I need help Veeky Forums. My players want to play a campaign where they are nobles from the start. I like the idea...

I need help Veeky Forums. My players want to play a campaign where they are nobles from the start. I like the idea, but I'm having trouble with trying to come up with a good adventure for them to go on. I always try to make my games realistic, to keep up immersion, so I need some way have nobles mucking about in ruins or caves, without having it make no sense. Politics will eventually come into play, so I just need a good way to invest my characters in the setting.
Any ideas are appreciated

Fire Emblem that shit

Well, what kind of nobles? There's all sorts. Are they just dumb wine-eating, cheese-drinking fatsos that do nothing but own a villa? Are they knights? Dukes? Princes and princesses that are all landowners trying to show their Papá that they're just barely aware of the outside world enough to rule?

They're counts, for now at least, not high on the social totem pole. They've all a small castle to themselves

Well, part of the motivation for the crusades was to give all the young noble men in England something to do other than bully serfs, so it's not like adventure is anathema to nobility.

In fact, the appeal of adventure hits every man and woman, even the most straight laced prude. This was part of the appeal of lord Byron in his day. Dude had had adventures in the middle East and fucked dudes there (not just a societal scandal, but a religious one too). The 'proper' English ladies fucking loved him.

Just have them be bored-ass pricks who crave real adventure.

>These counts make a divided profit off of mines in a mountain range that is considered "theirs to share"
>They're pissed that the experts they sent to appraise a cave slated for conversion in to a strip mine haven't reported back
>They get on their bitch-slapping outfits and grab their duelling swords, assuming the coward is hiding in the mine to smuggle precious greystone for himself
>insert plot hook once they're in the cave

Spend some time with them creating their noble houses. The Game of Thrones RPG has some cool rules for that.

What about the setting? If they're viking-inspired nobles (you mentioned Counts, the equivalent would likely be a Jarl), there'd be no end to the kinds of adventures and raids to go on.

If they're more standard English/French styled Counts, they might be sucked into a fantasy realm through magic or some shit (if you really want to make them historical). If the setting already contains fantastic elements, maybe they're all down on their luck, and have banded together to find a relic that will restore their houses. Perhaps they're plotting something, and are slinking around to forge alliances for an upcoming war. Maybe they're all stuck in the ass crack of this fantasy world, and want to escape, improve their lot in life, or help their serfs (if they're do-gooders).

Really these ideas apply to all kinds of nobility, but you get the gist. Keep us updated on how this campaign goes, this could be really interesting.

If they're nobles, have them be politicking all day erry day. It's time to jockey to be king, motherfucker.

Whatever you want them to do, king wants it, queen want that bauble, prince wants this sword. Go fetch. No not your troops not your lackies I told you to do it. Also after they prove competent have other nobles start rumors poison servants generally make life hard for them. While they are off running royal errands cousin usurped your lands good luck.

Ever play Romancing SaGa 2? You start as the Emperor, have a mountain of cash, and a laundry list of shit to do that spans multiple generations.

Medieval nobles did the majority of fighting in their time. It's not at all strange for them to respond personally to a threat within their lands. Three minor nobles, their squires, and a few retainers would make a fun party to fight banditry, beasty incursion, or investigate something.

Best answer ITT. For reals lower nobility were still expected to join the military until WW2 for example. The idea that they're all lazy snobs is really a modern invention based mostly on the French nobility who were essentially forced in to lives of drinking,whoring and gambling by the French Kings. The reason why they were often encouraged to stay in the Kings court and partake in expensive banquets and fashion styles was because the King wanted his nobility spending their incomes on fancy clothes and other less desirable hobbies. Basically the less money they are spending on armies and enriching themselves the less chance there is of a major revolt lead by the lower nobility which could decentralize France, leading to something seen in the HRE and England where lower nobility have much more say in the government.

There are lots of good examples of nobles who like to fight their enemies personally. The Targaryens were known for being batshit crazy dragon riders, the Heterodynes are feared throughout Europe, many nobles in LotR were either warriors, superhuman, mages, or former soldiers, etc. Someone else mentioned the Crusades, which is true.

All a noble or count needs to go out in the world and mix it up with goblins is a good enough reason. And there are lots.

>Their race plays a role. Some wimpy human is going to throw soldiers at a bandit ring plaguing their lands, but a Dwarf, pompous spellcasting Elf, or honorable Dragonborn would take that insult personally. Time to smack the shit out of them.
>Their enemies are Chaotic Evil or followers of an evil god, and the PC is either a Paladin/Priest or politically supported by lots of them.
>Their character is either known for being a hardass or is genuinely is crazy and warlike, and they relish the chance to get out and kick some ass.
>Rather than being random ruins or caves, these are extremely important magical ruins or a cave containing lost family heirlooms. They arrive to poke around and shit goes south.
>One of them is a wizard who can't learn much about combat magic without an excuse to use it, and serfs make shitty practice targets.
>Noble in question was an adventurer when they were young and fears life as a noble is making them soft.

Grail?

THE BOAR

If you're playing 5e, use the "When Armies Clash" ruleset. Your nobles are leading small military parties, because they're nobles. Problem solved.

>the crusades
>england
Even though England was involved in only 2/9, neither being about claiming land and both of those being about protecting a land with already established rulers? The Princes Crusade was almost exclusively French (especially when you realize the Sicilians participating were Normans).

Play some Crusader Kings 2 - Every time I play my dude seems to get embroiled in weird adventures...
>Build an observatory, get paranoid about hidden messages in the stars, go full Cthulhu and go on an expedition to meet Abdul al Hazred and find the Necronomicon

>Go on a hunting trip with some of my noble buddies. See a mystical white stag, become obsessed with hunting it down

>Become a lay member of the Dominican order, get shown a holy relic, decide to try and steal it for myself

so you've never heard of Conquistadors, any human being who participated in the age of exploration, Knights, Samurai, or the entirety of English history? You understand that the dnd "adventurer", the idea of homeless wandering murder machine that has no interaction with society at large is a fictitious creation? That for the most part human beings who went on dangerous, time consuming adventures to far off lands wielding advanced weaponry were generally incredibly wealthy people with the social influence to convince other nobility to fund their insane expeditions? Crack a fucking book jesus christ.

>I always try to make my games realistic, to keep up immersion, so I need some way have nobles mucking about in ruins or caves, without having it make no sense.
Revolution.

None of the players are eldest sons: They are all expendable. And infact need to either: Go be a soldier, a priest, or wealthy on their own terms.

How was that difficult?

You must not have read my post. I just wanted to find to a way to get my players invested early on. Anyone with half of basic education knows of basic history. I asking for any ideas that players, with such high station from the beginning, could get a good feel of the lands he's in. The majority of your reply seems to be directed at some mystery person.

Have you considered some kind of Magi-style thing, where the dungeons they delve into are really testing grounds build by possessed magic items that seek to crown their own worthy kings-of-all-the-land?

Pendragon
PENDRAGON

MOTHERFUCKING
PENDRAGON

Play it, it's good.

This, nearly every Fire Emblem game features a noble protagonist but doesn't get wrapped up in inter-political convolutions too deep and complex for any player to reasonably keep up with.

Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth's szlachta were nobles, had high tendency to duel other people with their sabers, and often joined armoured companies of wealthier magnates.
Also, magnates tended to wage their own private wars, like during Time of Troubles, where they ended up occupying Russia.

Literally just run the Great Pendragon Campaign.

What a load of trite shite

They're a bunch of young rakes who've been kicked out (2nd-and 3rd offspring, no heirs-apparent) and with their pittance of an allowance, must outfit themselves and win renown to get back in their parents' good graces.

>Either their houses are allied or they're from the same house
>Said house(s) wind up on the wrong side of a losing war
>War is over and their house is one of many the new regime knocked down to dirt farming peasants for supporting the other side
>Now go meet somewhere in a stank ass backwater tavern and go on a quest to reclaim your riches, your ancestral land, and your noble heritage

>reclaiming a crumbling ancestral fortress so that local trade routes can be better protected/taxed
>rumors of a semi-mythical beast roaming near your lands have reached your ear, and you think its head would look nice on your wall

>not making them barons instead.

Pleb

Have them help colonize a far away land or something like that. America 2.0 or the colonization of Africa 2.0. Resources and new land is something nobles ought to jump for.

More info pls, OP:

Do they just want to have noble titles? I mean D'Artagnan was a minor noble, and he pretty much goes on to be a prestigious King's Guard and run around killing baddos.

Or do they want to control the lands of a noble house? Depending on how big they are, this can be done and be fun, but I'd like to hear that that's what they actually want before sperging about it.

Small time nobles needed to work their asses off to keep their place in the court or raise up their status, if your PCs are young nobles, chances are their parents will pressure them to do what they can to ascend and make themselves look better than others. In a fantasy setting that can translate into:

>Go defeat enemies to show the other nobles you're honorable and other houses shouldnt fuck with us
>Go fight wars in distant lands to acquire renown, favors from royalty and political influence in the court
>Make money so our house can grow stronger and have more influence

Adventuring is the fastest way to literally carve your way through nobility, be it by becoming incredibly rich, incredibly famous or really fucking badass. The moment the king goes "oh this fucker has been doing some crazy shit I might need to have him on my good side" you're golden.

Since you're probably sleeping OP, here's how we did option 2 once:

Started the game after the main plot arc basically. The King went "Those adventurers helped us a lot, and they're also dangerous and ambitious people. What do we do with those again, advisor?" - "We make them nobles and give them a fief away from the heartland, near the wild border, where there's bandit incursions and the threat of large army X rolling in at some point, sir." - "Ah right. Take all the necessary precautions.".

Have them be Knights who were sent to negotiate a Trade Treaty but got ambushed and then went on to find a Chosen One child plot device.

I wouldn't have made them counts to start with, it's actually higher up than you think it is, Barons as the other user stated would have been better, or Viscounts or even lower.

Instead of thinking about how you can bring nobles to the adventurers environment why not try to bring adventuring to the nobles environment. You can also have the BBEG come and siege their castle and steal the contents of their treasure vault. They still have good credit as everyone assumes they still have a vast amount of treasure, but if they don't retrieve their gold soon the banks will catch wind and they'll be living a life of peasantry.

GODS I HAD A BODY THEN

>My players want to play a campaign where they are nobles from the start

Just run pendragon. The game is especially designed to do this and it's pretty good to boot.

Make them second/third/whatever in line for inheritance. Their parents send them off on 'adventures' to prove their worth, but really it's an attempt to get them all killed so they won't have to deal with them fighting over the inheritance.

We have changed their station to Baron, at least in power

Birthright.

Look it up. You're welcome.

Have them get involved in noble conspiracies and shit.

>I like the idea, but I'm having trouble with trying to come up with a good adventure for them to go on

>They're counts, for now at least, not high on the social totem pole. They've all a small castle to themselves

Have the next noble up throw a feast, and tell them they're all going to war on his behalf. But don't worry, they won't have to travel far: the war is coming to them.

Good thing they have those castles, right?