04 Night's Watch.pdf - Chaos Bleeds

CHAPTER 1: The NIght’s Watchin 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 Watch 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 Watch 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 Watch). 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 Watch 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’sWatch 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 theWatch 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 Watch 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 Watch 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 Watch 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 Watch 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 Watch itself.Lands -5While the Gift extends south of the Wall a full fifty leagues, the Watchis 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 Watch, wildlings domake it through to raid the lands to the south. Those few settlementsthat remain within the Watch’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 Watch, 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 Watch 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 Watch 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 Watch. Becauseof the timeless nature of the Wall, however, things change at a slower36