MadBear
2018-10-05, 09:14 AM
So my players have just entered into a 1,200 square mile area that was "gifted" to them by the local kingdom of Braken (basically the Waterdeep of my setting). But low and behold, it's overrun by an orcish mob and their monsters (to be fair, this area was considered wilderness, not an actual part of Braken's kingdom).
Anyways, the players have decided that they are going to slowly sow discord by sneaking to different encampments that are miles apart. They and I both are looking forward to this guerrilla style warfare scenario.
One thing I love on paper, but in practice sucks though are random encounters on the road. either, the encounter is the only one they take that day, and therefore pointless as they spam all their abilities, or it's super deadly, and kills them in meaningless ways that don't really contribute to the story. So I pulled back a bit, and thought about the game of D&D in general, and took some inspiration from the board game Gloomhaven. Because in Gloomhaven, you draw a "road event" card and you have to make a choice of how to act. Usually, regardless of your choice you are down a resource in the next dungeon.
Since D&D is a resource game, I figured what if instead of just rolling on the random encounter chart, I instead create a deck of cards that I draw from for every 8 miles (1 hex on my map) they go over. Safer areas could be drawn with advantage (I draw 2, and pick the one more advantageous to the players) and more dangerous areas disadvantage (I draw 2, and pick the one that's more disadvantageous to the players).
The cards would range from:
1. A small band of goblins ambush you/ you ambush goblins
2. Nothing the way was clear
3. You encounter a hill giant sleeping aside the road, a sack of what looks to be living beings wriggling in the sack against his side
4. Deadly encounter of some sort (usually 4-5 CR above party level). Will only have 1 of these in deck. This would be the only encounter that is played out.
5. etc.
Now, what makes this different, is that rather then play out the scenario, the players would narrate how they'd handle this encounter, and what resources they'd use. So for example if the bard declared that he'd cast sleep on the goblins, and the fighter said he'd protect the party, they'd enter the next dungeon with the bard missing a level 1 slot, and the fighter down some HP (probably use the trap table to represent the level of danger/damage took). In some scenarios like the in the case of the giant, they could opt to just leave, leaving the villagers to their fate. (which could have consequences later in the story).
One thing that makes this work in my group, is that you can only take 2 short rests between a long rest, and long rests will trigger a card draw. So, sure if the cards were bad enough, they might just short rest at the start of a dungeon, but now they only have 1 left for the day. Or they could long rest, which might trigger a really deadly encounter.
So in this way, those encounters across the map will be narrated rather then played out, the PC's will be down a small bit of resources, and they're still the chance of an actually deadly encounter.
After watching a youtube video that had a similar system, you could even get the players involved a bit. Each would be given the option of creating 1 negative and 1 positive card to go into the deck. Since I'd probably have 6 neutral (nothing) and 6 negative (with 1 being a deadly encounter), each additional set would decrease the deadly draw, and potentially give them a positive boon. I wish I could give credit to the youtuber who inspired this part, but alas I can't find them.
Anyways, just curious to thoughts and suggestions on how to make this work better (my players seem to like this idea in theory, but we haven't actually played it out yet).
Anyways, the players have decided that they are going to slowly sow discord by sneaking to different encampments that are miles apart. They and I both are looking forward to this guerrilla style warfare scenario.
One thing I love on paper, but in practice sucks though are random encounters on the road. either, the encounter is the only one they take that day, and therefore pointless as they spam all their abilities, or it's super deadly, and kills them in meaningless ways that don't really contribute to the story. So I pulled back a bit, and thought about the game of D&D in general, and took some inspiration from the board game Gloomhaven. Because in Gloomhaven, you draw a "road event" card and you have to make a choice of how to act. Usually, regardless of your choice you are down a resource in the next dungeon.
Since D&D is a resource game, I figured what if instead of just rolling on the random encounter chart, I instead create a deck of cards that I draw from for every 8 miles (1 hex on my map) they go over. Safer areas could be drawn with advantage (I draw 2, and pick the one more advantageous to the players) and more dangerous areas disadvantage (I draw 2, and pick the one that's more disadvantageous to the players).
The cards would range from:
1. A small band of goblins ambush you/ you ambush goblins
2. Nothing the way was clear
3. You encounter a hill giant sleeping aside the road, a sack of what looks to be living beings wriggling in the sack against his side
4. Deadly encounter of some sort (usually 4-5 CR above party level). Will only have 1 of these in deck. This would be the only encounter that is played out.
5. etc.
Now, what makes this different, is that rather then play out the scenario, the players would narrate how they'd handle this encounter, and what resources they'd use. So for example if the bard declared that he'd cast sleep on the goblins, and the fighter said he'd protect the party, they'd enter the next dungeon with the bard missing a level 1 slot, and the fighter down some HP (probably use the trap table to represent the level of danger/damage took). In some scenarios like the in the case of the giant, they could opt to just leave, leaving the villagers to their fate. (which could have consequences later in the story).
One thing that makes this work in my group, is that you can only take 2 short rests between a long rest, and long rests will trigger a card draw. So, sure if the cards were bad enough, they might just short rest at the start of a dungeon, but now they only have 1 left for the day. Or they could long rest, which might trigger a really deadly encounter.
So in this way, those encounters across the map will be narrated rather then played out, the PC's will be down a small bit of resources, and they're still the chance of an actually deadly encounter.
After watching a youtube video that had a similar system, you could even get the players involved a bit. Each would be given the option of creating 1 negative and 1 positive card to go into the deck. Since I'd probably have 6 neutral (nothing) and 6 negative (with 1 being a deadly encounter), each additional set would decrease the deadly draw, and potentially give them a positive boon. I wish I could give credit to the youtuber who inspired this part, but alas I can't find them.
Anyways, just curious to thoughts and suggestions on how to make this work better (my players seem to like this idea in theory, but we haven't actually played it out yet).