Dungeon Master: Fragmented State

Political intrigue is one of those things that make for a great session or a great campaign. However, there are many different ways to create such a session or campaign and different ways to create the setting. However, I hope to narrow down and focus on games set in places with heavily fragmented states. It could be that a bigger power just hasn't come about yet or that it has fragmented before. Regardless, the result is many small regions interacting with each other.

Reason Why

Having smaller and less powerful kingdoms allows for some spectacular double crosses and also forces dependency. One kingdom by itself can't beat everyone and so, as a result, relations between allies and enemies (potential future allies) are greatly important. It also provides for many different avenues for the players. They could take high ranking roles in a failing kingdom and get absorbed into a bigger one. Doing so loses their original kingdom but could gain them high positions in the bigger kingdom. In this way, even bad situations present opportunities for creative and manipulative players. It also allows for a vastly different set of cultures to be presented in each kingdom as well as changing when large migrations or land gains take place.

Joining Regions Isn't Easy

In these kinds of situation, even in the event of being able to join multiple kingdoms into one, the unity can be shaky at best. As a result, it allows for a wide range of events and activities for the players such as kingdoms growing, fragmenting, alliances changing, takeovers by marriage, and many others. There are also players who like the idea of being able to unite the world or at least playing a part in that goal. For them, this situation is exactly what they'd want. These kinds of situations are not very stable either. Since alliances can shift, uncertainty plays a big role and stability is absent. This is different than if the campaign or session took place in a stable and united land (though it could yield very entertaining and vastly different sessions).

Incentives

These kinds of situations also allow for many incentives to be given to the players. Since massive events can take place quite easily between kingdoms, gaining land, fame, and resources can act as a large draw to players. A kingdom that is doing badly could decide to give up a good chunk of land to the players if they help solve their problems as opposed to a prosperous one. At the same time, the stability of the prosperous kingdom provides its own incentive.

Real Life Inspiration

In these kinds of cases I like to be inspired by real historical events, time periods or situations. Typically I like to look at Eastern European history. There were many small, almost city state level powers that eventually became far larger countries (Novgorod Republic, Vladimir-Suzdal, Tver, Grand Principality of Moscow, etc.). However, at the time most other areas also had many small competing kingdoms. For that reason around 1000-1300 AD is one of my favourite time periods to draw inspiration from.