Cadre Concepts?

[Angelman]

Yeah, this is pretty much what I do too. I usually have an idea of the type of epic I want to run, or at least some themes and genre, and then I discuss with my players to find what they want to do. Often I will then decide what kinds of characters the payers will pay, based on their wishes and the need of my epic, making sure their characters are well integrated into the story and vice versa. Often I will even create pre-gen characters for the group to maximise the "fit". This allows me to plant seeds which will play into the story or setting... that interesting location I have planed for a storyline 6 drama into the epic becomes a Refuge benefice for one of my player's characters; this Lore skill is predicted to be useful in the seasonal finale, etc.

I know that this wouldn't fit every gaming group, but I find that the older me and my gaming groups get, the less we need to control the character generation and the more we enjoy exploring pre-gen characters. (This is common for most groups I regularly GM or play in nowadays). Many of us have even come to appreciate pre-gen characters for the chance it gives us to play new interesting characters that mesh well with the story, instead of creating the same old stock characters one tend to make when having free reins of the char-gen.

[Bertjammin]

[Madmage]

Skimming through the books for an upcoming session, I found there are actually existing rules to allow players to pool together character creation points to purchase a spaceship as the cost for those is very prohibitive. So in this case, any design would just require a fief (or business, or Church) customization system.

[Angelman]

That's true. It wouldn't be difficult to device a system where the cadre "buys" a fief from the start by pooling points. More difficult, or at least more work intensive, would be devicing a fief management system of some sorts that made sense and was interesting to use as a basis for runing a homelands type of epic.

[Bogie]

I always wanted to add to a game a whole creation system of creating a group's ship, crew, and other things along the lines of Conspiracy-X's base creation system. Where each character's specialty makes access to certain resource points easier and an entire part of character creation is the players working together to create their ship and the ship having a bigger role in the game.

Not sure that helps the conversation but wanted to throw that out there for thought.

[Madmage]

I found the various ways one could customize regular ships and cybertechnology might be an approximate good fit with slight modifiers one could apply to improve or reduce its effectiveness and thus modify the cost.

A very elegant solution I came up with for a home campaign of Shadowrun, where I asked my players to create a street gang, was to create 5 categories where they could assign priorities to each category from A to E (or 1 to 5 for those unfamiliar with the system). Depending on the priority the group assigned, they got a number of edges or flaws to distribute to craft their gang and its turf. I provided them a baseline for each category prior to allowing them to assign it. Priority C was a minor edge, while A was 1 major and a minor (or 3 minors), B was 1 major edge (or 2 minor), D had 1 minor flaw, and E had a major flaw (which you couldn't downgrade to two minor flaws). You could take additional flaws to get additional edges in different categories (max 1 additional per category).

For the purposes of Fading Suns, categories I might suggest are:

Tech: Defines the tech level of the fief along with its accessibility. Considering tech level is already defined to range between 1-8, I think a base of 4 is more or less fair. This would translate into a 1-1 ratio based on the priority the players or GM assigns to it. Thus, we might want to consider an 8 category system.
Faith: Represents the main sect of your fief as well as relations between the Church and its representatives with the secular authority. The middle ground might be Orthodox, while placing a low score might result in an overzealous and powerful Avestite religious order, or a heretical sect like the Incarnates.
Population: Represents the number of people in the fief but also their utility. A low score might be a Decados Gulag while a high score represents a major city with potentially numerous skilled freemen.
Wealth (or prosperity): The level of development of the local economy and in a sense, how influential the local guilds and/or Merchant League is. This could also include the fief's resources whether natural (say a gold mine) or its means of production (a 2nd republic era factory).
Rank: This represents the secular authority's rank within the landed gentry (i.e. a duchy, county, barony, etc). This also ties into ties with its neighbouring fiefs. A high rank could include a certain number of vassals, but also in turn a few enemies. A low rank would be a minor holding with multiple enemies; particularly if the other scores are very high. This is essentially the "nobles" category. A
Power: The military strength of the fief but also the general security of the domain. A low score might represent a rag tag poorly trained military rife with corruption while a high score might imply a veteran force from the Emperor Wars.
Loyalty: The general attitude of the fief's inhabitants towards its ruler. Low scores could suffer from banditry, high crime rates, or a people about ready to rebel. On the opposite end of the spectrum, the people are faithful and loyal.

I struggled to figure out the final category, but perhaps something to represent Imperial Favour?

[Holz]

Creating a fief, ship or something with management must be faced as a management game (or a game in a game).
Some people wont care much on taking care. So it smut be made in way it may affect players and the environment.

If you will create something attached to a point system, were better cost more (making a better fief, for example).
Ranging from 10 (a very poor fief) to 100 ( a very rich fief), you must allocate point on the traits Madmage said.
A 50 point fief can barely sustain it self with low population and high technology, but maybe an even distribution might help it.

How to "weight" each trait, well that is food for thought.

I made a while back a Fief Generator. I'll attach it. It is fairly simple and a work in progress. It can help on making instant fiefs!

Also, for my campaign the players have a mine (outside the fief, run by ukari's) and a fief. I made a 3d6 table from 3 is the worst thing can happen and 18 the best. With 3d6, the mean is fair enough not to make the fief have great harvests and terrible storms, every month.

[Madmage]

I was thinking for management the level of the different category would go towards a goal roll (on a 1d20) for each category's developments over whatever time span (a year or season perhaps?).

[Amlost]

Personally I don't really see the need to have characters spend points to purchase fief's or ships. If you want to throw the characters into a long campaign in a fief; have it awarded to them. Make the fief suitably unstable, poor, and make sure the characters understand their liege is just as likely to strip the fief from them if they are successful or failures. (But that success may have other benefits and bonus'es.)

I wanted to do this to with a Decados noble. Give him a fief on Pandemonium to strip clear of resources in the badlands. Or a rebellious (slave revolt?) island on Cadiz. Punishment or reward for services rendered?

IMHO; Turn a reward into danger/adventure. Title, rank, property, etc... should be awarded "point-free" by GM's for good PC play after initial character creation.

[Holz]

Well it is cool to give free stuff to the Players... tough all the time I do that, they manage to screw it, or just dont care.

I believe whatever came with hard "labor" comes great rewards. Hence they'll take care better of it. Or I just got terrible people.
=P