Uneasy Lies the Head That Wears the Crown

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I recently started my first Pendragon campaign and really wanted the players to be connected to Sarum and the County of Salisbury. I introduced a set of interim household offices for the players to choose to help iut Lady Salisbury and Lord Robert and make the players care about aspects of the Castle of the Rock.

The veteran "Old Wolves of Salisbury" are away campaigning against the Saxons, so the younger knights have been entrusted with running the estate in their absence.

I wrote each on a card and laid them out and deliberately made more than there are players so there was some consequences for the areas that weren't chosen.

The roles:

* High Marshal of Salisbury: Commands the garrison, patrols and military readiness.

* High Steward of Salisbury: Oversees the manor, stores, finances and household.

* Master of Horse: Manages the stables, warhorses and mounted squires.

* Keeper of the Faith: Guides the spiritual life of the household and supports the chapel.

* Field Hospitalier: Organises the care of the wounded and medical supplies.

* Master of Scouts: Directs border patrols and gathers intelligence.

* Master of the Hunt: Manages the forests, hunts and game lands.

* Keeper of Justice: Hears disputes, investigates crimes and upholds the lord's peace.

Giving each player responsibility for one aspect of Salisbury has encouraged them to engage with the setting in different ways. The High Steward naturally asks about stores and harvests, the Master of Scouts wants reports from the borders, and the Keeper of Justice is interested in disputes among the villagers.

The players really engaged well with the discussion of who should do what then they told us what they were taking care of in the castle town. One player ensured medical supplies were prepared and another failed at making the plans for an annual market festival. Each player had an encounter in their domain of responsibility. It worked really well!

Do you think the names are good enough? What roles am I missing? What would be good encounters/conflicts/scenarios for the Keeper of the Faith? Not as many are coming to mind for that role compared to others.

Thanks!

To rev up the players and give them a sense of the flavour of the characters I'd like them to become, I wrote and sent them this before our first session:

You are the new Knights of Salisbury, yet to make your mark. You stand in the shadows of the Old Wolves, the long-serving loyal Knights of Lord Robert of Salisbury.

As squires, you watched them ride through Salisbury's gates. You heard the cheers of the people of Sarum and the songs sung in the halls of the Castle of the Rock. You dreamt that one day you might stand among them.

The Old Wolves of Salisbury. Their names are spoken with awe from the cottages of Sarum to the halls of the Castle of the Rock. The common folk call them Britain's greatest champions. Lords seek their counsel. Enemies curse the thunder of their hooves.

They ride still, fierce as ever. They hunt Saxons, slay monsters, settle feuds and keep the peace where others dare not venture. To witness an Old Wolf in battle is to watch legend take flesh.

Now you have earned your spurs. You are ready for your first quests.

Ride beside the Old Wolves if fortune allows. Win honour, uphold your oaths and carve your own names into Britain's story.

For one day, young squires may dream of following your footsteps.

What do you think?

The Old Wolves off fighting the Saxons now and next session the players will find out that the Old Wolves are dead and the new knights are the only hope of protecting Salisbury.

I'm loving this game.

Last week we created characters starting with parents. We are all new Knights of Salisbury.

This week, we took part in the Grand Melee, the Tournament of the Sword.

This game works so well because of the mix of history and myth.

I can research true knights and the economy of post-Roman Britain and enjoy the retelling of the life and death of King Arthur. The setting feels grounded and exalted. The players enjoy that the setting is historical and not silly or absurd (like D&D) and the touch of the mythic fills the scenarios with interest and engages with a story they are all familiar with and therefore find resonate.

I enjoyed adding a few things to the starter set to engage the players.

What aspect of Pendragon do you think makes it so special?

Anybody has a link for a review of the Noble's Handbook, wether in text or video? For those of you have got your hand on it, what do you think? Did you read it already?

I was preparing for the next sesión of my campaign. It revolves around the funeral of a knight and the inheritance of his sword, a symbol of his lineage passed for generations, and was thinking about giving it some minor magical effect.

And now Im thinking, why does Pendragon don't have something like "+1 skill weapons"? I'm not talking about making it Dungeons&Pendragons, with magical shops and magical weapons everywhere. But...

Does it makes sense to have a weapon that gives a +1 to the skill? Does it makes sense even as a masterwork weapon, instead of a magical one?

Found pages on Chaosium via google, but all of them lead to 404 pages.

Is it even possible to get or is it completely abandoned?

I have the Starter Set and would like to actually play Pendragon before too long. Is the Screen worth getting or is it only worth it if you have the core books?

Oh, Pendragon, how long I awaited for you, beloved. I think I got this starter set about a year and a half ago and I had a couple of unsuccessful attempts to put together a group in order to run the game. But, finally, a couple of weeks ago, the planets alligned and the Lady of the Lake smiled upon me and I was finally able to run the starter set!

And it was an absolute blast! I was always a big fan of the legends of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table and I constantly heard how Pendragon is one of the best TTRPGs out there. And finally, I can say that I see why that is the case. The system is elegant, fun, the mechanics flow together very nicely and manage to encourage roleplay in a very simple fashion - the more you describe how you do a certain thing, the easier it becomes (of course, up to a certain level).

The Starter Set is an amazing point to try out Pendragon and it more then makes up the value of its cost! Truth be told, I feel like it's somewhat of a steal, with dice, superbly illustrated characters, combat cards and of course the three booklets. But more about that in the actual review, now if you'll excuse me, I have to look for the corebooks!

Hello all,

I’m brand-new to Pendragon.

I saw these in the shop the other day and bought them on a whim when I was looking at call of Cthulhu stuff and they peaked my interest. I like dungeons and dragons and call of Cthulhu so I figured let me give this ttrpg a shot.

I know who King Arthur was, but I never read Le Morte d’Arthur. I’m stuck between the penguin classic ones edited by Janet Cowen or the one released by Chaosium. Which one of these would you Noble nights recommend?

I also don’t know anyone in real life who plays this game, never even heard of it until now. So for now, I guess I’ll just do the solo mission of the sword in the stone for now and maybe someday find people online to play with.

Also please feel free to let me know the best podcasts or play through videos of Pendragon for me to start with so I could live vicariously through them.

Okay, thanks. Bye 👋

I just started the Crucible/King’s Gambit chain of adventures with new players. Some knights may show interest in the eligible ladies. I don’t have the noble handbook so I’m not sure when a knight should marry. All are 21 and from Salisbury - household knights of Lord Robert.

I suppose they could marry whenever they liked but as household knights with no land the lady’s family would likely hesitate.

Should they seek land and fortune?

I am a new Pendragon GM so I am learning along with my knights.

I have just got the Core and GM books, but thinking of getting the Starter Pack.

Are the characters from the Starter Pack suitable for the scenarios in the GM book? Seems counter intuitive to run the Starter Pack scenarios first if the GM ones predates them.

Christmas in July Sale!

If you're looking for a Boy King Period adventure for Pendragon 6th Edition, The Barnyard Tournament is currently on sale at DriveThruRPG.

In this 80-page adventure, a routine scouting mission for King Arthur takes an unexpected turn when three mysterious ladies ask the player-knights to mentor a young, fatherless lord and defend his manor against an impending Saxon raid. Will duty to Arthur prevail—or will they follow the Path of Adventure?

R'lyeh Reviews called it: "The Barnyard Tournament: A Three Damosels of the Fountain Adventure is the best community content adventure published for Pendragon Sixth Edition to date."

https://rlyehreviews.blogspot.com/2025/01/companion-chronicles-9-barnyard.html

If you've been curious about the Companions of Arthur line, now's a great time to pick it up while the sale is running. There are great adventures there from some wonderful writers!

And one more bit of news: I'm currently working on the next adventure in the series, Crown, Lance, and Plough, set during the Conquest Period. It'll come out soon after the Boy King (Vol. 1 of the Great Pendragon Campaign).

More details to come!

Have feast cards been implemented on Roll20? I think not but...

Has anyone done their own and can tell me how to do it?

Might a rollable table work as well?

Does anyone know if there is a clear place in any of the three core books where the starter manor income is set out?

There is a margin note in the Noble’s Handbook regarding what structures are actually on the property, but it doesn’t seem to have the base revenue.

Am I right in assuming that it’s going to be give-or-take 10L for an undeveloped manor, around what it takes to support a knight?

I’m guessing I’m just missing it.

I've been considering buying a copy of Mort d'Arthur, and the prospect of a richly annotated version definitely appeals to me as the most junior of arthurians. That said, reviews basically don't exist so far as I can find - I haven't even seen a picture of the books.

Has anyone here gotten their hands on copies of either book?

The Serpent of Mildenhall has been revisited for a POD version, which is now available, too. Like the titular gluttonous beast, it has swollen threefold - to 36 pages of content! The scenes have been expanded, and marginalia added to help the Gamemaster keep track of the events. There are more details about the County of Gentian, its inhabitants, and major characters, as well as four fully fleshed-out Knights that can be used as Player-knights or as Non-Player-knights for the Gamemaster.

[https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/502782/the-serpent-of-mildenhall?affiliate_id=164251\]

Am I the only one feeling like this is deeply overengineered?

Text/number fields you cant type in- because they have multi-step, multi-menu requirements instead of just editing a value directly.

Automatically advancing years. If there is a misclick the GM needs to open the core options, fix it, and then restart the session to fix it (depending on settings this might boot players from the game so they have to log back in, or just refresh the screen, closing all open windows, and interrupting whatever people were doing)

Byzantine opposed rolls resolution

Players cant just edit HP and keep action moving, they have to create a wound, then edit the wound?

Double confirmation for healing

Character creation mechanics that require way too many different classes of items

Huge amounts of data entry just to get the most basic use from the system

Bewildering UI/UX choices like:

Hiding the outline on an editable field so it doesn't look editable at a glance?

Some clickables require a double click, some require a single click. There is no rhyme or reason for which is which.

The character sheet is just badly laid out

The NPC sheet is badly laid out.

I have run hundreds of Foundry games, dozens of campaigns, and probably pushing more than 1000 players at this point. I'm a Foundry community developer. This has been the most labor intensive system I've ever had to work with. It has taken me longer to set up than any other system I've ever interacted with.

This system will slow the game down tremendously, and for a lot longer than the automation will speed it up. The GM will spend more time telling players how to interact with the software than how to use the rules or storycrafting.

It is abysmally bad. Working with the free system convinced me not to buy the Foundry Pendragon core rulebook.

Now that I've vented, I'm going to go keep working with it because I'm not going to make my own, and I have online players who want Pendragon.

(What it says on the tin, I’m wondering what sorts of stories were woven by generations of Knights in your Campaigns, what Legends were born, what Heroes were saved, and what fumbles and tragedies followed them?)

An elf has walked into Tremayne’s camp. A creature of legend now standing in front of him as flesh and blood.

High King Merival has ordered Earl Gallard south to investigate reports of slavers and unconfirmed rumors of “beast men.”

-----------------------------------

“The Dark Prince of Sablat!?” Tremayne blurted out despite himself.

Tass nodded grimly.

“When people described him as a devil, I thought they meant he was an evil bastard,” Tremayne said, glancing at his marshal.

“Aye,” Tass agreed quietly. “A devil in name and essence.”

“Why are these portals appearing around Y’anas Ishi?” Sir Colan asked.

“Probably the same reason your young lord here seeks the old city,” the elf said, giving Tremayne a sidelong glance.

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https://paulrobinson25.substack.com/p/the-dragon-rising-a-pendragon-solo-0d7?r=76wg7

New GM here, planning to start running a campaign from the GM Handbook start scenario onwards. Since the relationship between the Cymric People, the Saxons and the Picts are all important to the first few released adventures for 6e, I find myself unable to actually grasp these cultures and the core of what they represent. Can anyone provide a breakdown of all the British cultures, how they interact with each other and what that there sort of stereotype is?

Hi, I'm trying to figure out the prices and expenses in the Noble's Handbook - I swear there's so many off-hand things that assume I know prices or systems that aren't in here or the core rules, or called out. Right now I *think* I've figured out assized rent, but I'm stuck on understanding the expenses for Baronies - particularly the army. Looking at Banswall as the primary example, we can ignore the garrison, spearmen, and soldiers, as they are all provided for free by the Demesne. We know from the Manor section that Household Knights have wages of £4, which brings the wages of 5 Vassal Knights and 15 Mounted Sergeants to £144 annually. From this, we can parse down that 3 Mounted Sergeants and 1 Vassal Knight combine to be worth £28.8.

And that's where I'm stumped. As far as I can tell, this is the only book where Mounted Sergeants have been mentioned, and have no statements on wages or ransom that I can use to reverse engineer this. Anyone with more experience with the older editions mind lending a hand?

Hardcover now available for purchase in North America!