Hello all! I’m working on trying to recreate the concept of a Cohort, from Pathfinder and old D&D editions, in DW. Here’s what I’ve been thinking of, suggestions and fixes are welcomed. I should note, this is intended to be part of a PDF I’ll be offering through DriveThruRPG, and credit will be given to this group as a whole.
New Compendium Class: Custody of a Cohort
When you gain the service of a person who’s willing to accept your directions for the foreseeable future, take this move. Do not gain a move the next time you level up.
A cohort requires a lot of your time, resources and attention; it’s unlikely you’ll have more than one cohort at a time.
A Cohort’s Service
You are followed by a person who’s willing to do as you bid them. Write down a Commitment, the reason the cohort is willing to follow you. A few example Commitments:
• Gar wants to understand how I was able to defeat him in combat.
• Helga was told by her superiors to help me get the Chalice.
• Vince is connected to me in some mysterious way, and trusts me to get us out of this alive.
The cohort has Loyalty similar to a hireling, except that it’s much harder to raise or lower. Your cohort starts with a Loyalty of 2. When taking the End of Session move, if you’re supposed to mark any XP you can choose to instead gain +1 Loyalty. Then ask yourself this question: Did your cohort had a reason to doubt their Commitment? If so, take -1 Loyalty.
Your cohort has 4 points to distribute between hireling skills of your choice.
Choose a type of service:
• Fight alongside you
• Do your errands
• Scout and search
• Take care of you
Your cohort will always agree to act according to your commands that relate to this type of service. Otherwise, the cohort will do what you tell them to, so long as it isn’t obviously dangerous, degrading, or stupid. When the cohort finds themselves in a dangerous, degrading, or just flat-out crazy situation due to your orders roll+Loyalty. On a 10+ they stand firm and carry out the order. On a 7–9 they do it for now, but come back with serious demands later. Meet them or the cohort takes -1 Loyalty.
If Loyalty ever reaches 0, your cohort loses all confidence in the Commitment. They’ll act upon this decision as they see fit. If Loyalty reaches 5, reset it to 2 and gain an enhancement from the following list.
When your cohort leaves your service, for whatever reason, choose either to gain a new cohort if a willing person is available, or replace this move with an Advanced Move of your class.
Enhancements
Skilled: Gain 2 more points to distribute between the cohort’s skills.
Know-how: Gain a new hireling skill with 1 point.
Flexible: Choose another type of service.
New Development: Rewrite the cohort’s Commitment. This enhancement can only be chosen after the two of you underwent a major event together, and had some time to talk.
I’m aware that this is quite long and complicated, for a DW move. For now, I’m fine with that.
📌
What in the existing hireling rules is failing for you that you want this?
I think Perilous Wilds has some expanded hireling rules you should check out. Doesn’t mean you can’t do your own thing though. http://drivethrurpg.com/product/156979/The-Perilous-Wilds
Lester, I’m looking for a connection between a specific PC and a specific NPC. Give emphasis to the relationship between them, while still keeping the NPC in the “under your orders” category.
Daniel, I’ll check it, thanks!
Subby sub sub
Regarding the robustness of the mechanics, is this something you see yourselves using? Or is it too much, maybe even against the spirit of DW’s simplicity?
I find that these add alot more text to something that i feel works fine. Thats just my tastes, and shouldnt ever stop someone from making awesome hacks 🙂
As for the sugested Perilous Wilds Followers, i would use those modifications for a more structured hireling. They are quite nice, and suggest you read them if you havent yet
They look just like Hirelings to me, too. But the Hirelings in my game had commitments as you describe – they weren’t just folks for hire – even if they weren’t written down. So I think that’s valuable, and makes the Hireling more than the bonus-giving meat-shield that some other groups think they are.
After reading the expended hireling rules from Perilous Wilds, I think I’ll refer the reader to them while still including this mechanics as a suggestion for “if you want something more”. I believe the reader might still want to consider this, because of the context of the rest of the PDF – it’ll be self-evident, once you see what’s the PDF’s all about.
Thank you everyone for helping me reach a decision!