miinstrel
2020-03-14, 05:20 PM
==TL;DR==
PROBLEM: Travel takes too much game time and/or is boring.
SOLUTION: Treat all overland travel as a skill challenge regardless of distance or time. The PCs have 1 day's worth of resources to burn over the course of the entire journey. Thoughts?
==LONG VERSION==
I've struggled with finding a simple, satisfying way to portray overland travel as I think many of us have. My current system involves each PC selecting a role (lookout, forager, etc.) and making a check each day. It's cumbersome. It takes too long. Anything longer than 3 days gets boring and sucks up a whole session.
Here's another idea I just came up with... would like the communities thoughts and critiques to improve it.
OVERLAND TRAVEL MECHANIC
- All overland travel is treated as a skill challenge. The distance and number of hours/days influence the difficulty of the challenge.
- The base DC is 8+(party proficiency)+(modifiers).
- The base # of successes required is 1.
- For each time increment of travel (hour, day, etc.), the DM may either increase the # of successes required up to a maximum or 5, or increase the DC by +1. The first 2 increases should go toward successes needed and the max successes should not be greater than 5 (or the # of PCs if that's higher).
- Each failure results in a setback TBD by the DM (an encounter, an environmental hazard appropriate to the terrain, a further delay, etc.)
- PCs take turns describing how they will use a skill that could reasonably contribute to travel success. The DM then assigns dis/adv (or not) or further modifies the DC (if they have a bad plan) and they make a check against the travel DC. No single PC may make another attempt until all other PCs have done so at least once.
- Each skill may be used any number of times, but each successive attempt increases that skill's DC by +5. (i.e. "i keep watch" = Perception DC 12. Next player: i scout ahead for danger = Perception DC 17).
- The total number of checks the party makes is the amount of time it takes them to arrive. I.E. if it's a 4 day long trip and they finished with 3 successes and 3 failures, it actually took them 6 days... a bit waylaid by difficulties.
This keeps the RL time impact of travel consistent at roughly the same as 1-2 encounters.
POSSIBLE CHALLENGES
Q: Why don't PC's refresh resources at night?
A: it's an abstraction just like a lot of other stuff. not resting provides internal balance to the mechanic. Also they're out on the road and do not have the comforts of a bed, etc. maybe this doesn't provide the necessary provisions to refresh abilities.
Q: What if the party uses things like Magnificent Mansion at night?
A: It's a used spell slot like anything else. Consider giving the next check advantage for the used resource.
Q: What if they get there in half the normal time because they only roll successes?
A: Good on them. Travel times account for some difficulty along the road. The party managed to dodge all of them.
Q: What if it's a REALLY long journey? Like 20+ days? The DCs are going to be way off.
A: Either create waypoints to break up the travel segments or consider traveling in "weeks," "months," etc. as the time increment.
PROBLEM: Travel takes too much game time and/or is boring.
SOLUTION: Treat all overland travel as a skill challenge regardless of distance or time. The PCs have 1 day's worth of resources to burn over the course of the entire journey. Thoughts?
==LONG VERSION==
I've struggled with finding a simple, satisfying way to portray overland travel as I think many of us have. My current system involves each PC selecting a role (lookout, forager, etc.) and making a check each day. It's cumbersome. It takes too long. Anything longer than 3 days gets boring and sucks up a whole session.
Here's another idea I just came up with... would like the communities thoughts and critiques to improve it.
OVERLAND TRAVEL MECHANIC
- All overland travel is treated as a skill challenge. The distance and number of hours/days influence the difficulty of the challenge.
- The base DC is 8+(party proficiency)+(modifiers).
- The base # of successes required is 1.
- For each time increment of travel (hour, day, etc.), the DM may either increase the # of successes required up to a maximum or 5, or increase the DC by +1. The first 2 increases should go toward successes needed and the max successes should not be greater than 5 (or the # of PCs if that's higher).
- Each failure results in a setback TBD by the DM (an encounter, an environmental hazard appropriate to the terrain, a further delay, etc.)
- PCs take turns describing how they will use a skill that could reasonably contribute to travel success. The DM then assigns dis/adv (or not) or further modifies the DC (if they have a bad plan) and they make a check against the travel DC. No single PC may make another attempt until all other PCs have done so at least once.
- Each skill may be used any number of times, but each successive attempt increases that skill's DC by +5. (i.e. "i keep watch" = Perception DC 12. Next player: i scout ahead for danger = Perception DC 17).
- The total number of checks the party makes is the amount of time it takes them to arrive. I.E. if it's a 4 day long trip and they finished with 3 successes and 3 failures, it actually took them 6 days... a bit waylaid by difficulties.
This keeps the RL time impact of travel consistent at roughly the same as 1-2 encounters.
POSSIBLE CHALLENGES
Q: Why don't PC's refresh resources at night?
A: it's an abstraction just like a lot of other stuff. not resting provides internal balance to the mechanic. Also they're out on the road and do not have the comforts of a bed, etc. maybe this doesn't provide the necessary provisions to refresh abilities.
Q: What if the party uses things like Magnificent Mansion at night?
A: It's a used spell slot like anything else. Consider giving the next check advantage for the used resource.
Q: What if they get there in half the normal time because they only roll successes?
A: Good on them. Travel times account for some difficulty along the road. The party managed to dodge all of them.
Q: What if it's a REALLY long journey? Like 20+ days? The DCs are going to be way off.
A: Either create waypoints to break up the travel segments or consider traveling in "weeks," "months," etc. as the time increment.