Not really related to the RPG, but that was one of the things that irked me in the Dune universe. If the Imperium has millions of planets, why do Houses have only one planet (or a couple)? It would be feasible that Real Great Houses have a whole area of space with lots and lots of planet. Or if they are limited to a couple there should be millions of noble houses, unlikely, but you get my point. I think this one of the points in Dune one should graciously gloss over. 
Its a good question here’s my take.
There are a lot of planets, but a very finite amount of ones that are habitable and/or mineral rich. I also assume the Guild keeps some really good ones quiet for themselves as they are the only ones capable of looking for more.
I get the impression that while there are ways to do it naturally, Dune doesn’t really have large scale terraforming technology. Also, given how some House treat their planets, some might be rendered inhabitable with pollution or empty of resources after a generation.
Then you add to that the political power of having more planets. Certainly the Corrino claim several, and they gave nine to House Taligari. Even the Harkonnen have at least two (Giedi Prime and Lankevil). But each new planet a House is given grants them more power, and as the Emperor controls who gets what I expect there are a fair few planets ‘in waiting’ to be granted as rewards for loyalty.
Then there is the betrayal factor. Sometimes a loyal House minor is given a small planet to administrate on behalf of its House Major. But then they use this to claim independence and achieve Major House status.
So basically, there are a lot of planets, but not all of them are useful, and everyone is very stingy with giving them out.
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There’s another factor to consider - the difficulty and expense of administering a multi-planet House thanks to the Spacing Guild monopoly.
The costs required for regular transport between two star systems might outweigh the economic benefits of controlling that second planet, especially if your House isn’t notably wealthy.
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I think the transport is not that much of a problem. It would function like the colonies in India or Americas. They had limited transportation too and it worked.
I think Andy touched most points. I think that Herbert simply did not give much thought of these things, as his stories were not much about planet hopping as such.
True. But the British built and manned their own ships. They weren’t forced to deal with a totally opaque third party with an absolute monopoly who could jack up shipping costs 2X (or 20X) at any time and for any reason; or simply refuse them service entirely.
The only estimate we have for the size of the Imperium is an extrapolation from one of the Dune Appendixes. It talks of “…80 million deaths, approximately 6,000 for each planet in the Landsraad…”.
Which works out at a bit over 13,000 inhabited planets. Nothing about how industrialised or populated these are however.
Dragging in the Dune Encyclopaedia (Non-cannon, but perennially popular) that gives us an upper and lower band for the number of House Majors. Each House Major has between 1 & 10 votes in the Landsraad and the number of votes allocated to House Majors is 400. So our range of Major Houses is 40-400. Which feels like a reasonable number. (The British House of Lords has ranged from ~50-777).
The way I’d square this particular circle is fiddle the definitions. (AKA Fudge)
Because of the Guild, distances between planets is effectively irrelevant. But the Guild won’t stop at every two bit town, only the major ones. These are the ones that are counted as planetary Fiefs. Around these are the local systems that non-Guild vessels travel to. Many of these may have habitable planets, but they aren’t significant so get lumped in with the main Fief for purposes of determining who controls them.
Zanovar for example may have 10 local systems that have habitable planets. As they don’t have a Guild Heighliner stopping there the economies are tiny and they all are counted as part of the Zanovar Fief for purposes of awarding it to a House Major. Extrapolate that out for Taligari as a whole and they control about 90 planets. Most of which aren’t particularly valuable though.
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Yeah I’m pretty sure local space FTL is outside of the Guild monopoly. That is if you happen to have a number of solar systems in close proximity they can be traveled to by local traders using local FTL.
Also I like to imagine that under the Imperial House there are some Royal Houses led by Kings/Queens. Then the Major Houses led by Archdukes, Dukes, Counts, Barons. Then the Minor Houses which are planetbound.
I use the Dune Encyclopaedia cause its awesome and I think it should be believed when things in it are fun.
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New question reagarding houses: how does a house like Mikarrol exists?
I mean “pirate and raiders” need Guild transportation to raid. After all there is nothing to raid in their own system(s).
Yet, it is not something the Guild would do. After all even with their power would they assist pirates?
Any ideas or suggestion?
The only way I can think of is if the pirating and raiding are effectively a secondary domain and kept quiet from the rest of the Imperium.
So they have a legitimate reason to move a lot of things around the Imperium and use that as cover for the piracy. I can’t see the Guild not being aware though. Maybe there is a deal whereby the Guild use them to do deniable attacks for their own reasons?
The raiding could be slightly more explained as being effectively mercenaries for hire during kanly and wars of assassins.
Houses hire them to perform a raid on their enemy. The understanding is that they only do what they are paid for and dont take sides. So theoretically they could raid both sides. No different to a House that supplies ground forces as mercenaries.
I agree that it is a still a stretch, though not as big as the one to explain piracy.
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Thank you for your answer. I had similar thoughts.
That again raises the question how they acquire their slaves. It faces the same problem. They have to get to the periphery planet of X of House Y and go back home. Again, the Guild won’t be happy to assisst in such an endeavour.
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Interesting point.
We know slaves are a thing in Dune. Not all Houses seem to use them, but certainly the Harkonnens made extensive use.
The Dune Encyclopedia has Gurneys backstory have him be taken in a Harkonnen raid (non-canon and later changed in the House books to having been born a slave), which would imply that some level of raiding is seen as acceptable. Though it might be restricted to if there were hostilities between Houses.
As for the Guild… I think it depends on how you view the Guild.
In my campaign the Guild are neutral between the Houses, but perfectly willing to play politics to ensure the balance in the Imperium. Might they see a bit of light raiding between Houses as a safe way to allow the hotheads to blow off steam? I certainly don’t see them as having a moral issue with slavery and raiding.
They might charge a premium for a raiding force, but they may well allow it.
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The Guild is a balancing factor in may games too.
The problem with premium price is that it will make raiding uneconomical. While slaves are “free” to take, they are not of high value as there are many humans around.
My other idea is that raiding happens around the outskirts where new planets are contested, or newly colonised. Here we have the problem of plausible deniability: Mikarrol raids the colony of House X in unmarked ships. The Gulld knows whom they transported. They can hardly say: “We don’t remember.”
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I am for this option. I think providing transport of raiding forces works for them, as long as it is ‘limited warfare’.
I also agree that there is no way a House can have ‘raiding’ and ‘piracy’ as their main, public, source of income. They need something else.
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I wonder what type of cover besides mercenaries for a conflict would cover pirates and raiders. You could only go in as a merchant once or twice before your cover is blown. Same thing with transporting workers or specialists. Unless the house maintains two separate fleets. One for trade and then an unmarked fleet for raiding and slaving, but that would be expensive. It seems like the House Major Mikarrol, House Minor Reyder, and House Gauger (Harkonnen minor house) are known as raiders and slavers by the entire Landsraad. Any fleet marked as theirs would be suspect in my opinion. Also, they would have to cut the Spacing Guild in to a large amount of the profits to transport their hidden fleets. We know the Guild works with spice smugglers and the Freeman for spice outside of the Imperial courts knowledge, so it would not be a huge stretch to do this. I just think it would be crippling financially to make the ventures profitable. Unless the guild can take payment in kind from the raids as opposed to money or spice. There are enough houses to trade in slaves to have slave markets. I just think raids would lead to many wars of Kanly. I don’t think the Landsraad has the power to break the Guild from allowing this, but it would have many political ramifications. The Houses that buy slaves might have a big enough voting block to stop any legal repercussions to raiders and slavers. This still would not stop the wars of Kanly. I think known slavers and raiders would have multiple wars going at some times, with enemies allying against them. Maybe not the one in service to the Harkonnens, out of fear of that great house. I could even see a few minor house keep by the Corrino’s for this purpose to destabilizing their enemies, but in secret. Only enough power to protect the raiders and slavers would keep the Kanly wars at bay for these families. Now that I think about, I can see a lot of intrigue, skirmishes and battles to keep any campaign based of this busy for a while. Especially if you willing to indulge in a morally evil or gray campaign. Back to my original point are there any better covers that we could thing of besides mercenaries, merchants, and worker transports as covers for raiders and slavers?
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If we take Arrakis for example, than the Guild has to be a silent partner at least. But on Arrakis there is spice, which is very much coveted by the Guild. What use do they have for slaves? Even if the raiders can capture substantial other material goods, I have diffuculty to justify their value to be comparable to spice.
Some other ideas:
- House Gauger can capture slaves for the Harkonnen alone, as the Harkonnen are big enough to buy up all the slaves. So they can at least largely resolve the buyer problem.
- As hinted in the description of house House Mikarrol they can use other means to enslave people, like lending. Maybe raids are very rare and the majority of slaves are more “caught” through financial debt.
- Another option is that they are collected on planets in secret and transported to their planet. No one said the Guild has to look in every cargo container. Not sure if they can produce the number of slaves required, as they have to hope from planet to planet to avoid detection. But with some suspension of disbelieve…
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I agree that spice is much more important than any thing a raider or slaver provides. That is where my theory breaks down for that point. I like your first two points as that makes sense and keeps House Mikarrol out of constant Kanly. You final point is very interesting to me. Smuggling inside a Guild Highliner, what happens if you caught fines, blackmail, interdiction of trade. This leads to more intrigue with one of the most powerful forces in the Empire. What would a House Major or Minor have that is worth the Guild keeping their secret besides Spice? The only thing that comes to mind is using the House to bring unruly smugglers to heel and possible candidates for Navigators among the slaves taken. Another option would be space craft besides a Highliner. The other option is what if a family member has joined the Guild as an agent. This Guild member has dual loyalty helping his family and the Guild profit from the venture. The flip side is helping his family with out the Guild’s knowledge which would be an interesting agent character.
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Good points. Here is a possibility. To what extent is the Guild interested in checking the cargo?
Let’s say I, as a House, would like to book a transport at the Guild from planet X to Y for 2 transport shuttles / spacecrafts. The cargo is in my ship, so I am not transporting cargo, but ships. I could imagine that the Guild is not interested, nor entitled to check my ship. While in case of cargo they can and will check what they transport. So, that is a possibility to circumvent Guild inspection. As long the ship does not blow up, or does not cause much ruckus the Guild will not care. That why I think slavery operation are covert and not large military raids. One kidnaps a couple of thousand people from a population of billions and moves to another planet. Of course the transport prices are a big, unknown variable here.
Dual loaylty is a neat idea, but it works “once”. I do not think that would be the rule for all houses.
CountThalim’s suggestion with light raiding is neat. I am just not sure how it would work in practice. The Guild arrives, drops the raiders and picks them up and leaves? The first thing is the attacked House will do is to ask who it was. How can the Guild not answer?
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I like that covert slaving operation, I think besides quasi legal debt slavery, that is the best option. The light raiding make sense and as long it is spread out it would work. The issue is why would the Guild not answer. Maybe it a non disclosure agreement that is with the Guild, again quasi-legal. Maybe they do answer if the bribe is big enough, and a war of assassins starts,. I am going to ponder that for a bit. Thanks for all the help.
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I’ll raise you a better question - why WOULD the Guild answer? Privacy and security of travelers would be a major element of Guild operation. Maybe if the Landsraad as a whole voted to demand an answer or something but I bet secrecy of travel is useful.
Also remember hundreds, if not thousands, of ships travel among Heighliners on each leg of a journey. So there being a small group of raiders is a small drop in the travel bucket.
Also I think ‘little war’ is probably totally allowed.
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That is a good question / answer. Especially if we consider that heighliners are 20 km in length. Lot’s stuff can be transported in it, even if a fraction of the volume is cargo space. So, yes, I think the covert way is alright.
The real problem is the pick up. Either the target must have no space defense, or have it destroyed. It would cause a problematic situation if the raiders arrive with their pursuer in tow. Raiding is still fishy IMHO.