MY NEW NES!
My turn at trying an simulationist/arcader type of NES. Brace yourselves. This isn't going to be a fast paced NES either. It will start at the year 900. The individual lordships may not be correct, or whatever, but I will try and do my best, and I hope you will do your best to realise the continuance, and strengthening of your noble family.
With that I would like to go over the rules...
Economy
Your economy will be a number of the collective levels of all your cities put together. This amount will be accumulated every february and august.
Your gold is accumulated by your cities every six months (February and August). Each city will have a gold value (I'll call this it's "level"), and this is the amount at which you will gain gold each february. You
can not increase your gold economy by simply saying "Increase economy". It simply won't compute. Your economy will be grown depending on a couple of factors. Listed as follows:
A. Circumstances: Sometimes circumstances, such as Constantinople being right there in the middle of trade between the middle east and europe. This circumstance would obviously have a boosting effect on the city. There are plenty of different circumstances that may effect a city's gold level.
B. Policy: A ruler with who ennacts policies that have a positive effect on the business ventures of a city will obviously gain more gold from said city. At the same time, crappy policies will have crappy effects.
C. Taxes: High taxes will bring you short-term boost in income, but in the long-run it drains your city's economic base. Low and no taxes will have positive effects on your overall economy at the cost of short-term loss in gold accumulation.
D. Ruler's Efficiency: Your ruler can only be in so many places at one time. If your ruler owns too many lands, he cannot govern to the fullest of his ability. If your lands aren't ran at a high enough efficiency, you may want to make one of your courtisans into a Lord, so that he can govern in your name. A ruler's politics rating will decide how effectively he can govern his lands.
Taxes
You may tax your people none,light,moderate,or heavy. You may tax different regions under your direct governance at different levels. Say, for instance, you own 2 cities. 1 of these cities you may tax heavy, the other you may not tax at all.
Moderate taxes bring you the amount of money as shown as the gold value of the city. No taxes brings in no money. Light taxes brings in 50% of a city's gold value. Heavy taxes brings in 150% of a city's gold value, and lower's it's value.
In addition to high taxes, you may loot a city to bring in an extra 200% of it's gold value. Doing this will drop it's gold value to half of it's pre-loot value.
If you do not say otherwise, you will accumulate moderate taxes on all cities. A skilled ruler will use tax policy to his advantage.... And remember.
Army
Your force's are the backbone of any lordship in this time era. Thus you must worry about how to best strengthen your forces. There are many factors you may use when worrying about your army's stats. Numbers, Equipment, and Ammunition. For every gold, you can raise 100 troops from your populace. You can only raise an amount of troops equal to the gold value of all your cities put together times 10 on any 1 turn (I have 2 cities, one is has a vlue of 30, and one has a value of 40. I can raise 700 troops this turn).
In addition to the ability to raise an army from your populace... You have a force of Knights which have pledged loyalty to your lord. This number will be represented in the templates. Each Knight will be assumed to have 2 men-at-arms who fight specifically for said Knight.
Another way of raising an army is through mercenaries. There will be bands of mercenaries throughout the lands, who will join a lord's cause for a pay check each month. Mercenaries are usually very well trained, but highly motivated by coin.
Navy
It's pretty expensive to maintain a fleet these days. There will be a section of the rules specifically for fleets. It'll show how costly a ship is to build, it's stats, and the upkeep required to maintain the ship once it sets sail.
When a ship is in your port, it doesn't require maintnance.
Ships travel quite a bit faster than armies do... So if you're wanting to get somewhere, you may want to think about traveling via ship.
If you have no port, but have lands that are near the port, you may opt to build a port. How much time and money is spent on the port will effect the capacity of the port you build.
Upkeep
An army needs to be fed and payed. Thus, every hundred soldiers that remain a part of your retinue require 1 gold per month.
Every hundred Knights require 3 gold every month for upkeep. (This includes the cost of their men-at-arms) Keep in mind, you only have to pay this upkeep when you have called these men to arms. Otherwise no upkeep is needed for your knights.
Mercenaries' cost is different per band.
You may say to yourself "Damn, it's too expensive to maintain even a medium sized army". This is done on purpose. Many times a bare-bones garrison force is used in these times durring peace, due to this fact, durring these days. The more money you have in the bank, the larger the army you can raise when you need them most, and the longer you can maintain said army, should a campaign last longer than anticipated.
Keep in mind, that if you have lower than 100 men at any one time, you do not have to pay any upkeep.
Equipment
The better the equipment the higher the cost (amount depending on the equipment). All soldiers have their weaknesses and strengths. Such as pikemen and bowmen ruling cavalry, and Cavalry ruling over infantry, and infantry ruling pikemen and everything ruling a bowman in short range.
To make weapons, you simply put in your orders how much you want to make, and the cost associated. There will be a seperate portion of the rules set aside for weapons and their cost. Each unit you buy, will be a unit of 10.
Some cities will have a specialty. If a specialty starts up in a city, it will be able to create that certain type of weapon/armor at half-price. (Both in time and money)
A smart lord may have a large surplus of arms to be ready at a moment's notice, in case a war should erupt. If you raise an army, and you find yourself without weapons and armor to equip them all, the remnants of the army will simply be pitchfork wielding ragged clothes wearing rabble that like to die real quick.
Amunition
The more amunition your men have the more dammage they can inflinct onto the enemies. It is worthless to have archers if you do not give them any arrows to fire. 1 gold per 100 arrows. 1 gold per 60 bolts (For crossbows)
Loyalty
Loyalty is divided into 2 sections. First section is loyalty from the Knights. Third is loyalty from your common folk. Each will be on a scale from 1-100, based on a percentage of loyal vs. unloyal followers you have. Thus, if your knights have a loyalty of 30%, that means they are very independant, and a large portion of these knights may find a reason not to answer your call to arms.
In addition, mercenary bands will have a loyalty rating beside their stats in your template. The longer you have a certain mercenary group employed, the more loyal it will become to you. Eventually a lord may even get a band of mercenaries to join him for good, and perhaps promote their leader to a courtisan position.
Leadership
Every ruler and members of his court have stats. These stats are as follows...
Leadership: Ability to lead men into combat.
Combat: Personal combat ability. High value means he can personally kill enemies more effectively. (Useful in tournaments and duels)
Naval: Ability to lead naval forces into combat.
Intelligence: Has alot of effects both on and off the battlefield. A smart lord or courtisan will find the most efficient ways to impliment policy, and pull off special tricks in battle.
Politics: Ability to manage lands properly. A higher value would allow you to manage a larger region at full efficiency.
Each of these stats are on a scale from 1 to 20, with 20 being the best you can have. You may consider 10 as the "average", and expect anything lower than a 10 to have a detrimental effect on the section in question. (Thus, a ruler with 3 politics would cause more harm than good on your overall economy. Probably shouldn't have him in charge of your domestic affairs, if possible.)
If you need another courtisan, you can promote one of your knights. Each courtisan will have a different price tag, but it will be yearly on February when his salary must be payed.
Language
This is the language of the region.
Household
In addition to your lord, you will have the members of your house. On your template will be a list of your lord's immediate family (Wife and kids). Everyone will age 1 year on February. When a kid reaches age 15, you must write a story on the education of the kid, so that his stats are influenced. Otherwise everything will be completely random. Do not worry about writing a story for your girl. You and I both know they don't matter (In the medieval days anyways
)
Trade
There will be caravans travelling to and fro durring the course of this NES. There will be a seperate template for these, and that template will have the location of the caravan, along with the goods they have for sale, and the price of said goods, and what they are willing to buy from the region they are in, and the price at which they're willing to buy. And the amount of gold a caravan has in store.
Caravans are the easiest way for each region's specialty to be transported from place to place. There will be times when prominent merchants in a lordship confront the lord to ask for money or goods to sponsor a caravan. At this point, negotiations would begin about how much the lord would sponsor, and what said lord's cut of the profits would end up being.
Everything with caravans are negotiable. If a caravan is saying they want to buy a certain good for a specific price, the lord with said goods may offer a counter-proposal.
Also, nothing bars a lord from siezing a caravan and it's goods. This should be done with caution. A lord who gets a reputation for siezing caravans may no longer find caravans entering his realm to do business. Caravans may also be accompanied by a force of men-at-arms who's job it is to protect the caravan from any who would attempt to do it harm.
Example of template.
Household[ /B][player's name]
Head of Household:
Language:
Knight Loyalty:80%
Peasant Loyalty:50%
Gold Economy:10
Treasury:30 gold
Homeland army:100(Short Sword/Leather)
Extra Equipment:
Amunition:
Navy:No port 
Family
Wife/Age
Son1/age(L/C/N/I/P)
Son2/age(L/C/N/I/P)
Daughter1/age
Courtisans
So and so/age(L/C/N/I/P)(Salary)
So and so/age(L/C/N/I/P)(Salary)
Cities
City1:Lvl(Notable garbage)
Vassals
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Example of Mercenary band templates
The Knights of BOOBS!(working for so and so)
Leader:Boob-E master
Troops:50 Knights, 100(Long Sword/Large Shield/Scale Mail)
Location:City
Coffers:6 gold
Upkeep:2/month
Asking price:3/month
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Example of caravan templates
A note on goods: You'll notice that beside each good in the caravan is 2 numbers divided by a slash. This is the rate at which the good will be bought. i.e. 5/1 would mean 1 units would be bought at the cost of 1 gold. The same goes for demand.
Jimbob's Van(10% cut to Lord OMGWTFBBQ)
Leader:Jimbob!
Coffers:10 gold
Goods:120 Long Swords(8/2), 100 Leather(7/1)
Demand:Chain Mail(20/5)
There won't be any caravans at the very begining, but the first caravan will probably start up turn 2.
