Hey there,

As production winds down on the new Book of the Estate, we thought it would be fun to offer a little sneak peek of the book. So without further fanfare, I present the PDF:

http://goo.gl/Jukej

Also here's a pretty high res version of one of the maps that we'll be using in the book:

http://goo.gl/z6r46

Without making any promises, our goal is to have this book available for purchase by the end of the month. There's over a hundred more pages of landholding goodness where this came from.


Best,


T.

very nice.

Step one: Rouse my campaign from slumber.
Step two: Buy this book.

Steps one and two may be interchangeable. But I'm definitely intrigued with the possibilities.

Very nice indeed, looking forward to it

Looks great :-]

PDF & PoD by the end of the month?

Looks quite nice.

Any comment on the overlap with Book of the Manor? Are they how compatible?

In other words: I have BotM. It works for me. Why should I buy this book? What would make it a 'must have'? :)

Looks great :-]

PDF & PoD by the end of the month?


That's the goal. Depends on how long it takes us to identify and implement the remaining artwork. The cardinal rule in this game is not to promise dates, so NO PROMISES. But we're working hard to deliver by the end of the month.


T.

Looks quite nice.

Any comment on the overlap with Book of the Manor? Are they how compatible?

In other words: I have BotM. It works for me. Why should I buy this book? What would make it a 'must have'? :)


That's a great question. Hopefully, the table of contents in the sneak peek provides more insight here, but I can share this:

This is a book about the lesser nobility — very rich knights and barons. Their world is a bit different from the knight that lords it over a single manor.

For some players, the Complete Land Management system in the Book of the Manor is too time-consuming and tedious. Other players like that level of detail. The Book of the Estate says all the petty accounting and economic formulae are beneath a fighting man — it's for Stewards and wives to manage. So Step 4 of the Winter Phase is simplified to pretty much eliminate the bookkeeping bits. A £10 manor yields 10£ — period. If there's a shortage, the lord takes it out of the peasants' share. There are still economic calamities to be dealt with — war, famine, curses and the like — and an all-new system has been devised to simulate these.

There's new and very much extended Family Survival Roll tables, that allows you to track the deaths of people in your family as well as your entourage.

There's TEN estates with stats and descriptions, for player knights when they get promoted as well as guidelines on how to recruit knights to one's newly expanded household. You can use these straightaway, and each includes notes about the holdings future in the GPC. If that's not enough, we've provided three economic and staffing models (£10 manor, £50 estate, and £100 estate), right down to the washerwomen. The offices at each level are detailed as well, including who should occupy each and what their skills and responsibilities are.

About the only overlap with the Book of the Manor, is the Improvements that you can build, and even then there's not a 1:1 relationship. Some of the old ones are revised and there are new ones as well.

In short, this is all about becoming a lord in truth and running an ESTATE — a large landholding that's five to ten times larger than the manor of the Book of the Manor.

There's lots more. The King Arthur Pendragon game is undergoing a major change in place names. One of the unfortunate ironies of the game is that many of the places — towns, cities, counties — have mostly Saxon names! Until now. We've done painstaking research to try and derive new place names based on the earlier Celtic or Roman, or plain-English generic versions based on the etymology. So we're striking words like "shire" and bits like "-bury" and so on that are descended from the hated Saxon tongue. Some anachronisms will remain, especially ones found in Mallory (Silchester, etc,). This represents a major shift and some players no doubt won't like it. They can of course keep the names that they're already accustomed to. This is a forward-looking shift. All materials going forward will use this new "Pendragon Naming System," including all maps, etc.

All of this lays the foundation for the next book in the queue: The Book of Warlords, which looks at the upper nobility and describes their holdings.

Note that the Book of the Manor and Book of the Estate are fundamentally compatible. Gamemasters can run one or both systems, if they so choose. But even lords of the manor can switch to this simpler system, if they want to do away with the fiddly economic bits. The only shift here is that we now include "the money you never see" so that a standard manor no longer generates £6 per year, but 10. All the same costs and benefits of a knight's fee still apply after making this shift.

Trust me, this one's not to be missed. Use it in conjunction with The Book of the Entourage to get a ton of options for building, organizing and customizing a place your Lord Knight can call his own.


T.

I can't wait for a list of places according to the new naming system, given I'm about to run a game that's pre-saxon invasion.
I've gathered the names of a handful of places, mostly larger cities and the like from the few maps I've been able to find.
More would be fantastic, very much looking forward to that.

Taliesan looks like you Greg and the rest of the Nocturnal staff have done an excellent job of designing a game product as usual. Congratulations on having it finished or almost so.

I, however, grew up influenced by my father's war gaming circle amongst whom any piece not not perfect in every historical detail had to be removed and the battle fought without it (typical engineer thinking) will point out the parts that are bad. The hall shown has two huge errors. Hammer beams were in use quite early in England http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&site=imghp&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=136 5&bih=910&q=hammer+beams&oq=hammer+beams&gs_l=img. 12..0.2816.5875.0.7874.12.11.0.1.1.0.87.756.11.11. 0...0.0...1ac.1.8.img.X466UWJLiE8 and supported on corbels in the walls normally, so the pillars/posts in the hall are just wrong. The table is also wrong, normally a Hall had a high table and two side tables, and only the outer side (away from the center of the hall and closer to the walls) had benches. the inner side of a table was used to serve the guests.

That said I've always loved the quality of the drawings in your products as drawings, whether their antiquities were accurate or not. I wish you would have them signed. Art director as a credit does not tell us whom actually did the drawing, unless they're the only artist.

Snaggle, historical accuracy is not the key thing in Pendragon. Else we wouldn't have full plate armour in the 500s would we?

Gonna have to buy this book when it comes out.

Snaggle, historical accuracy is not the key thing in Pendragon. Else we wouldn't have full plate armour in the 500s would we?

Gonna have to buy this book when it comes out.


Some would say that to be historically accurate, your King Arthur campaign wouldn't' even have Arthur in it. ;). And that would be a drag.

Yeah, the one table in the picture ruins the whole game for me.

Taliesan looks like you Greg and the rest of the Nocturnal staff have done an excellent job of designing a game product as usual. Congratulations on having it finished or almost so.

I, however, grew up influenced by my father's war gaming circle amongst whom any piece not not perfect in every historical detail had to be removed and the battle fought without it (typical engineer thinking) will point out the parts that are bad. The hall shown has two huge errors. Hammer beams were in use quite early in England http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&site=imghp&tbm=isch&source=hp&biw=136 5&bih=910&q=hammer+beams&oq=hammer+beams&gs_l=img. 12..0.2816.5875.0.7874.12.11.0.1.1.0.87.756.11.11. 0...0.0...1ac.1.8.img.X466UWJLiE8 and supported on corbels in the walls normally, so the pillars/posts in the hall are just wrong. The table is also wrong, normally a Hall had a high table and two side tables, and only the outer side (away from the center of the hall and closer to the walls) had benches. the inner side of a table was used to serve the guests.

That said I've always loved the quality of the drawings in your products as drawings, whether their antiquities were accurate or not. I wish you would have them signed. Art director as a credit does not tell us whom actually did the drawing, unless they're the only artist.


Thanks, Snaggle. Yes, there are, sadly, a great many historical and thematic errors in the artwork that are a BIG Topic of Conversation with the development team. In fact, it bothered Greg so much that he's authored this bit for the introduction to Book of the Estate:

Our decision to use 19th-century artwork in the King Arthur Pendragon line results in some interesting anomalies which are presented in the same spirit as the general anachronisms found in the game itself. Thus most of the illustrations throughout this book do not accurately depict the Early Phase of The Great Pendragon Campaign.

Not surprisingly, very little art from the 9th and 10th century survives, and the era was seldom depicted by the great illustrators of the Victorian Age. So we have chosen pieces evocative of the general subject matter, if not the historical era.

Keen-eyed readers will note a number of pieces that illustrate the Victorian artist’s ignorance of the first critical fact about using a lance from horseback: A knight who bears his lance on the right side of his horse’s head, rather than with its point crossed over the pommel of their saddle, is likely to tear his arm out of his shoulder socket! Alas, such is the flavor we must bring to the game, and we sincerely hope it does not spoil its overall taste.

—Greg Stafford

The art in these books are all from Victoria-era or early 20th-century artists who are long dead; we don't even know who some of them are, and it would be tedious to research and credit all of them, piece by piece. We've come to understand that even the great artists of the age (including the revered Howard Pyle) got lots of details wrong, and it's one of the compromises we have to make. Readers of the Book of Battle 2nd Edition will hardly find any Arthurian art in it at all. It's almost all real-life historical figures, as one can tell from the coats of arms.

Don't really know how to respond any better than Greg's explanation other than to say we have three choices: nice art that's historically inaccurate, amateurish art or almost no art at all. I'm not too keen on amateurish art, but I'm happy to entertain almost no art at all if the community indicates they'd prefer it. But then the books would seem awfully dry, at least to me. It's already a challenge making them look compelling given the design decisions we've made, like using a Traditional style and layout, keeping ink densities low, etc.

We actually contacted Gary Gianni, who did the Prince Valiant strip for a decade or so about doing some art for us, but sadly never got a reply. If any of you know any top-notch illustrators capable of rendering are at the quality of these Old Masters, by all means have them contact me! That kind of draughtsmanship is exceedingly hard to find these days.


Best,


T.

For my part, I'm perfectly fine with the old drawings. Especially in the noted BoB2 with its pictiures taken from the bayeux tapestry above all this maneuvers where a fine example of a well chosen artwork, perfectly suiting its purpose.

Detailed knowledge can be the source of great fun, if you have good use of it. But if you let it become dogmatic, you are killing your fun. Having done some very historical oriented live-roleplay for a couple of years brought me to the insight, that some inaccuracies and anachronisms are just needed in terms of usability or gaming purpose, only to keep yourself running smoothely. Fact is, that some historical stuff will never enhance your concrete gaming situation.
I would suggest to everyone, that sometimes, it is better to accept an inaccuracy. If you HAVE the knowledge AND feel, your group ist ready for it: tell them. If not, dont bother around.

Especially in the noted BoB2 with its pictiures taken from the bayeux tapestry above all this maneuvers where a fine example of a well chosen artwork, perfectly suiting its purpose.

Thanks! I'd like to say they were chosen. In fact they were painstakingly created by yours truly, every one of 'em. Glad you liked 'em!


T.

Jokes aside, I tend to agree with Snaggle that I like my pseudo-historical rpgs to look historical. I feel the same about movies. However, it is a pseduo-history inspired game and not a scholarly article and the artwork is pretty good for the most part.

Looking forward to the paper copy...

Well, I will say there's a long history of historical anachronisms when it comes to depicting the Arthurian milieu in all kinds of media, so we're in good company!


T.

Absolutely. The layout looks nice as did BoBattle.

Thanks! This is taking a little longer to finish up that I thought, but the good news is each of the TEN player estates will have little maps! Taking awhile to produce all of those, but the wait will be worth it, I hope!


T.

How's this coming along, anyway? Any estimate on when we might get our eager little gauntlets on it? :)

Well, we had a slight hiccup, which has pushed the thing a couple of months past our target launch date. But I can say that we're in the final stages of QA and our new target, which I believe is realistic, is May 30. Soon! We're very close!


Thanks!



T.

Outstanding!

The 30th approaches... ???

The interior of the book should be completed today. Then just need to do the cover art! Patience, dear friends. The PENDRAGON elves are working as hard as they can!


T.

The downloadable version of THE BOOK OF THE ESTATE was sent to the publisher last night. I'll let you all know when it's available for purchase on Drivethru RPG. Should be soonish. It's going to take a few weeks for us to get the Print on Demand version up there though — mainly because we have to prepare special files for the covers — a process that's technically complex and a bit tedious. Then we have to wait a week for proofs to come back, rinse and repeat, etc., until we get the desired result. This is our first POD book with the new design, so there's a bit of a calibration curve here. We appreciate your patience as we work through the POD technical issues, but the book is, at last, finished! Woohoo!

T.

Will we be able to purchase them together even if we have to wait? I'd hate to miss out on a deal to buy both copies but don't want to wait!!!

(I should also point out I'm pretty excited about this for a selfish reason. I've been working on a domain/manor system for use in an Artesia system game of feudalism. I am using a mix of Harn/Pendragon and wanted to document the taxes paid "up" to lords of vassals. I ended up settling on a number of 10 libram myself. So it should flow right into my WIP!)

Will we be able to purchase them together even if we have to wait? I'd hate to miss out on a deal to buy both copies but don't want to wait!!!


Yes. The publisher told me last night that he'll issue coupons for the POD version later for people who buy the PDF now). so you'll end up paying effectively the same price as the PDF/POD bundle, which will be available later. By the way, we're looking to do the same for Book of Battle II, for those who care. So, anyone who's been holding off there, should go ahead and buy the PDF (unless, of course, you ONLY want the printed version).


T.

What if we bought the BoB2 PDF, and now want the printed version? Is there a coupon for that?

So this book details the property of bannerets and barons, yeah?

What if we bought the BoB2 PDF, and now want the printed version? Is there a coupon for that?


That is my understanding, yes.


T.

So this book details the property of bannerets and barons, yeah?


Not barons — that's the next book. This one is for the lesser nobility in the Early Phase. Rich knights with estates, as opposed to single manors. You could think of them as "bannerets," although that term is coined by Arthur during his reign.


Best.


T.

So this book details the property of bannerets and barons, yeah?

No
To assign all of Britain to various overlords would be extremely tedious
and, to me, not especially valuable

What it does tell is what the banneret-sized lords are like
what their holdings are like
what their resources are like
what their obligations and expectations are
and plenty more

No
To assign all of Britain to various overlords would be extremely tedious
and, to me, not especially valuable

What it does tell is what the banneret-sized lords are like
what their holdings are like
what their resources are like
what their obligations and expectations are
and plenty more


Okay, thank you. That's what I meant; I didn't think at all it was going to list hundreds of individual peoples' land. I meant 'detail the property' as exactly you said: how their stewardship is different than a typical single manor

Note that the Book of the Manor and Book of the Estate are fundamentally compatible. Gamemasters can run one or both systems, if they so choose. But even lords of the manor can switch to this simpler system, if they want to do away with the fiddly economic bits. The only shift here is that we now include "the money you never see" so that a standard manor no longer generates £6 per year, but 10. All the same costs and benefits of a knight's fee still apply after making this shift.

Trust me, this one's not to be missed. Use it in conjunction with The Book of the Entourage to get a ton of options for building, organizing and customizing a place your Lord Knight can call his own.


T.


So, just to make it clear: I'm not interested in the uber-detail of Book of the Manor, but I certainly would like to have a system that I can use for both starting PK's manors as in BotM AND that covers the expansion of the PK's possessions beyond that. So BotE can be used for both situations, right? It can substitute for BotM and go up from there?

Thanks in advance.

So BotE can be used for both situations, right? It can substitute for BotM and go up from there?

Yes - it is focused upon the estates held by the 'lower nobility'. So it goes from the standard holding for a vassal knight (estate valued at £10 - ie £6 manor plus £4 of "money you don't see") up to the sort of lands that a knight might aspire to hold after a generation or three of vigorous plundering, advantageous marriages and generous gifts from a grateful liege lord (estate valued at £100).

Any bigger than that and you are in (yet to be published) 'Book of the Warlord' territory and your character should be asking his man of business at Camelot some pointed questions about why he doesn't have a peerage yet...

Regards
Luke

silburnl,

thanks a lot for the info. I'll order BotE as soon as I have some spare cash. :)