Hi all,
starting soon another Pendragon Campaign, 4th edition, 531.
Regrettably experience warns me that we wont be able to play too often, hence the 531 start, but I would also like to create a bit of 'running start', similar to the family history section. So to introduce some complications/background for the new players to begin with to get things going and make adventures more personal (when I write them myselves).
Something personal for each player, ideas I have so far are:
so one will get a 'Hate (Steward Levcomagus)',
another will already have a running Amor
another a faerie-'infected' manor
Maybe have one start a bit older (already with kids to show of the generation idea)
Maybe one with two lords that dont like each other.

Did anyone do something similar?
Does anyone have some other nice idea for a 'starting Complication/Background'?

fg,
Thijs

Everything we've used is either player generated, comes from various tables in the rules or is there as a consequence of what has happened in the game before. I guess I can try some ideas, still. How about we steal from the classics?

- PCs clan/family are enemies with his lover's clan/family.
- PC is deeply in love with someone who already loves another (and both happens to be friends of the PC).
- PCs father was presumably murderad (although there is no proof), and the uncle has married the mother and inherited the lands.
- PC (or PCs sister/lover/mother/father) has tampered with some dark arts, and created/summoned a creature that has to be dealt with in secret. The creature wants to live a normal life.
- PCs father has been murdered (and PC has returned from being fostered overseas), and PC vows to find and slay the murderer (who, unbeknowst to him, is the PC himself). Oh, whattahell, go all in with the Oedipus/Iokaste thing if you want; don't know your origins and marry your mum.
- PC has let his family down in multiple ways (the last betrayal was killing his broter and leaving home forever) while adventuring and courting his lover. Lover decides to leave PC for a better/richer husband.

- PCs clan/family are enemies with his lover's clan/family.
- PC is deeply in love with someone who already loves another (and both happens to be friends of the PC).

Basically you have to then add a chance for a starting knight to already have an amor.
And then add an 'amor complication table'

- PCs father was presumably murdered (although there is no proof), and the uncle has married the mother and inherited the lands.
- PCs father has been murdered (and PC has returned from being fostered overseas), and PC vows to find and slay the murderer (who, unbeknowst to him, is the PC himself). Oh, whattahell, go all in with the Oedipus/Iokaste thing if you want; don't know your origins and marry your mum.

But starting knights always have a manor, and as far as I understand the lands would always go to the son (and not the wife/mother).
However the murder of the father is a nice idea to generate a Hate(murderer)..

- PC (or PCs sister/lover/mother/father) has tampered with some dark arts, and created/summoned a creature that has to be dealt with in secret. The creature wants to live a normal life.

This sounds like a nice modification of the 'having a magician' in the family that causes complications, so more 'family event'.
A grandfather who made a deal with some demon giving you extra strenght as long as you sacrifice a virgin a year or so?

But your ideas got me going.


fg,
Thijs

Ok, just some quick ideas for starting complication of 531 vassal knights:
[future version will have what dice roll needed to get which result]

You have fallen in love (Amor 15+1D3),
with a daughter/sister of an enemy (clan)
with the daughter/wife of your liege lord
with a rich heiress
with a peasant girl
with a woman from Faerie (Faerie Lore +5)
with a daughter of a fellow vassal knight [due to inherit]
with an unknown woman you met only once.

and she loves you
and she allows fine Amor
but she doesnt love you.
you have already consumated the relation (Amor -> Love)

Your father's dead was actually a murder, by (Hate 15+1D3)
A rival (the Steward of Levcomagus)
A rival's younger brother (younger brother of Levcomagus)
A random Saxon
A Saxon King ()
A vassal knight of your liege lord
A unknown knight with six fingers
Your Liege lord (Earl Robert)
Your Mother

Your lands are already occupied by Faerie (+5 Faerie Lore)
-1D6 Bad Weather
+1D6 Bad Weather
who will increase your income by 1D3-2
You fell in love with one of them (Amor 15)
Ghosts haunt your mansion (Fear (Ghosts) +2D6)
Increase all birth rolls by +3, but all births are twin
A reappearing Faerie knight challenges all entering your lands
They gave you a belt that gives +5 APP, but -3 STR that never comes off
They gave you a belt that gives +3 STR, but -5 APP that never comes off
They gave you a sword that does +1D6 damage, but will always make you fail Mercifull checks while holding it
They gave you a sword that does +2 armour, but will always make you fail Reckless checks while holding it
They gave you armour that gives +2 armour, but will always make you fail Chaste checks while wearing it
They gave you a shield that gives 7 defense (instead of 6), but will always make you fail Energetic checks while using it
They gave you a charger that does +1D6 damage, but always make you fail Prudent checks while riding it
They gave you a charger that has +2 move, but always make you fail Modest checks while riding it
they made you infertile but age at half the rate


I am looking mostly for 'complications' to get things started. Is anything unbalanced/deadly?
Anyone any other ideas?

fg,
Thijs

How about a raven banner?

From Wikipedia:

The raven banner was also a standard used by the Norse Jarls of Orkney. According to the Orkneyinga Saga, it was made for Sigurd the Stout by his mother, a völva or sorceress. She told him that the banner would "bring victory to the man it's carried before, but death to the one who carries it." The saga describes the flag as "a finely made banner, very cleverly embroidered with the figure of a raven, and when the banner fluttered in the breeze, the raven seemed to be flying ahead." Sigurd's mother's prediction came true when, according to the sagas, all of the bearers of the standard met untimely ends. The "curse" of the banner ultimately fell on Jarl Sigurd himself at the Battle of Clontarf:

Earl Sigurd had a hard battle against Kerthialfad, and Kerthialfad ... broke the array of Earl Sigurd right up to his banner, and slew the banner-bearer. Then he got another man to bear the banner, and there was again a hard fight. Kerthialfad smote this man too his death blow at once, and so on one after the other all who stood near him. Then Earl Sigurd called on Thorstein the son of Hall of Sida, to bear the banner, and Thorstein was just about to lift the banner, but then Asmund the White said, "Don't bear the banner! For all they who bear it get their death." "Hrafn the Red!" called out Earl Sigurd, "bear thou the banner." "Bear thine own devil thyself," answered Hrafn. Then the earl said, "`Tis fittest that the beggar should bear the bag;'" and with that he took the banner from the staff and put it under his cloak. A little after Asmund the White was slain, and then the earl was pierced through with a spear.

-----------------

Perfect for a hack-n-slash player who asks for something that will give him victory in battle -- especially if a bard tells him (and his buddies, squire, etc.) *exactly* what it is.

How about a raven banner?



Oh, love it!
Maybe we should add column : "Your mother is a sorceress", with more boons/items like this.

fg,
Thijs

There's a great marvel's graphic novel about a raven banner (The Raven Banner: a tale of Asgard), it was drawn by Charles Vess in 1984. I used to love this comic (sadly i have lost it some years ago :()