Taking Responsibility
Once per month, three times a season, a character, PC or NPC, can take responsibility for a community attribute: Fortune, Milieu, Security, Resilience, or Virtue, assuming they have the skill and the authority to do so.
Three times per season (once per month) a PC or NPC make a roll of Skill+Ring for the attribute. The TN of this check depends on the Condition of the Community, modified by any unaddressed Perils.
On a success, they negate 1 point of Threat for that attribute. Accumulated threat puts the community at risk.
If they achieve bonus successes, they may also acquire 1 point of Prospect for every success or mitigate 1 point of additional threat for every bonus success. Accumulated Prospect allows a community to grow.
They may spend opportunities as usual, or they may spend opportunities to Identify Hidden Threats or Identify Hidden Prospects.
Alternate skills can be selected with GM approval. For example, a community with a rising Milieu threat that puts the community at risk of disease might be better served with a Medicine check, while rising strife caused by squabbling inhabitants might be better served with a Games check. Players should express how they are taking responsibility for their attribute when they make their roll.
Note: In 4th Edition, bonus successes would instead be successes with raises, 1 raise per bonus success.
Three times per season (once per month) a PC or NPC make a roll of Skill+Ring for the attribute. The TN of this check depends on the Condition of the Community, modified by any unaddressed Perils.
On a success, they negate 1 point of Threat for that attribute. Accumulated threat puts the community at risk.
If they achieve bonus successes, they may also acquire 1 point of Prospect for every success or mitigate 1 point of additional threat for every bonus success. Accumulated Prospect allows a community to grow.
They may spend opportunities as usual, or they may spend opportunities to Identify Hidden Threats or Identify Hidden Prospects.
Alternate skills can be selected with GM approval. For example, a community with a rising Milieu threat that puts the community at risk of disease might be better served with a Medicine check, while rising strife caused by squabbling inhabitants might be better served with a Games check. Players should express how they are taking responsibility for their attribute when they make their roll.
Note: In 4th Edition, bonus successes would instead be successes with raises, 1 raise per bonus success.
The amount of Bonus Successes a community receives from a successful Taking Responsibility roll is also modified by that community's Features.
Attribute |
Ring |
Proposed Skills |
Actions |
Fortune |
Air |
Commerce |
The character provides labor and manages capital to create or acquire the resources need to sustain their community. This can take the form of trading, farming, hunting, fishing, or working in a position with a focus providing necessary resources. |
Milieu |
Water |
Sentiment |
The character devotes themselves to building and maintaining relationships within the family with a mixture of events, humor, and honest care. |
Security |
Fire |
Tactics |
The character devotes themselves to protecting the community from outside threats, standing watch and preventing harm. This may take the form of watching over herds, reinforcing the walls, or guarding the hencoop from foxes. |
Resilience |
Earth |
Labor |
The character devotes themselves to preparing the their community for difficult times. This might mean preparing stores, building irrigation or levies, performing maintenance, locating shelters, or training. |
Virtue |
Void |
Theology |
The character devotes themselves to rites, rituals, and readings, bringing the community together through the shared experience of faith and appeasing the spirits that hold sway over the land. |
Example: Kaito Sano has been selected to care for the shrine in Golden Petal Village (Virtue: Excellent, with Threat 9 and Difficulty TN1) Each month, she must make a TN 1 Void Theology check as she does her shrine-tending duties.
Month 1: Sano succeeds with 2 bonus successes.
Month 2: Sano fails her check.
Month 3: Sano succeeds with zero bonus successes.
At the end of the season, Sano has mitigated 4 points of threat. But the Community, as a spiritual hub, still accumulates 5 points of Threat to its Virtue.
Month 1: Sano succeeds with 2 bonus successes.
Month 2: Sano fails her check.
Month 3: Sano succeeds with zero bonus successes.
At the end of the season, Sano has mitigated 4 points of threat. But the Community, as a spiritual hub, still accumulates 5 points of Threat to its Virtue.
Fulfilling Roles
When PCs are unavailable to assist in mitigating threat, NPCs will in general take responsibility for attributes for a community. A unchanging, fixed, fully staffed community will be considered to have NPCs taking responsibility for all 5 attributes every month, and those NPCs are able to generate enough success in their rolls to mitigate the threat that that community is experiencing.
NPCs can mitigate threat based on how skilled they are at their role.
Add +1 to the Threat Averted for each Feature for that attribute that the community has in place.
Decrease the Threat Averted by 1 for each increase in TN over 2.
NPCs can mitigate threat based on how skilled they are at their role.
Add +1 to the Threat Averted for each Feature for that attribute that the community has in place.
Decrease the Threat Averted by 1 for each increase in TN over 2.
|
Example: Doji Ieyasu is a skilled Yoriki who has responsibility for Golden Petal Village's security. He is able to mitigate 5 threat to Security per season. If able, as long as the village is receiving less than 5 Security threat per season, he will be able to address all the Security threat to the village.
If the TN to mitigate Security threat for the season is TN3, Ieyasu will only be able to mitigate 4 threat per season. If the village has a Security Feature, Ieyasu will be able to mitigate 6 threat per season. |
Role Deficiency
Role Deficiency occurs when the skill of an NPC fulfilling a role is insufficient to address the amount of threat that attribute is accumulating, or when that NPC is killed or otherwise is unable to fulfill their duty. Without an NPC to fulfill that role, the threat accumulates unchecked. A PC or noted NPC may be able to alternate months, addressing threat from a different attribute each month, but until the threat can be fully addressed each month, it will accumulate until it is spent on a Peril.
The Players may address role deficiency in a community in a number of ways:
In addition, you can use the community's Prospect to buy the Benefit of filling a Role Deficiency.
If a Peril is great enough, it will potentially kill an NPC or otherwise create a role deficiency for a community.
The Players may address role deficiency in a community in a number of ways:
- As a daimyo or high level leader of a community, they may promote or order a community member or outsider into that role, though that member may not have skill enough to fulfill the position.
- They may earn and spend their influence (In the Influence Game) to request that a person with the appropriate skills be assigned to take responsibility for that role in the community.
- They may spend wealth that they have acquired to hire someone to fulfill that role for the community.
- They may arrange a marriage to bring a person into the community who has the skills needed to fulfill that role for the community.
- They may negotiate with another community to receive someone who will fulfill that role on a temporary basis.
- They may settle down and fulfill that role themselves.
In addition, you can use the community's Prospect to buy the Benefit of filling a Role Deficiency.
If a Peril is great enough, it will potentially kill an NPC or otherwise create a role deficiency for a community.
