Improving the Bastion / Stronghold System in D&D 5e

The most recent Unearthed Arcana about Bastions is very intriguing. Imperfect, but very inspiring and full of potential. Since my fellow players and I have been enjoying our own keep in our DM Quest campaign for the past couple of years, I definitely think that D&D 5e could use a more robust stronghold system than it currently does. Having a place for the adventurers to call home, gain benefits from over time, and most importantly, invest gold in, is a great way to make players feel more bonded and invested in the world and campaign as a whole.

Bastions in Other Games

Having a home base is a big part of other role-playing games. Managing the construction of a town while heroes are adventuring and gaining levels helps give a bigger picture of the world and the conflicts surrounding the characters. It creates a familiar, persistent environment for heroes to return to and spend downtime at between adventures, and each new addition or upgrade to the base adds a sense of ownership and provides benefits during adventures that call back to it. It provides a home for allied NPCs, a source of quest hooks, and an incentive to gain more treasure to upgrade it and to keep it well defended.

Towns are an essential part of Heroes of Might and Magic III, and deciding what buildings to build in them determines everything from what creatures you can recruit and what spells you have access to, to how motivated your troops are in battle and what resources you gain over time.

In King Arthur: Knight's Tale, Camelot acts as the sanctuary for your heroes, where they can recover from grievous wounds, train, and sell and purchase items. It also offers a court where you can pass permanent Laws and temporary Decrees that make subsequent missions more manageable. Several choices you can make when building Camelot even depend on your alignment, which is unique.

Adventuring in Darkest Dungeon is so stressful for heroes that often they spend several adventures simply sitting in town at the Hamlet and coping with it. It also offers buildings that upgrade equipment and skills, treat maladies, and compile knowledge found during adventures. 

The underrated game Overlord has a dark tower where your villainous character can live, train, keep track of his minions, and sacrifice his minions as fuel to upgrade his gear. The tower begins in ruins and can be fixed up and upgraded over time.

Things I Don't Like in Unearthed Arcana's Version

Before we get down to mechanics discussion, let's get out of the way all the stuff I don't like about the Unearthed Arcana version of the Bastion system:

• GP Expenditure. The PDF says "we want the gold [players] spend to make them happy (as opposed to feeling like mortgage payments)," but I disagree with the level that they give things out for free. D&D 5e already has few enough ways to spend gold coins as it is. What better way to give players an incentive to supplement their expensive magic items with an expensive living space than to make it actually cost a lot? As long as the gold expenditure is worth it, I don't think players will mind. And even if it doesn't feel worth it, charging players gold will take away their supply and motivate them to go out adventuring and look for more. 
• Bastion Turns. I don't like how often Bastion Turns occur. In my opinion, players (and DMs) should only have to worry about their Bastion whenever they take downtime and actually spend time at it. Resolving things like events and maintenance while the players are away takes away the focus on the current adventure. If there's anything that needs to be done to a Bastion while the players are away, I guarantee any DM who has approved the use of a Bastion in their campaign would not mind taking that responsibility upon themself. 
• Bastion Points. This resource is far too abstract, both in acquisition and in use, and it literally only has three purposes: acquiring magic items, spreading word of heroic deeds, and resurrection. Bastions don't need "points" when players already have thousands of gold pieces burning a hole in their pocket, and I hate how simply using your Bastion inexplicably supplies it with more free points.
• Bastion Defenders. I like the idea of defenders in general, but in this version, they don't have stat blocks, and they are only used in the event of an "Attack" Bastion Event, in which they automatically succeed in thwarting the attack but have to roll to see how many of them die. I think attacks on a Bastion and similar events should be significant developments that are tied directly to the story and campaign as a whole, not just something that happens randomly and periodically with trivial repercussions. Hence, I think the idea of Bastion Defenders in general doesn't need as tight of an inherent mechanic tied to it.
• Bastion Orders. Bastion Orders, or the act of using facilities in your Bastion, are of course essential. What I do not like are some of the specific orders given as examples. I don't see a point in confining them into categories ("Recruit," "Empower," "Harvest," etc.); I dislike the lack of game mechanics of some of the orders, such as crafting mundane items you could easily buy; and I dislike how few of the orders actually cost anything at all. The "Maintain" order is especially boring, and it seems to be the one that you would utilize most in the current ruleset.
• Bastion Events. As I mentioned earlier, I think events should be noteworthy and significant to the campaign as a whole. Every time you use the "Maintain" order, you have a chance of triggering an event, which might unceremoniously kill some of your defenders in an attack, forbid you from using one of your facilities for a Bastion Turn, or just straight up give you free gold or favors. Fun in games comes from dealing with challenges and making meaningful decisions, not from getting handouts.

My Bastion System

Now, let's see if we can smooth out the mechanics that do work and come up with a system that focuses on all the fun that can come with owning your own Bastion. Here are the main points that I think will help us accomplish this:

1. Acquiring a Bastion
2. Utilizing Downtime
3. Making Every Facility Count
4. Offering Meaningful Challenges
5. Focusing on the Characters' Stories

Acquiring a Bastion

I think acquiring a Bastion is straightforward: It should be a quest reward. For something as important as a home base that the players will be spending time and money on for the rest of the campaign, simply choosing a Bastion's size and putting a price on it like the current DMG does is bland. The most memorable magic items are those with a great story about how the player character acquired it, so emphasis should be put on this when finding a Bastion. It could be a haunted house no one wants and is sold to the players for cheap so they can go clear all the ghosts out of it. It could be a keep awarded to the players after special services to the crown. It could even be a ship the players seize after defeating its previous owners. This is a fun part of the Bastion creation process and should feel like an awesome reward that belongs to the players. Then they can make it all their own with how they choose to deck it out.

In terms of pricing when adding facilities to a Bastion, I think the prices for different sizes of facilities on the PDF are a good place to start. However, they obviously might vary by the campaign or need some playtesting first. In any case, I think it's better to have each facility cost 500–3,000 gp based on how good it is rather than on size (although larger sizes can take longer to build), and you should not get any free facilities like the PDF offers! Things you earn rather than are given are much more valuable and have a lot more longevity.

Utilizing Downtime

Some of my most memorable playing moments are those in "downtime" sessions between adventures where my character has fallen in love, met interesting shopkeepers, or discovered interesting information that helps out on a future adventure. I think that downtime and Bastions should be intertwined as much as possible, with expansions to the Bastion improving access to downtime activities or enhancing their existing options.

I even realized that I often forget to charge my players living expenses, so why not use those amounts as a baseline for how much utilizing Bastion facilities and downtime activities cost? Since downtime is generally for a week or more, here, I'll do some calculations for a quick reference:

Lifestyle	Per day	Per week	Per tenday	Per month
Modest	1 gp	7 gp	10 gp	30 gp
Comfortable	2 gp	14 gp	20 gp	60 gp
Wealthy	4 gp	28 gp	40 gp	120 gp
Aristocratic	10 gp	70 gp	100 gp	300 gp

I imagine that anyone poorer than a "Modest" lifestyle is not living in a Bastion.

Making Every Facility Count

This is possibly the most important aspect of a Bastion: Making owning one desirable and worthwhile. Sure, some players might be content with making their imaginary money disappear for their player character to own an orphanage or a tavern purely for roleplaying purposes, but if we want to motivate all players, we have to focus on mechanical benefits. Since RPers will find enjoyment out of anything anyway, making sure that each Bastion Facility offers a mechanical benefit means a win for everybody.

The current Bastion system sent out by Wizards fails in this regard. Some of their facilities offer benefits that fall flat, such as:

• Crafting a blank book for 10 gp, which you can sell for 25 gp
• Spending 100 gp per Bastion Defender to make each one 33% less likely to die in their next battle.
• Winning 3–600 gp gambling
• Assigning guild members to create a work of art that has no monetary value until after your death
• Crafting a metal piece of adventuring gear (like a shovel, chain, or four horseshoes) for half its regular cost
• Buying a mount  or selling one you own for a 20% profit

Keep in mind that each of these benefits costs a so-called "Bastion Turn," which is a period of 7 days! Can you imagine a player ever responding to a DM's request to take their Bastion Turn with "Yeah, I'm gonna have my smithy craft a shovel. That's 2 gp reduced to 1 gp, right?" You can just buy a shovel at any town for 2 gp. Or heck, if I was DM, I'd allow them to just have a shovel for free that their smithy happened to have lying around.

Each facility should have a clear mechanical benefit that should be attractive and worth the money players put into it, and in my opinion, each benefit should be temporary, consumable, or incremental. In other words, you should go to your Bastion to help you out on future adventures, but you shouldn't be able to get permanent effects that render that facility redundant after one use. You should value each of your Bastion's facilities and utilize them as resources for different needs at different times throughout the campaign. Here are a few benefits that fall under these categories, both examples of good ones from the Bastions PDF and some of my own:

• Fortifying a suit of armor or a shield so that it can turn critical hits into normal hits a certain number of times (temporary)
• Training so that you have proficiency in a new skill or saving throw for the next 7 days (temporary)
• Crafting a spell scroll or a potion (consumable)
• Gaining a certain number of charges of a free spell or Battle Master maneuver (consumable)
• Researching a topic and having new information about it for future adventures (incremental)
• Gaining piety or renown (incremental)
• Putting in progress crafting a permanent magic item (incremental)
• Strengthening your mount with extra speed and temporary hit points for the next 7 days (temporary)
• Admiring your past works so that you have the ability to hold 2 charges of Inspiration at a time for the next adventure. (temporary)

I could go on, and I will in a future article where I list specific facilities that I would offer in a Bastion system for my own players, but hopefully you get the idea. Each of these benefits has a clear use. The fleeting benefits give players a bonus to the early parts of their next adventure, which fade and give a sense of the adventurers getting tired and longing for the safety and comfort of the Bastion again. The incremental benefits promote a longer narrative in a campaign, giving players something to look forward to and to save up for.

Offering Meaningful Challenges

This is something that I feel like Wizards is straying from more and more: Making the game too easy. This is why higher-level campaigns often flop: The players stop being challenged. A perilous journey can just be teleported past. The encroaching madness of a warped dimension can be avoided by sleeping in Mordenkainen's magnificent mansion every night. You forcecage the end boss and take pot shots at it until it dies.

With something as valuable as a Bastion, making it too easy to upgrade and utilize will make it less appealing as a source of investment, and it will increase the power creep of the players even more without any downsides. Facilities should not be given out for free when you reach certain levels, every facility order should have some kind of cost or risk to using it, and events should come with bad news at least as often or more than good news. 

A good example of this is the Gambling Hall facility example given. You simply use the "Trade" order, roll a d100, and you get a chance of getting anywhere from 3d6 to 10d6 x 10 gp from the house's winnings at the end of the week. BORING! Gambling is about risk! There should be a chance to lose money as well as a chance to gain. Choosing to use that order on your gambling hall should not be a choice made automatically because you get free gold every time, but made based on factors like how badly you need to make money, how much you can stand to lose, and how lucky you feel.

Even facilities that always give a temporary benefit when used could benefit from utilizing the player characters' skills. For example, a Sanctuary that grants you temporary proficiency in a saving throw could require a Wisdom check as you meditate. If you fail, you could roll randomly for what type of saving throw you gain proficiency in, and if you succeed, you get to choose. A Training Ground could require a Strength (Athletics) check, awarding one additional charge of a fighting maneuver if you succeed. This rewards characters based on the choice they made to construct that particular Bastion facility, the gold they chose to spend on running it this particular time, and the choices they made to enhance their character in a certain way.

Events should come with a similarly wide range of both good and bad, to give the characters new choices to make and to give them a reason to fight for their Bastion. Out of the 9 events that Wizards gives as samples, only 3 of them are purely bad, and the worst thing that can happen is that you lose the use of one of your facilities for one Bastion Turn. All of the events have some roleplaying potential, but mechanically, they just give you random amounts of gold for housing visitors or refugees, or an honored guest comes to give you a free favor or money or additional free Bastion Defenders, or your hirelings create an Uncommon magic item of your choice. Even in the bad events when hirelings are lost, they are replaced at no cost to you the next turn.

Truly compelling stories come with conflict, and that's why I think events should include truly troubling events, like one of your facilities getting lost in a fire and needing to be repaired at cost, one of your hirelings turning out to be a traitor and running away to join the campaign's current villain, or the local village believing a rumor about you and vandalizing your Bastion until you make an effort to dispel the rumors. There should be good ones, too, but they would be made more interesting with choices. For example, perhaps someone in the village offers you some money to use one of your facilities, but you can't use the facility for a certain amount of time while they make use of it. Or in the case of refugees fleeing to your Bastion for aid, you might be able to utilize them as hirelings and gain more uses of your facilities, but they cost more because you have to feed more mouths.

Focusing on the Characters' Stories

As I said in a previous post, "Ultimately, a [Bastion] should feel like it belongs to the players, that it depends on them, and that they can get more the more they put into it. They should feel excited and satisfied to drop 25,000 gp on a new expansion for the stronghold that will make their adventuring easier afterward, after having scrimped and saved to earn that amount. It will make them more motivated to seek out treasure and lucrative quests, and more invested in the stronghold should enemies threaten it, or should they find out that a hidden traitor lives among its staff."

A Bastion should not be the focus of a campaign, but it can be a great center of the stories that the adventurers create together. Characters can bring trophies from their adventures and put them up for display, or store their treasure there. NPCs can visit them at the Bastion and give them new quests. They can return from adventures to find mail there, leading them to their next adventure. They can bring a pet they found to the Bastion and raise it there to wait for them every time they come back.

How can the Bastion, its facilities, and the downtime activities available in it tie into a character's background features? What would a character do if a hireling they were particularly fond of was captured or had a personal favor to ask? What guardians can the characters hire? What spells of concealment and defense can they cast to keep it safe while they're gone?

Keeping the Bastion in mind as a recurring aspect of downtime between adventures can keep the focus on the storyline and give it lots of ways to meaningfully progress.

Conclusion

Honestly, the reason I don't like this rough system is that most aspects of a Bastion are self-explanatory, and some of the rules they create for it make running a Bastion overly complicated. Gold costs for construction and maintenance of a Bastion could require playtesting, but I don't think a DM needs a table for Bastion Events or a system for determining how many Bastion Defenders die. Those events don't need to be randomized and played out off-screen; they can be played out as memorable encounters for the players in the game itself. The only things that really need ironed out are the mechanical benefits of the facilities, and I'll be making a post on my ideas for as many of those as I can think of soon.

Player characters' interaction with the Bastion and any NPCs in it are easy for any D&D group to play through and have fun with on their own. Even at higher levels when the players become close to demigods in power, it's easy to make the Bastion transcend its mundane status along with them, transforming into a mobile stronghold, merging into a demiplane accessible by Mordenkainen's magnificent mansion or mighty fortress, or residing on a different plane entirely. A Bastion that becomes a beloved character all its own becomes as memorable in the minds of the players as their own characters as they make it their own.