Leadership followers, Strongholds and payroll

[Power]

DM variation is not RAW. DM variation is DM variation.

Indeed. And pretty much everything you have listed for followers to do has been predicated purely on DM variation.

No, the follower rules I listed aren't very heavy on DM variation.

How the fuck you managed to jump from "Players build their cohorts" to "That implies players don't get to build followers!" is beyond me. That is not how logic works.

That is precisely how logic works - in an exception based rules system.
Which is what this game is.

No, "denying the antecedent" is distinctly not how logic works. It is a logical fallacy. It's like saying "the sky is blue" "Well, since this object is not the sky, that means it can't be blue." Or in this case "A cohort can do this," "Well, since a follower is not a cohort, that definitively means it can't do this." Not how it works, especially when the Leadership feat itself explicitly states that followers are similar to cohorts and the nearby rules from Ultimate Campaign on followers have you default to cohort rules for building up followers should their character sheet become necessary.

What you can and cannot do with followers isn't very explicitly listed. Ultimate Campaign suggests that followers should not be directly controlled by players and you shouldn't invest too much effort into building them, but that is for convenience's sake and it doesn't state too much about the rules and limitations regarding followers.

 

That is what I keep saying!
And what you keep acknowledging, but then insisting that it does not matter because of possible DM variations, which you acknowledge is not RAW.

There is no hard RAW here, only reasonable inferences and the DM playing it by ear.

Well, Ultimate Campaign's Stronghold story feat requires you to staff a stronghold with 100 combat-capable followers "such as fighters or rangers," so we have a direct example that it is reasonable for your followers to all have PC class levels and for you to have a degree of selection over their capabilities.

Only so far as requiring you to select specific classes. Full design is not stated as being required or necessary.

But it does indicate that your reading that "anything beyond basic descriptors is not allowed" is false, and there are other rules that indicate you should stat out followers as you would cohorts when circumstances make it necessary to reference their character sheets.

However, if events require advancing a follower (such as turning a follower into a cohort to replace a dead cohort), use the same guidelines as for cohorts.

IF you turn a follower into a cohort, THEN design it like a cohort.
And if not . . .
Summarize it without a stat block, including a lack of skills.
Which are needed for crafting.

No, that's a nonsensically restrictive reading. The words "such as" are only used to indicate when this is not an exhaustive list. It explicitly indicates that there are other applicable circumstances as well. The idea here is that the character sheet of followers should not matter 90% of the time. If the character sheet does matter (a circumstance where advancing the follower becomes necessary), you are to build the follower as you would a cohort. While you are discouraged from leveling followers and it is preferred for you to pad new higher level NPCs instead, that is more for convenience's sake to reduce bookkeeping, considering that you are also presented rules for doing precisely that. We already saw it going above and beyond the basic NPC descriptors when Stronghold indicated recruiting PC classes for followers was a thing. And it gets ridiculous if you are running a Wizarding academy and someone were to assert you are not allowed to have followers level up in accordance to the leadership feat. I think the paizo writers would agree that that is not the intention. Their intention is that you keep it simple so that it's easier to manage, and that you build them as you would build cohorts when your followers' character sheets becomes essential.

So it appears that the rules do in fact agree with me, both by logical deduction of an exception-based rules system, and by an overt statement to not build 500 different characters and run them.

No, what you are doing is not logical at all. Denying the antecedent is a patently absurd mode of reasoning.

There is no real resolution to those questions. It depends entirely on the GM, the sort of campaign you are running, the circumstances of your leadership, and how involved you want to be with your followers' lives. The only brightline I can offer is that followers are not hirelings and players shouldn't be made to pay them like hirelings.

 
Which is what I just said.
That you just quoted.

Actually, there is a further inference from downtime rules that followers should be considered as self-sufficient and unpaid from a rules perspective. PF's downtime rules on followers state this: "The Leadership feat can grant you followers—people loyal to you who assist you if they are able. In the downtime system, followers provide additional Influence or Labor to supplement your activities at no cost to you." And in another section of Ultimate Campaign: "Followers can be used like Labor, but aren’t expended like capital because they are loyal to you and don’t leave as soon as an activity is completed." This indicates that you are indeed not paying them under the downtime rules. That doesn't really give a hard indicator on what happens when you are no longer using the downtime rules, but it is reasonable to infer that you should not be paying followers in general. But as always, the GM can play it differently depending on circumstances.

[Samwise]

No, the follower rules I listed aren't very heavy on DM variation.

versus

There is no hard RAW here, only reasonable inferences and the DM playing it by ear.

At this point you are arguing with yourself, not me.
As such, there is nothing else for me to defend or rebut, you already have it covered.

[Samwise]

Okay, so if I understand the debate;

Generally speaking, the followers work for free. Or effectively free in the sense that whatever they are doing is assumed to be paying for their living expenses.
Barring something unusual of course.

While no rules says that overtly, that is the best effect you should see without diving into playing multiple optional sub-games.

So for the SBG, using the followers I would think would qualify for the -30% cost since they are functionally free labor.
Now the actual staff I'm less sure on. Particularly the ones that have a 30gp monthly wage.
I could see it as either they work for free for you and if you run out of followers then you have to pay for the extra staff.
Or;
You have to pay everything.

Again, that comes down to the multiple optional sub-games.
By egregiously strict RAW, leaders of the construction crew and staff above 1st level are "specialists" and would have to be paid individually. However;

Also; how do you folks interpret the part about independent income.

"Income Sources: ... Each income source provides 1% of the stronghold's final price annually as pure profit
--- above and beyond labor costs and other expenses...."

To me that sounds like it may pay for all your labor costs and then 1% on top of that.
Is that correct or am I reading it incorrectly?

Yes, but that is

after

your stronghold is built.
Which means you get to eat all the costs up front, out of your WBL, and then replenish it slowly over the next few decades.
Well, assuming you have any income sources. For which there are, you guessed it, no actual rules beyond DM discretion.
I would also add that while you may not have to pay your followers, you do have to equip them. Arms and armor costs add up very quickly, again coming from your WBL, again having to wait for an income source to replace.
Which is why I suggest handwaving both, and letting the stronghold "pay" for itself and all associated costs, with any "profit" subsumed in ongoing costs to expand and become more important.

Regarding the comment about this being a 3.5 topic and it going all pathfinder;
Given the very minimal conversion work between the two (mostly just condensing skills), I see them as mostly interchangeable.

They really are.
And I would note that between the Business and Affiliation rules in 3.5 and the Downtime and Faction rules in PF, you can cobble together some "bonus feats" providing the PCs with greater social standing and titles, as well as "free" lifestyle (which everyone forgets to charge anyway) for maintaining a "proper" stronghold.

The post about the scepter above raised a question.

Heros of Battle, p97, has a feat that doubles the number of followers.
What would that scepter likely do in addition to that feat?

I would treat it like any other stacked doubling. Which is to say, it becomes x3, not x4.
Stratovarious mentions the Orc Warlord feat to double followers.
There is also the Extra Followers feat in Heroes of Battle which doubles followers.
Going by the handwave of the leadership score and thus follower level limit in Powers of Faerun, you might want to make some form of the Legendary Commander feat available to get x10 followers. Perhaps creating a version that gives x5 followers.
And if you want to get really egregious, Powers of Faerun notes that nothing stops a follower from having the Leadership feat and getting followers of its own, or having a ranking position in an organization and having command of a bunch of grunts. Just be aware that Powers of Faerun has a LOT of egregiously superfluous charts and tables to set up complex webs of power and control that require significant play/design time to use.

The purpose of these questions are two fold.

One is to be able to use it as a player.

The second is to apply it to a major villain as a DM and functionally build their organization as an expression of their followers and cohort (or cohorts).

Personally I'm inclined to think the combo of that scepter and the feat would equal 3x the followers since if you double a doubled number, it's quite a lot more than that.

Oh; and regarding the "Villan" leader, she has roughly 50/50 split on leadership and combat feats. The stronghold is functionally a hidden reinforced and built up ore mine that she uses as her main base and the overall organization uses as a major income source to keep functioning. She's functionally a general in said organization.  If the PCs take out the mine it would be a very signifigant blow to the entire organization given the huge reduction in manpower, materials and income.
Oh, and she does have a evil cohort.

Villains open up other wonderful options to abuse.
Either Undead Leadership (3.5) or Vile Leadership (PF) gets you flunkies that you can abuse and replace.
There are a number of "bonus" cohort feats out there - dragon and wild companion.
Heroes of Battle has a number of feats for improving a cohort and making followers more mass combat "effective".
On the PF side, even if you do not go for the full mass combat rules, you can pick up the Troop subtype, which is a variation on the Mob template from 3.5 and the Swarm subtype, to make small units of low CR grunts into CR 5-15 (I forget the full range of their examples, but about that) "monsters" suitable for mid to high level PCs to fight.

[Power]

At this point you are arguing with yourself, not me.
As such, there is nothing else for me to defend or rebut, you already have it covered.

I said there is no hard RAW on the matter of controlling followers. There is RAW on statting followers as cohorts. This point at the least is very clearly directly arguing with you. I also corrected you on the lack of hard rules regarding paying followers by pointing to rules precedent for followers being used as unpaid labor. But to be honest I'm not very surprised at getting this sort of evasive nonsense from you. You're essentially looking for excuses to leave the argument when it was pointed out where you were wrong, while pretending you still have a point. There are better ways of bowing out and handling this sort of thing, you know.

Well, not that this really matters. I was simply annoyed at the absurd redirect you tried to do.

[awaken_D_M_golem]

{ ... when was the last time we had a good argument like this ... I feel nostalgic , really ... }


DL Master can get a knack at level 4 = cohort , leader score based on profession
DL Master can get a knack at level 7 = all Expert followers (!!) , also leader score based on profession
Oddly can be dip 1 and get either those knacks with the Prof pre-req, at those levels.

Apprentice Entertainer gets a "groupie" that only ~works half the time, but still helps survival at level 1+.

[Samwise]

{ ... when was the last time we had a good argument like this ... I feel nostalgic , really ... }

Yes, but I am done with it.

DL Master can get a knack at level 4 = cohort , leader score based on profession
DL Master can get a knack at level 7 = all Expert followers (!!) , also leader score based on profession
Oddly can be dip 1 and get either those knacks with the Prof pre-req, at those levels.

I have looked at that, then promptly forget it each time.
But yes, another example of designing specifically for followers.

It is also another example of the curious element of implied rules with followers.
If the class gets all Expert followers as a class ability, it rather suggests that DMs should inflict mostly Commoner followers, with only some Experts and Warriors, on PCs.
I might even go so far as to suggest that using the settlement demographics rules for % of followers by NPC class should apply.
But then I have to note that was written for 3E, as was the ELH and Epic Leadership, which had a rule restricting followers to NPC classes, and a level "cost" for followers with PC and Prestige Classes. No such text exists in the 3.5 (or PF) versions of the feat.
And while the tier system is not a rule or even RAI, considerations of balance in followers suggests using some form of limitation based on it.

Apprentice Entertainer gets a "groupie" that only ~works half the time, but still helps survival at level 1+.

Apprentices and Masters are one of those rules I was including when I mentioned extra downtime/design work.
A Master is supposed to require random services of a PC apprentice.
A Master is supposed to train NPC apprentices and be asked random favors by them.
An NPC Apprentice is supposed to become an "extra" cohort for a PC Master after 6th level.
An organization is supposed to exist for them to belong to.
That is a lot of design and sidequesting for relatively minor bonuses and a narrow focus. It needs a lot of work to be turned into a really functional rules subsystem.

[dkt0404]

Villains open up other wonderful options to abuse.
Either Undead Leadership (3.5) or Vile Leadership (PF) gets you flunkies that you can abuse and replace.
There are a number of "bonus" cohort feats out there - dragon and wild companion.
Heroes of Battle has a number of feats for improving a cohort and making followers more mass combat "effective".
On the PF side, even if you do not go for the full mass combat rules, you can pick up the Troop subtype, which is a variation on the Mob template from 3.5 and the Swarm subtype, to make small units of low CR grunts into CR 5-15 (I forget the full range of their examples, but about that) "monsters" suitable for mid to high level PCs to fight.

I haven't found the troop subtype. Can you give me a pointer to it's location? It does sound like a good option.
Villan isn't the Chaotic Evil sort that the Vile leadership feat seems like it applies too.
More LE/NE mix. Those are good options for some others I have tentatively planned though. I'll keep them in mind.

As far as paying the workforce during construction; the SBG actually has a rule for that already. The extra 10% you pay for the entire place is already representing the cost to setup and run  the income source. It does have an option to only setup the income source at 5% but you have to pay the other 5% before it's active. So even with the formen being specialists, they are already paid for in that cost for the income. For the -30% for the stronghold; I do see your point about paying the construction bosses there. Maybe tac on a couple percent for them? Ie; -29% or -28% instead.

[Samwise]

Troop type:
https://www.d20pfsrd.com/bestiary/monster-listings/humanoids/troop/
and
https://www.aonprd.com/MonsterFamilies.aspx?ItemName=Troops

I am not sure how complete those lists are. My checking found troops in AP issues 100, 106, 115, 117, 120, 123, and 126, in addition to the ones in the Bestiary.

As for Vile Leadership, it seems pretty much any Evil to me. Executing underlings who fail seems rather standard LE and NE to me. You just cannot kill too many, which would be the CE schtick.

The income source surcharge looks like more grounds clearing and such, things not really available in the SBG rooms. (Compared to PF, which actually has "farmland" rooms and such.)
I would also note that even if you do not pay followers, they have to eat. And especially if they are working full time for you they are not working at other jobs and earning enough to eat. So if not wages, at least room and board have to be provided for them, along with equipment, be it arms and armor or construction tools. (Conversely, PF seems to assume you are in fact paying them full wages for whatever job they may or may not be doing for you. It does not say so outright, but it is inherent in organizing them as teams for the downtime rules.)

I would ask at this point, if you do allow PCs to profit from their strongholds and followers, to what extent do are you prepared for them to profit ("We build a 5B gp stronghold! We earn 50M gp/year, almost 1M/week. We buy everything at the epic magic shop!") and why?
That is one of the vaguely hinted at but never overtly answered questions about all such downtime systems - if the players can earn so much with them, why would they keep adventuring? This is doubled if you allow for xp gains from rulership. ("Adventure? And get killed?!? No thanks! We are staying right here and collecting our profits where it is safe. Hire some other fools to save the world.")

[Keldar]

So for the SBG, using the followers I would think would qualify for the -30% cost since they are functionally free labor.
Now the actual staff I'm less sure on. Particularly the ones that have a 30gp monthly wage.
I could see it as either they work for free for you and if you run out of followers then you have to pay for the extra staff.
Or;
You have to pay everything.

The problem with the labor rule its other than a Lyre of Building it operates entirely on DM fiat.  Notice it doesn't  tell you how many laborers you need, so you can't determine the appropriate discount for your Leadership score.

Also; how do you folks interpret the part about independent income.

"Income Sources: ... Each income source provides 1% of the stronghold's final price annually as pure profit
--- above and beyond labor costs and other expenses...."

To me that sounds like it may pay for all your labor costs and then 1% on top of that.
Is that correct or am I reading it incorrectly?

You are reading it fine, its just badly worded.  A DM could rule either way and it would be reasonable.  Player plans should be flexible until that factor is known.

Regarding the comment about this being a 3.5 topic and it going all pathfinder;
Given the very minimal conversion work between the two (mostly just condensing skills), I see them as mostly
interchangeable.

The post about the scepter above raised a question.

Heros of Battle, p97, has a feat that doubles the number of followers.
What would that scepter likely do in addition to that feat?

The purpose of these questions are two fold.

One is to be able to use it as a player.

The second is to apply it to a major villain as a DM and functionally build their organization as an expression of their followers and cohort (or cohorts).

Personally I'm inclined to think the combo of that scepter and the feat would equal 3x the followers since if you double a doubled number, it's quite a lot more than that.

Oh; and regarding the "Villan" leader, she has roughly 50/50 split on leadership and combat feats. The stronghold is functionally a hidden reinforced and built up ore mine that she uses as her main base and the overall organization uses as a major income source to keep functioning. She's functionally a general in said organization.  If the PCs take out the mine it would be a very signifigant blow to the entire organization given the huge reduction in manpower, materials and income.
Oh, and she does have a evil cohort.

In the case of NPCs the leadership and stronghold construction rules really don't matter.  Big bads get their mooks and dungeons for free.  Just focus on the resulting stronghold, not its fiddly construction under sloppy rules.

[kitep]

Also; how do you folks interpret the part about independent income.

"Income Sources: ... Each income source provides 1% of the stronghold's final price annually as pure profit
--- above and beyond labor costs and other expenses...."

To me that sounds like it may pay for all your labor costs and then 1% on top of that.
Is that correct or am I reading it incorrectly?

It would pay for the labor costs to produce that income, not the labor costs to run your stronghold.
For example, if you're next to a diamond mine, it'll pay for the diamond miners, the diamond polishers, the diamond sellers, the diamond mine guards, etc, but it won't pay for your castle cook, your castle guards, your castle pet trainer, etc

[dkt0404]

Also; how do you folks interpret the part about independent income.

"Income Sources: ... Each income source provides 1% of the stronghold's final price annually as pure profit
--- above and beyond labor costs and other expenses...."

To me that sounds like it may pay for all your labor costs and then 1% on top of that.
Is that correct or am I reading it incorrectly?

It would pay for the labor costs to produce that income, not the labor costs to run your stronghold.
For example, if you're next to a diamond mine, it'll pay for the diamond miners, the diamond polishers, the diamond sellers, the diamond mine guards, etc, but it won't pay for your castle cook, your castle guards, your castle pet trainer, etc

Okay. I can see the logic in that. That goes back to the sticky subject of; "If I assign followers to work as staff in a stronghold, do they need to be paid?"
Obviously any overflow would when the number of followers runs out. But prior to that?

Also, would the output of the mine increase if additional workers were hired?

And yes, they get room and board. Their own, though small, rooms and well above average food (though this is a side effect of the Luxury kitchen serving 100 people....).

As far as having the Villan have the leadership stuff and basically stick to it; it gives the villans some sort of background limit that functionally follows the rules. A small bit of an attempt at extra fairness towards the PCs as well as a potential side goal. Namely, It actually becomes possible for the PCs to run the bad guys out of minions over the long haul given that PCs slaughter them far faster than they are typically replaced.

Instead of the "oh the buy guys have an infinite number of bad guys as needed." the bad guys need some sort of at least halfway reasonable source for their resources along with their limits. With that are required sacrifices on the villain's side to get those resources. In this Villan's case, half or more of her feats are currently going to Leadership related items while the rest are the bare minimum to qualify for her classes (Assassin and Shadow Dancer; I know it's not optimal. It's a story/background choice for her)

New related question;

3.x Dragon Cohort feat reduces the effective level by 3 and makes a specific exception as a result of the cohort power level. ie; whatever it is, it counts as 3 lower.
Villan has 25 Leadership score (actually higher than 25....but caps) at level 16 as well as the +1 Cohort level feat so that any cohort can be level 15 (or the equivalent in this case). Part of this is due to me noticing that Pathfinder bumps up the dragons different than 3.5. ie; they all use the same progression but the starting points are all different.
That should?....I think?.... translate to EL15+3 for a dragon only. Everyone else would be EL15.

So EL18.

The Bestiary says, I believe, that a dragon counts as whatever it's CR is +8.

So a dragon with a base CR of 4 that is advanced to Juvenile would add +5 CR for a total of 9.
9+8= EL 17.
Add Advanced for +1 CR.

Advanced Juvenile Dragon, EL18 (though only 13 HD in actuality)

Did I mess up something in there somewhere?

[awaken_D_M_golem]

... Dragon Lance ...

... I have looked at that, then promptly forget it each time ...

Ergo ... 
 

**

Commoners can do work Untrained or Trained ... but ... who does the hiring?
Commoners can do "Craft Skill" -ing (to coin a word) or do "Profession Skill" -ing ... but ... who does the buying?

It's basically time for piles Diplomancing, i.e. they hire or buy against their normal will, because skill check abuse.
Eventually everyone in a town gets along fabulously and no one talks to one another, walking around with ear plugs.

iirc - it was Lokiyn who noticed the Cityscape rules cause a whole town to riot and/or kaboom, just trying to walk across town.

[Samwise]

Ergo ... 

Indeed. 

Commoners can do work Untrained or Trained ... but ... who does the hiring?
Commoners can do "Craft Skill" -ing (to coin a word) or do "Profession Skill" -ing ... but ... who does the buying?

Higher level Commoners and Experts and Aristocrats of course!

But yes, that is another element in a long list of why D&D is a FRPG, not an economics model.
Despite this, people insist there is some integral rationale in any of the crafting and WBL and other rules and ignoring the circular justification for things. ("To craft armor, take 1/3rd of the sale price. This higher cost for the materials explains the higher price of certain armors." That is only slighly paraphrased from AD&D 2nd ed version of the Arms and Equipment Guide explaining why ring mail costs more than chain mail despite being a lesser armor.)
And why I routinely recommend handwaving all such rules and just declaring everything a break even action except direct murderhoboing.

It's basically time for piles Diplomancing, i.e. they hire or buy against their normal will, because skill check abuse.
Eventually everyone in a town gets along fabulously and no one talks to one another, walking around with ear plugs.

iirc - it was Lokiyn who noticed the Cityscape rules cause a whole town to riot and/or kaboom, just trying to walk across town.

Sounds about right.
I think back to MegaTraveller, where the skill system was written so that if you did not have the proper social interaction skills you pretty much could not talk to anyone about anything ever.
Which goes to another longstanding peeve of mine regarding the difference between role-players writing rules and wargamers writing rules.

dkt404

3.x Dragon Cohort feat . . .

Non-human cohorts have an ECL equal to their HD + Level Adjustment.
For most dragons below epic level, their LA is +2 to +5.
The Dragon Cohort feat effectively eliminates that LA, meaning your dragon cohort's level is usually equal to its HD.

I have no idea how the PF stuff works, but I would suggest just a simple hacking in of the 3.5 values and using the dragon's HD and call it a day.

[dkt0404]

dkt404

3.x Dragon Cohort feat . . .

Non-human cohorts have an ECL equal to their HD + Level Adjustment.
For most dragons below epic level, their LA is +2 to +5.
The Dragon Cohort feat effectively eliminates that LA, meaning your dragon cohort's level is usually equal to its HD.

I have no idea how the PF stuff works, but I would suggest just a simple hacking in of the 3.5 values and using the dragon's HD and call it a day.

Actually in one of the rare instances of clear rules;

The Pathfinder ones simply say to add +8 to the age category to get the effective level.

Samwise:
I think we are saying the same thing differently.

The EL 18 dragon I used as an example would have a EL of 15 is you subtract 3 for the Dragon Cohort feat. Or at least I think it would?
Pathfinder does their dragon advancement rather differently than 3.5.
You have the base wyrmling dragon for whatever type it is. Then all the dragons add the same fixed progression on top of that. Including a fixed CR gain each category.
Pathfinder does template differently to in the sense that they add to the stats and abilities and such, but don't seem to increase the number of hit dice. They increase CR too
meaning you could, possibly, be fighting a monster with 1 HD but a 4 CR that, even though it is powerful, would die on the first sword swing or arrow shot.

The Advanced template I added since I had 1 CR left (each age category is +2 or more) is meant for creatures that are bigger and stronger than normal. It's +1 CR and a flat +4 to all ability scores.

[Samwise]

A straight +8 to the age category, regardless of HD and CR and such?
If that is what they do, then I suppose yeah, with the feat just use age category + 5 and that would be the ECL for a dragon cohort with the feat.

As for the template, adding to CR is not the same as adding to ECL.
Unless the template has an explicit LA adjustment in addition to a CR adjustment, then it would not affect the ECL for a cohort.
3.5 templates do not add to HD either. There are quite a few (most?) with an LA adjustment. Fiendish is CR +0 to +2 depending on HD, along with a straight LA of +2.

If there is no equivalent template with an LA between 3.5 and PF, either Rule 0 one or do not use that  PF template on a cohort. LAs tend to be (I think, I have never surveyed them) than CR increases, so I would not use a strict CR = LA equivalence, especially on the advanced template, especially if you use the rewrite version instead of the simple version.
If you need to add 1, just give the dragon a class level.

[Stratovarius]

Just going to point out that templates can add to hit dice. Werewolf / Lycanthrope for example.

[dkt0404]

A straight +8 to the age category, regardless of HD and CR and such?
If that is what they do, then I suppose yeah, with the feat just use age category + 5 and that would be the ECL for a dragon cohort with the feat.

As for the template, adding to CR is not the same as adding to ECL.
Unless the template has an explicit LA adjustment in addition to a CR adjustment, then it would not affect the ECL for a cohort.
3.5 templates do not add to HD either. There are quite a few (most?) with an LA adjustment. Fiendish is CR +0 to +2 depending on HD, along with a straight LA of +2.

If there is no equivalent template with an LA between 3.5 and PF, either Rule 0 one or do not use that  PF template on a cohort. LAs tend to be (I think, I have never surveyed them) than CR increases, so I would not use a strict CR = LA equivalence, especially on the advanced template, especially if you use the rewrite version instead of the simple version.
If you need to add 1, just give the dragon a class level.

All the Pathfinder templates specifically add to CR. They don't seem to have 3.5s ECL system aside from that. Which is weird.....I thought the LA system was much more straightforward.

The advanced template is directly out of the Pathfinder monster book.
Literally all it does is +4 to stats.

A class level instead of that is an interesting idea.

Trying to convert to Pathfinder, figured I should use their templates and rules as much as possible.

[dkt0404]

Also; Lyre of Building

Hire some halfway competent bards to play in shifts and you can reasonably expect to accomplish the stronghold in record time. From years to months or weeks.

[Samwise]

The wording on the lyre does not seem to support such an option.

The lyre can be once per week to build - per lyre; not per owner/user of the lyre.
When using it, the person playing it can continue to play; subject to making skill checks, and theoretically subject to "normal" rules for exhaustion and the like.
While that can be worked around by things like a clear spindle ioun stone so they do not need food or water, an iridescent spindle so they do not need air (and so won't start wheezing from sheer boredom and bleeding fingers), casters ready to remove fatigue and cure wounds, and such, doing so seems "questionable", particularly considering later instruments with hard limits on duration of use that were not considered back when before players started figuring out how to optimize needing to eat, sleep, and breathe out of existence.
Nothing in the description suggests the lyre can be passed along to another to continue a "session" of playing endlessly.

Even if needs to be Rule 0ed in hard, I would put an 8-hour limit on that 1 use/week building option for some semblance of balance. If more construction is needed that badly, buy another lyre or three.

[Keldar]

I've been over this here, Lyre of Building is one of the 10 things the SBG actually provided rules for in construction.  Its the only non DM fiat way of getting the "Special or Free Labor" discount (pages 10 and 45).  Besides, the rules already assume magic is used to cut castle construction time from decades to weeks (page 13, sidebar).