From conqueror to king
After taking the orc realm and dive the lands the players decide that they will pool their money and divide it evenly. One of the oldest henchwoman (a cleric named vita) will receive the same treatment and stand as equal to the rest, this decision was based on two reasons: the desire to have a level 11 cleric as fast as they could and a fondness for the character.
We also decided that most bookkeeping would between sessions, and that the excel sheet will record their earnings and expending and xp gain (also it will say when one of them level up). That decision was the best one we take on the campaign.
Also on long waitings we would chat over whatsapp about what they wanted to do on their free time.
For some time they dedicated themselves to gain xp from domain income, claim some land and build some castles, fight a couple of orc rebellions, doing magic research and doing some mercantile ventures.
In this, one of the players create a very profitable venture based on trading gems transported on pegasi from the dwarven capital to the elven capital. With that money he buyed a giant roc (he got lucky to find one with 1 in 200 chances per month).
The first problem that arise after the conquest was that some of the local nobles demanded that they kill the orcs, and they refuse. threatened with war they decide to search for potential allies, they eventually form a coalition with an independentist Caelum Duke and with the Astegos Raiders (after finding that the Astegos were the original owners of the land). And again they marched to war.
This war, unlike the other was decided on a single massive battle (battalion scale), and in that battle the key player was the roc bird that proved itself to be an excellent commander killer. For one brief moment the enemy wizard managed to take control of the roc, but the party wizard used his researched summon dragon spell to kill the enemy wizard and regain control of the bird.
After this victory the only obvious enemy was the Ice Queen, lich ruler of the big bad chaotic domain… but to my surprise they decide to negotiate with the Ice Queen and ended forming an alliance based on the marriage of one of the PC and the lich.
I loved
-how my players pass from more or less murder-hobos to diplomatic and conspiracist nobles.
-the magic research, the machinist automatas and the spell creation rules.
I house ruled
-Very little
I didn't like
-the mechanic to resolve damage inflicted on heroes by armies, they were not coherent with the normal fighting mechanics, as in a normal fight a big group of weak opponents will always inflict a little damage each turn on the powerful character, but in D@W you either suffer no damage or you receive massive damage.
-Also the retreat mechanic is really exploitable by heroes, as individuals don't get disorganized.
-The population grow… ist ok, but such a chore to do each month. In the future i will use a season based domain: morale, growth, and income come every season (adjusted accordingly)
Next: kings