CHAPTER 1: The Night’s <strong>Watch</strong>who earn Glory and Coin will want to spend it on their division, muchto the appreciation of their brothers and the jealousy of the other castles.To this end, these rules allow the Narrator and players to create andrun castles of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> much in the same way as other noblehouses within the SIFRP core rules. This confers an additional benefitfor narrators who are shaping the political landscape of the Seven Kingdoms,providing the ability to have noble houses (particularly those ofthe North) interact directly with the castles of the <strong>Watch</strong> without introducingtoo many additional mechanics.At the default timeframe for SIFRP, only three of the <strong>Watch</strong>’s nineteencastles are in use. The others exist in varying states of decay andruin along the length of the Wall. Narrators who are expanding thegame to include other political elements along the Wall should feel freeto modify the setting as they need. See the sidebar Alternate Settingsand Changing History for more information on how to modify thesetting and what effects that might have on both your game and on thestory unfolding in A Song of Ice and Fire.Creating aCastle on the WallCastle creation, like House creation in the SIFRP core rules, shouldbe a cooperative process between the Narrator and the players to helpdevelop a setting in which everyone has a stake. Because of the nature ofthe Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> versus a more independent noble house, some of theelements of house creation are shortened or predetermined. Considerthese rules as a supplement to those established Chapter 6: House &Lands from the SIFRP core rules.The first element you should determine is which castle you plan torepresent. For ease of reference, a list of the castles along the Wall is includedin the sidebar Castles of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> on this page. Eachof these castles is discussed in greater detail in Chapter 2: The Wall& the Gift. Once you have a rough idea of which castle you’ll beworking with, you and your fellow players have a starting point fromwhich you can base other elements of the creation process.Step One: The RealmA house’s realm within Westeros is a formative issue, and foretells agreat deal about both the size and population of the areas controlledby the household, and to whom they are likely to owe the fealty. TheNight’s <strong>Watch</strong>, in contrast, has no such comparison. They are beholdento no authority save the King (or Kings). To represent this, useThe Wall as the starting realm of your castle rather than one of theresults from Table 6-1: Starting Realm in the SIFRP core rules. Theeffects of this on the other steps of castle creation will be discussedCastles of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong>The castles along the Wall, in order, moving from west toeast, are: Westwatch-by-the-Bridge, the Shadow Tower, SentinelStand, Greyguard, Stonedoor, Hoarfrost Hill, Icemark, theNightfort, Deep Lake, Queensgate (formerly Snowgate), CastleBlack, Oakenshield, Woodswatch-by-the-Pool, Sable Hall, Rimegate,the Long Barrow, the Torches, Greenguard, and Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.35
CHAPTER 1: The NIght’s <strong>Watch</strong>in their relevant sections, and are summarized in Table 1-11: CastleAttributes along the Wall.The WallLiege: Robert Baratheon, King of Westeros & the Seven KingdomsCastles along the Wall owe fealty only to each other and to the King. Thenorthern extent of their realm is the Wall for which they are named andtheir influence extends southward into the fifty leagues of land collectivelyknown as The Gift. Lands controlled by the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> are notoriouslypoorly populated, many with only a small village or a few farmsteads toprovide for the castle, and few hands to work the cold, stone-riddled soil.Step Two: Starting ResourcesMuch as a house has a set of attributes that determines its influence andcontrol, each castle of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> has an equivalent set of attributesthat shape and define it. As there are many disadvantages associatedwith its barren and inhospitable location, it is important to rememberthat a castle’s attributes cannot be reduced lower than 1. Any penalty thatmight reduce the attribute lower reduces it to 1 and the excess is ignored.For each resource, roll 5d6 and sum the results (if it helps, think ofeach castle as a separate banner house of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong>). The modifiersfor each attribute are discussed below, and summarized in Table1-11: Castle Attributes Along the Wall. These modifiers are designedto replicate a castle of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> in the years surrounding theUsurpation, the default timeframe for a SIFRP campaign. Should youwish to run your campaign at a different time, you will need to developa set of modifiers to more accurately reflect that. At its best, the Night’s<strong>Watch</strong> will have similar modifiers to those listed for houses that owefealty to the Kings of the North as listed in the core rules.Note that the sum of the modifiers below leads to a castle of the<strong>Watch</strong> being far weaker than a randomly chosen noble house from therest of Westeros. That’s entirely appropriate: noble houses have manythings that castles of the <strong>Watch</strong> lack, especially in these benighted days.After you have added in the modifiers, just as with a noble house,each player is allowed to add 1d6 to a resource of his or her choice.Defense +0Defense as regards the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> refers not only to the towers andelements along the Wall, but also to the state of the Wall itself. Fromits very foundation, the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> were forbidden to build walls toTable 1-11: Castle Attributes along the WallAttributeModifierDefense +0Influence -15Lands -5Law -10Population -10Power +5Wealth +0defend themselves to the south, and only the Wall to the north. Manycastles along the Wall have towers and small halls that can be defendedin case of an emergency but little else. Castles along the Wall have nomodifier to their defense attribute (though they are limited in whatholdings they can purchase with that influence—see Step Four: Holdingson page 37 for details).Influence -15In the default setting for SIFRP, Influence will be the lowest attribute ofany castle along the Wall. The Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> is far from the minds of mostof Westeros, and they have little influence either with the King or with thenoble houses that populate the south. This is further complicated by thelack of heirs and the democratic power structure of the <strong>Watch</strong> itself.Lands -5While the Gift extends south of the Wall a full fifty leagues, the <strong>Watch</strong>is able to exert very little influence over it. Most brothers are restrictedto acting within the immediate vicinity of their castle.Law -10Despite the Wall and the best efforts of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong>, wildlings domake it through to raid the lands to the south. Those few settlementsthat remain within the <strong>Watch</strong>’s purview are almost parasitical in theirrelationship to the brotherhood. Drinking, prostitution and a frontierlawlessness are the norm within the region.Population -10The lands controlled by the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong>, collectively known as theGift, are sparsely populated and poorly tended. The woods have reclaimedmuch of what was once farmland, and wildling raids across theWall have driven all but the most resolute further south.Power +5One thing the Wall has in abundance is well-trained troops—that is,after all, its purpose. In addition to troops to man the Wall and rangeout into the lands beyond it, Power can also used to buy the catapultsand mangonels that adorn the top of the Wall and help in its defense.Wealth +0The Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> has little in the way of wealth, but most of the castlesalong the Wall are self-reliant. Smiths are common, and many castles havea sept to handle issues of faith for the brothers and a maester to handletheir injuries. The most prosperous castles may also have access to tradecoming up from the Kingsroad or from the port in Eastwatch-by-the-Sea.Step Three: Castle HistoryThe history of the Night’s <strong>Watch</strong> extends back to the time of Bran theBuilder and the end of the Long Night. Many individual castles alongthe Wall saw their fortunes rise and fall over the time since. Much ofthis history is discussed in Chapter 1: The Night’s <strong>Watch</strong>. Becauseof the timeless nature of the Wall, however, things change at a slower36
Change language