With the 2024 version of (aka 6e, aka 5.5e, aka anything but "the 2024 version of") the Player's Handbook coming out later this year comes a new "Bastion" mechanic for letting the players manage their own keep and gain benefits from it. I've already expressed my thoughts on the Unearthed Arcana version of Bastions, as well as offered some improvements to the facility boons in other posts, but today I thought it might be fun to try and tap into that feeling of leveling up a character and see if we can apply it to Bastions as well. This might be a bad time to be coming up with these mechanics, but if the new PHB has changes I haven't taken into account, I can always update this later.
Bastion Level Costs
Leveling up in D&D is not satisfying unless it's earned. You have to spend at least two or three sessions feeling like it's time to level up and not leveling up, craving another Hit Die of hit point maximum and that next upgrade to your character's abilities, for the time it actually comes to feel so good. So upgrading a Bastion to its next level should have a similar level of challenge to it. However, since a Bastion is built and reinforced with materials rather than with heroic deeds, I think Bastions should level up solely with money, not experience points.
I think we can put a level minimum on this, of course. The first tier of play (levels 1–5) is like the first season of a long TV show—it should be exploratory and focused on getting used to playing a character. There's no need for the extra bells and whistles that a Bastion would offer at such low levels, especially if you're not even sure what your character needs most or would benefit from. So, just like with the new Bastion system coming out, the first level of a Bastion should be purchaseable at 5th level. Other than the minimum level, I see no reason for there to be any other level limitations on tiers of the Bastion—only paywalls. That way, if they manage to rake in lots of money before 20th level, they can gain some really powerful abilities that help them reach that level easier.
Now to determine the cost of each level. A good place to start would be the Treasure Hoard tables in the DMG. The explanation right before the tables states: "Over the course of a typical campaign, a party finds treasure hoards amounting to seven rolls on the Challenge 0–4 table, eighteen rolls on the Challenge 5–10 table, twelve rolls on the Challenge 11–16 table, and eight rolls on the Challenge 17+ table." The tables tell us the average amount of treasure you get from a 0–4 hoard is about 155 gp in coins and around 200 gp in gems or art objects, so 355 times 7 is about 2,500 gp. Parties in this tier of play are also expected (according to Xanathar's Guide) to find magic items with an approximate total value of 1,500 gp by 5th level, but I don't want to force players to sell their magic items just to get a baseline level of a Bastion.
I think the baseline Bastion should cost, per player, 500 gp. This is around the value of a Rare magic item, which also becomes available around 5th level, and for reasons you'll soon see, I want the upgrades of a Bastion to based around individual player wealth, not party wealth. So dividing 2,500 by four players is reasonably close to 500 gp.
If we do the same calculations to determine the estimated wealth of a 20th-level character to determine the final cost of the highest level of the Bastion, it turns out to be... Oh. Oh wow. 2,676,000 gp. Eight rolls on the Challenge 17+ table? That's around 700,000 gp kicking around at that level. What would you even spend that on? If the DM was liberal with letting you buy magic items, that'd be enough to buy like 10 Legendary ones! Okay then, that convinces me even more the value of a Bastion as a gold sink. We'll mark the final upgrade to a Bastion, available after 17th level, as 500,000 gp. That actually checks out with how much a real castle would cost in real life, assuming a gold piece is worth around $50 by our monetary standards.
Okay, so we know the range of cost, but since the benefits of a Bastion will be added onto the existing ones and upgrades are cumulative, we need to make sure not to go too high with each additional upgrade's cost. In other words, we need to keep the Bastion's overall cost, i.e., everything the player has invested in it, in mind, so that it has the feeling of upgrading a magic item instead of just replacing one with a rarer one. The final upgrade will add up to 500,000 gp in total cost that the player spent over their entire adventuring career, but the actual step up to that value will be much lower.
Okay, so here's a distribution based on the level progression from 5th–20th level. I'll give its milestone tiers names just to keep the level requirements straight:
Keep in mind that few players ever reach 20th level anyway, and no player is obligated to upgrade their Bastion if they don't want to (good luck finding something else to spend all that gold on, though), so I think this looks very reasonable. Now the only challenge is making each level worth that amount of gold.
Leveling Up and Using a Bastion
When I use the word "Bastion," I'm picturing a keep or an estate or a floating castle or even a sailing ship; this basic framework of a place the players can call their own as stewards could probably be given as a quest reward at 5th level for free; however, mechanically, each player character will be funding their own "Bastion" which indicates components and facilities that can be part of a larger one that the party owns. In other words, Fighter Laios can own a 3rd-level Bastion that he sunk 7,500 gp into and enjoy the effects of his smithy, armory, and training grounds; but if the rest of his party doesn't invest in any of their own facilities, they can still live in the keep and enjoy it as a base of operations without gaining benefits from facilities. I would leave the keep and its layout, staff, and defense up to the DM and players to just roleplay, honestly. This post is all about the mechanical benefits of a Bastion that would have an effect on the players' gameplay.
Bastions, by their very nature, need to be managed between adventures. The focus of a campaign should be on the adventures themselves, and sitting around at your stronghold would not be fun for more than one session. Hence, leveling them up and using them should only be done during player downtime. On the one hand, it doesn't make much sense to be able to build a huge expansion to a keep in the time it takes to find another quest to go on; but on the other hand, character progression is the same way. Realistically, with the gauge of power increase (both magically and martially), player characters should have to spend around a year to progress from one level to the next. I as a DM like to let months pass in between adventures so that NPCs can age and wars and politics can progress, and so a 1st-level party of upstarts doesn't turn into demigods in the process of a few months; however, that's usually not the norm, and personally I don't think in-game time should be a resource that needs to be met to upgrade a Bastion either. It's just up the DM ultimately, and all that matters is gold. Heck, magic exists. Maybe part of the gold cost includes having a constructomancer expedite the building process or something.
The whole purpose of a Bastion's mechanics, in my opinion, is to (1) be used between adventures during downtime, and (2) make the subsequent adventures after being used easier for the players in mechanical ways. I've mentioned this in my other posts, but it's very important for these mechanics to be temporary, consumable (i.e., provisional), and/or incremental. A Bastion's effects should last for part of the adventure, but they should be resources that fade over time and not be regained until the adventure is over. Characters who use their Bastions' facilities will have the feeling of being fresh and invigorated at the start of an adventure, and weakened by the end of it, ready to return to the Bastion for relaxation—think of it as the feeling of using resources throughout a day looking forward to a long rest, but over the course of an entire adventure. And I'm totally fine measuring by adventures, too. No need to say "for the next 7 days" or whatever. Just say that you get these effects until you complete downtime again.
Bastion Mechanics and Effects
And now for the fun part: The actual mechanics! As I mentioned before, I came up with a list of basic boons for Bastion facilities in an earlier post, but those didn't really scale well, and some of the mechanics, especially the crafting ones, just don't feel provisional enough. I want to focus fully on the effects, both passive and active, that a player can get for upgrading and using their Bastion. I also like the idea of making the individual bastion types based on background, since it really defines the core of a character's personality, values, and origins. And the more variety of backgrounds in a party, the more facilities and services a party can benefit from as they create a collective Bastion together.
Below is an index of the Bastions I've done so far, using the backgrounds from the new PHB:
- Acolyte - Church
- Artisan - Guild
- Charlatan - ???
- Criminal - Thieves' Guild
- Entertainer - Fairgrounds
- Folk Hero - Farm
- Hermit - Sanctuary
- Merchant - Market
- Noble - Mansion
- Outlander - Grove
- Sage - Mage Tower
- Sailor - Port
- Soldier - Barracks
- Urchin - ???
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