My reboot campaign with New, Improved Players has one session under its belt. We did the hunt for the bear as presented in the KAP rulebook and it went swimmingly.

Two of my PKs ended up with farly large monetary inheritances and they're eager to blow it on a tremendous feast celebrating the four PKs' knighthood. I'm all for this. They also want it to be ludicrously extravagant. Most of the limits I've placed are there because it's 485 and they're more or less limited to things from Logres and NW France... Dark Ages and all that so no silks and spices from Byzantium or the Levant.

But here's my question. Where does it get TOO extravagant? Their current plan is to build a makeshift hall for feasting and then burn it to the ground afterward in a pagan salute to the gods of fire (3/4 are pagans). I've stated that anyone taking part in this will receive a check to Proud and Worldly. The question comes in at the point where the peasants see the burning of what might otherwise have been used in manorial improvements. I'm inclined to give the host's peasants a check to Hatred (Landlord).

Manorial improvements don't necessarily benefit the peasants, so I doubt they'd be too put out by the burning. I wouldn't give them a hate for that - there'll be plenty of opportunity for that later. If the harvests are bad, and the peasants are squeezed, that's the time to have peasants be heard muttering about that wasteful burning a few years back.

Makes sense. They are EXTREMELY into this feast.

There's really no reason the peasants wouldn't enjoy the spectacle just as much.

But here's my question. Where does it get TOO extravagant? Their current plan is to build a makeshift hall for feasting and then burn it to the ground afterward in a pagan salute to the gods of fire (3/4 are pagans). I've stated that anyone taking part in this will receive a check to Proud and Worldly.


I think that is great.

There is no end to the extravagance. History records knights who threw huge feasts and lit it up all knight with thousands of candles (very expensive) and another who had a field plowed and then sown with silver.

That brings up the next thing. They don't want to stop at 1lb per 30 nobles/100 peasants. They want to make it way more lavish since, with the two fairly hefty inheritances in play, that just doesn't seem like much. My inclination is to give 10 more glory per libra spent and pile on more checks to indulgent personality traits. The female Pagan knight, head of the Order of Boudicea, is going to make her knights "available" which seems like a prime Lustful check, for example.

You don't think that outright prostitution is below a knight's dignity?

They'd have to be getting paid for it to be prostitution. I'm likely overstating it somewhat. She'll be host and lasciviousness will run rampant. Really, is it any worse than a bunch of male knights descending on serving wenches like a plague of horny locusts?

Well, yes, though obviously if your Pendragon group is okay with the proud and ennobled spiritual heirs to the not-particularly lascivious Boudicea opening their legs for anyone who comes by, I'm in no position to nitpick.

While it's a total derail and not terribly germane to the original topic there seems to be a rather interesting double standard here. One could just as easily say that about male knights or that the Knights Templar hardly living up to the proud and exalted morals of Christ. The point about out and out prostitution is well taken but I see no fundamental difference between secular female knights having a rousing night of passion and their male counterparts doing likewise *IF* the conceit is that female knights are equal to their male counterparts.

That brings up the next thing. They don't want to stop at 1lb per 30 nobles/100 peasants. They want to make it way more lavish

The Knight's Adventurous supplement had a sliding scale of feast costs, listing Coomon, Quality, Superb, Grand, and Regal feasts, each costing double the preceding one. But even without that guideline, you can always spend more - Greg gives two great examples above. Just let the players decide how much they want to spend, then have them invent colourful expenditures to explain it - and don't worry too much about making the price fit the event.

PS: It's weird seeing the lb used for money rather than weight; £ is the proper symbol for money. I'm not sure if lb was ever used for the money 'pound'.

While it's a total derail and not terribly germane to the original topic there seems to be a rather interesting double standard here. One could just as easily say that about male knights or that the Knights Templar hardly living up to the proud and exalted morals of Christ. The point about out and out prostitution is well taken but I see no fundamental difference between secular female knights having a rousing night of passion and their male counterparts doing likewise *IF* the conceit is that female knights are equal to their male counterparts.


This depends on your game. IF you're having female knights be considered fully equal, to the level of a D&D game (further than Modern America), then yes, it should be a single standard. If there's any inherent misogyny in the setting, even if this bunch of female knights is accepted, then they'll be held to the unfair, sexist double standard on what chastity means and probably face the scorn of the existing Christian leadership for it. Of course, they're already facing that scorn for being pagan female knights in that case, so...

Darren: Yeah, it's a little weird but my keyboard inexplicably has no pound/libra sign. :( I'm sure I could html or bbcode it but I'm lazy.

Ramidel: I'm not going so far as a D&D game or even modern America. My campaign is just downplaying the sexism and religious aspects a bit for now. The sexism I'm not entirely comfortable GMing. It's there and I intend to use it some, mainly in the sense that male knights will be looking down at my lone female (especially foreign knights) until she proves herself. For religion, I'm entirely willing and able to go further but I'm not certain how much of a central theme I or they want it to be. None of us are religious and I was a Religious Studies major so it's not a matter of offense or anything like that; it's simply a matter of a young campaign and the "most people are secular" baseline we're using.

Well it went swimmingly. The squires took part in a mock hunt of a rabbit with a ribbon tied to its foot while a proto-tournament was held for the right to slaughter a heavily pregnant sow for the feast (they ate piglets). Lady Adwen's overprotective brother was, perhaps, crippled during the tournament for life by our almost entirely socially oriented night when he was inspired by his love for her, our female knight fell for Sir Jaradan while he remained insufferable to everyone else and Earl Roderick wondered aloud if there isn't a better way to hold feats of arms that wouldn't risk a knight's life on the eve of battle...

Darren: Yeah, it's a little weird but my keyboard inexplicably has no pound/libra sign. :( I'm sure I could html or bbcode it but I'm lazy.


It's not the easiest thing to remember, but you can type the £ symbol by pressing left-alt + 0163 on the keypad (assuming a Windows machine). Or do like me and go find the one place where I typed the symbol and do a copy/paste :D

It's funny but I explicitly remember typewriters having a pound sign back in The Day. How did we go backwards as globalization took hold and what was it replaced by?

It's funny but I explicitly remember typewriters having a pound sign back in The Day. How did we go backwards as globalization took hold and what was it replaced by?


If you're on a Mac: option-3.