Design Your House

First, get a crayon. Don’t eat it yet, you’ll need it later…

We’ve decided for Houses on Fire that all our houses will be starting a Houses Minor, so the first big choice is all set up. You should already have an idea of the physical geology of your homeworld, and that should help you imagine the circumstances of your House as we move forward, but it is very important to note during this creation process (homeworld, house, and character) that if you find something from a previous step isn’t going to serve the story you want to tell, you should go back and change it before gameplay starts. Before the game starts changing stuff is easy, but afterword, it is difficult as decisions might have already been made (by the GM and other players) based on that information, so it wouldn’t be fair to change it. So, please think deeply about these steps, and revise where you need to, but make sure you let the Game Master know, so we can update any records that are already in place.

Now download a copy of your House Record sheet (there is a copy on my Discord, or you can get a free file direct from Modiphius) and we’ll be on the road to greatness…

1. Choose Domains
2. Revise Homeworld Sketch
3. Banners and Arms
4. House Traits
5. Sketch Out Your House Members
6. Enemies
7. Assign House Attributes

Step One: Choose Your Domains

As a House Minor you will begin with one Primary Domain and one Secondary Domains. Should you get promoted to Hose Major, or Great House, you’ll acquire more domains, but for now, just one Primary Domain and one Secondary Domain. Domains in this sense are what your House produces or is most famous for, pundi rice, artists, or whale fur, nearly anything you can imagine might be the basis of your economic engine. The difference between Primary and Secondary Domains is that your House is recognized as an unparalleled producer in your Primary Domain, while your Secondary Domain represents an activity that is economically important to you, but is an area where you have significant competition. One of the interesting and fun activities you can have is developing new Secondary Domains, and trying to secure dominance in a Secondary Domain to transform it into a Primary Domain. The opposite can happen as well through play, your Primary Domain may be eroded by competitors and you might find it take a Secondary Domain status, or a Secondary Domain may become unprofitable and be lost entirely. A house that does not have at least one Secondary Domain will become bankrupt and lose its seat in the Landsraad. As listed on page 88 of the core rules, each domain has an Area of Expertise, a Category, and a Specialty. It is important to note that this list isn’t meant to limit your choices, only to provide options, if you would like something that doesn’t appear on the list, and it is something that could exist in the economic, political, and technological confines of the Dune universe, you are free to take it.

To make it abundantly clear, only one House will be allowed to have a Primary Domain with the same combination of those three factors.

Areas of Expertise

The Area of Expertise describes how it is that your House excels in a given domain, do they have the best rice harvesting equipment, or do they rely on super-secret rice technology to give them the edge? Multiple House might have the same Primary Domain Category and Specialty, but as long as they have different Areas of Expertise, they aren’t duplicating the same domain, they are completing in different ways.

• Expertise: Your House excels at training or managing the people who lead the area of expertise.
• Machinery: This is any large-scale machinery or devices that might be created, either by the area of expertise or to help craft or maintain the area of expertise.
• Produce: This is something the area of expertise actually produces. Many areas of expertise offer several different types of produce.
• Understanding: This is the theoretical part of the area of expertise and allows a House to develop secret new techniques or strategies they might share with others, for a price.
• Workers: Your House either trains or produces dedicated staff who are responsible for doing the actual work that makes the area of expertise flourish. They are usually required in large numbers.

Categories

Most domains fall into one of these categories, a brief description from the core rules is included, but please see the book (pp 88) for more details.

Artistic

Artistic domains may not be very powerful, but they grant the House both fame and respect across the universe. Those famed for their performers might also use the opportunity to put spies within a traveling company. The famous Face Dancer spies of the Bene Tleilax were originally designed as performers (officially at least).

• Machinery: Stage effects, scenery pieces, scenic art, lighting and sound systems
• Produce: Plays, poems, novels, comedy sketches, musical pieces
• Expertise: Playwrights, poets, composers, directors
• Workers: Actors, stage crew, musicians, speakers, traveling companies
• Understanding: Philosophy, literary criticism, theatrical performance styles

Espionage

Intelligence operations and secrets are the meat and drink of most Houses. As such, there are several who are renowned for supplying the mechanisms of the spy trade. A few even infiltrate other organizations to learn their secrets, not for themselves but so they can sell them to others.

• Machinery: Surveillance devices, sensors, jamming technology
• Produce: Information and secrets from other Houses, probably by a particular specialty (such as military secrets or blackmail information)
• Expertise: Spymasters and agent handlers
• Workers: Agents, spies, infiltrators
• Understanding: Particular forms of espionage and counterintelligence techniques

Farming

Houses that rely on farming tend to be pastoral and peaceful places. However, their power lies in creating
something basic the other Houses may not realize how much they rely on.

• Machinery: Tractors, harvesters, large-scale farming equipment
• Produce: Crops and animal products (from special wheat to sheep and cheese)
• Expertise: Stewards, land managers
• Workers: Farm laborers, shepherds, and herders
• Understanding: New farming techniques, such as rotation, that increase productivity

Industrial

Industrial Houses tend to control planets full of factories and production facilities, but most do not let productivity destroy their home. Industrial items can range from filmbook readers to Guild Highliners, although any technical House must take care to follow Butlerian proscriptions on what they develop.

• Machinery: Factory machines, spacecraft, large vehicles
• Produce: Mass-produced goods, refined alloys, toys
• Expertise: Supervisors, business managers
• Workers: Factory workers, craftsman, mechanics
• Understanding: New techniques for business management and factory operation

Kanly

The next step forward from espionage is assassination. To avoid chaos, the Great Houses agreed on a set of rules for assassination to prevent a slaughter. These ‘forms of kanly’ are designed to limit both assassinations and the inevitable responses and are ruthlessly enforced by all the Houses. As such, they are also a lucrative area of business.

• Machinery: Assassination weapons and traps (hunterseekers, mines, bombs, etc.)
• Produce: Poisons (not just to kill but to stun or weaken and to be near-undetectable)
• Expertise: Assassin masters, operation planners, and trainers
• Workers: Assassins, thugs, infiltration specialists
• Understanding: Means of assassination, infiltration techniques, deadly combat strikes

Military

While war is rarer than assassination, no House wants another to see they have a weak military, as that may be considered an invitation. Military actions are costly and logistically difficult, often requiring expensive Guild payments to move troops to another planet. But if you want to take land or facilities from another House you need soldiers to claim and occupy it.

• Machinery: Battlefield weapons, artillery, large-scale shields, tanks
• Produce: Ammunition, personal weapons, small arms (rifles, pistols, etc.)
• Expertise: Tacticians, officers, strategists
• Workers: Soldiers, engineers, pilots, logistics personnel
• Understanding: Military strategies and new tactics

Political

To some Houses, politics is their meat and drink. These social gadflies don’t just play the complex games of the Landsraad for extra power, they make these games their business. They don’t have much personal power, but they have powerful friends, very useful for a Minor House seeking to rise. Such Houses are the ultimate courtiers, and the leaders of style and etiquette. They know who is doing what to whom and how to get the ear of the most powerful figures. However, they also make good mediators, understanding the complexities of House politics and how to keep everyone happy.

• Machinery: Couture fashion, expensive trinkets, message services
• Produce: Information, secrets, and favors, possibly even from the Imperial House
• Expertise: Political analysts, mediators, diplomats, fashionistas, social planners
• Workers: Courtiers, spies, administrators, servants, entourage
• Understanding: Diplomacy techniques, forms of etiquette

Religion

Faith still plays a large part in the society of the Imperium.
It remains a force powerful enough to create leverage in business ventures and is even a service that
can be sold. The trappings of religion are popular, and some Houses have found a way to monetize religion and package it for sale.

• Machinery: Churches, statues, prayer beads, religious symbols, religious books
• Produce: Prayers, hymns, religious and inspirational writings
• Expertise: Philosophers, clergy
• Workers: Choristers, altar servants, community managers
• Understanding: New religious philosophies, new forms of faith

Science

While the tenets of the Butlerian Jihad remain in force, it does not mean humanity cannot research and develop new scientific ideas. Many Houses have a research and development department to advance their domains and keep ahead of the competition. This domain often couples well with Industrial domains where a House might take full advantage of what they discover, rather than pass it on to others to make solari on.

• Machinery: Laboratory equipment, quarantine areas, entire scientific facilities
• Produce: Chemical compounds, drugs, genetically adapted humans and animals
• Expertise: Scientists and researchers
• Workers: Lab assistants and managers
• Understanding: New scientific research (many different possibilities in many areas)

Step Two: Revise Homeworld Sketch

Now that you know what your House does economically, you will want to go back and look at your Homeworld to make sure that things are going to make sense from a story perspective. Are you living on a barren moon and trying to export pundi rice? It’s not impossible, but you’ll want to make sure you address any inconsistencies and give some narrative treatment for anything that shows up that might be confusing to other players or especially the GM, because these inconsistencies will often make strategic or tactical “soft-spots” others might use against you at some point. Don’t think that is telling you that you shouldn’t have interesting twists in the story of your House or Homeworld, just make sure the ones that are there are things you meant to have there, or you might find yourself blindsided by your own developing story (which really is quite fun if you let it be, but some players might not enjoy the feeling).

Step Three: Banners and Arms

Your coat of arms and banner will become rallying points for your house and allied minor houses, don’t let them down with having something less than heroic. Usually simple is better, but the arms are going to be different than what any other House has so they aren’t easily confused. You can see other Coats of Arms of the Landsraad here. I am working on a page about the use of heraldry in fantasy and sci-fi, but it’s going to take awhile, the wikipedia page on heraldry is quite good, and can be used in the mean time.

Step Four: Select House Traits

Your house begins with a Trait that is the same as your Primary Domain (see above) and one that is a descriptive of your House’s reputation. So House Atreides would have Farming and Honorable. more information on House Traits, please see pages 102 and 142-143 of the core rule book.

Step Five: Sketch Out Your House Members

Each of player will have the Ruler of the House as their primary character, but there will be other characters we flesh out along the way, it will work best if you have an idea of who they all are, but this can change a bit as you start to play your house, and until one of these characters has been “used in game” they can be tweaked and refined without any problem. The other roles you need to consider follow and more information can be found in the core rule book pp 93.

• Consort
• Advisor
• Chief Physician
• Councilor
• Envoy
• Heir
• Marshal
• Scholar
• Spymaster
• Swordmaster
• Treasurer
• Warmaster

Step Six: Enemies All Around

Who are your enemies? Do you have preexisting bad relations with a different House? In Dune: Houses on Fire, your disposition with other Houses has an unexpected role in the mechanics of action resolution. To determine the target number for success on a d20, you will add your House Skill to your House Drive, and your House Drive used for inter-House operation is how much your House hates them! But this is same for the other House, so in contest where both participants really hate one another, both sides will be highly motivated to succeed, creating a terribly dangerous situation for both Houses. The levels of hostility are as follows:

Step Seven: Assign House Attributes

Just like character, Houses have skills:

Battle

The military power of the House. It represents the quality of the training and equipment of the House’s soldiers, spacecraft, and weapons, etc. But it really represents the tactical skill of its lieutenants and generals and how well-placed and positioned its military forces are. It is used when the House goes to war.¹The Great Game: Houses of the Landsraad, Modiphius, pp 88

Communicate

Measures the House’s diplomatic reputation and the favors it is owed. It also represents the acumen of its various envoys, spies, and diplomats across the Imperium. It is used when trying to exert influence in the court or the Landsraad.²The Great Game: Houses of the Landsraad, Modiphius, pp 88

Discipline

The loyalty of the people and forces at its command. If it cannot trust its people, there is a strong chance the House will not have the support it needs to act. It will also make it easier for the enemies of the House to plant false information, spies, and rumors. How the House maintains this loyalty is up to its ruler. Both House Atreides and House Harkonnen command high levels of Discipline from their subjects. But where the Atreides are loved by their people, the Harkonnens are feared. Discipline might be used just before any House action to ensure there are no internal problems that will endanger the mission.³The Great Game: Houses of the Landsraad, Modiphius, pp 88

Move

Measures the House’s response time for any crisis. It is determined by the amount of well-placed agents and resources across the Imperium. The ability to Move is not restricted to weapons and war. A well-placed diplomat can respond to allegations made against the House quickly before they become more damaging.⁴The Great Game: Houses of the Landsraad, Modiphius, pp 88

Understand

The level of academic excellence the House can rely on. This might be in terms of new scientific research or advanced art and craft. It is a vital skill when developing a new project or trying to upgrade and improve the technology the House has available.⁵The Great Game: Houses of the Landsraad, Modiphius, pp 88

As a House Minor your array of stats will be 7, 6, 6, 5, 4. These can be assigned in whatever order you wish and may be changed during play, you can expect about 7 bumps up during your climb to Great House status.

Final Notes

There are a couple things about your House that you don’t get to choose, but are important to understand none-the-less.

Status

As a new House Minor you begin with 20 Status points. These points can be gained or lost through your actions and the actions of others, this is what the points mean:

Income

Depending upon your domains and how well they are doing, you will receive Resources and Wealth every Dominion Turn. You can sell some of your Resources to generate Wealth (Solaris). Each Dominion Turn you will be conducting “Ventures” and those will all have varying costs in both Resources and Wealth.

Upkeep

“He who controls the accounting controls the universe!”

The more you have, the more it costs. Everyone might want to have an invasion fleet sitting around for emergencies, but few can afford it. You’ll need to maintain your Military Power, your Population Loyalty, your Lifestyle, your House skills (that expertise costs cold, hard solaris to keep around), and for your House roles you’ve filled, but we’ll get more into that when we cover Dominion Turns.

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This is a fan site devoted to running Dune: Adventures in the Imperium by Modiphius Entertainment, based on Dune created by Frank Herbert and owned by the Gale Force Nine, a Battlefront Group Company. No use of eithers’ intellectual property on this page is meant to constitute a challenge to either entities’ rights and is intended under fair use provisions. We encourage you to buy a copy of this fine RPG, if you use one of the links provided on this page we’ll receive a small fee that will help support expansion of the material found here. The planetary illustrations here are mostly from the core book and NASA. Art not coming from Modiphius, or NASA are fan works either from myself or other fans, I credit other artists where I have a source available and would appreciate your help finding the origin of other fan art included without attribution. In many places I cite the Dune Encyclopedia, a collective work released in 1983, which I got from a book of the month club accidentally and was my entry point to the Dune universe, I would love to have a link available so you could get your own, but it appears to be out of print.