The Citadel

Hey guys, just saying, Iove the mod, and as you may not have already guessed, I am a huge fan of the Ironborn and their home.

I noticed the "Drowned" trait and thought to myself that the Iron Isles could do with some more flavour, traits and ambitions. The few ideas I have all seem to focus on approval and acceptance. Look at Theon Greyjoy for example, minor spoilers for Clash of Kings ahead here folks.

Despite being a proven warrior, and trusted by a great noble house he was brought up with, he betrayed them to win the love of his hard, cold family. The Ironborn do not like weakness. They appreciate strength above all else, and family loyalty seems to come way down the list. Looking at the dynamics between Balon and his brothers, Victarion was more than willing to kill Euron in revenge for his adultery despite the associated stigma of kinslaying. Damphair was equally happy to try and bring an uprising against Euron for percieved weakness in his faith. A brother, willing to kill his sibling, over a lack of faith in a god that drowns his subjects. This is the stuff the Ironborn are made of. Cruelty, toughness, and strength. And Iron. Possibly some sea water in there too.

So I'm asking the forums, what events and traits would you give the Iron Islanders? I have a few ideas:

1) A "Proving your worth" system.
A set of traits, that change depending on the age and status of a character. So a young lord wouldn't command the absolute faith of his Ironborn, he needs to show he can Reave and make the soft greenlanders pay the Iron price first. So perhaps when the first real combat occurs for the young lord or lady, this trait goes away and provides a few options including a chance to get "Craven" and "Unproven" (which decreases troop morale and martial, vassal opinion etc) or "Brave" and things like "Proven Commander", "Ruthless Reaver" or a rare but awesome trait along the lines of "True Ironborn" which increases martial, opinion, piety, strength, attractiveness, so on. Basically, a system which allows your character to win the approval of his subjects.

2) What is dead may never die.
The option to drown your prisoners as gifts to the drowned god for piety, but also the chance to gain the cruelty trait. Drowning yourself at 14 or older for the "Drowned" trait at the risk of death (I haven't noticed a way to attain it yet, I might be going mad). A moot for the election of the Damphair? Replacement of maesters with priests of the drowned god, we know for a fact that the Ironborn HATE maesters. Look at what happened to Urrigon Greyjoy (Google it).

3) Reaving
The option as King of the Iron Isles to begin reaving in secret. You gain money and slaves for court, depending on where you reave. You can order vassals to reave as well, which gains you money. Events emerge where there is a chance of discovery, where you will have to pay damages and send hostages, or you can declare your independance. This could lead into the megawar system, and send off a spiral of revolting vassals if they dislike the king enough.

4) Personal traits
Maybe when growing up you can decide if you want to fight with an axe like Victarion, or a hammer like Robert Baratheon. Both present options for intimidation and martial bonuses. Could feed nicely into the approval system of traits, where your personal strength or the "Giant" trait could decide if these choices become available by event. The option for your sons to become priests of the Drowned God, and not want to be maesters. Theon requested nearly immediatly when I began my Balon Greyjoy game to go to the citadel. Unrealistic, but at the same time, probably a better future than his canon life.

I don't know if these are even possible, but I think larger degrees of difference for playing in different regions should present massive replayability to the mod, more so than the abundant reasons to now. The Ironborn are unique compared to their mainland overlords. I hope that this mod reflects that in the future. Thanks for reading, throw your ideas in as well, and most importantly, cheers to the devs for an awesome mod!

Greyjoy wrote:Hey guys, just saying, Iove the mod, and as you may not have already guessed, I am a huge fan of the Ironborn and their home.

I noticed the "Drowned" trait and thought to myself that the Iron Isles could do with some more flavour, traits and ambitions. The few ideas I have all seem to focus on approval and acceptance. Look at Theon Greyjoy for example, minor spoilers for Clash of Kings ahead here folks.

Despite being a proven warrior, and trusted by a great noble house he was brought up with, he betrayed them to win the love of his hard, cold family. The Ironborn do not like weakness. They appreciate strength above all else, and family loyalty seems to come way down the list. Looking at the dynamics between Balon and his brothers, Victarion was more than willing to kill Euron in revenge for his adultery despite the associated stigma of kinslaying. Damphair was equally happy to try and bring an uprising against Euron for percieved weakness in his faith. A brother, willing to kill his sibling, over a lack of faith in a god that drowns his subjects. This is the stuff the Ironborn are made of. Cruelty, toughness, and strength. And Iron. Possibly some sea water in there too.

So I'm asking the forums, what events and traits would you give the Iron Islanders? I have a few ideas:

1) A "Proving your worth" system.
A set of traits, that change depending on the age and status of a character. So a young lord wouldn't command the absolute faith of his Ironborn, he needs to show he can Reave and make the soft greenlanders pay the Iron price first. So perhaps when the first real combat occurs for the young lord or lady, this trait goes away and provides a few options including a chance to get "Craven" and "Unproven" (which decreases troop morale and martial, vassal opinion etc) or "Brave" and things like "Proven Commander", "Ruthless Reaver" or a rare but awesome trait along the lines of "True Ironborn" which increases martial, opinion, piety, strength, attractiveness, so on. Basically, a system which allows your character to win the approval of his subjects.

2) What is dead may never die.
The option to drown your prisoners as gifts to the drowned god for piety, but also the chance to gain the cruelty trait. Drowning yourself at 14 or older for the "Drowned" trait at the risk of death (I haven't noticed a way to attain it yet, I might be going mad). A moot for the election of the Damphair? Replacement of maesters with priests of the drowned god, we know for a fact that the Ironborn HATE maesters. Look at what happened to Urrigon Greyjoy (Google it).

3) Reaving
The option as King of the Iron Isles to begin reaving in secret. You gain money and slaves for court, depending on where you reave. You can order vassals to reave as well, which gains you money. Events emerge where there is a chance of discovery, where you will have to pay damages and send hostages, or you can declare your independance. This could lead into the megawar system, and send off a spiral of revolting vassals if they dislike the king enough.

4) Personal traits
Maybe when growing up you can decide if you want to fight with an axe like Victarion, or a hammer like Robert Baratheon. Both present options for intimidation and martial bonuses. Could feed nicely into the approval system of traits, where your personal strength or the "Giant" trait could decide if these choices become available by event. The option for your sons to become priests of the Drowned God, and not want to be maesters. Theon requested nearly immediatly when I began my Balon Greyjoy game to go to the citadel. Unrealistic, but at the same time, probably a better future than his canon life.

I don't know if these are even possible, but I think larger degrees of difference for playing in different regions should present massive replayability to the mod, more so than the abundant reasons to now. The Ironborn are unique compared to their mainland overlords. I hope that this mod reflects that in the future. Thanks for reading, throw your ideas in as well, and most importantly, cheers to the devs for an awesome mod!

Hmm these ideas are pretty good and will add something different for the iron isles

King in the North wrote: Hmm these ideas are pretty good and will add something different for the iron isles

Thanks! I'm just throwing ideas around for making the Ironborn a bit more unique. After all, they are very different to the mainlanders, and I hope someone with modding experience agrees with me!

+1 from me.

The one here I really like is number two (though I figure much of that goes in line with the current overall lack of religion). Maesters are mostly looked down upon by the Ironborn (mostly), and at the moment there is no representation of the priests of the Drowned God. (For the record, you can become "Drowned" by random event at the moment).

The others... mixed bag. A little reaving in events might be nice, I'll give you that. But the "proving yourself" mostly just feels like the sorta thing prestige already takes care of for the most part, and much of the rest is easily represented by current traits. Might be simpler to represent something like this by imposing a relations penalty/bonus based on your rank and your current prestige. A LP with no prestige would be looked down upon even more by his vassals and make them more prone to rebel, while a leader with high prestige would gain even more respect from his vassals than his mainland counterparts. Personal traits... well, clearly that isn't Ironborn specific :p. Still, it'd be some nice little fluff to add in, though I'd say it should mostly just be flavor. A warhammer or axe shouldn't be superior to each other or a sword, and the fighting skill traits already add some hefty bonuses to characters. I'd much rather see something like this used as fluff/flavor, with maybe the absolute smallest of actual perks to it (though honestly, the vast majority of characters will end up with one of those traits as they would almost all use some form of weapon).

I think what we could use is an event chain where an Ironborn person is accused of making a sacrifice to the Storm God.

Comradebot wrote:The one here I really like is number two (though I figure much of that goes in line with the current overall lack of religion). Maesters are mostly looked down upon by the Ironborn (mostly), and at the moment there is no representation of the priests of the Drowned God. (For the record, you can become "Drowned" by random event at the moment).

The others... mixed bag. A little reaving in events might be nice, I'll give you that. But the "proving yourself" mostly just feels like the sorta thing prestige already takes care of for the most part, and much of the rest is easily represented by current traits. Might be simpler to represent something like this by imposing a relations penalty/bonus based on your rank and your current prestige. A LP with no prestige would be looked down upon even more by his vassals and make them more prone to rebel, while a leader with high prestige would gain even more respect from his vassals than his mainland counterparts. Personal traits... well, clearly that isn't Ironborn specific :p. Still, it'd be some nice little fluff to add in, though I'd say it should mostly just be flavor. A warhammer or axe shouldn't be superior to each other or a sword, and the fighting skill traits already add some hefty bonuses to characters. I'd much rather see something like this used as fluff/flavor, with maybe the absolute smallest of actual perks to it (though honestly, the vast majority of characters will end up with one of those traits as they would almost all use some form of weapon).

Yeah, the more I think about it, the more I agree with you. Point 3 is far too general, but I stick by the "proving yourself" concept. Ironborn seem much harsher on themselves and their cohorts than any others, I guess I just don't feel that the current traits reflect growing up in the Iron Isles.

Comradebot wrote:I think what we could use is an event chain where an Ironborn person is accused of making a sacrifice to the Storm God.

Now that... that would be awesome. It would be easy to class the Storm faith as a heresy, and the chain of events could end in full conversion of your provinces (and a holy war with the loyalists) or absolute disaster and exile.