Raid Action

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TH - The Hunt
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Re: Raid Action

Post by TH - The Hunt » Mon Jun 22, 2020 11:40 pm

That sounds difficult to implement. And it doesn't make sense if the province produces more income, in total, when raided, than it would if it wasn't raided. In principle, the temporary reduction in province level would discourage raiding the same target multiple times fairly well, though I'd have to wonder what the point is, if the other negative consequences of being the target are removed.
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CI - Charrek Ironfist
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Re: Raid Action

Post by CI - Charrek Ironfist » Tue Jun 23, 2020 8:24 am

The creators intended a warlike action to steal gold to be to occupy a province and burn it down a level.
Mercenaries always do that in the core rules.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by WM - The Waste Mage » Tue Jun 23, 2020 8:31 am

Kind of rough in this game where you can't rule your province up except once in a blue moon.

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Re: Raid Action

Post by TH - The Hunt » Tue Jun 23, 2020 10:21 am

It's also been pretty rough ever since pillaging became something that takes an entire action, and requires occupation which takes an entire action, too. Makes it so you can't just pillage an undefended province, you can only pillage if your army is so powerful that no one can oppose it, even if they have all the time in the world to gather their forces for it.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by CI - Charrek Ironfist » Thu Jun 25, 2020 12:18 pm

I think Fulgar the Bold's opening moves on Cariele/Dhoesone in Taelshore inspired a "slow-down" to the war rules/pillaging.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by JB - Jana Boulderbrew » Sun Jun 28, 2020 1:51 pm

Raids should require resources. And costs....Similar to the costs associated with moving troops around and some troops could die in the attack... Personally I do see raids as a declaration of war. It is not like the Vikings raiding the early English states were loved... If I were a monarch of a land and cared at all about my people, I would not want them killed, my crops stolen, and land pillaged.

What happened to SET was an expected result.... He is playing a forest goblin. What he did was perfectly in character and fun.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by TH - The Hunt » Sun Jun 28, 2020 2:52 pm

Right now, raids cost the maintenance of the units used for raiding. So, there's an incentive to raid when a large, idle force is available, all else being equal. If the naval transportation cost was included, raiding would be much less favourable. Though, I'm not sure that balance change is necessary when it's been a rare action choice as it is.

The reason a raid isn't a declaration of war is because it doesn't threaten the regent's authority. (It even props it up a bit, since the hit-and-run strategy makes it clear they're trying to avoid such a confrontation--implying the regent is a force to be reckoned with.) A realm can survive being raided turn after turn without responding--assuming they're wealthy enough to absorb the losses--but if armies march through and the regent does nothing, they stop looking like a ruler and start looking like a waste of space.

The main reason a regent might not want to declare war on someone who's raiding them is because it would cost more to stop than it would to absorb the losses. (There's limited sense in 'saving your people' from the raiders by drafting them into the military to fight a war where their homes may burn down.) Both sides might prefer a tribute arrangement to reduce risk. There's no point in raiding someone who's willing to give you resources without a fight.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by BB - Bronzebeard » Sun Jun 28, 2020 4:33 pm

Raids do threaten a regent's authority. They take money from his treasury and lower loyalty, encouraging revolts, especially if used multiple times.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by TH - The Hunt » Sun Jun 28, 2020 4:55 pm

Losing gold and loyalty makes a regent more vulnerable, but ultimately what they're vulnerable to is an armed invasion or insurrection that might cause them to lose control over their provinces. If it wasn't possible for hostile units to be raised in or march into another regents' realm, or if those units couldn't be used to occupy provinces, then there'd be no 'war' in the game, no matter how many other hostile actions could be or were taken. There could still be 'trade wars' and 'influence wars', or even 'assassination wars', but not any unqualified 'wars'. So when we talk about 'acts of war' generally, it seems to make sense to talk about the activities a Declare War action allows.

Anything, no matter how benign, can still be considered 'a cause for war', that's subjective. (At least unless we come up with 'cassus belli' rules, though I'm not keen on those.) And characters can (mis)interpret any action they want ("You disrespected the royal partridge!") as a declaration of war, too. But that's all fluff. In the mechanics, raiding units don't actually gather as an army inside the province they're raiding, so they don't (and can't) do any sort of 'war actions'. It's supposed to be a lower level of escalation than outright war. If it's not generally regarded that way, it might need adjustment. Like, for example, making it impossible to inflict several levels of loyalty loss on one province in a single turn just by using more raid actions.
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Re: Raid Action

Post by TH - The Hunt » Sat Feb 27, 2021 10:36 pm

I just looked at the new naval raid rules. I think some asymmetry would be good... If the largest ships are better at stopping raids than performing them, and longships are better at performing raids than preventing them, that gives an incentive for traders to develop and build larger ships, and for those with fleets of light, agile ships to raid more often.

The Brecht ships could even be given an all-around +1 to defend against raids and -1 to be used for raiding, to reflect the different doctrine by which they were designed.
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