Every Problem that a faction has should be a seed for adventure. Every affliction that troubles a group should have room in it for PC involvement, either as a source of help or as a weak point in an enemy faction's armor. Problems help add color and flavor to a faction's tra- vails, but their real value to you as a GM is as an easy adventure hook. The Problems listed here are just a brief selection of the possibilities. When possible, you should personalize a Problem and give it a face the PCs can focus on. If you've got a bandit group plaguing a village, spare a few words about the bandit chief leading them. If you've got a nefarious band of sinister religious "reformers" undermining a city's major temple, give the chief a name and description. If the PCs decide to go after the Problem, it makes it easier to direct their focus, and even if they don't it helps give you a name to hang recent events on.
If it looks like the PCs are going to end up clashing directly with a Problem, you might want to take a little time to prep some statistics for it, whether in combat stats for the leadership and enforcers, a mini-dungeon of some major headquarters they use, or a court chal- lenge for a more political problem. That way, if the PCs take it into their head to deal with the problem on a more personal basis, you won't have to pause to fabricate the details in play.
It usually takes a session's worth of play to solve one point worth of Problems. If the difficulty is far beneath the PCs' scale, such as a bandit chief versus a pantheon of Godbound, they might be able to extinguish it entirely in just a few scenes. Even much larger problems can be wrapped up rapidly if the PCs are able to find out who's re- sponsible for them, and then deal with them in the fashion for which PCs are famously known.
d20 Cultural Problems
1 A hostile neighbor propagandizes the faction's people
2 A local religion is pushing for a very bad idea
3 A local religion makes constant, painful demands
4 A sub-group is convinced it should be ruling the polity
5 A sub-group nurses a bitter grudge against the rulers
6 A tedious local custom slows and hinders projects
7 Decadent leadership is always seeking new vices
8 Ethnic strife boils up on a regular basis in the faction
9 Idealistic reformers are tearing down vital institutions
10 Leadership is divided between uncooperative rivals
11 Multiple religious factions are always feuding
12 The commoners are ignorant, brutish, and venal
13 The faction lacks confidence and falls easily into despair
14 The local nobility is corrupt and does anything for cash
15 The people demand the rulers seek an impossible goal
16 The rulers are blindly convinced of their own wisdom
17 The rulers have very little actual control over the people
18 The ruling class is impressively incompetent
19 Their neighbors send agents to destabilize them
20 Two or more castes are constantly fighting each other
d20 Military Problems
1 A grasping noble is embezzling vital military funds
2 A rival power is launching deniable raids
3 A terrible monster scourges the faction
4 Bandits are plaguing the faction's periphery
5 Hostile migrants seek to claim land in the polity
6 Mercenaries are running amok after not being paid
7 Rebel guerrillas are striking deep within the faction
8 Soldiers have been used as workers until they can't fight
9 The army extorts the citizenry like a pack of bandits
10 The army has a reason to hate the current rulers
11 The army is led by a discreet would-be usurper of rule
12 The army is led by an irreplaceable well-born idiot
13 The army is so disorganized that it's near-useless
14 The army is so underfunded it's practically starving
15 The army's hidebound with antiquated gear and habits
16 The faction holds soldiers and warfare in contempt
17 The military is broken into mutually-hostile factions
18 The military is locked in constant low-level policing
19 The military lacks morale after a terrible defeat
20 The elite are painfully reluctant to employ needed force
d20 Economic Problems
1 A major chunk of the populace is kept nonproductive
2 A major religion teaches scorn for material goods
3 A parasite class has the right to loot the faction's wealth
4 Guilds are both strong and careless of the faction's need
5 Productive work is sneered at as base and contemptible
6 Religious tithes or customary taxes beggar many
7 Ritual demands and sacrifices cripple local industry
8 Technical expertise is jealously guarded by its keepers
9 The faction has a social structure that creates poverty
10 The faction has very little cash in circulation
11 The faction is desperately short of natural resources
12 The faction is paying off a crippling foreign debt
13 The faction's technology is extremely backward
14 The local currency is debased and near-worthless
15 The most productive sub-group is scorned and despised
16 The people enviously pull down the successful
17 The rulers are trying to run the economy, badly
18 The rulers keep wasting wealth on selfish indulgence
19 The wealthy and the rulers are in constant conflict