D&D with a strategic layer

So I'm going to run a campaign with my players as members of this defunct noble house who go to reclaim their birthright. The major feature of the game will be the "strategic layer", in which players can spend "Charter Points" (earned on missions or by exchanging a certain amount of GP) to improve their estate, and later, holdings. I've got a decent number of ideas for this, but I'm interested to see what people think of the concept and what kind of ideas you might have. Pic related is the first and second tier of the upgrade path, and you can see what comes in tier 3, but basically I want to have each upgrade provide a tangible, meaningful benefit to the players.

In addition, every time the players clear a whole row/rank, they receive an extra bonus for free. They aren't shown in the image but I'll paste them in here:

>RANK 1 COMPLETION BONUS
>Players may now donate GP to the House Coffer, to exchange it for Charter Points/CP. Every 3,000 GP converts to 1 CP. Players may also extract CP for gold, at a rate of 1 CP to 1,500 GP.

>RANK 2 COMPLETION BONUS
>Players may now winter at the estate, and receive official recognition from the crown. Players now have access to the hinterlands around the estate, and legal dominion within.

Bumping.

Again, looking for additional ideas for upgrades and opinions about the concept.

Bumping once again with castle waifu.

I actually really like the concept, but how are you going to deal with having multiple characters? It seems like most players want to have very disparate backgrounds, and are very hard to meld into one cohesive metaplot like this. Honestly, vanilla D&D is probably not the best setting for things like this, but I can't think of any better system.

Do you have a full upgrade path?

>but I can't think of any better system.
Reign.

Also, vanilla D&D is not a great system for long term strategy.

Suggested houserules:

Injuries take much longer to recover from, making path A worth more.

Get in deep with weapon customization. Like, video game deep. That's really hard with a tabletop, but it's the only real way of making path B better.

Path E is great for short term plot hooks already.

Path C will just need good storytelling and very invested players, but could be cool.

Path D will be mostly political and long term stuff.

Overall, this sounds like you're making video game play in a tabletop, which is tough because video games can do a lot more with information in a short time and do some stuff better than tabletops (like random stats and damage spread).

The players will know ahead of time that this is the premise of the campaign, I don't think I'll run into an issue with that.

I have it written out to tier 4, and I planned on something like 6 tiers, with a few floating trees in there as well.

Holy fuck. I'm stealing this idea!

I like the idea. I generally like any idea that makes an RPG into something closer to a wargame - and D&D is perfectly suited for it.

A suggestion - while your players become lords and ladies, someone has to attend tp all those newly found dungeons. Why not have your players control randomly generated characters while exploring them, with upgrades provided by stuff buit on this strategic layer of yours?

>I like the idea. I generally like any idea that makes an RPG into something closer to a wargame - and D&D is perfectly suited for it.

Basically I want to run the game to be mission based, with a strategic aspect over it, like XCOM or Jagged Alliance, but also give my players room to do what they want aside from that. So I'm thinking a session consists of a mission (selected from a pool, with rewards known prior), estate time, and then some sandbox time to round it off.

The hard part is finding out how to get the three to integrate well, but I'm trying to kind of work that into the estate management itself, what with the multiple branching upgrade trees. I was thinking that it would be better to give each player 1-3 CP for a mission rather than reward the party 5-10, so that people can decide when they want to collaborate or just save up and do their own projects.

Seconding the person who said Reign. Just run it in Reign. That system was built for what you're describing. D&D was not. Run it in Reign.

Reign

Have the players play the henchmen

I'm not interested in the ORE, but personally I would prefer running this in GURPS. Problem is that players are hard to find for such a thing.

I've done Minion Quest before and it's really not all it's cracked up to be.

Maybe I'm missing something, but what is the purpose of these "Charter Points"? Why not just price these things out in gold, instead of making up some sort of an intermediate currency?

Also, they share an acronym with copper pieces, so you should probably think of a different name.

>Maybe I'm missing something, but what is the purpose of these "Charter Points"? Why not just price these things out in gold, instead of making up some sort of an intermediate currency?

Because it's an intangible resource that can only be effectively spent on the estate. I can reward it in situations that wouldn't necessarily merit lots of GP and I don't have to worry about players amassing GP by exchanging CP because the rate of return is 50%.

>Also, they share an acronym with copper pieces, so you should probably think of a different name.
In just use GP as $, there are no copper, silver, platinum, etc. coins in my games.

You have to be careful with this kind of thing. You want a system that can be played with a boner.

Makes sense, if you tell them "For every 1000 gp you spend on your estate, you get 1 CP" they will just ruin it, despite 1000 gp building a well will not have the same benifits of setting up a players bedroom, they won't have the same benifit. I do love the idea though.

I would like to know more, for example the end game of this? Would it be war/defense/leadership of the area

What sort of time line is this intending to play out over?

Maturity of the players?

I'd warn against (as a player who would love to be in this) giving stuff like if you build a temple yuo get heathier workers thus increasing grain production, I'd call these Age of Empire bonuses, while no doubt practical they do not provide the same oomph, instead if you build a temple to the god of... law/order, you find out that the majority wanted a fertility god and burn it down, then those Guardsman who wanted the Law/Order god go full Baltimore on them, players then have to fix.

Things shouldn't be good, for example you find the tombs and crypts... not haunted as that is too cliche, instead you find out a connection to the Underdark?

Go visit the OSR thread and steal all their Birthright PDFs (inside the TSR, then Settings folder)

Sorry, but I really can't make heads or tails of most of what you're trying to say here.

Birthright's domain management system is highly overwrought, nigh unplayable, and terribly balanced, I assure you.

You said CP was an intangible resource. I agree with this, it should be hidden from the players as if you set an exchange rate 1000 gold - 1 Charter points it sets it in stone when it should not. 1000 gold spent on welcoming visiting nobles is going to be a lot better at building the estate then spending the same gold on weeding the yards.

As a player who would love to do this, I'd suggest you do not make everything they do good and benificial. I'd have some effect for everything they do, but have some bad things. My example was if they built a temple to the god of Law, this pleases the soldiers but displeases the farmers who massively outnumber the soliedrs, thus things go to a mini civil war, your famers either get beaten up by the soldiers or the soldiers get locked up in their own gaol.

I want to know more, here are some questions
>How long do you expect this game to last?

>How mature are your players? Will they cry if they do not get the epic sword of the ancestors +3?

>What do you plan for the future of the game once the estate is build? Will they go on to lead their fiefdom to war and conquests? Will it be a base for them to come back to during their adventures? Will it be a political game? Personally, go for war, let them invade others!

You don't have to use it straight, but usually going over something that already exists will give you a good idea of how to or not to do things and what you might be missing.

>You said CP was an intangible resource. I agree with this, it should be hidden from the players as if you set an exchange rate 1000 gold - 1 Charter points
Well first off the way CP is awarded is primarily through missions, so like "Rescue the Merchant from Bandits" would pay out 750 GP and 1 CP to each character. People can also exchange GP for CP, but it's 3:1.

>As a player who would love to do this, I'd suggest you do not make everything they do good and benificial. I'd have some effect for everything they do, but have some bad things. My example was if they built a temple to the god of Law, this pleases the soldiers but displeases the farmers who massively outnumber the soliedrs, thus things go to a mini civil war, your famers either get beaten up by the soldiers or the soldiers get locked up in their own gaol.
The game as I envision it is much less of a kingmaker affair than something like L5R, so the players won't be managing large populations until late in the game. That said, I have incorporated trade-offs into the majority of upgrade paths, but they're different positives rather than positive-negative. For example:

"Furnish some guest rooms
(3 CP)
Enables the hosting of dignitaries, can alternatively be used as a servant's quarters. Hosting dignitaries improves reputation, resulting in an increase to CP gains so long as it is used in this fashion. Servants improve the effectiveness of several facilities and can be ordered to work either as domestic attendants, which provides the “Orderly Home” buff, or loaned out for a steady income of GP. Unlocks the VIP Suite and servant's quarters."

>How long do you expect this game to last?
Level 1-20.

>What do you plan for the future of the game once the estate is build? Will they go on to lead their fiefdom to war and conquests? Will it be a base for them to come back to during their adventures? Will it be a political game?
It'll be really late in the game by that point, so whatever they want.

One more question... can I join?

Can you describe your players to us. Specifically the characters they are playing this campaign, or their preferred playstyle if they haven't gone through chargen yet. I think the info might be helpful in tailoring some aspects of this idea so it would appeal to them and make progression more interesting.

...

You should really take a look at ACKS (it's in the OSR trove). It really covers Domain level play, which is more or less estate level as you're describing it plus a little more.

Sounds fun OP.