Non-Player Character
NPC
Non-player characters (NPC's) are characters who contribute to the story of a player character (PC) in myriad of ways.
NPC Progression
NPC's have skills and merits which may be advanced by the player who owns them, through the Experience Ledger. There is no limit on Arcana, race, and so on. However, NPC's cannot be awarded free Merits nor forms of experience debt - as a caveat, their Merit progression is separate from the player's.
Formations
Formations of NPC's are sets of NPC's that meld with the background of the story, and may or may not have details associated with them. They serve a specific purpose, and they might come and go with the flow of a narrative, often replaced in time. Formations beyond a hundred (10^2) must be applied for in the Support Forum.
Formations are awarded in powers of ten (10, 100, 1,000, and so on) and they have Apprentice-level skills in anything pertaining to their duties. Every owned formation beyond the allowance is a Formation Merit to obtain, with additional Formation Merits expended to expand their size and skills. Formations must make narrative sense to be awarded, upgraded, and maintained - as such any of these changes must be applied for in Prophet Support with the reasoning behind them.
Formation Merits
Formation Merits are a form of Merit that follows its own experience curve. Each Formation Merit costs 25 XP + 25 XP for each Formation Merit purchased before it.
The skill tier of a Formation may be increased twice by Formation Merits, from Apprentice to Journeyman, up to Expert. Master-level skills may not be added to a Formation.
Formation Limit
A player may purchase any number of formations and divide them between any number of specialties and tasks, but the size of them is affected by the Formation Limit. A king might have two 10,000 man Formations loyal to him as his retinue, spending a total of 8 Formation Merits to do so. The maximum amount of upgrades for a standard Formation is 5 (100,000 Formation Limit) + 2 (Expert Skills) for a total of 7.
10: Anyone 100: Minor Title (County), Local Enterprise 1,000: Major Title (Duchy), Regional Enterprise 10,000: Major Title (Kingdom), Continental Enterprise 100,000: Major Title (Empire), World Enterprise
Please refer to the Price List for the price of hiring Formations from factions.
Arcana
A formation with Arcana - including Practices - is limited to 1,000 individuals and requires expending twice as many Formation Merits towards the Formation Limit. Their skills also require four times as many Formation Merits to upgrade. A full regiment of a thousand expert-skill wizards requires expending a total of 14 Formation Merits, which would amount to 2,625 Experience.
Please note that lesser ranked characters descended from a title who might aid their liege would have their own Formation Limits, and diplomacy should not be discounted for the actual number of individuals contributing to an endeavor.
Construct Exception
As loyal undead and automata require expending substantially expensive resources to create and maintain them, they are exempt from all aspects of the Formation System except for needing to expend Formation Merits to increase their size and number to represent the opportunity cost of governing them - there is otherwise no Formation Limit for an artisan, only time and ingenuity.
