So, there are fewer options now that we're getting into the later tiers of play, but we're covering the Special Facilities for Bastions. This new system, described in the previous two posts, is something coming in the 2024 DMG that will more or less outline how players can attain, design, and use their own individual home locations. Each player character can get one of these at level 5, and can expand and upgrade it over the course of their leveling career. Bastions have "bastion turns" that happen roughly every seven days and can be used for new systems that allow for crafting and research, and can operate even if the players aren't able to spend lots of downtime there. The Bastions are staffed by NPC hirelings who can perform the work for them, and the whole system gives players a bit of an opportunity to do some design and creation like the DM does.
We've covered the facilities you can have at your bastion at level 5, and when you reach level 9. Now, we'll touch on the facilities you can unlock at level 13.
Archive:
No prerequisite. Lets you Research to have your hireling or whoever did the work gain knowledge as if they had cast Legend Lore. Additionally, your archive acquires one rare Reference Book that grants its benefits while you're in the bastion - the books, all with flavorful names, grant advantage on each of the Intelligence-based skills, such as Bigby's Handy Arcana Codex to give you advantage on Arcana checks. You can enlarge the Archive for 2000g, giving it two additional reference books (and upgrading it from Roomy to Vast).
Meditation Chamber:
No prerequisite. Lets you Empower to then give another of your facilities an order even if it has already been given an order that Bastion turn (this also generates 1d8 BP, so I think this is a way to gain additional BP). Additionally, if you meditate here over a period of seven days you gain advantage on two types of saving throw, determined randomly, for the next 7 days (you roll on a table and reroll repeats).
Menagerie:
No prerequisite. Let you Recruit creatures to add to the menagerie. Over the course of 7 days, your hirelings can find various kinds of beast to bring and house at your menagerie. These beasts will act as bastion defenders, or can act as they would with their normal stat block. There are different costs for different creatures, all of which are beasts or occasionally monstrosities (you can get an Owlbear). CR 0 creatures cost 50g, 1/4 cost 250g, 1/2 cost 500g, 1 cost 1000g, 2 cost 2000g, and CR 3 creatures cost 3500g. The menagerie is big enough to contain four large creatures, with four small or medium occupying the space of one large creature.
Observatory:
Requires the ability to use a spellcasting focus. Lets you Empower for a 50% chance to get a Charm of Darkvision, a Charm of Heroism, or a Charm of Vitality. Also, if you spend a long rest in the observatory, you can cast Contact Other Plane once within the next 7 days without expending a spell slot.
Pub:
No prerequisite. Lets you Research to send the bartender's spies to find creatures that are familiar to you within 50 miles that aren't too well-hidden for them to access or hidden by magic. Additionally, there's a Pub Special always on tap, which have magical effects when drunk. For example, you might have Bigby's Burden, which gives the effects of the Enlarge part of Enlarge/Reduce for 24 hours, or Sterner Stuff, which provides immunity to the frightened condition. You can enlarge the pub for 2000g from Roomy to Vast and gain a second Pub Special beverage on tap.
Reliquary:
Requires the ability to use a Holy Symbol or Druidic Focus as a spellcasting focus. Lets you Harvest to produce a talisman that can be used as a spellcasting focus in place of any material component with a cost of 1000g or less, but only once. Additionally, if you spend a Long Rest in your Bastion, you can cast Greater Restoration once for free in the next seven days, without expending a spell slot or a material component.
Moving on, we come to the final set of special facilities, which require you be 17th level or higher.
Demiplane:
Requires the ability to use an Arcane focus as a spellcasting focus. Lets you Empower to grant yourself temporary hit points equal to five times (wow) your level after spending an entire long rest there over the next 7 days. Additionally, while in the Demiplane, you can use a Magic action to create a nonmagical object of your choice out of nothing, which can be no bigger than a 5-foot cube and must be made of wood, stone, clay, porcelain, glass, paper, nonprecious crystal, or nonprecious metal. You must finish a long rest before using this feature again. The Demiplane and its contents cannot be scried upon using Crystal Balls or Divination spells or similar magic.
Guildhall:
Requires Expertise in a skill. Lets you Recruit to commission on or more members of your guild to perform a special assignment. These vary by guild type - you might earn gold or create something big like a ship (if it's a shipbuilder's guild).
Sanctum:
Requires the ability to use a Holy Symbol or Druidic Focus as a spellcasting focus. Lets you Empower a creature of your choice to gain temporary hit points equal to your level when they finish a long rest. Addtionally, if you spend a Long Rest in your Bastion, you can cast Heal once during the next seven days for free. You can also make the Sanctum the destination of your Word of Recall, and one creature who arrives at the Sanctum by that spell also gains the benefits of the Heal spell.
War Room:
Requires Fighting Style or Unarmored Defense. Can Recruit to add Lieutenants, who reduce the chance for your bastion to lose defenders, or to recruit soldiers, up to 100 guards or 80 guards all on riding horses, which require 1g per day per guard and per horse. The war room comes with two lieutenants (who use the veteran stat block) to work there, but you can recruit up to ten at a time.
Now, we've been talking a bit about bastion defenders, which means we'll need to get into some of the other elements of the bastion.
Bastion Events happen when the player issues the Maintain order to their Bastion - which they only do if they're no using the facilities for other Bastion Actions. When this happens, you roll a d20 and consult a table to figure out what happens. 45% of the time nothing happens, while the others are a mix of good and bad. On a 10, meaning only 5% of the time if you aren't using your various Bastion Actions, it gets attacked, and you'll need to roll 6d6, losing a defender on any roll of a 1, and one of your special facilities is damage and forced to shut down until it can be repaired during your next Bastion Trun.
Right, so let's do some analysis and feedback.
First off, I think that some balance needs to be worked on. For example, the Demiplane option grants an amazing amount of temporary hit points - at level 17, when you can get it, you'll be picking up 85 temp HP by taking advantage of it. Why does the Sanctum give only a fifth as much?
Also, things like Barracks and Armories provide an effect that is important for your bastion defenders, who are really only relevant in the cases of two of the Bastion Events, meaning about 10% of the time you aren't actually using the facilities. I wonder why you would ever not use your facilities, given that there's usually no cost and sometimes you earn gold by using them.
Naturally, I'm looking at World of Warcraft's Garrisons as a cautionary tale for creating a mechanical system for player housing. I think this does it better - indeed, it creates a clear and usable center for downtime activities and crafting that D&D has kind of lacked. But I think too much of a focus on maintaining the Bastion itself and getting involved in all the bastion defenders could wind up giving us solutions in search of a problem.
What I'm very happy about is the way it encourages players to buy in to creating their own environments and NPCs. I know that if I ever get to play my Artificer, I'm going to really relish being able to come up with a workshop for him to build his armor suits and design spelljamming vessels.
Indeed, I actually think a system like this for one's spelljammer would have been a really cool thing to get in the sadly anemic Spelljammer box set. If your ship is meant to be your mobile base in those campaigns, it would stand to reason that you'd have some personal facilities aboard your ship (that are probably a bit more cramped).
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