After months of trying to handle making my game and my full time job I have finally been able to get a website up and running.  it is oddballe.com.  The website is very basic right now but I plan on making a better one as I find time to do so.  I know some people have been interested in the game so know you can look up the different sections as they are written.  The question I have is does the Guild and Reputation section work? and does it make it easy to create a good and workable guild? 

John,

After looking through the rules and guilds section, I have one major question, what are guilds in this game and what do they do?

In real medieval Europe each guild controlled the trade of a specific good produced.  They determined the appropriate quality, quantity and set the price.  It was illegal to produce to much of a given product, to high a quality of a product or sell a product for to high or low a price.

In this game, it seems like guilds are tight associations of individuals who do cooperate together to make money.  More like a fraternity or a gang then a guild.  How does a random band of mercenaries differ from a “guild” who helps nobles fight their wars?  Does the Guild Council represent the economic leaders of the city, or simply he heads of random gangs who have forced their way to the top?  If there is no over arching purpose to guilds, why does the city need them?  Why do they continue to prosper?

You put a lot of detail into the combat elements of your rules.  If this game is about simulationist combat driven by guild intrigues then that’s fine.  If its about those intrigues and combat is not the games focus then I would recommend simplifying them.  (But don’t remove your multiple action rule, that’s to much fun.)  If your game is just as much about interpersonal interaction as combat try to keep the depth of both rule sets the same.

The website looks nice.  Best of luck!

Best,
        Bill

Thanks for the input.  The guilds are a mix between a gang, union, standard fantasy guild, and historical guilds.  As far as what the guilds do that varies greatly.  Most NPC guilds will be more of the midieval kind and run shops and produce.  As far as the players guilds then it is up to them.  You could create a guild and have them all shop owners controlling the trade.  You could create a guild for nothing more than human fighting services.  You could create a guild to try to take over the other guilds and build an empire.  So there are many things that guilds can do it depends on how you want to play the game.  From the city standpoint guilds are still around because they do bring in money ofr the city.  Most guilds have some kind of legal buisness of some kind which brings in money for the city.  Also guilds often do the jobs no one else wants to do.  City watch are most likely guild members, figthing small wars, the merchant shops like weaponsmithing, and armor.  The guild council is made up of those guilds with a reputation 80 or higher.  It does not matter how much money you have what matters is reputation. 

We have left alot of holes in the reality of the guilds so different people could play the game different ways.  I know that the guilds might have no real purpose or I cannot explain it well enough.  They do have a purpose in the city which is to make money for the city, it might be a weak purpose but it is one.  As far as the details for combat and guilds sections all I can say is the combat section was and still is my strong point.  I was able to write that much better than the guilds section.  The game is as much about interpersonal interaction as flat out combat and I would like to see the same depth in both, though it looks like I have a ways to go.  Again thanks for the feedback.

I have added parts to the guild and reputation section.  Where there not many extra rules for the section I have tried to explain the importance of guilds both in game play and for the city.  I have also tried to explain a few other things.  I hope this helps clear some things up, and as always would like to hear any ideas anyone has.  oddballe.com