Hireling Missionaries

I've got a quick question about deploying hirelings as missionaries, as per p. 124 of Core.  What exactly is a "hireling missionary"?  The use of the word "hireling" implies they are not quite henchmen but instead occupy a category similar to a sage, armorer or assassin.  However, there is no cost listed for "missionary".  However, I'm dubious that the intent was that a cleric can simply go down to the tavern, hire a bunch of layabouts and pay them to pass out pamphlets to the unbelievers (well, now that I write that down I'm not sure how silly that sounds).  My assumption is as follows:

1. You can use the cleric's henchmen, assuming they worship the same god and all.  

2. Followers. Once a cleric reaches 9th level he gets clerical followers.  I'm assuming that these guys can be used as hireling missionaries.

3. Congregants?  Can congregants act as hireling missionaries?  What would their cost be.

 

Further, let's assume that a cleric has two clerical henchmen that serve as hireling missionaries.  I would think that in addition to adding their "cost" (which I am guessing refers to the lifestyle costs on p. 51) that any spells cast charitably by the missionaries would count towards the larger pool.  Am I correct in assuming that a church's Divine Power pool is somewhat fungible?  The two henchmen clerics, in other words, could tap into the pool while the head cleric is off adventuring, or something?

To go even further down the rabbit hole, let's assume that a Kingdom has a network of churches, with a Matriarch ruling the entire thing.  Would Divine Power be subject to the same kind of "tithing" that the feudal system uses for taxes, with the holy energy trickling upwards towards the central cathedral?

Okay, maybe this isn't a quick question.

Hireling is the broader category of which henchman fall under, as well as the specialists you listed like Sage and assassin.

You can have literally anyone be a missionary as long as, as you pointed out, they worship the same god.  ACKs assumes that power, both physical and political, correlates with level, so someone who is level 3 is a more effective missionary than level 2 regardless of their class.  For this reason, The cost to assign someone as a missionary is the same as wages to hire a character of that level, as described in Chapter 3 of the ACKs core rulebook.  I would ignore any kind of specialty pay for things like Sages or Alchemists, and treat them as level 1.  That being said, a Sage or Alchemist knows they can make more money plying their actual trade, so they would likely insist on either being paid their usual rate or refuse to be a missionary.  Just about everyone else is fair game though.

So, in theory, if you were founding a new religion you could:

1. PC begins to build temple and casts spells per day to recruit congregants.

2. Once you've got congregants you can try to hire them as missionaries.  They will be 0-level, I would assume, and you'd need to make hiring reaction rolls, and each costs (and is worth) 12 gp per month.

3. Later on, the PC recruits a 3rd level clerical henchmen and persuades her to act as a missionary.  The henchman is worth 100 gp per month, instead of the 12 gp a month that the 0-level congregants are worth; in addition she doesn't need to make a reaction roll when told to prosthelytize, especially since preaching to the unconverted is miles better than tramping through some dangerous dungeon.  

4. The hirelings must spend a full month as a missionary in order to get the benefit of their wage.

there was a patreon article recently that detailed just how much of the month the missionaries need to spend, but I think that's basically correct.

Yup. Although, IIRC, it explicitly gives the time required to task hire kings to do missionary work. The actual time to do missonar work is implied to be one month, but not actually given the same treatment.

Tangentially, p. 124 describes how one adds the "value of any religious structures erected . . ." to the number of congregants gained in a given month.  Is this value only applied for one month, at the project's completion, or is it counted every month after it is completed?  I'm assuming the value is counted in every subsequent month after it is complete, but the text is a little unclear.  

the way I read it, building a 300gp chapel contributes to attracting congregants only the month it's built.  I'm not sure what makes more sense from an actual play perspective, but if you, for example, build a 10,000gp cathedral, you could rack up congregants pretty quickly, although I suppose there's also a cost per congregant in maintenance so maybe it balances out?  If that was all you did, you'd slowly attract congregants in smaller and smaller amounts until the cathedral contributed only to maintance?  I dunno.

[quote="Jard"]

the way I read it, building a 300gp chapel contributes to attracting congregants only the month it's built.  I'm not sure what makes more sense from an actual play perspective, but if you, for example, build a 10,000gp cathedral, you could rack up congregants pretty quickly, although I suppose there's also a cost per congregant in maintenance so maybe it balances out?  If that was all you did, you'd slowly attract congregants in smaller and smaller amounts until the cathedral contributed only to maintance?  I dunno.

[/quote]

 

Yeah, I read it the same way you did, honestly, but then thought there was no way that could be the case.  I think if I were to run it that way I would say that maintenance and upgrade costs are counted.  So, when you switch out the brass candelabras for solid gold that counts towards attracting congregants.

As it stands investing money into building churches is wasted gold as the return in congregants is so minimal.

I think it would be ok to have it count each month and not only once. I mean what is this 10k cathedral attracting on average? A measly 55 congregants...

i didn't do the math to see how much of a danger it represents. i think i'd be more concerned about how things play out when, say, you funnel all your adventuring money into cathedrals every month.  I have to wonder what that would look like.

It also helps to compare to other similar activities. what are the benefits of spending 10k on a cathedral vs. spending that on investment in a domain or expansion of a stronghold?

[quote="Jard"]

i didn't do the math to see how much of a danger it represents. i think i'd be more concerned about how things play out when, say, you funnel all your adventuring money into cathedrals every month.  I have to wonder what that would look like.

It also helps to compare to other similar activities. what are the benefits of spending 10k on a cathedral vs. spending that on investment in a domain or expansion of a stronghold?

[/quote]

 

Well, the big thing I see is that clerics don't get XP for investing in building up temples.

[quote="thirdkingdom"]

Well, the big thing I see is that clerics don't get XP for investing in building up temples.

[/quote]

 

not directly, no, but my suspicion is that given enough time, a congregation that produces enough holy power to regularly churn out and resell magic items is going to be more efficient than magical research, for which the wizard has to constantly hire adventurers or pay market prices for monster parts.

A single 5th level priestess can cast beneficial spells worth 9000gp per month

A cathedral worth 10000gp generates 55 followers who in turn generate 11gp worth of divine energy per week.

 

I honestly doubt there is a worse way in ACKS to spend gold...

 

[quote="Rodriguez"]

A single 5th level priestess can cast beneficial spells worth 9000gp per month

A cathedral worth 10000gp generates 55 followers who in turn generate 11gp worth of divine energy per week.

 

I honestly doubt there is a worse way in ACKS to spend gold... [/quote]

 

I've actually been toying with the idea of limiting the gold piece value of charitably cast spells to a given market class.  After all, there's only so many people that need to be healed or whatever in a given area.

Hmm, if you have to I would rather go by number of families in a domain.

Limiting charitable castings too much would make the already super powerful "become spiritual advisor of the ruler" even more important though.

I don't see any reason to limit the number of charitable castings considering that, well, you're charitably casting them.  The whole point is that the supply is free, so why wouldn't the demand be infinite?

After seeing the math, I'm coming around on the idea of religious structures contributing perpetually to divine power.  I'd still like to see how it compares to a wizard trying to do magical research without leaving town.  After all, Cleric-types get all sorts of other benefits like half-price strongholds and wage-free followers.

 

I kinda wonder if there isn't a way to draft the "recruitment by time period" tables for adjucating the continual traffic of congregants and/or pilgrims. Something like a cathedral of X value exerts a "pilgrimage range" of a domain or realm of Y size, and so there's periods of times where pilgrimages come to experience the divine wonder and times when the population has to refresh a bit to get new pilgrims. If a cleric adventures in order to keep the miracles a'coming (go find the fingerbone of St. Horace!) that could pop up traffic - hell, a "vagaries of faith" table to represent random occurences of actual or false divine action (there's a comet in the sky, pilgrimages are up 50%)

If one wanted, it could also function as a trade route sort of system - folks were constantly going from wherever they were at on a walking/riding pilgrimage to Rome and back, let's say, so those routes may change based on the existence of a particularly glorious religious structure. That'd introduce some competition between clerics, as was the case anyway with the various European bishoprics and cities.

 

 

 

Having re-read the core rulebook, i'm more open to structures continuing to produce congregants:


Each month, calculate the value of the spellcaster’s proselytizing:

   The gp value of all spells charitably cast on behalf of peasants by the spellcaster or his henchmen or followers (using the costs for spells from the Spell Availability by Market table in the Hirelings, Henchmen, Mercenaries, and Specialists section);
   The gp value of any hirelings deployed as missionaries in the realm by the spellcaster; and
   The gp value of any religious structures erected in the realm by the spellcaster (using the Stronghold Structure Costs in the Strongholds and Domains section).

assuming a constant effect, the hypothetical 10k cathedral generates 55 new congregants per month, less the maintenance of existing congregants. at 1gp per congregant, this cathedral could support up to 10k congregants, but the ACKs core rules specifically limit you to the "realm" you are recruiting within.  

This is a bit ambiguous though. If you are building a cathedral in a city, are you limited to just that city's population? just the personal domain of the ruler of the city? or the entire realm that ruler controls.  Does this mean if you wish to have congregants for an entire kingdom, you must construct it within the personal domain of the ruler of that kingdom? If not, what determines whether you're allowed to pull from a realm?  What happens if there are two independant kingdoms adjacent to each other and you wish to get congregants from both?

[quote="Jard"]

This is a bit ambiguous though. If you are building a cathedral in a city, are you limited to just that city's population? just the personal domain of the ruler of the city? or the entire realm that ruler controls.  Does this mean if you wish to have congregants for an entire kingdom, you must construct it within the personal domain of the ruler of that kingdom? If not, what determines whether you're allowed to pull from a realm?  What happens if there are two independant kingdoms adjacent to each other and you wish to get congregants from both?

[/quote]

I'm going to wager it's the realm in which that cleric is considered the "spiritual advisor", either by direct domain/realm ownership or by grant of the domain/realms ruler. I don't think there's any other location-based requirements. It's a "layer" on top of the generally secular domains, which are themselves dotted with the personal domains of various clerics, who, depending on the structure, either have fealty to secular rulers or skip that and go to their immediate religious supervisor.

I've been long considering it a Holy Roman Empire style of thing - as in there's a Bishopric of Brandenburg, a personal domain of that bishop, who's spiritual domain includes the Diocese or Brandenburg, much of which covers the secular Margraviate of Brandenburg. D. Brandenburg is sublet from the Archdiocese of Magdeburg, who himself has personal holdings.

If  history is any guide, pulling congregants from somewhere you're not authoritative is a job for Domains At War - if not at the start, most certainly at the end.

 

>
> If  history is any guide, pulling congregants from somewhere you're not authoritative is a job for Domains At War - if not at the start, most certainly at the end.

unless you're the Ammonar pope.

speaking of different layers of religious hierarchy, what happens if the Sun Pope has been given the role of spiritual advisor by King Arnold, but the Bishop of the Sun has been made the spiritual advisor of Duke Bob's realm, wholly contained within King Arnold's realm?  Can they "double dip" congregants? What if it were an actual HRE situation where there are some protestant and some catholic realms, but the war part has already resolved that that's allowed?