Book of Strongholds & Dynasties

We are looking not just at the stronghold but at the whole process of building, quite literally from the ground up. You will be able to choose the level of detail that suits you, depending on how immersive you want your game to be. Either supervise the laying of every flagstone and the sitting of every spiral staircase, or have a package deal stronghold assembled for you and simply pay the bill.

Here you will find not only the castles of lore, but dozens of other strongholds and other buildings, enough to build all the major features of a city. Everything from the humblest farmhouse to the mightiest palace is covered between these covers.

The materials you use are detailed, as well as the places they come from and the way in which you establish your supply. Harvest the resources yourself, or have them delivered to you by professional builders’ guilds. Build anything from a log cabin in wood to a towering fortress in crystal; turn an ordinary manor house into a fortified tower, or set up your home in the skull of a dead god; establish a base of operations in a fortress high in the boughs of a tree, or locate the true heart of your power deep underground in some columned sanctuary.

Once your stronghold is built, there are a multitude of fantastic features that you can add on to it. From the basics of low fantasy such as stained glass windows and simple secret compartments to the lofty magic of trundling juggernauts, levitating platforms and magical energy cannons.

The truly adventurous can now create power sources within their strongholds. Expand your trapbuilding, feature planning and gadgeteering horizons by giving your stronghold a lightning-powered engine, or a central treadmill powered by untiring golems, or even an old fashioned coal-fired boiler. Why rely on magic, when the power of transmitted force can do much of the same work for you?

Most exciting of all, in the second part of this book we unveil the Open Governmental System. This set of game mechanics allows player characters to set themselves up as kings, princes, potentates, dictators, generals, theocrats and governors. Once you have made your fortune as an adventurer, you can now try your hand as a monarch or as a politician. Learn to wield new kinds of power as your various ministers offer you their services; face new kinds of challenge as the people demand satisfaction, or hungry empires eye your land jealously, craving it for themselves. Be a despot, governing with force, a plutocrat using your wealth to buy your way to power, or a High King uniting the tribal warlords of a battle-ravaged country with nothing but your powers of leadership.

Finally, we close with the Open Mass Combat System version 2, an expanded and updated version of the original. After all, we could not give you rules for building strongholds without some rules to help you smash them down again!

The Book of Strongholds and Dynasties is the first in the ‘Book Of...’ series from Mongoose Publishing, which will all cover one field of central importance to the d20 system in unprecedented depth and detail. With this series, we intend to produce the definitive works on subjects relevant to any Games Master.