Post/Author/DateTime	Post
bobbilcon 07-29-05, 11:09 PM	Recentally my character has came it to a wealth of money. (Around 2 million gold) My character is a elf princeish person. (left his fathers kindom to train with better master). I have gone out and bought some land with the aid of my team mates( the land costed us 3 million). I now own a huge lushus forest. I have just started construction of a elven tree villige to start. (My character is clearing the forest of threats)I was wondering if there was any suggestions on how to go about doing this with as little problems to the dm as possable.
lonesoldier 07-30-05, 03:44 AM	Have/Do you read/seen/own the Stronghold Builder's Guide 3.0? Good book that.
RavenoftheCrags 07-30-05, 11:24 AM	First you should get some people to help you build the village. Woodsmen, carpenters, masons e.t.c I used an iron golem to build my wizard tower
Pryrates 07-30-05, 12:13 PM	well if you already spent all of your money on land then your extremely limited in what you can do now unless only you and your party build everything and even then your going to need to find an incentive for people to move to your village. So you're probably going to have to find a way to earn a bit more money, after that find the stronghold builders guide...i think amazon might still carry it.
Radin Of The Justice 07-30-05, 12:46 PM	well id say you should use lots of magic, i mean even some meager 1st level spells could help, also you should ask around youre party, i mean lets face it if youre getting 2 mill you gotta have a pretty powerfull high level party, maybe some of them have connections, and get all the money you can, even 73 platinum could buy spell casters components if youre going to use alot of magic, thats just my view
solandras 07-30-05, 01:42 PM	Firstly, you cannot run a country without people. So therefore gather the people (being an elf, and in a forest, I'm assuming you will rule an elven country.) Alot of people (especially elves) do not have too much of a problem building their own house if they never have to pay for it. As such you can easily get every inhabitant (or close to) to do the work themselves....of course you are going to need prof. as well. Next, find some stable form of income. Being an elf, you will most likely not get into the lumber business. So you are going to need to find something else. Maybe create a monopoly on the guilds that will eventually wind up in your contry. Whatever the case, get money. Next, try to keep it small and contained. If you try to expand too quickly, your country will fall. Focus on maintaining a strong city, good finacial backing, strong boarder guards, things like that.
bobbilcon 07-30-05, 05:51 PM	i probally will look into buying the book suggusted. Currentally I probally will lookinto giving insentives for people to come. like lots of jobs, cheap housing things like that. get bards to spread the word of the kindom amoung elven, human and other such creatures towns. I will hire guards and i have hired wookers from another elven village. Wondering if anyone has a good price for say 10 guards pay a week? and what other prices i will need to pay?
ShadowDragon8685 07-30-05, 06:21 PM	Remember, communities don't, as a general rule, spring up for no reason, or just because the King said so. Exceptions are those crazy Russians. Lousi XV went and declared his castle was now a remote place, so some Russian Tzar went and declared the CAPITAL was now a remote place. But I digress. A community needs some way to make money, though this can be conventional (Laying on a trade route, charging a tax, and providing services) or unconventional (wizard's school, home for retired adventurers.) So you're building a villiage into the trees, eh? Tourism might work. Find some Elves with less dignity and more humor, and make the place into a tourist trap. Offer every sort of thing the adventurer with gold might want to spend his money on. As a bonus, you can use Wands of Detect Evil. If anyone rolls up in the town with an Evil alignment, you're perfectly justified in jumping the evil bastards before they start killing people, slaughtering the dumb sods, Soul Binding them, and Imprisoning their soul gem. Reap the benefits of the sale of their stuff, or keep it for yourself. Warning: Do not attempt this with any Paladins around. :)
peakaboojones 07-31-05, 10:39 PM	IF any one wants almost any book, except the quitnessential human, i cant find the elusive fox, then just download them from limewire.
braindead345 08-01-05, 04:26 AM	Unless you're planning on retiring the character, your big mistake was wanting a kingdom. Running a kingdom is hard work and a 24/7 gig. Your character will never be able to leave the kingdom (except on rare occasions). Kingdoms require government, which means laws- not very elflike in most cases. Your second mistake was BUYING the land. What was it? The D&D equivilant of the Louisana Purchase? In my experience, most people starting a kingdom usually go exploring in the wilderness and find some valuable resources to exploit. Once the resources are found, serious monster threats are eliminated. Next, they build a stronghold and outposts to mark the boundries; then protect their territory from any rivals that claims the land. Finally, they improve the transportation routes. Meanwhile, bards and relatives spread the word of the new kingdom (or more often the resources waiting to be exploited) and imigrants slowly start to move in. Total costs involved: the cost of the bards' services and the building of the strongholds & guardposts. Add in costs of guards and an army from the DMG. I doubt if you can do anything about your earlier choices, but just keep this all in mind for next time. Here ends the rant. Now, lets look at what we need to know and consider the possiblities. Who did you buy the land from and how much did you get for your 3 million? Did the party you paid have a legal claim to the territory or are you going to be faced with wars with the neighboring kingdoms/monsters over ownership? Answer carefully; we need to know if we need to hire diplomats or an army first. Send out envoys to any known kingdoms in the area and establish treaties. Build an army and a navy if needed. Build slowly, you don't want to panic your neighbors. If they see you building up for a war, they will too. However, if you have a hostile force confronting you, raise your army fast! Taxation is going to be the main source of revenue for the new kingdom. Most commoners do not pay taxes (directly at any rate) but an annual head tax (2 CP/year) for each citizen might work. The real source of income is the noblity. In return for their nifty title and a grant of land to do with as they wish; the nobles provide so many soldiers in times of war and an income from the rents charged the commoners. Alternative means of raising money include toll roads and the exploitation of resources by the king directly.
CzarGarrett 08-01-05, 09:48 AM	Find natural resources. Being a forest, you'd have lumber. But being an Elf, that's probably a limited option. But some sort of resources would be necessary to run a kingdom, something to export.
Leibel 08-01-05, 10:55 AM	Are any trade routes near the forest. Idea's for making money. - If so you could offer protection to caravan's for a fee. - Or monopolize the fur market. - Perhaps since it's DnD there are spell components of a foresty nature lying around. - Or herbs that cure disease's(think anti-toxins). - It sounds really odd but a Druid School - Your elves and have a good number of rangers; archery school for human/dwarf/gnome country's/cities nearby - Get experts to manufacture that spiffy elven chain mail everyone loves There is also wisdom in getting non-elves to move into your country as well; elves breed slowly and at best you'll end up weaker/smaller than other country's/cities. Incorporate faster breeding races into the empire to keep up demographically and make them loyal to your country via assimiliation and making elves the nobility. Speaking of Nobility do the usual spy on them/play them against each other thing - it's cliche but one of them could rebel against you later down the road.
Heironymus_Vann 08-01-05, 12:23 PM	Bard cohort + lyre of building = landlord's best friend. That should take care of the "elven tree town". Beyond that, if you can keep the forest secure (free of monsters and invaders) and maybe employ some arcane and druidic magic to make the weather pleasant and food abundant, youe forest will acquire the dual reputation of a haven (for good creatures) and dangerously enchanted (for evil ones) so you should have your pick of refugees from oppresive or evil lands looking for a safe home. Plus you're an elf, so you've got plenty of time to wait for people to discover your haven and migrate there. HV
jasper 08-01-05, 03:35 PM	I assume part of the game is now being played around your PC trying to get this kingdom going. As a dm I would: Give you a rough hex map of local area either 1 hex = 1 mile etc and have you do both a quick scout, you know where the big streams, landmarks are, etc. And a deep scout in which you go hunting for critters. Note some critters will be way below and way above your level. Make you give me a general plan of your town. Make you roleplay the advertising and hiring the foremen of various groups. Aka Hiring a foreman to build houses, Foreman to build bridges, etc. Make you roleplay hiring some of staff. Head cook, Head steward, Butler, hunter. Once you get basics covered I would come up with a random chart of happenings in your town. Ex 01-02 plague 99-100 adventuer drops dead body looted 1000 gp + one magic item recovered. This chart would depend on how much time you spend in the near by area. I would map out the general resources of the area and terrian. I doesn't matter if you huge tracts of giant redwoods if you have no quick way to cut them down and deliever to market.
RavenoftheCrags 08-01-05, 04:29 PM	I made my entire stronghold using magic. This takes a while to do but perhaps you should get some mages over and use the following spells: Transmute Rock to Mud - Use this on a cliff or large expanse of rock, cut chunks out of it and mold them into blocks, then cast Transmute Mud to Rock to make them stone again (this may take a while it took me ages). That will get you bricks. Wood Shape - Shape wood into planks for scaffolding, door frames and furniture. Then create strong constructs. Golems and Shield Guardians can lift heavy loads so they can lay the bricks and carry other stuff. Teleport Objects spell can also help in this. As for inhabitants, what you need to do is pursuade others to come over. Or unleash a horrific force (via gate) and promise they will be safe living in your village... Then again, theres always geas................. Don't take me seriously, I am only a mad conjurer from the heaths.
Derren S. 08-01-05, 05:10 PM	Well unless you play the sterotypical tree hugging elf (something not even the PHB suggests) start clearing the forest for cheap building material and as a ressource for export. You also need more space for crops to feed the population of your town/city (a village is not enough to form a kingdom, let alone to controll a huge forest and hunting is a very unstable food source and can't subbly many people) and even elven homes aren't created out of thin air. But before you start clearing land you must search for a good place for your city. Rivers are always a good choice as the land near it is fertile and you have a source of fresh water. Also later you can get bridge toll from it. Also try to settle in an area which isn't very hard to reach and immediatly start building a road to your town/city to other trading hubs/road networks. The abundance of lumber will help you in the beginning, but you need other ressources to make your city attractive. Scout early for them and either build your city near them if there is a good place nearby or build an outpost there. Also you need to clear the forests of most monsters to attract people but be selective about it. When you clear the forest of monsters than only parts which are far away from other towns so they can't chop lumber safely. That will strengthen your economic position as you are the only one who can trade large quantities of lumber cheaply and might attract worker from other towns. You also need to quickly raise a milita to give your citicens a feeling of safety. When you are not part of an kingdom you also need it for protection. Also, don't aim to be an elven village. Elves don't form kingdoms. They are too lazy and too chaotic for that. Also they don't reproduce fast enough. At the beginning you probably won't be able to controll all the forest (depending on what huge means) so giving away part of it to a vassal would be a good idea. Or your entire group could split the forest among them and everyone starts a small city in other parts of the forest. This would give you a strong position when the cities are up and running but it would also strech you ressources very thin at the beginning. It also could lead to conflicts over ressources. A quick source of money would be giving other cities the permission to chop lumber/hunt in your forest for limited time (depending on which race 1 year (human) - 10 years (elven)) Of course this would require to focus the whole campaign on the city. If you or your DM doesn't want that, find a frindly NPC and let him do it and continue adventuring. As the DM probably doesn't want to make many calculations your town will magically start growing. I also advise against building a tree village. It is unpractical (especially for the industry and farming), building space is extremly limited, hard to defend (just burn the trees or lay siege to it) and generally unsafe for the citizens (danger of falling, fires will be a big problem and gathering water to extinguish it or just for personal use will be very hard).
theif lord 08-01-05, 09:28 PM	if you used any of my money i will personally guide the arson crue that will burn down your forest, but have you thought where people are comming from are you going to pay them to show up or sumthing? and you just cant be a self proclaimed king. but it is a good idea. i might start a rogues guild in Athren or just take over Rockroost