Here's a few examples to help give an idea.

Military

     Mercenary Captain: Decreases X% of troop maintenance cost.

     Drillmaster: Reduces time required to train soldiers

     Chief Armorer: Increases X% of troop armor defense points.

Social

     Head Magistrate: lowers civil unrest and corruption by X amount through law

     Chief Clerk: Lowers cost to maintain city buildings.

     Chief Tax Collector: Raises X% amount of money from taxes

Research

     The Librarian (who strangely looks like an orangutan): Reduces cost to research items.

Other

     Master of Assassins: makes espionage missions more efficient and lowers civil unrest through fear.

     King of Thieves: Puts more money in your coffers through questionable means (heh, heh, imagine putting him the same room with the Head Magistrate.)

     Head Matron of Seamtresses: makes your people more happy and loyal through...  

I like it more depth = delicious quality. (yummy)

I kinda imagine a council would be along the as the 'governers' discussed in other threads, except by different names.   That would allow you to monitor and assign tasks to each of the different 'brains' of your kingdom (or is it channelerdom?) beyond just city management.

Right after more info on magic system plans, I want a basic outline of how champion units will work. Fenhiro's basic concepts could probably work out without the need for an on-map unit to fill any of the roles, but I'm still hoping that champions will be both potentially somewhat numerous and able to work both in the field and at home. In my dream world, we'd have both something like an Advisor's Council to help a channeler deal with the realm as a whole and some settlement-leader slots (administrator, viceroy, whatever) where champions could work to help a specific location.

It'd be interesting if the makeup of the Royal Council changed with the faction.  Some might divide advisory and administrative duties out to city governors - others might maintain a small council of minor hedge wizards.  Just an idea...

Okay you got a point, NTjedi. But fortunately this just a rough draft, so it isn't set in stone. But I do like the concept to make the King of Thieves more of a social nuisance to rival factions.

Though, I would have to disagree about not having a thief in a government council (I would). Who better to oversee the muck work than someone who already does it for a living. Not to mention having a self financed spy network helps. Of course some factions would object to the idea (especially the morally righteous), but for the more machiavellian factions wouldn't dream passing up such an asset.

Yeah it would be interesting to see how (or what) changes occur in the Royal Council as your faction grows, expands and evolves over time. What I don't know

Balking at a Master Thief advisor seems like a modern worry to me, or maybe just a little to rosy a view on how governments, especially authoritarian ones, can work. It is not an unreasonable idea for rulers to have close advisors whose role is not common knowledge or is even fairly secret. Sometimes that could be because the advisor's job is dirty (spying, murdering) and sometimes because the advisor "should" be an enemy of the state but in fact provides value to the monarch despite doing something like running illegal businesses (brothels) or good old fashioned theft and extortion.

In other words, if a Master Thief can bring enough info and/or 'special forces' to the table, who's to say other than the monarch whether that rascal needs killing or not. Even if the hometown Rogues Guild takes a steady cut of caravan traffic and regularly creates new business for the town silversmiths, a monarch might see that 'resource flow' as just another form of taxation. At least that's how it seems when I try to put on my fuedal thinking cap.

What about "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer?"

Somewhat more seriously, think about the fact that "coaltion governments" existed long before western parliaments started looking like we see them today. After all, regardless of any specific details, the art of government is an art of compromises.

It seems to me that your take on including a Thieves' Guild rep in a royal council is really a role-playing POV, which is more than fine by me. But despite my growing interest in the RPG aspects of this game, my strongest interest is in seeing as flexible and complex an underlying rule set as is possible. In tabletop RPG terms, I want an engine that's more like GURPS or the Hero System than it is like D&D or Runequest.

Gee and here i thought people would baulk at the idea of a representative of Seamtresses (prostitutes for those unfamiliar with the term) being in the royal council.

I'm gonna have to disagree with NTjedi on not trusting thieves. You can trust that they'll rob ya blind and you wont even notice.

If we put the theory of "two way loyalty" aside we might find that thieves in general could be very patriotic. In that they like stable governments for people tend to feel more secure and are less inclined to protect their valuables. You know, if there's a crisis people'll hide grandma's jewelry under the mattress but if everything is calm and orderly then people will get lazy. Thus making it easier for a thief. So thieves in general would have a natural interest in the welfare of the government. Not to mention the potential of being rewarded with a general pardon upon retirement would be icing on the cake.

Of course, the beauty about this Royal Council system is that you will be allowed to choose who ever you want to be in your council, if you don't want a master thief (for whatever reasons) don't pick him. Ultimately, in a way, the royal council sole purpose is to help better define your play style and your way of thinking. It would give us the players an another layer to define our factions and make them more unique.

 A shady master thief who's part of a 3rd party thieves guild could be used for stealing money from your own citizens... but heck why not ask him to send his people to steal from your opponents instead!  Why steal from your own citizens who might end up leaving your cities when you could steal from opponents which would increase the chances of new citizens moving into your towns! 

You are highly mistaken if you think thieves will ONLY be stealing from citizens.  A shady thief which cannot be trusted could not only steal from members of your high council, but possibly even the channeller himself.  Not to mention if he's part of the high council he gains knowledge of everything discussed which he can turn and sell to one or more players.  He would even be able to develop relationships with members on your high council which he could later use for corrupting them!!  This corruption could cause the chief tax collector and the shady master thief to steal extra gold for themselves, or convince the head magistrate that with the channellers assassination the thieves and guards combined would be the new rulers, etc., etc., .  

ANYONE  who's part of the high council must be  HIGHLY TRUSTED.  So a master thief could work, but his loyalty to the kingdom must be solid.

The problem is that an unloyal thieves guild will do more than just steal extra money from citizens... who if ever discovered their leader supported a criminal of people would increase the risk of a revolution!  An unloyal thieves guild who is on the same high council as the top treasury, political and military advisor  is not only risky, but downright INSANE.  Seriously he would gather the secrets being discussed in the main meeting and then turn around and sell them.  So there's goes the planned surprise attack or the simultaneous peace treaty between two nations at war.  Not to mention he would increase the chance for CORRUPTION with your high officials.  The list goes ON and ON and ON !

There's a  BIG  difference between using a shady master thieves who's part of a 3rd party thieves guild  and  allowing a shady master thief to sit in regular meetings as part of the HIGH COUNCIL !!   Seriously the list of problems are ENORMOUS!

  This has nothing to do with an RPG  point of view...  this has to do with having a reliable and trustworthy high council.  I don't want anyone to be part of my high council who obviously would turn around and consider selling secrets which were discussed in the high council meetings.  It would be foolish to have someone  part of the high council who would not only increase corruption of your high officials, but possibly steal from them or assassinate them !! 

That was sort of one of my points, although I don't think you need to narrow scope to such recent history. After all, a great many stories about royal families are full of all manner of betrayals and murder, including things like suborning Royal Councilors, senior eunuchs, and princes and princesses who cannot inherit.

Lol... you know when you think about it there's not much difference between a thieves guild and a government. i mean both steal from the people (thieves are just more honest/obvious about it). Everyone hates a taxcollector and a pickpocket (not much difference there either).

And NTjedi, i can think of a few reps who would be worse then a master thief: a power hungry relative who either tries to manipulate you or tries to have you removed through natural causes (a knife in the back for a king is a natural cause of death). A drooling, incompetent idiot is another. Corporal Nobby Nobbs (at least a master thief has a little self control). The Spanish Grand Inquisitor (his name rhymes with Talk-Him-Outta, heheh, don't know how to spell it). An unpredictable, homicidal maniac who could go ape $&@% at any second.

I diagree with some of what you have said, namely that you would need a 3rd party thieves guild to steal from your own people. The way I see it, the sort of person you would have as a master thief could be TRUSTED to steal from your own people because the channeler is NOT a citizen. Just because they happen to pay taxes to you doesn't mean you can't collect some fees that aren't on the books.