Building Bhakashal – High Level Play

My gaming groups are starting later this year, which gave me some time to review my campaign notes over the last few days. My Wednesday group started the year heading to a place on a map, the Forgotten City, just because it sounded cool, and there was lore suggesting it had great riches.

The lore was off, it had a gateway to hell, and moderate riches. After releasing a Pit Fiend, and pissing off a very high-level warlock, they managed to flee and catch up with their caravan. On their way back they had a bandit encounter that was very chaotic, but they managed a stalemate and retreat and headed home to Bhakashal.

They have all accumulated enough experience to level, which will make some of them 7^th level, and some of them 8^th. For reference, it has taken 4 years of gaming, about 360 hours of table time for the highest-level PCs in the party to get there. When you hit 9th level in Bhakashal you get to join the upper echelons of your faction. Each faction has a ruling class, a group who, by distinction of raising through the ranks, are now those who direct the faction. So, some time near the end of this gaming year, assuming they survive, they will be in a position to become part of the ruling class of Bhakashal, and will no longer have a patron directing them.

 However, you don’t just automatically become a Lord upon hitting 9th level.

You have to do one of two things:

a) defeat a sitting Lord in combat in the arena

b) perform a service for the House that significantly impacts their status/repute 

A Lord can refuse a challenge if desired, unless they have dishonored their station or the challenger. So that route is risky as the party doesn’t have any “dirt” on anyone. Over the next gaming year, they could look for some and challenge someone directly.

Option B would involve something BIG. Something that would significantly impact the status of their House. They are of course welcome to come up with a task that would meet the requirements. My Friday group did this last year, as they were older than my Wednesday group and had party members that hit 8^th level halfway though the year. They came up with the idea of establishing trade relations with factions in the underworld in order to get access to the unusual monsters and plants of the underworld. Establishing an outpost and trade relations for their Noble House would be a big deal.

However, it can be hard for players to come up with, “something big”. As much as the players are involved in faction play, and familiar with their patron’s interests, coming up with a significant goal to gain prestige amongst the upper echelons of Bhakashal House nobility isn’t. So, I’m going to give them some ideas. In each case the idea will be one that they learned through a contact or ally they have made over the last 4 years of play.

It’s time to cash in on the many relationships they have built

Option 1 involves the Brass Blade Spider’s Guild, it currently has 2 branches, one located in the Ward of House Quannar, the party’s House, the other branch works out of the Raosk. The Lords of House Quannar have sway over the city branch.

But the Raosk branch is out of their sphere of influence. So, task one would be for the party to either assassinate their Guildmaster or determine how to bring them to heel. This would bring all of the guild into Quannar’s orbit. That’s the kind of “big move” that would be worthy of a Lordship, as it would fundamentally shift the relationship between factions. It would involve infiltration and spying, gathering power. 

Option 2, over the last year there have been several prominent attacks by demons in the city. Demons, even powerful ones, rarely enter Bhakashal, there are so many wards, warlocks and high level priests around. So, someone in the city has likely been summoning them, or there is some sort of rift that lets them through. If the party can stop this it would be a major achievement, as demons are quite powerful, defeating several of them would be notable.

It would also put all of the Noble Houses in their debt, as the demons have attacked and killed several powerful Lords and Warlocks in the city before they were themselves destroyed. In addition, it is believed that some of the demons are polymorphed and hidden amongst the population.

Option 3 involves the Bhakashal Blossom, a huge plant that has roots throughout the city that connect to the healing pools that are accessible only to the most powerful in the Bhakashal factions. The PCs would hear that there are one or more pools that have not been discovered, and their task would be to find those pools and either secure them or bargain with the faction who control the territory where they are found.

The pools are extremely important, discovering new pools and securing/controlling them would be an achievement of the highest order. It will also be very challenging as it will involve negotiating with other Houses if they are found outside of the territory of the party’s House.

These three options were created by raiding the Bhakashal City Rumors Table. The table has 50 rumors about the city, the ref gets to decide which, if any, are true. Most of them have a conspiracy flavor, so they make excellent fodder for the sort of bold, game changing action that would be worthy of soon-to-be Bhakashal Lords who want to impress their House to gain stature and standing.

This year they will need to step it up and do some game-changing things in order to earn their spot amongst the Bhakashal elite.

It going to be epic.

Also, it is important to note that I haven’t had a chance to play test this part of the game much yet, two of my groups are approaching the goal, but none have made it.

One of the key differences between Bhakashal and other indie games is that it has been extensively playtested, over the last five years we have put in 1000+ table hours of playtesting. This high level piece is one of the few that hasn’t had the opportunity. Playtesting ensures that the systems work, work well, and the system is integrated.

Onwards and upwards!