Idea for some character type that bridges the commoner adventurer and the noble...whatever the noble does: Player-controlled "captain".
The concept is that of a low-ranking noble or someone who is not exactly a commoner but not high ranking enough to lead a unit as a knight or similarly ranked noble. Since in BM, just about every noble character is actually the upper elite of nobility, there is a lot of room to stick this "captain" class in there.
How would this work? The character stats would be the same, for the most part since all character classes operate according to Physical Age, Honour, Prestige, Hours, Money, and Status. As a minor nobility, I suppose the Captain could use silver, since he has to work with the smiths and stuff for repairs to his own equipment. That would probably be done using silver. Everything else works in much the same way, though for balance purposes, the Captain's time pool works the same was as a non-priest, non-adventurer's time pool.
Ok, now what's the point of this Captain? Like all other characters, he comes with skills. However for him, the only relevant skills are Swordfighting, Jousting, and Leadership, so basically, the Warrior's relevant skillset. What do these mean? Well, for Infantry, Mixed Infantry, and Special Forces, the combat strength is increased linearly according to the sum of the Swordfighting % and Leadership % divided by...3 I guess (Maintains balance or a 100/100 sword/lead Captain would provide a 200% bonus to CS rather than a 67% boost, which is still pretty good) For Cavalry, it would be (Jousting skill% + Leadership skill%)//3. For archers, it would be Leadership skill% * 0.67.
Now, how would this work? Well, actually the mechanics aren't too hard. If I had any idea what the variable names used for BM were I could probably write out the entire Captain class in a couple of days. So first, let's talk about the most important mechanic for the Captain class, their entire reason for existence: Fighting in a unit.
If we actually tried to simulate the captain fighting in the unit it might get messy. Instead, we'll do a different method that works to hopefully satisfying results. First, we must define whether the captain is part of a unit. For that we will use similar code to the estate system. A captain can serve any noble character in the same realm. This information is then assigned to both the noble and captain, much like the current estate system assigns knight to a region. Using a similar framework, we can give the noble control over his captain, to give good mark, bad mark, kick out, etc. In order to make sure that the new captain isn't fighting with any other captains for the spotlight, we could alter the script for a unit such that the entry of a player-captain automatically deletes the existing NPC captain. I think it should not be too hard to add a line in the unit display that allows instead "Captain Name" instead of a preset randomly generated name. This would allow the noble to actually see that his captain is indeed Captain Artemesia, for example. It could use the first name too. Not too hard, just insert the string when a player-character captain exists.
Now the second part of handling the captain in a unit is to make sure no other PC captains can exist under the same noble. The NPC captain is easy to take care of. Just boot him. However, for PC captains, they can only serve under a noble who does not at that moment have any PC captains. This is also not too hard to do (I could even do it myself after May 19) as one would simply add a test before any "oaths" can be made to see if there exists a captain for that noble. If so, then the option to take a captain would be unavailable to the noble, and the captain would also get the check and be unable to serve a noble with a PC captain.
Ok, so now that we have settled how to integrate the captain under a noble's command, let's talk about units. First of all, I intentionally made sure to say that the captain would be under the noble, not unit. This is because the unit can vary through many battles, and it would be very difficult to make a satisfactory system where a captain is bound to a unit. It would also make players mad if they died because their noble TL was dumb and left them to die, or they get stuck as captain in a militia unit. So how exactly do they function for units? I'll now explain that.
I showed the algorithms above for how the CS % increase is determined. Let's say that Captain Artemesia serves under Sir Artemesia, who is at this time fielding infantry. Captain's swordfighting skill is 33% and leadership skill is also 33%. That means sword + lead = 66 and 66//3=22. Therefore, Sir Artemesia's infantry unit gets a 22% increase to CS. However, if we want to get more realistic such that the captain actually has to be present for battles, we can make that bonus rely on a region check, to give that bonus only when the captain and noble are in the same region. Again, not too hard. We do this all the time for stuff like oaths and item trades. This would simulate the captain being with the unit and in battle, and disallow lazy captains who sit in the capital while the noble fights with a juiced up unit. Now for a part that I originally forgot: What happens when the noble changes unit type? No problem, the Captain simply uses the skills relevant to that unit type as bonus. So if Sir Artemesia drops his infantry and picks up cavalry, Captain Artemesia now provides a bonus according to his jousting and leadership skills rather than his swordfighting and leadership skills.
But now we should look at how the captain actually functions in battle. After all, he does go into battle. Well, he'd be coded pretty much like a noble hero. He participates in the battle, can get wounded (maybe even die. Hey, that's the risk of creating a Captain?). His in-battle mechanics are pretty much exactly the same as a hero's, so that should not be hard at all. Just make sure to separate the parts in case the noble also happens to be a hero. I don't have a clue about what the BM code looks like, but if I had to guess, currently the noble ID is linked uniquely to the unit ID, and in battle, the noble participates in some way, and counts as a valid target, and has some reactions tied to what happens to the unit (getting wounded). It probably wouldn't be hard to copy-paste what a hero noble does, and change some names to allow both a captain and a hero to react independently in the same unit, as well as for captain and non-hero. This avoids the potential problem of having the captain and noble linked by fate, meaning a wound to the captain also is a wound to the noble because they share the conditions that lead to wounding. However, because the system already distinguishes wounds to the unit from wounds to the noble, this doesn't sound at all difficult.
From this, we can then set an independent set of conditions that determine the skill gain, and H/P gain from battles for the captain. I see no reason why the current noble system for such gains is insufficient, so we can just give a new part for the captain to gain those numbers independently of the noble.
Now that we are done talking about how the captain gets into a unit, and battles with them, let's talk about how he gets paid. A unit gets paid anyway, and it should make sense that the captain, as part of those men, gets paid alongside them. I would rather have a sort of stipend system because that would be much easier. We can just use the current oath system and modify it so that the captain gets a share of the noble's tax income after all other taxes. The captain would therefore get paid at the same time as taxes for all nobles are collected, which I suppose makes some sense. The captain is the highest ranking in the unit, and as low-ranking nobility, could get some special treatment. This would make the implementation much smoother too, as now the current lord-knight oath system can be used for the backbone of the noble-captain system.
And now, apart from giving a boost to a noble's unit, and risking your life battling for mostly someone else's glory, what else is the captain good for? Well, he can possess unique items too, and would use them much like a noble would, with some slight text changes to reflect that it's the captain, not the noble leading the unit, using the item. I suppose he can also provide a small passive buff to morale, cohesion, and training. This might be more difficult, but the captain could use his own money to repair the unit's damage where smiths don't exist, but that might involve some balance issues. Still, that money should go somewhere...Maybe the captain can also pay the unit? This would lessen the stress of a unit left at home during a 10-day tournament (Those exist, right?)
In summary, the Captain is a battle-centered adjunct class. It allows you to take part more directly with the unit, giving a more personal feel (hopefully) to battles you participate in.
