In the classic roleplaying tradition, the PCs are independent heroes, and though they may undertake missions for powerful patrons, their association is usually temporary, with no long-term benef its. In Pathfinder, belonging to Factions is about something different.
The concept of factions is familiar from books and movies: mysterious organizations with hidden agendas, some secretive and others very public with their activities. Their members are contacts, associates, and informants for the heroes of the story, able to provide information, resources, or even backup or rescue in a pinch. The heroes might meet them by chance, seek them out for help, or be sought by them as their own reputations increase.
This section is a guide to how you can create characters that are integrated with the Andoran Eagle Knights. This entry talks about the mission and outlook of the group, why your character might want to be a part of it, and what the advantages are (both social and mechanical) of membership in a group.
Using Factions promotes a style of play that presumes characters are actively plugged in to the power brokers and organizations in the world of Golarion. Moreover, their connections with these organizations are rich and deep, affording characters both benefits of membership as well as the opportunity to advance.
Faction Basics
PCs improve their standing within their faction by succeeding in missions relating to or coming from a faction. In a given adventure, or even in between adventures, you should think about the faction your character has chosen to represent. Their factions might ask them to assassinate a crime lord, protect an innocent merchant caught in a crossfire, save a kidnapped child, hand off an important letter, foil an assassination, recover a specific stolen relic, or locate a letter of marque. Whatever the mission, a positive outcome earns the character a Prestige Award (PA).
As a character’s prestige increases, her faction rewards her excellent service with ever-increasing boons. In this section, you’ll find an expanded system of rules that describes the kinds of rewards and privileges a character can access as her Total Prestige Award (TPA) increases and how she can use her Prestige Award for a variety of benefits that reflect her faction’s willingness to assist her in times of need.
Faction Secrecy
Governments and religious, political, mercantile, or cultural organizations may vary a great deal when it comes to dealing with factions and their activities. Some factions, like the Mendev Crusaders and the Hellknights of Cheliax, are blatantly public in their actions and their efforts to recruit others to their cause. Others are subtler in their plots and operate in the shadows; even where their presence is known, local leaders often turn a blind eye to their existence and activities as long as they don’t make trouble. The more secretive factions often look down on those who act openly, but every faction must weigh the value of a public presence and reputation versus the ability to operate without interference. Factions have alliances and rivalries to be sure, but they usually avoid open conflict with their rivals in the interest of keeping the favor of local governments that allow them to operate freely in their territory.
Choosing the Faction of the Andoran Eagle Knights
Every faction has a unique history, culture, style, and specialty. Each has its own modus operandi in the ongoing struggle for power and influence on Golarion, and each offers its members different boons. Bear in mind that a PC need not be from a particular country to become a member of a faction, even if that faction itself is closely associated with that country. Likewise, characters of any class can join a faction. Thus, even a wizard born in the Mwangi Expanse can become an Eagle Knight of Andoran.
Lastly, characters should not be required to join a faction. Those uninterested in the idea can ignore it, but those who find it appealing have an additional option for customizing their characters and how they fit into the world.
Character Class versus Faction
Following a brief overview of the faction, the Eagle Knights entry explains the goals and the general alignment of the group; PCs who are part of the faction need not match this alignment precisely, but it serves as a guide to the faction’s general attitudes and values. Each description also includes the headquarters of the faction and one of its primary leaders. To help guide players, there is a list of character classes that are best and least suited to membership and advancement in the Andoran Eagle Knights.
These are by no means hard rules—if an assassin wants to join the Eagle Knights, it can be done, but she is going to have a harder time achieving the faction’s goals than a paladin would. The following entry provides a description of special resources available within the faction—not only material goods and services, but also unique feats, spells, equipment, and magical items only available to faction members, as well as titles, honors, privileges, and opportunities that can be accessed by gaining prestige in the faction.
Prestige Award
A character’s Prestige Award (PA) is an abstract way to track his growing renown and reputation within a faction.
Total and Current Prestige Award
Just as a character has a maximum hit point value when fully healed and a current hit point value when injured, that character has a Total Prestige Award (TPA) and a Current Prestige Award (CPA). TPA represents the character’s overall reputation within a faction. CPA represents how much influence the character currently has within that faction in terms of favors owed to him and his ability to influence others and make use of the faction’s resources.
Characters may spend CPA to acquire goods or services (see Spending Prestige Award), which means that a character’s CPA is usually less than his TPA, just as an adventuring character’s current hit points are usually less than his total hit points. CPA can never be higher than TPA.
Earning Prestige
Characters earn prestige for performing missions for a faction or otherwise advancing the faction’s goals. For example, a character allied with the Eagle Knights gains prestige with that faction for breaking up a slaving ring. At your discretion, a character may earn prestige for an adventure even if it’s not part of an “official” mission for a faction—a 7th-level paladin who’s freed many slaves probably has earned prestige with the Eagle Knights even if she’s never taken orders from a member of that faction.
When a character’s Prestige Award increases, her TPA and CPA increase by the same value. For example, Jothalia has 5 TPA and 2 CPA with the Eagle Knight faction; if she completes a mission for them and her PA increases by 2, she now has 7 TPA and 4 CPA.
Not every adventure or encounter needs to relate to an Eagle Knight mission, nor do the Eagle Knights have an interest in every possible adventure. If you cannot find a place within a given adventure for the interests of the Eagle Knights, make a point later on to achieve some faction goals.
The ability to earn prestige should be routine, but it is not be automatic. If a PC fails at her appointed tasks or passes up opportunities to further the Eagle Knight's goals, she does not earn prestige simply because her player showed up to play. By choosing to play using a faction, a player is agreeing to “play along” with faction goals in order to obtain faction rewards. If the PC does not fulfill her obligations as a member of the faction, she should not expect to rise in the faction’s esteem.
The rate at which characters’ prestige increases varies, but on average, characters should be able to increase their PA by 3 to 5 points per experience level, whether acquired by completing several small missions or tasks or one more difficult or significant task. Over the course of a long campaign like a Pathfinder Adventure Path, characters might expect to increase their PA by 40 or more points, especially if the campaign is tightly linked to the factions players choose.
( This campaign will use the characters’ PA to replace or supplement standard treasure awards. In a situation where looting the dead or robbing tombs is frowned upon, I will use PA to help fill the gap in character resources that would normally be satisfied by pillage and plunder. ~ Eric )
Losing Prestige
Prestige should be seen as an enticement rather than an instrument to punish PCs, but a character can lose prestige for betraying faction secrets to outsiders, causing the death of a faction member, stealing from or lying to their faction brethren, befriending or allying with members of opposed factions, and so on. A typical penalty would be the loss of 1–3 CPA. In extreme situations, however, a character might incur such a negative reputation within his faction that his CPA and TPA decrease by 5 or even 10 points for a major transgression, possibly resulting in loss of rank and privileges within the faction. This does not force characters to forfeit boons already acquired, but it may prevent them from obtaining any new boons or benefits for which they no longer qualify at their lowered TPA, and they must work to get back in the good graces of their peers.
Benefits of Prestige
A character’s Total Prestige Award represents her trustworthiness and status within their faction. The simplest representation of this prestige is that for every 10 points of her Total Prestige Award, she gains a +1 bonus on Diplomacy checks with members of that faction. In addition, she may learn certain feats or spells or be able to purchase unique magical items or other goods that are restricted to those whose TPA reaches a certain benchmark. Her faction contacts can allow her to buy or sell goods whose value exceeds the normal gp limit of the local area or that might be of questionable legality. Finally, depending on the organization, a character’s TPA might afford her certain titles and incidental privileges.
Dealing with Allied Factions
Many factions have close associations and alliances with other groups, and earning prestige in her faction can allow a character to enjoy some of the benefits of membership and prestige within allied factions as well. Each faction entry describes whether that faction is allied with any others. When dealing with members of an allied faction, a character may treat her TPA as if it were half its actual amount, including the related bonus on Diplomacy checks with, and buying and selling goods through, the allied faction; she can also spend CPA to obtain boons from an allied faction, though the costs are increased by 1.
Dealing with Opposed Factions
Just as factions have allies, so too do they have enemies. The very same prestige that can make a PC famous within her faction and among allies can make her infamous in the eyes of opposing factions, and avoiding attracting unwanted attention from her faction’s enemies or those friendly to them is one reason that some characters keep their faction allegiances secret. If a character’s faction allegiance is known, the initial attitude of an NPC of the opposing faction is treated as one step worse than normal (for example, Indifferent becomes Unfriendly, Unfriendly becomes Hostile), and for every 10 points of the character’s TPA, she takes a –1 penalty on Diplomacy checks to inf luence that NPC. If the NPC’s faction opposes more than one of the PC’s factions, only the faction with which the PC has the highest TPA counts.
Spending Prestige
A character’s CPA total ref lects the goodwill, political capital, and personal favors she has built up through service to the organization. While a character’s TPA can provide certain titles and privileges, most tangible benefits of faction membership are acquired when a character spends his CPA on temporary boons, favors, aid, spellcasting, or other services (see the Appendix). Regardless of whatever honorific titles a character has earned through his Total Prestige Award, the cost for obtaining boons remains the same—an exalted Vision of the Fifteenth Step of the Church of Razmir must spend 1 CPA to have a remove curse or dispel magic spell cast on his behalf, just like a new initiate.
Once a character’s CPA is spent, it is spent permanently; it is not recovered automatically like lost hit points or ability score damage. The character can, of course, earn more PA, which adds to both her TPA and her CPA, but spent points are gone.
Characters may not spend CPA during combat, and for the sake of simplicity you may limit characters to spending CPA once per gaming session (this keeps players from saving up their PA in large amounts and spending it all at once, making an adventure too easy). It is possible for a player to spend his character’s PA even if the PC is dead; in essence, this represents the PC having made prior arrangements with his faction to perform certain actions on his behalf, such as recovering his dead body and returning it to a specific location or having it raised.
You can add to the services presented in this book or create your own factions. The monetary equivalent of 1 point of PA is approximately 375 gp, though characters should normally only be able to spend PA on services, not physical goods.
PCs may not pool their earned prestige to obtain items or services, or for any other purpose, even if they are members of the same faction. As a general rule, PA is designed to be spent by characters on themselves; PA costs increase by 1 when the benefit is to other characters instead of to the member of the faction. However, PCs in a home game are ultimately free to spend their PA as they see fit.
A character’s ability to spend PA is dependent on his being in contact with other members of his faction, and unless noted otherwise, most factions tend to have agents, contacts, or headquarters in settlements that are at least the size of a large city. To reflect the difficulty of contacting a faction agent in a smaller settlement, PA costs increase by 5 in communities smaller than 5,000 people. This change, of course, can vary by organization.