Hostages

[Command]

Since  this is a criminal game why not offer missions where you have your gangs capture hostages from rival gangs.  Then you get a chance whether the gang you got the hostage from pays the ransom, attempts a rescue, or ignors the hostage.  You can even get a chance on who the hostage is from a daughter of a raval leader to an influential member, to a grunt or one of their own slaves.
 
Their could even be chances where the other gang members try to kidnap your own slaves and troops.  But their is a chances of succeeding mostly depend on where your slaves are working and how skilled your members are.  But their is always a chance of the enemy succeeding because they don't need to kill off the guarding gang to grab the hostage.
 
Does this sound like a good idea?

[DocClox]

Oddly enough, I was thinking along the same lines myself.

It'd be nice to be able to get one rival to declare war on another, with a hostage to ensure good behavior. Or to take (or offer) a hostage as part of peace negotiations. There's one "nice" way for players to win - negotiate alliances among the ruling gangs so everyone can live harmoniously together. Of course, for your own hostages to mean something, you'd need some sort of bond there. That would work well with the proposed marriage objective. Or with the PC's offspring, although it might not work so well if he has the little treasures wearing a collar and working on their backs.

You could also, potentially, improve your street cred by taking the mistress of a rival and publicly humiliating her. It'd be instant vendetta, of course, but sometimes it might just be worth it

[zodiac44]

oooooo...public humiliation!  I like it!  >;o)

[edit]

err....wait, that didn't come out right!  That's not what I meant!  Noooooo!

[Alugere]

...But their is always a chance of the enemy succeeding because they don't need to kill off the guarding gang to grab the hostage.
 
Does this sound like a good idea?

I'd say nix that part about the enemy always having a chance to succeed and it should work. It's stupid and insanely annoying already how people succeed in raping and running away when I have 8 gangs that are fully trained with level 4 weapons and full healing potions all on guard duty. I might see a kidnapping working like that when the girl is working the streets, but just stick a gang at the entrance to the brothel and they can easily stop any gang trying to kidnap someone from inside.

[Wispowill]

I agree with nixing the "always have a chance to succeed" part. Back when I was young, there was a series of text based adventure games called Eamon. The monsters at Eamon always had a small chance for an instant kill, no matter how insignificant they were. It is exceedingly annoying to have a character with heavy armor that you've survived a number of adventures with get taken out by some rat that can only do 1 damage on an unarmored character to begin with. (How does something that can only attack your ankles instant kill without poison, anyway?)

The main point with this is that I've seen some pretty whacked out consequences come from using "always has a chance" type scenarios. In fairness though, it might be possible to balance this out to work ok.

[zodiac44]

I agree with nixing the auto-success.  Brings back memories of old-school D&D - just line up 20 villagers and ask each one in turn what color underwear the king is wearing.  Chances are one will roll a natural 20 on his knowledge check and give you the answer.  >;o)

[Command]

Ya their could also include the possibility of worsening relations with rival gangs if you do it wrong it because of an occasional random fluke.
 
You could even create a ending or an event that could be titled as "Complete Chaos"  the entire city turns into a war zone among the gangs due to a result of an ineptitude with using hostages the right way and an inability to use diplomacy.