McKay Mentoring Final Course
Day 12 - Final Course
As this is your final lesson, I just wanted to take this opportunity to cover some "odds and ends" topics of the game.
Guilds
Guilds are a relatively new addition to BattleMaster, which allow like-minded players to band together in a common cause, regardless of their realm. A guild is formed by a local lord who constructs a guildhouse within his own region at a certain expense. Other nobles, of any realm or class, are then free to join the guild if they so desire - after paying the entrance fee of course. Potential members are required to travel to the guildhouse in particular to join. However, once the first guildhouse is built, more may be created elsewhere by fellow members who command regions, spreading the influence and reach of the guild throughout the island.
Guilds have an interior hierarchy, with the Founder at the top, going down all the way to aspirants seeking entry at the bottom. Higher ranking members may promote, or demote, other members below them at their whim, however they often do so with an established rules base. Each guild has a guild treasury, and the gold is distributed among all the guildhouses according to the size of the guildhouse. Here, members may deposit or withdraw, depending on how much they are allowed by the Founder, physical gold. Through the use of an extensive network of messengers, guild members may communicate with each other just as though they were in the same realm.
Prison
When another realm captures you, you will be put in their prison, and a ransom in gold will be set. Every day that you are in prison, the ransom will decrease. While you are in prison you will not be able to conduct any of the normal actions. You will be restricted to only one letter per turn, and it is possible for the enemy judge to read your mail. A particularly dishonourable judge might steal all of your gold. You might even be tortured!
Ways to be Imprisoned
o You could be captured in a battle.
o You could be captured if you try and use any of the special abilities of the infiltrator.
o If you attack a vastly superior force, your unit will be overwhelmed and you will be captured.
o If you have no unit, or all your troops are wounded, you can be captured by enemy troops in the same region as yourself.
Things to do While in Prison
o You can bribe the guards so you can read and write messages.
o You can talk to other prisoners in the same dungeon.
o You can write letters to the judge or ruler of the realm that imprisoned you
o You can write letters to your own ruler, but they will likely be read by the enemy before they are delivered, so be careful what you write.
Ways to Get Out of Prison
o You can pay your ransom.
o A rich family can bail you out (i.e. pay the ransom from family gold, not from your personal gold).
o Sometimes, you have a chance to escape. There are several reasons why this option shows up or doesn't show up, not all of them are fully known.
o The enemy judge could set you free.
o There is a random chance that you will escape each day.
o After seven days, you will be set free automatically.
If you have previously been banned
If you were banned from the realm in which you are imprisoned, there are less pleasant ways to leave prison:
o The enemy judge puts you on a ship and deports you.
o The enemy judge executes you.
Banking
Each realm has its own bank, located in its capital with branches in any and all cities. Their primary use is to convert your bonds into gold, or vice versa. For the sake of simplicity, taxes are handled by the banks, and all the tax proceeds are given to troop leaders as bonds instead of sending out runners to deliver the physical gold. Banks can also handle transfers of gold within the realm, though the sender must be present at the bank in order to sign the necessary forms. Bank employees are not willing to handle transfers in small or irregular amounts.
Banks are the key to a smoothly running medieval economy, but still are not as developed as one might hope: there are no agreements between banks for rate of exchange of bonds, for example. The only way to send gold to another realm is to load it into a cart and physically carry it to that realm's capital, where the main branch will happily take the gold and send bonds representing it to any troop leader of that realm.
The only exception to this is that troop leaders may send bonds to their family, even when their family is in another realm or another island altogether. In this case, the troop leader sets aside a bank transfer to be picked up by an agent of the family. This agent will take care of securing the gold from the bank, and arranging for it to be transported to the family manor.
In addition, banks facilitate bonds. Bonds are small slips of paper backed by your realm's government, very similar to an IOU or a modern-day check, which you can exchange at one of your realm's banks for gold. Most of your bonds are going to come from taxes. You might also be sent bonds by another troop leader.
There are a few things you can do with bonds that you cannot do with gold.
o Send it to another troop leader.
o Send it to your family
Also, enemies who capture you can steal your gold. Bonds are safe.
Wiki Items
There are several interesting and useful items in the libraries of Eston, many writings even brought from far away lands. Some of the resources found there are:
o The Atamara News
o Historical information about non-battlemaster medieval times
o Family_Pages
o BattleMaster Acronyms
Finally
Finally, this is the end of your training as a new troop leader. In your travels and your experiences, many times questions will arise. Most of the time there is someone out there that has the answer to your question. Since Eston is an old, and therefore, stable monarchy, there is a lot of experience in the realm; there are a handful of troop leaders with over 1,000 days experience, even more with more than 500 days. This makes for a realm heavy in experience and full of wisdom. TO that end, we are always here to help develop anyone that asks for our help.
