Realms, Warbands, and TTRPGs
Recently I've been looking for a game to scratch the itch and fill the loose time that is otherwise spent scrolling through the endless echo-chambers of social media.
I wanted something that allowed me to forge a character and step into a world that couldn't care less about me.
I wanted a game that let me blaze my own trails, interacting with a world in interesting ways.
I wanted a game with a moderate level of complexity, but a well-developed community that would help me get there.
I found Mount & Blade. After a brief consultation with my wallet, I found Mount & Blade: Warband, the predecessor of their newer game, Bannerlord.
While Warband lacks a few of the Quality of Life features and the graphical polish of Bannerlord, it's proving to be a fun game, and I found it on sale for $5 at the Humble Bundle.
Fresh-faced and eager, I carefully crafted a hero and began the hard work of recruiting unfortunate souls for my warband. Unfortunate, because they would all be murdered by taiga bandits who proceeded to knock me unconscious and take me prisoner.
I loved it.
After several such stories, I at last found myself sitting at the head of a band of about 20 seasoned warriors, and now the bandits flee from us. Literally. You can watch them running away on the map as soon as you get close. It's awesome.
Of course, my mechanical brain wondered, "How can I emulate this type of campaign at the table?"
The following is the seed of an idea that will likely never see publication, and has probably already been done elsewhere, in more detail than I am capable.
Design Goals
Faction & Purpose
The campaign is focused on serving the interests of a faction through warfare. The players, during a session 0, would need to decide that faction and their interests. For instance, is this a peaceful domain threatened by invasion? Is it a Viking-style clan bent on conquest of land? Is it a rebellion seeking allies before declaring open war? While most of the game will be focused on battles, the players should know what they're fighting for.
Player Action
Recruit & Manage a small army (~20 soldiers)
Troops are mainly gained from friendly villages and cities. While higher level troops can be purchased straight off, it's cheaper to hire low-tier units and train them up.
Each player may have a "band" of 1-4 troops under their command.
Management is mainly Morale, Training, & Upkeep
Morale: Do the troops want to keep fighting for you? I think the standard OSR morale system would work for this. Morale can be improved via pre-battle speeches, victory celebrations, and fraternizing with the troops. Morale is lowered after a defeat, if upkeep costs are not met, or if the commanders order something foolish or cowardly, such as attacking a much larger army, or leaving behind a few soldiers so the rest of the army can escape. Whenever morale is lowered, it is also tested. On a failed test, the soldier deserts. Morale starts high.
Training: With large scale combat, it might be best to earn XP as an army, which can be spent to improve troops. Troops should have simple but varied "classes," and troops of one class can be graduated to the next "tier" of the same class by spending XP, although this will always increase the upkeep of the army. Training can also be purchased for GP.
Upkeep: The army has a party fund, and each week the upkeep of the army is deducted from that fund. If upkeep cannot be met, morale decreases by 2 for each troop.
Capture & Defend Land
Capturing Land is primarily done through securing strongholds.
This can be done through lengthy, costly, and often dull sieges. Sieges can be made faster with siege equipment, such as trebuchets, to break down walls and make an opening for an actual assault.
If I were running a siege at the table, I would try to calculate the number of days the stronghold will last before breaking. The maximum number of days is its food reserves (depending on season, this could vary a bit, either 1-4 months). If the besieging army has siege equipment, the maximum number of days would be the strength of the walls divided by the force of the siege equipment. Barring any major events, the maximum number of days passes, that much upkeep is spent by the attacking army, and then either the city surrenders, or a battle ensues.
You could also "capture" land by securing its ruler as an ally. Alliances usually state not only a keeping of the peace, but also the lending of troops in warfare.
Defending Land is required if hostile armies enter your territory. Failure to meet them on the field of battle will result in villages being raided and strongholds being taken.
Participate & Command Large Scale Warfare
Here's the kicker of this campaign. This is where it is made or broken. Combat.
The most important aspect of combat at the table is not going to be "realism" but "engagement." Are the players engaged with the events unfolding at the table? Do they feel responsible for the outcome? Do they feel thrill with each victory? Do their own characters matter?
Visualization is key. For this reason I'm a little hesitant to use cards like Matt Colville's Kingdoms and Warfare, which acts as a supplementary card-based game to 5E. I think for this style of game, having minis (or even printed tokens glued to cardboard) on a battlefield (Built from Jenga blocks if nothing else) would be the ideal set-up.
Statistics need to be simple, and developed with a wargame in mind. Combats are going to tend towards long affairs (if you're combat averse, this is not a campaign for you), but even so we need to do our best to find a basic system with just enough diversity to allow for tactical set up. A game like Joseph A. McCullogh's Frostgrave provides a simple framework for units, giving them stats for Movement, Melee, Ranged, Armor, Health, and Morale.
Unit Activation also needs to be simple and fast-paced. Players would each act as "commanders", and have a number of units in their band. A simple OSR turn structure might work, with whichever side initiates the fight taking the first turn, acting in order clockwise around the table. After each player takes their turn, the GM activates all NPC bands.
Commanders need to have the same base stats of any other unit, but can also have special features that the players can choose from. This would allow them to take on small-scale fights as well, or participate in things like dungeon crawling, where an entire army would be out of place.
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