[PnP] Large Scale Looting

[Burton Choinski]

Hey all, good to be back on the list!.  I changed addresses a while back and forgot to update my address with Wout until just now.  Hope I didn't miss any interesting threads.

Okay, coming back with a question for GMs out there, or anyone really with ideas.  And it's a big one.

My players are involved in my long running "Legends" campaign.  Basically, we dusted off their characters from 1983-85 (back when I was in college) and picked up where we left off, 20 years later (the characters were stuck in a time bubble, from Doom manor).

So, it's been about 7 (or perhaps more) years realtime playing about once a month.  In game time has progressed about 11 years.  In that time these 3 (now 4) capable PCs have set up a small kingdom in the Western elder mountains, in the little hills pocket on the other side of the mountains from Treaus.  In their adventures they have obtained power and wealth, and their small culture has reached a population of about 27,000, via recruiting from surrounding populations (That was a fun system to try and figure out).

Ok, fast forward to now. The characters (1 Alfar, a Human Warrior, a Law Wizard and and Warrior with some Elder training) have taken their ship, along with 150 archers to Shestar, and with a deal of a crapload of metal spear heads and other metal gear managed to entice the Kunni (Ro'babza) into a large scale raid of the neighboring Kotasi (Shurikal).

The Main warrior is highly skilled in Tactics and in leadership, and fully capable of commanding his attacking host (side note: in the typing of this message I realized I was probably a little generous with how good his control was -- I will have to note this and inform him if they decide to continue).  With his 150 archers and 1000 Kunni, his combined force managed to eliminate the Kotasi warriors in several sets of battles, with little losses (NOTE 2: I also found, while cleaning up my mass combat sheet that the bonuses for numbers were a bit high, so I tweaked it down for the next game.  However, I have let the past results stand).

Ok, With the Kotasi warriors crushed, the remaining non-warriors have pulled back into the surrounding tribes (NOTE 3: That will teach me to do this without fully reading the culture book carefully -- His forces should probably have had to face a large force of civilians, since they are all vicious bastards and there is no way they have any concept of giving up, but I'll pull this out and say that of the remaining 9600 people, at least HALF will be around to fight them in a guerilla war in the next game, so their victory is not as complete as we left off at).

Ok, long story short.  At the end of the game session (with all of the above second thought notes not in play), I said they and their Kunni forces could loot the tribal lands.  Wild ass guess I figured a week to clean out the tribal center.  The tribal lands are not separated like for other cultures, so I figured another 8-10 hexes around that, at 2 weeks per hex.

Not that I'm going to given them all that time.  With this reading, I figure they have a week at best before the remaining kotasi start making counter strikes.  I figure that the tribal center holds at least 1/3 the wealth of the tribe.

Ok, end line, assuming they manage to wipe out the Kotasi...how much can you get?  My WAG for that game as about 1/3 to 1/2 GNI, which for them would mostly be in tools, pelts, some tribal artwork, a smattering of precious metals and jems and whatever animals they could not take with them.

My query to you is: Is this too low?  Too high?  Assuming the players can manage to do this with out getting "Zulu Dawn'd", how much is a barbarian culture worth if you wipe it out and take what goods can be sold off to other markets (other barbarian tribes, or civilized cultures)?

---- addendum, after today's game ---

Recruiting more of the Ro'babza and some of the close Fomorians, my players and their motley army have managed to pretty much roll up the Shuirkul.  Only the Sabai (plus refugees from the other tribes) remain, though the player's forces did take a beating.  So at present they have access to the looting of the other tribal centers.  The next game they intend to try and finish this by taking out Shirikul city foces and sack that.