Justify a world where adventurer guilds are a thing. I mean,

>>46591042
I imagine the obvious system would be a nation formed of inter-dependent but competing republican city-states - like renaissance Italy.

Historically mercenaries were more common there because standing troops are expensive to maintain and the major families would instead sub-contract the responsibility for warfare to large, professional mercenary companies.

Mercenary companies were a thing. Obviously, there weren't any goblin infestations to exterminate (Or where there?), but seeing a company of dudes willing to hire out to a local lord in need of muscle.

Of course, few of them were as stationary as the classic adventurer guild, but the guild concept is the logical extension of the mercenary company when applied to a universe in which wandering monsters are a thing and when humans are perfectly capable of soloing small armies at the right level.

>>46591042
>>46591187
Italian mercenaries were also notorious for being scheming assholes.

Two mercenary armies would meet in the field, then spend as long as they could constantly "repositioning for tactical advantages" for months, trying to milk it for all it was worth. They'd chase each other up and down the land to give a good show, but never actually fight.

>>46591042
Also, watch Seven Samurai. Just because a city might have an established guard or a lord has a full-time military, that doesn't mean that Average Joe Farmer has access to either of those. A lot of your duties would probably come from either incredibly wealthy individuals looking for something -- like a wizard in need of reagents, for example -- or just commoners pooling up some of their resources to help get the goblins in the woods cleared out so that they can go back to hunting.

>>46591279
>Italian mercenaries were also notorious for being scheming assholes.
So are adventurers.

>>46591042
The only justification I can find is some kind of post-apocalyptic world where ruin exploration is absurdly dangeours but also incredibly rewarding, because the world is literally full of deadly shit that nobody understands anymore except for people whose entire live is dedicated to it, and there's many useful things to find around as long as you know what to look for.

>>46591042
In whose hands the safety of our world lays?

>>46591042
I DON'T KNOW OP HOW WERE LANDSKNÄCHTE AND DOPPELSÖLDER A THING?

HOW ARE HIRING AGENCIES A THING?

FUKKEN HELL, think before you post.

>>46591042
Central administration. I think that's the most convincing explanation. A powerful secular authority (think royal) controls what armed mercenaries are doing by handing out charters to handle business the crown wants done. These are guilds. If they fuck up and cause trouble, the crown can revoke their charter.

Would-be adventurers join these guilds because it's actually illegal to do anything without being a part of them.

>>46591042
>what sort of system would let the safety of everyone lie in the hands of powerful freelance mercenaries?
Capitalism.
It's already worked once.

>>46591233
>>46591279
Their existence surely made Italy to be a more safe and orderly place .

>>46591042
They wouldn't. Standing armies are for protecting nations, adventurers are for troubleshooting (find trouble and shoot it).

There may even be a whole thing where adventurers AREN'T allowed to participate in wars, and vice-versa, especially if they happen to be super-powerful assholes.

It's much easier to have an army "just in case" over having to fight off a dragon with it and then promptly be invaded.

It's probably cheaper to have an adventurer do it, too.

>>46591042
There's historical precedent. The real question is how the economy fares when millions of previously uncirculated gold and silver coins from millennia-old ruins flood the market.

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>Oyyy mate it would be bad for your busniss if suddenly goblins were to attack

>best pay us to ensure your safety..goblins are pretty unpredictable you know

hunterxhunter does this exact thing

As an organization they adminster and train individuals in the art of Nen who then go on to fulfill various roles whille they go out and "hunt" whatever it is they are hunting in particular.

cheif among their ranks tend to be Black List Hunters (those who go after criminal bounties) and they often tend to do jobs like body guard duty for various wealthy individuals and share and trade information with one another.

>>46591519
That also happened many a time in history. Mali singlehandedly bombed the gold market in the west when that one african king (too lazy to look up his name) decided to make a pilgrimage to Mecca and throw gold everywhere.

Then there's the more frequently cited example of the New World and what it did to silver and gold markets.

>>46591233
>there weren't any goblin infestations to exterminate (Or where there?)

For the last time HAPSBURGS ARE NOT GOBLINS!

The dungeons are guild property, see?
No way is the local lord going to let all that sweet treasure simply walk off with any murderhobo who sees fit, so he taxes it through the Guild, and the Guild taxes you.

Even if you managed to sneak or stab your way through their blockade at the dungeon entrances, you'll quickly find yourself persona non grata at every inn, tavern and shop in the mainland.

>>46591042

It could work if 90% of Adventurers are basically glorified rat-catchers. They're not particularly powerful on average.

It could also make sense if there are truly wild areas where human settlement is sparse and government control is non-existent. This is where threats tend to breed, but sending a column of professional soldiers out into the wilderness is a waste of time, money, and often soldiers. Why bother with the cost of maintaining standing garrisons when you can send disposable lunkheads out there and just pay off whoever survives to drag home a sack of goblin heads?

>>46591279
Someone's read Best Served Cold

>>46591327
Nothing about your post necessitates a post-apocalyptic world, it could just as easily take place in a regular fantasy setting. "Deadly shit that nobody understands except for people whose entire live is dedicated to it" is a pretty accurate definition of magic.

In the distant past a group of powerful adventures stole divine sparks and ascended to become deities. Due to the fact that decades of adventuring together developed incredible teamwork and their good relations most individual gods couldn't stand up to them.
They established the adventures guild as a means to gain worshippers and wealth without having to do much.
With divine backing mortal nations don't mess with their autonomy and other deities don't want to make a set of powerful enemies with a history of god slaying when they were mortal.

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>>46591633

Okay, what are they then?

>>46591384
>I DON'T KNOW OP HOW WERE LANDSKNÄCHTE AND DOPPELSÖLDER A THING?

That is a good question, what were the conditions that allowed their formation and what ultimately led to them becoming defunct (unless there are still a load of Landsknachte and doppelsolders around, standing at the intersections of german highways with signs saying "will pike for food")

>>46591766
Demonspawn.

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>>46591317

so basically.

>>46591233
>but the [adventurer] guild concept is the logical extension of the mercenary company when applied to a universe in which ...
No. Adventurer's Guilds are a degeneration of bulletin boards at taverns with plot hooks on them.

>>46591770
There are, but nobody notices them because the Autobahn has no speed limit. They just speed by and the poor mercenary is left to starve.

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>>46591813

>>46591042
"It just works".

>>46591042
They function as mercenaries for the wealthy.
Wealthy inevitably need muscle for bodyguard duties or protecting their capital from goblin hordes.
Eventually competition gets so saturated that companies pop up just to recommend and advertise mercenary corps.

>>46591770
Well, given the prevalence of PMCs these days, I'd say it's a bit foolish to pretend that the life of the mercenary has really left.

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>>46591442

>"Oh, do NOT get me started..."

>>46591533
Desert goblins did the Twin Donjons

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>>46591868

And then we'll bring back the good ol' days after 9/11!

A semi-justification I came up with is that Adventurer guilds are a way for nations to retain the talents of individuals who wouldn't do well in the military. Vets with PTSD, eccentric wizards, headstrong youths and all that. They're also a good way to offload some costs. With mercenaries, you pay in advance, but with adventurers you don't have to pay until the goblins or whatever are dead.

>>46591633
>The physician who practiced his autopsy stated that his body "did not contain a single drop of blood; his heart was the size of a peppercorn; his lungs corroded; his intestines rotten and gangrenous; he had a single testicle, black as coal, and his head was full of water."

Charles II was somethin', alright.

>>46591766
My friend wrote a live quest which we played and they were actually vampires. At least the Charles VI and Maria Theresa were. Because Frederick the Great was a werewolf.

>>46591042
The definition of an adventurer is someone who goes to dangerous places where no-one else goes. This used to be a real life thing. Many of these men became rich and famous, and many of them died.

I ran a setting for an FFD6 rpg that more or less addresses this, freely cribbing from MGSV and Ivalice/Iron Kingdoms.

Several nations/nation states that are on varying terms with each other. Dangerous, monster-ridden wilderness. Armies are expensive and are reserved for home defense and specific campaigns/missions. They're generally of better quality, but again, expensive.

The brunt of the work gets done by Clans. There are two varieties of them. Adventuring Clans are smaller parties who do the typical adventurer jobs around villages and cities. They can also be hired on as specialists in military ventures. They are otherwise not permitted to engage in actual warfare.

This is where Military Clans come in. They're your Mercenary Companies. Your PFs. They get a charter and some land to establish their base of operations. They fight the Kingdoms' wars (or whoever can afford them). They adhere to a code of conduct.

>>46591042
>I mean, what sort of system would let the safety of everyone lie in the hands of powerful freelance mercenaries?
An anarcho-capitalist one?

>>46591770
Dude. D U D E. Private militaries are as active as ever. They only became less of a thing once absolutism became the coll new meme and immediately returned once the US started flailing around with its shlong.

Because adventurer guilds get all sorts of odd jobs from repairing the city wall to killing the dragon that's been terrorizing caravans. Sure the kingdom has a military, an archmage, and the king himself might be a very powerful fighter.


But, the king is an important man, he can't just go off to slay every beast that shows up in the country. The archmage has unlimited resources to study magic, no time to do something an adventurer could do. And we sure as hell aren't sending a couple thousand men to die when they could be used for enforcing the law or protecting the borders.

It would be an extension of the "help wanted" posting board in town, which is an extension of word of mouth/neighbourly helping.

Say John the turnip farmer needs an extra pair of hands to pull in his bumper crop this year. He already has all his kids help, so he would go to visit his brother, James the sheep farmer, to borrow a child. Maybe, one time, James is ill, so John can't borrow a child. Instead, he goes and speaks to the priest, and asks if the priest can mention it at the end of the next sermon?

Decades down the line, we now have an inn in the area, and merchants and travellers pass through quite often. Jeremy the turnip farmer asks the priest to write up a notice he can put on the inside of the inn, in case any of the bodyguards travelling with the caravans have a spare few hours ready for some coin.

Over time, it would make sense for the inn to set up a special counter for the work requests. People come in, and either look for work, or put work up be done - maybe the old widow wants some mushrooms gathering, and her joints aren't up to going trekking in the woods; or maybe James' heir has a wolf attacking the herd of sheep, and wants it gone.

The inn, of course, takes a small fee. Nothing major, but if you put up a job then be prepared to pay your reward up front (it saves strangers turning up at your house at midnight), plus a bit extra. And Jesse the huntsman pays a few coins a week to be first to be alerted that someone wants something in the woods killing. And of course, the inn also sends runners out once a week to the next pub down the main road, in case they have anything that their locals can't deal with.

>>46591519
In Spain, they imported everything while their own local economy fell apart because cheap foreign imports got you more for your gold than domestic production.

The manufacturing base hollowed out, and when that plunder dried up, the Spanish Empire went from world power to local joke.

>>46591279
>Italian mercenaries were also notorious for being scheming assholes.

So, you are saying that they were Italian.

Seems rather obvious.

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>>46593221

Yeah but modern mercenaries have always been ex-military - there was a massive surge of the bastards right after ww2 as well, and again after vietnam; the difference between medieval mercenaries was that they were exceptionally able to be professional military men, while national armies were all ragtag militia with a few more formal groups hither and thither.

So the question OP is basically asking is, in a setting where there's not a load of people who've just been demobbed from a westphalian nation's standing armed forces, what conditions enable and allow the formation of mercenary "guilds" whose membership can abide by doing odd murderjobbing?

or do you just go with "The Centralian Empire has just finished a final war and peace has settled uneasily across the land, spreading trained but now otherwise useless ex-military types across the world to make mischief as they see fit"?

>>46591042
Well guilds generally get formed to protect their members from abuse and competition, and to protect consumers from fraud. I'd expect an Adventurers' Guild to form in a world where the need for adventurers is real, but the costs of having roving bands of "powerful freelance mercenaries" give people second thoughts.

Start with your standard fantasy world: magic, agrarian economics, feudal politics, "dungeons" from a prior golden age, monsters running around, legendary heroes are born into every generation, etc.

This leads to predictable problems: local economies crashed by sudden influxes of treasure, nobles deposed by powerful adventurers, peasants conned by "heroes" who don't help them, sealed evils get released, general murder-hoboness, etc.

This leads to a crack down on "Adventurers" by the authorities, but the authorities can't fight the adventurers and the monsters at the same time. Successful and responsible adventurers band together in their common interest. They negotiate for rights with the nobility, and promise to police the adventurer community in exchange. Adventurers tend to stay out of politics thereafter.

A guild bank is established to handle recovered treasure, slowly dispersing it instead of suddenly flooding markets. Guild members get a regular salary plus bonuses based on their contributions to the bank. Retirement plans and healthcare are provided.

The guild establishes a program to track adventuring work, and apportion it based on capacity. Lazy freeloaders are punished and kicked out of the guild, high performers are publicly praised. Frauds who claim to be "heroes" and scam people are tracked down and punished by the guild.

The guild also polices "scabs" who do dungeon runs but aren't registered with the guild, and cheaters who don't share treasure. Dangerous magic items are contained. Dangerous locations are guarded.

Before you know it the guild is basically a multi-national conglomerate/fraternity.

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>>46591042
No, this idea is fucking shit, it has no point and made up by talentless nips, who are incapable of writing a setting that isn't completely retarded. Fuck.

>>46593100
Yeah okay, but that'd last for like 2 minutes before collapsing on itself. You'll never have an anarcho-capitalist experiment because it'll fall apart before you can cut the ribbon

>>46593867
It all got started because Little Burt didn't want to be buried when he died, he'd fought too many skellingtons. He wanted to be cremated, so that no namby-pamby necromancer got their dirty fingers on his body.

We all agreed that was fair enough, and thought we should probably do the same.

Billy, you remember Billy right? That small kid, with the warts? Yeah, that's right, the wizzard! Well he said he wanted to be turned into a book.
Now, we all knew Billy was a bit off, but he waz a wizzard, so we thought it would be some magical jiggery pokery.
This was all back before we did that raid, on the floating castle thing, so we dint have much gold then either, but we got Billy to write it all up, and we crossed it all good and proper, then left it at the Hope and Anchor, bartender there's a good guy. Doesn't kill you if you tumble his daughter, as long as you pay.
But then we sorted that floaty castle, and had a bit more cash. So the bartender, he sez he'll look after the gold, make it grow whilst we're off.
Well, that did sound a bit weird, but he was a dwarf. And you know what they say about dwarves? Not that, don't be daft, about dwarves and gold?
Yeah, they probably do, but we all rekkoned he had a point, it'd be cool if we had MORE gold when we came back.
Well we come back, and Billy's been arsking about the new Hope Inn's popping up, and it turns out that innkeeper just bought more! But we get free beds, and his daughter now runs her own. Says we don't even have to pay for a bed and a roll! Mentions something about some prancy elfs in the forest been fucking sheep, so we go off and bash em.
Guild? Whassat? Nah, we just sleep in the beds.

Justify guilds where the purpose is to guard a specific populace? Nah.

Why not make it a guild of the rich and talented who treat it more like a Big Game Hunter's Club, but with more spelunking?

>>46591770
>(unless there are still a load of Landsknachte and doppelsolders around, standing at the intersections of german highways with signs saying "will pike for food")

Well, some homeless folk will do anything

>>46593986
This. Almost every medieval fantasy setting they make is literally fucking Dragon Quest. The only good anime medieval fantasy settings I can think of are Records of Lodoss War and Berserk.

>>46594211
>>46591770
It's more like mamluks with signs "will behead infidels for food" there.

>>46591731

or Machiavelli.

>>46594102
The financial implications are actually pretty interesting. It's almost inevitable that an Adventurers' Guild would turn into a major banking concern like the Knights Templar did.

Also, most towns would have a "pensioner" or two. Former adventurers who made enough to retire. Probably have some people on disability too.

>You're really going with the old "arrow to the knee" claim?

>>46591042
Probably a setting where powerful evil overlords make the creation of proper police stations impossible. The closest thing the setting would have would probably be monasteries of paladins, which are obviously run by the church.

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>>46591770
He doesn't know.

Simple economics. You see a feudal kingdom doesnt give the lord and his subjects of his region time to handle anything beyond the land he can rule. But a couple of well renowned cartographers, scribes and men who knew how to read and write offers to set up shop and do it for me. I get a sum of money as rent and in turn the guild uses my lands services. So now bandit problems beyond my control are handled by the free men with weapons but barely enough gold to rent a cot for the night, the ancient ruins is investigated and priceless relics are found to the joys of the clergy. Men with notorious bounties can now be hunted.

That is why we have an adventurers guild. Because the lords are too busy watching their own lands

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>>46591279
Thats just in Italy. No point dying or killing for no reason.

In the rest of Europe, they raped face pretty hard. Heavy calvary, heavy infantry, crossbows and cannon... Unless your foe had Italians too.

The two Italian forces would meet on the field, laugh it off, and both retire, effectively neutralizing each other, and technically, earning their pay. And all of this was on the level, clearly written into their contract

Condottieri were a hoot, and this is all something I could see adventurer's Guilds doing.

>Bandits terrorizing a town.
>Town hires adventurers to defeat bandits
>Bandits hire low level adventurers to buff up their forces.
>Adventurers, bound by interguild law, can't fight eachother, and go piss off to have some beer with their pay.

>>46599653
>Bandits
>Having the coin to hire adventurers.

I'd see it more as Nobles hiring adventurer parties against one another.

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>>46599804
>Peasant town
>Having the coin to hire adventurers.

Low level adventurers get low pay gigs until they are experienced enough.

A guild won't send freshcuts into the Tomb of of the god-born Rape-taur for a first assignment, no matter how educational it might be.

>>46593737
>or do you just go with "The Centralian Empire has just finished a final war and peace has settled uneasily across the land, spreading trained but now otherwise useless ex-military types across the world to make mischief as they see fit"?

See, these are the guys you have to hire adventurers - possibly from guilds - to kill. Because these guys are bandits.

>>46599653
>>46599804
>>46599881
How often are the low-level adventurers going to fall for the getting hired by bandits scheme? The villagers may honestly scrape together the coin or other rewards to pay them, but bandits? Bandits are basically monsters wearing human form. They will rape and/or kill a plucky young dungeon delver before they give up a single copper penny. Not out of any sense of frugality, but because they enjoy it. Fuck bandits.

>>46602514
Scheme? Dude, the guild wouldn't send anyone if they didnt have the money up front.

Thats Merc 101.

>They will rape and/or kill a plucky young dungeon delver before they give up a single copper penny.

And now the entire Guild has targeted your petty little bandit company, and is sending the epic level adventurers to make a show of why you don't fuck with the guild.

Ever play Fable? If you got the coin, the guild has got the man, good or evil.

>>46602853
And at best in Fable, the bandits in that one single camp won't bother you after you've murdered their king. Any other time you encounter them on the road they default to murder.

>>46603013
And by then, you can kill them in three hits...

Doomed Slayers gives a pretty good explanation; http://www.drivethrurpg.com/product/103414/Doomed-Slayers?manufacturers_id=7923

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Reading this thread, you could say that war has changed... It's no longer about nations, ideologies, or ethnicity. It's an endless series of proxy battles fought by mercenaries and machines.

>>46591042

Nigga we have NASA and the UN.

>>46593687
My thoughts exactly.

>>46591042
Method of keeping murderhobos from going too far while out murderhobo-ing.

>>46591042
Dark Elf Ponzi scheme

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>>46591042
>Justify a world where adventurer guilds are a thing.
The fey leave doors to the realm of fey around the mortal world. Going through is never exactly the same two trips, but two constants remain: mortal danger with a fey-esque narrative sense of fair play, and magical treasure for those who survive. This is actually a cosmically symbiotic relationship between the real world and fey, because in the human world, stories, narrative, and drama are not a limited resource, but in the fey they are, and vice versa for magic and treasure . Certain municipalities that otherwise lack any major natural resource base their economy off of the dangerous job of "mining" these doors for treasure. Adventurers are basically Bering Sea crab fishermen, risking their lives to exploit a limitless resource and keep the economy of these "door cities" going.

An age of God Wizards comes to an abrupt end when they wind up tearing the bonds of reality by creating to many personal dimensions for their personal abodes.

Now random pocket dimension form and merge and this has the effect of causeing damage to the nearby area or warping life in the area creating a number of dangerous monsters.

People of various nations are forced to live in few areas of stable reality while groups of adventurers are contract to go and close down pocket dimensions or keep the ones that can't be closed stable.

Exploring new ones have the chance to make you rich by the various materials and treasures found in them.

>>46593627
Sounds familiar...

>>46591891
The Original Trollface

>>46591042
There is a race or culture that believes strongly in the freedom and power of the individual, possibly because their birth rates are so low. In addition, they are naturally good-hearted or value their fellows. So, instead of having a standing army or guard force, the race either relies on themselves or on heroic individuals.

An example I can think of is the Norn from Guild Wars even if they got shafted a bit in GW2 as far as writing goes. They don't have an army, but they're a race of hyper-strong giants that are obsessed with heroics and their unbreakable bonds as a race. It makes perfect sense that they have no military, and instead rely on heroes. In fact, my favorite bit of fluff for their story was that one time they were asked to sent an army to help, and they only sent four heroes or something.

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Here's one:
THERE'S A BIG FUCKIN DUNEGON UNDERNEATH XYZ LOCATION AND ITS FILLED WITH FUCKING HORRIFYING MONSTERS.
Instead of paying people to go down there we make adventurers form guilds by law to enter there where it's the guild leader's job to keep his guild equipped, supplied, and still alive by the end of the day otherwise he gets no profits from the discoveries found in the monster lairs.
Essentially dungeoneering prostitution.

I had it where the guilds were a large network built up by a man who wanted power on a scale larger than that of a nation. He took decades laying the groundwork, making contacts, investing years in different countries and working for varied organizations. He decided to take the concept of mercenaries and make it easier for them to operate. Being a central point of communication to ensure the right people get their news where it needs to.

He wanted to have a few amenities to promote loyalty to the guild, and help with sustainability of resources. Once he had the ability to make it happen, he had enough people on his side that were of notable power around the world that not many wanted to turn against them. One King tried to oust his foothold in his land, but a brief war sent the message to all the others that it wasn't worth the hardship to even try.

Couple more decades go by and the popularity of the guild come up, along with membership, and now it's just not able to be fought. It's been quick, but it's so diverse and what you get when joining has ensnared so many people.

It's sort of how Wal-Mart happened, but faster and more violent.

>>46605675
I kind of like this idea. I might steal it for a campaign.

>>46607878
Wouldn't it be safer, more efficient and ultimately faster to conquer the dungeon level by level, making sure each level is secure before moving onto the next one, rather than just sending random guys into the depths and see how far they get, only to have them die behind sixteen levels of fuck you, so that their corpse and anything they found can't even be retrieved?

>>46609132
In the first game the whole point of BBEG was to let adventurers farm the babbylevels, not letting them go down further. Most guilds wiped out themselves at lower levels. Those who survived were personally taken care of.

>>46591042
A guild would establish itself in an area where adventuring is profitable, and the threat of conflict justifies an authority being in place to reign them in.

First and foremost the military situation has to be one of the local guard/army not having the time/resources/willingness to risk themselves against local menaces. To that end, you have to establish an economy of adventuring which involves some band of nasties setting up shop in the local dungeon, and then raiding, pillaging, and banditing their way until some adventurers decide to address the issue, at which point the nasties kill them and take their shit, or get killed and their loot taken.

The adventuring guild acts as an intermediary authority to keep these things organized and stop out of town adventurers from fucking up the locals, as well as providing jobs related to the clearing out of said nasties. One of their critical functions is horde hauling, where in they take carts to haul away the piles of stolen goods from dungeons, distribute the goods to the wronged parties, and provide a reward to the adventurers who secured all that stuff in the first place.

>>46591425
>>46591452

This. My setting uses a variation on that and it works.

>>46593986
did you even read the thread though?

>>46591731
Great book great author

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>>46607878
>Essentially dungeoneering prostitution.

...but you repeat yourself.

whenever you have the time, you should read this: https://www.fictionpress.com/s/3238329/1/A-Hero-s-War

Basically, for fear of repeating a great past war that plunged civilization back to the magical stone ages and left ton of monsters. (and to prevent any noble from thinking the crown would look better on their head)

A size limit has been placed on the armed forces any one person can command. Instead you have certified freelance "Knights" that claim bounties posted by nobles(and often form adventuring parties). And instead of being assigned an army to perform a task, a general is instead assigned a bounty budget to get the job done.

Story's not actually about that, it's just part of the world that's built, check it out though, it starts getting really awesome after the first short arc.
TL;DR
Adventures guild is a government agency, that organizes bounties to make up for having a limit on how big each nobles forces can be.

How are adventurers' guilds any worse than NPCs who exist solely to hand out quests? Muh realism is a terrible argument (as always) since unless you're an actual historian specializing in medieval Europe very little of what you do is going to be 100% historically accurate. I mean, once you have wandering adventurers you've already thrown realism out the window. So the real problem is immersion. How is a character who exists solely to hand out quests any better than an organization that serves the same purpose? Both are utterly transparent, extremely gamy solutions to the fact that seeking out quests is far less fun than actually doing them. It's one thing if both the PCs and the quest giver are part of an organization and the "quests" are really just orders, but otherwise?

>>46610408
...Is she supposed to look like Bailey Jay?

>>46610897

I think you're mistaking eye shadow for penises.

an excerpt for example

>Capture and hold the village of Tamara until a baron can be assigned to the territory. Estimated patrol length, 10 days. Contract period, 15 days. >Payment: 10 Rimes on acceptance, 30 Rimes on completion, the usual penalties apply.

>A commission in the Duport Order of Knights branch


>Open Commission, kill or capture those who have accepted Chancellor Duport's commission to capture villages or towns in the Minmay region. >Bounty: 10 Rimes per head delivered, only with proof of acceptance intact.

>A commission in the Minmay Order of Knights branch

>>46591582
Musa Keita I

>>46591042
It's a way of regulating small time mercenary work and limited vigilantism.

Adventurers looking to work have to abide by the guild rules, which are a code of conduct considered acceptable to the state and pay guild dues, which are taxed by the state or be considered criminals.

>>46610113
come now anon, even if he had, when has anyone ever let a silly thing like facts get in the way of shitposting?

People keep talking about the massive influx of ancient gold adventurers find, so maybe the guild acts as a sort of bank and regulator that puts restrictions on what they can do with the money and how much they get at a time. Sorta like delayed payments.

>>46610897
Adventurers guilds are more than just quest givers. They're infrastructure. The support the curious industry of 'Adventuring'.

>>46591042
They exist for the same reason as job service/ day labor. Kings have enough overhead to manage. Its easier if the merchants handle the small problems. Who said the guild was paying full bounties?

>>46591042

Any place remotely similar to early modern Europe: Landsknechts, Swiss Pikemen, and myriads of other professional explorational and private military groups dominate their area of expertise.

>>46591042

Why is that dude wearing a conspicous nylon coat? Did he find it in a dungeon or something?

>>46615178
the anime the pic is from is a parody on the whole "kid transported to fantasy realm and has a great adventure" trope in anime and he's the MC
pic related is what he initially does while working part-time in construction instead of going on cool adventures

>Roguelike game of micromanaging an Adventuring Guild
>You train up your heroes and send them on quests the guild is assigned
>When they get to the dungeon locations you can let them autopilot if they're overlevelled
>Or you can take control of them and tackle the dungeon yourself
>Dungeons are 2-D platformers with live combat and secrets you can't uncover on auto-pilot
>If your hero dies, their gear gets taken by monsters and used against the next guy
>If your hero is captured, you might be able to rescue them if you rush a quest for them and send someone else

How hard is it to learn how to make a game like this?

>>46591841
What point are you trying to make?

>>46615540
I swear I've heard of that already.

>>46591042
A lot of assumptions there. An AG is more like a militia; mostly just the ragtag rabble. If anyone does really well for themselves, real power vessels start paying attention and consider recruiting.

>>46616083
I posted it in a roguelike thread here on /tg/ a couple days ago.

Original version had a lot of /d/ in it.

>>46591042
>Justify
why?

In my experience players really don't give a fuck about
>muh verisimilitude

I mean players throughout the world have already been accepting the existence of dungeons for years, and the concept of the dungeon full of treasure and monsters is something quite fucking silly if you think about it too hard, so adventurer guilds wouldn't seem out of place.

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>>46591042
So we are going to be playing Ryuutama soon. And my GM decided to make things guild focus. For those who don't know what Ryuutama is, its a table top focused on travelling and exploring the world.

He's put in a lot effort into trying to make the guild system. He made several of these posters and would place them up. We will get rep for helping certain people as well as publicity.

He's justified his setting by saying that the lands are usually peaceful and that the cost of maintaining an army would be too expensive than one off payments. Plus the other reason is that its cultural to go travelling, therefore a mobile workforce meant mobile jobs.

Theres some pretty cool posters he's made i can post a quick description of the posters for one of the town if you guys want.

>>46591042
Depends. Just what exactly do you think is the problem with adventurer guilds?

>>46616249
That seems awfully Westaboo and non-comfy for Ryuutama.

"I say, therefore, that the arms with which a prince defends his state are either his own, or they are mercenaries, auxiliaries, or mixed. Mercenaries and auxiliaries are useless and dangerous; and if one holds his state based on these arms, he will stand neither firm nor safe; for they are disunited, ambitious and without discipline, unfaithful, valiant before friends, cowardly before enemies; they have neither the fear of God nor fidelity to men, and destruction is deferred only so long as the attack is; for in peace one is robbed by them, and in war by the enemy. The fact is, they have no other attraction or reason for keeping the field than a trifle of stipend, which is not sufficient to make them willing to die for you. They are ready enough to be your soldiers whilst you do not make war, but if war comes they take themselves off or run from the foe; which I should have little trouble to prove, for the ruin of Italy has been caused by nothing else than by resting all her hopes for many years on mercenaries, and although they formerly made some display and appeared valiant amongst themselves, yet when the foreigners came they showed what they were. Thus it was that Charles, King of France, was allowed to seize Italy with chalk in hand; 1 and he who told us that our sins were the cause of it told the truth, but they were not the sins he imagined, but those which I have related. And as they were the sins of princes, it is the princes who have also suffered the penalty.

I wish to demonstrate further the infelicity of these arms. The mercenary captains are either capable men or they are not; if they are, you cannot trust them, because they always aspire to their own greatness, either by oppressing you, who are their master, or others contrary to your intentions; but if the captain is not skilful, you are ruined in the usual way."

>>46616271
Tis true. He's tried to make things not too dark but not too bright. Trying to make a nice balance between the two. Since some players refused to play Ryuutama after seeing the art we had to convince them other wise.

>>46616312
Damn straight

>>46591042
Everyone in the world has magic in one form or another; some have it as part of their physiology, making them akin to Hercules or other heroes who fight with strength of arms rather than spells. Others have more standard magical casting abilities, in other words base-line mages. Still others have a mix of the two, like weapon-based spells and such. Others have talent for imbuing magic into items, so forth and so on. This is a sort of superpower-lottery; you may be born with power that will develop into a talent for throwing fireballs, or you may end up with the ability to make unbreakable pottery.

Cities and major civilization centers have dedicated forces that can deal with common criminals by being prepared for most brands of troublemaker and their possible abilities, but the average town and village can't risk confronting the local group of bandits whose leader may or may not be able to make vines grow and strangle his enemies. This has given rise to adventurer guilds, where you essentially can take a job to deal with whoever's causing trouble, with payment only being rendered upon the task's completion. Thus, most adventurers are either thrill-seekers, psychos, or the scum of society who can't find employment anywhere else.
This is accomplished by building enemies with similar stats and abilities to the Player Characters. Enemies are less numerous, but far more dangerous.

A Massive Mega Structure/Dungeon/Massive Environment full of valuable materials that are require you to go through incredibly dangerous environs to get at.

>>46591042
>why not just hire and train a full time military capable of handling that?

One of my games had a nation that did just that. They rapidly became the new antagonists.

Guys.

Guys.

Guys.

RPG Adventurers aren't the same fucking thing as historical mercenaries.

>>46616315
>Since some players refused to play Ryuutama after seeing the art
Are you sure you want to be playing with people like that? That's usually a That Guy red flag.

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Speaking of mercenaries, Here's a little investigative journalism peice on how the guy who used to run Blackwater has been trying to create his own personal PMC airforce:
https://theintercept.com/2016/04/11/blackwater-founder-erik-prince-drive-to-build-private-air-force/

>>46618975
>RPG Adventurers aren't the same fucking thing as historical mercenaries.

... And your point is?

>>46594064
B-but muh invisible hand...

The difference is superpowers.
If we had a small group of people on Earth with superpowers they'd be pestered with cries for help 24/7. Isn't that why the wizarding world is hidden in the Harry Potter universe?

>>46621924
It depends in worlds where adventurer guilds are common the skill set and abilities of an adventurer aren't exactly "super power" tier within the context of the setting.

>>46616249
>first job is to rough up a black guy

Did you join the KKK?

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>>46622212
No. Just Moonman's secretary.

>>46622534
Moon-Man, the most horrid of Zarus' avatars

>>46611035
FINDS

>>46616145
No, I mean I think someone already made one.

>>46616271
Seems fine for a Black Dragon game.

>>46624414
Well then try to remember the name, anon.

The only thing that comes to mind is the world Naked Snake wanted.

But the only thing that comes to mind is a world that is like a constantly changing maze. Adventure parties are dispersed to find ways between civilizations, because the ways shift and change each week/month.

Other possibilities could be a human civilization landing on an alien planets and all are racing to claim lost alien tech to analyze and reconfigure.

A world where Rulers aren't a thing. The cities are run by the adventures guilds, who adventure for the sake of power. They battle other adventure guilds for fame and bounty.

Or a lawless town with or without a lord, and no city guard. Adventure guild is just a makeshift guard.

Adventuring used to be illegal, but people would still do it. It eventually got so bad that one in three people had tried adventuring. Sometimes kids would jump into a hole in the ground and come back out with their brains being eaten or all dressed in bondage gear. After a long and unsuccessful campaign against adventuring called the "war on murderhobos" the government finally decided to legalize, tax, and regulate adventuring to make it safer.

>>46591841
....then hire *hungry* samurai.
Seriously, pleb.

>>46618975
k.
Sooooooooo....how do you make an adventurer's guild that *isn't* like a mercenary company?

>>46625868
Super unorganized. Small groups only. No human targets. Limited support.

>>46591042

My world just experienced a massive growth spurt.

Mages and scholars are trying to figure out why it happened
Guards and militia are trying to protect themselves from the new dangers of these new lands
Land barons and industrialists are trying to land grab as much as they can

An adventurer's guild actually makes sense as it allows disposable guys to go out into these new lands and map them out, see what's out there, and report back all without risking your own ass.

>>46625879
Mainly working on a 'check at the local tavern, bartender there keeps an eye on work' situation?

>>46624414
Darkest Dungeon?

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>>46591042
>Justify a world where adventurer guilds are a thing.
Spoony complains a lot about how fighting giant insects makes him feel like a glorified exterminator, but that's one way to organize adventurer's guilds. The world is dangerous as fuck, the army is too busy doing army stuff to care and freelance adventurers take care of what are affectively gigantic pests. Shit like giant insects and, indeed, giant frogs. And sometimes some other things, because they're a bunch of murder hobos that do everything for cash. The guild exists as a broker between clients (often the state but private entities are possible too) and the murderhobos.

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>>46591891
>>46606323
Machiavelli had the second most punchable face in history.

>>46591042
>major keystone city must maintain powerlevels in said hold to prevent enemy attack
>far off cities of their "kingdom" are constantly under attack
>send out educators to establish a "guild"
>educators are paid well for little work and risk, since they just have to teach the orphans/outcasts/ whatever how to not die

Basicially make guilds headed by a retired general, in charge of keeping the people in the town placated under the name of the kingdom. Townies come to guild with issue, guild trainees are dispatched, collect whatever loot they find in dungeon/any sellable monster bits, then guild head pays them on completion, reports to kingland and gets re-embursed plus some.

Idk theres prolly holes in here somewhere but I'm too tired to care.

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>>46619033
No they've not gonna play anymore. It was quite bad cos one of the those players wanted to burn down forests and just be evil cos he doesn't like Noble/Grim Bright settings. He wanted to turn in grim dark.

>>46624693
Each quest is poster has the dragon symbol on it so we can also identify the plot or not. The way i see it, is if the world is darkish it can still have some beauty to. Kinda like Dark souls or any Miyzaki film set post civ.

>>46591042
Call it an adventurer guild, have it function as a combo of mercenaries with accountability and as monster assassins.

Make it interesting by requiring the adventurers to fill out detailed reports and analyses and research on the things they kill. The guild has the libraries of knowledge strictly controlled, that's why there's tiers of adventurers. The guild is backed by the state because it's the only system that resulted in effective monster killing and not people running off to get themselves killed.

Makes a very uncomfortable military force in the kingdom since the adventurers are all freelance contractors not obligated to risk life and limb to go to war, but will most certainly defend their homes, so war rarely happens; you can only mobilize half your country, and the shitty half at that.

>>46627748
You have a fair amount of control in Darkest Dungeon, you just have to manage your heroes' stress and stuff. Games that come to mind where you just sort of manage heroes like that include Final Fantasy Tactics, where you can just send some of your guys off on missions to find stuff and wait for them to come back, and Metal Gear Solid Peace Walker/Phantom Pain, which also involve that. Majesty has a neat little system where you don't actually control anyone. Your peasants build & repair structures, guards patrol, and tax collectors collect tax, but the heroes do whatever they want. You have to manipulate them through propaganda, issuing bounties on killing monsters & exploration, and casting a few spells you have available.

>>46625868
It's like the jews

>>46605675
Shit, I'm writing a book based on dangerous delving into a fey world with strangely distorted rules for the sake of magical reagents and artifacts. Like a fantasy STALKER. I guess it's a more common concept than I thought.

>>46624414
While Darkest Dungeon, Guild of Dungeneering and other such games certainly exist, the premise posted earlier is a copy-paste from a /tg/ thread on making /tg/: the vidya, sans the rather /d/ end.

Google the Pinkerton National Detective Agency.

>>46591452
Kek'd at shooting

>>46591042
>I mean, what sort of system would let the safety of everyone lie in the hands of powerful freelance mercenaries?
See, here is where you failed your logical conclusion roll.

Adventurers don't provide safety for everyone. Adventurers provide safety for a chosen few (usually themselves or their patrons) at cost and without much in the way of ethical ramifications. That their doings sometimes save countries or even the world is an incidental side effect.

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Sort of unrelated, but check out the Black Crusade RPG, specifically the description of the planet Sacgrave in the Screaming Vortex. Basically, the whole fucking planet is literally one giant "dungeon" made by ancient xenos who were many times larger than humans, so the proportions of the architecture are much larger. Sacgrave is covered in connected fortresses and honey-combed with miles of underground lairs. The planet used to be the base of operations for a Chaos pirate, before an Eldar/Grey Knight task force stomped him. Now, the planet is up for grabs, and lots of different feuding factions are trying to take control of it. Obviously, this creates a demand for mercenaries in the power struggle.

On top of that, the lure of treasure attracts many treasure hunters to the planet. The locals take advantage of this, which has given rise to what can only be described as a "dungeon raid-based economy". The entrances to each "dungeon" area are crammed with shanty towns, all selling supplies, goods, ammo, maps, slaves, guides, etc., to any poor sod who wants to try his hand at being a dungeoneer. Pic related is one such town.