for the story to move to the next step. Any DM's up to the challenge?

If there are concessions made to Amn for this constant financial support, I think we should see them more clearly. Maybe impositions of Amnian laws, or special export quotas. Maybe some of the darker gods of Amn be made permanently legal in Cordor, or there is free flow of some of the more questionable goods in the world. Maybe Cordor guards slowly get replaced by Amnian ones to reflect their growing influence. There are probably lots of other, better ways to implement a cost for the coin. I'm just spitballing a way for it to be different, but still engaging.

If there's just no good way to reflect why Amn dumps massive amounts of coin into a foreign city, then yeah, it should probably function like the rest of the settlements. I bet something can be done, though.

As for Cordor being a 'beginner' town, I'd argue that it is, but it also absolutely isn't. Just look at the long established mansion owners, and the auctions to get shops and homes because of the massive demand for them.

Anyway, my two cents.

It's okay for settlements to be different but when everything is custom there's no reason things can't be different and well designed. It's silly that the best settlement to own is also the safest to own and it doesn't seem to add anything of value by being mechanically enforced instead of simply being a backstory reason for why the city survives even if a Chancellor fails.

As for the newbie town argument, the only time Cordor is owned by noobs is when nobody is bothering to try and control it. Normally it goes to whoever has the blessing of the local active mega-faction which 9/10 times is not run by a new player.

This idea that the mechanic is somehow advancing rp or enhancing the story is a fantasy. There's nothing interesting about a mechanic that makes people in control of the most lucrative thing on the server even more secure in their power. If anything it makes the situation less interesting because it takes options for challenging that success off the table where they might otherwise exist.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 2:08 pm**

can anyone here actually say the last time Cordor's supplies dropped to 0

can anyone here then say what happened next

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 2:49 pm**

Cordor is a starter city in regards to writs. As far as the rest it really depends on what faction is in charge. I would argue most players strike out from the political minefield that is cordor if they want a chance to own thier own home or shop.

Side note, seeing Amn laws would be fun. Can anyone say Licensing to use magic to go along with the Lodestar? Such would need to be done by the players though as DMs are pretty standoff when it comes to direct Cordor control.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 3:45 pm**

This is a moot discussion anyways, as Cordor's stocks of resources are naturally bountiful from new characters shoving gathered resources at the minister for some extra gold with which to buy healing supplies or add that +1 AC to their accessories. And the treasury is often over-flowing from Cordor being a major place to shop and own property, so the city wouldn't have trouble offering a good price for resources even if you didn't have newbie horcs (and now firbolgs, I suppose) tossing big chunks of granite at city officials in exchange for filthy lucre.

And even if that changes, resource bombing is a pretty awful story-telling mechanic that involves grinding gold and then interacting with NPCs and spreadsheets without any kind of meaningful interaction with an opposing faction.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:27 pm**

Could someone explain in detail what is meant by "resource bombing"?

I don't really interact with settlements at all in any way at all, other than selling wood/stone etc to the lady next to the chest.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:28 pm**

Selling a whole lot of resources to a settlement to deplete its treasury.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:32 pm**

Curve wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:28 pm Selling a whole lot of resources to a settlement to deplete its treasury.

Forgive my ignorance, I really don't have anything to do with settlements. Eventually the lady by the box stops buying my coal and things, how do people circumvent that?

Is resource bombing an OOC action? It sounds like exactly what someone RPing logistics would do.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:40 pm**

MRFTW wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:27 pm Could someone explain in detail what is meant by "resource bombing"?

I don't really interact with settlements at all in any way at all, other than selling wood/stone etc to the lady next to the chest.

When a settlement goes bankrupt, it goes into 'anarchy' and all government positions are wiped. I can't speak for the developers, but I believe this was put into place to punish bad management of a settlement and to make conserving/managing a settlement's treasury actually matter in a political sense.

The issue was that hostile parties would scope out a settlement's 'buy' prices on a resource and then waltz in with enough of that resource to bankrupt the settlement. It was silly - the equivalent of Constantinople falling because the Turks rolled up with so many wagons full of cotton that the Byzantine Emperor couldn't afford it all and had to abdicate.

Since then, anyone who's managed the settlement for a spell has had to learn the importance of managing the sell settings to keep outsiders from easily bankrupting you. Same thing for keeping someone from buying out all of one resource and also causing anarchy that way.

Posted: **Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:47 pm**

Nintendo Entertainment System wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 4:40 pm snip

Ah, I think I understand. Thanks very much. I can clearly see a difference between attempting to overthrown PC governments by exploiting OOC mechanics and logistics RP. I thought when people were talking about "anarchy" it was as a concept, rather than a state which a settlement can be in.

I mentioned coal before as seeming to have a cap that settlements would buy, is that only for certain resources and the bad actors attempting resource bombs are using resources which aren't capped?

Arelith

Cordor Should Behave Like Other Settlements.

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