Idea Ravnica Nation Builder

[Bone2pick]

My favorite breed of roleplay is a story-heavy nation builder. I love reading the adventures that players dream up when you give them a cast of characters and narrative space. This thread will be used to develop a fandom nation builder that I've wanted to GM for years—one set inside MtG's plane of Ravnica.

My priorities for the RP are as follows:
- start small in terms of scale
- maintain balance
- reward participation & effort
- soft consequences for early/minor mistakes & hard consequences for continued/major mistakes

The premise: players will start as guild lieutenants (minor officers) and command their own guild crews. These crews will be staffed by creatures inspired by both Ravnica card blocks with their power levels set by me. Crews will operate similar to a typical gang with assigned turfs, responsibilities, and a certain degree of autonomy.

Creatures will be divided by the following power level:

1 = Common
2.5 = Uncommon
4 = Elite
6 = Champion/Monster
? = Legend
? = Mythic

Each guild will naturally have their own creature types. The following is an example for the Golgari Guild:

Golgari Creature List
Elves of the Deep Shadow - Common (elf druid)
Golgari Thug - Common (human warrior)
Sewer Shambler - Common (zombie)
Stinkweed Imp - Common (imp)

Kraul Warrior - Uncommon (insect warrior)
Thrashing Mossdog - Uncommon (plant hound)
Rot Farm Skeleton - Uncommon (plant skeleton)

Golgari Decoy - Elite (elf rogue)
Dreg Mangler - Elite (plant zombie)
Zanikev Locust - Elite (insect)

Golgari Brownscale - Monster (lizard)
Korozda Guildmage - Champion (elf shaman)

In order to purchase their crews players will start with 27 creature points. Common creatures cost 1, uncommon cost 2.5, ect. Players will also be awarded one free Champion to act as their primary character (crew leader) and either one free monster or one free elite creature with *authority.

*Authority to be detailed later.

 

[Bone2pick]

Authority - I want leadership to play a role in this skirmish faction RP. To represent this I'm including the keyword Authority to attach to certain creatures. Authority will factor into combat, trade, engineering, search & investigation, and spellcraft.

Champion creatures and better all come with the Authority keyword. Elites can earn the keyword, but only through spending creature points—price to be determined. Whenever crews face a significant challenge without an authority creature leading them, their likelihood of failure skyrockets.

Izzet Creature List
Sparkmage Apprentice - Common (human wizard)
Goblin Electromancer - Common (goblin wizard)
Wee Dragonauts - Common (faerie wizard)

Izzet Staticaster - Uncommon (human wizard)
Frostburn Weird - Uncommon (weird)
Goblin Test Pilot - Uncommon (goblin wizard)

Nivix Cyclops - Elite (cyclops)
Fluxcharger - Elite (weird)
Izzet Chronarch - Elite (human wizard)

Nivix Guildmage - Champion (human wizard)
Torch Drake - Monster (drake)

———

Azorius Creature List
Azorius Arrester - Common (human soldier)
Nightguard Patrol - Common (human soldier)
Opal Lake Gatekeepers - Common (vedalken soldiers)

Azorius Herald - Uncommon (spirit)
Azorius Justicar - Uncommon (human wizard)
Nav Squad Commandos - Uncommon (human soldier)

Azorius Aethermage - Elite (human wizard)
Azorius First-Wing - Elite (griffin)
Hussar Patrol - Uncommon (human knight)

New Prahv Guildmage - Champion (human wizard)
Lyev Skyknight - Champion (human knight)
Tower Drake - Monster (drake)

 

[Bone2pick]

There are ten great guilds of Ravnica, each unique in character and culture. Each one "governing" massive swaths of the city and "servicing" the populace with their thousands and thousands of guild members. A single guild averages 100k members—that's over a million guild members in total. The guildless populace throughout Ravnica is roughly the same size bringing the total population of the city to roughly two million. Here's is how they all will be organized for the roleplay.

Guild Organization
• Guildmaster - supreme leader
• Guild Officers - typically between 4 - 6 officers. The guilds are divided into shares, with an officer managing his or her own share. Shares are usually staffed with 16k - 25k members.
• Commanders - manage guild chapters and report directly to a guild officer. 3k - 6k members per chapter.
• Wardens - manage wards (500 - 1k members)
• Captains - lead companys (100 - 200 members)
• Lieutenants (15 - 40 per crew)

This further breaks down to roughly:
3000 lieutenants
650 captains
130 Wardens
20 commanders
4 - 6 Officers
And 1 Guildmaster per guild.

Guild V Guild Combat

The overwhelming majority of violent guild conflicts are small scale skirmishes. Typically it takes place at the crew vs crew level, or maybe even a duel between opposing lieutenants. These minor "dustups" are referred to as feuds. A feud can range from crew v crew to—in less common cases—ward v ward. Anything bigger than a single ward marching into battle would be considered a major conflict, and those happen rarely because they draw the attention of Guildmasters.

Feuds, while publicly condemned, are frequent occurrences throughout Ravnica. Entire crews are wiped out every week, and whole companies fall every moon cycle. The blood spilt in these turf wars are hardly a drop in the bucket to the great guilds, and the lives lost are quickly replaced by new recruits.

Rakdos Creature List
Rakdos Cackler - Common (devil)
Kill-Suit Cultist - Common (goblin berserker)
Splatter Thug - Uncommon (human warrior)
Gore-House Chainwalker - Common (human warrior)

Rakdos Shred-Freak - Uncommon (human berserker)
Sadistic Augermage - Uncommon (human wizard)
Thought Picker Witch - Uncommon (human wizard)

Thrill-Kill Assassin - Elite (human assassin)
Spiked Jester - Elite (goblin warrior)
Rakdos Ragemutt - Elite (elemental hound)

Rix Maadi Guildmage - Champion (human shaman)
Rakdos Drake - Monster (drake)

 

[Bone2pick]

Victory & Defeat

After significant combats players will receive one of four outcomes: Victory, Narrow Victory, Narrow Defeat, or Defeat. These distinctions—along with being guidelines for the consequences I will hand down—indicate how the citizens of Ravnica will interpret the combat. Victory means it will be viewed as an uncontested win for the player; Narrow Victory/Defeats means the combat's results will have mixed conclusions throughout the community; and Defeat means everyone believes the player(s) suffered an unarguable loss.

The preeminent (but not the only) factor in determining what outcome is awarded will be the competing creature points. Whenever there is a great disparity of creature points (25% or more) Victory will be likely for the higher CP force. Less than 25% CP disparity will generally result in a Narrow outcome. Other factors like home turf, authority, and post quality (especially strategic or dramatic content) will also be taken into account.

Losses

Every type of combat outcome can, and often does, come with CP losses. These are issued by the GM but managed by the player, so that they can "protect" their favorite creature(s) for narrative reasons. In other words, the GM will determine how much creature value is lost in combat, and the player(s) will determine exactly which creatures fall.

Wounds

Wounds are the only penalty that can be issued by either the GM or the Player. But they can only be applied to creatures with authority or monsters. This penalty will significantly weaken whoever suffers it, and will require a 2 creature point expenditure to remove/heal it.

Selesnya Creature List
Greenside Watcher - Common (elf druid)
Axebane Guardian - Common (human druid)
Dryad Sophisticate - Common (dryad)
Watchwolf - Common (wolf)

Bronzebeak Moa - Uncommon (Bird)
Centaur Safeguard - Uncommon (centaur warrior)
Ivy Lane Denizen - Uncommon (elf warrior)

Selesnya Sentry - Elite (elephant soldier)
Silhana Starfletcher - Elite (elf druid archer)
Centaur Healer - Uncommon (centaur cleric)

Archweaver - Monster (spider)
Vitu-Ghazi Guildmage - Champion (dryad shaman)