Bjarkmundur
2021-10-31, 05:24 PM
I've being going back and forth on how I want to fulfill my players' fantasy of wilderness travel.
First I thought about making a series of decision points, like in a choose-your-own-adventure book, and use that to determine how the travels would go. I liked that idea, but I didn't love it.
Next I thought about how the safety of an urban or outpost environment has meant that the party has only ever seen single-encounter adventuring days. So I thought about throwing at them a series of wilderness encounter, but deem the environment so hostile that no one could benefit from a long rest until the journey was over. I liked this idea better. It challenged the players in a new way and it highlighted some of the strengths of short rest classes. I would also explain my intentions beforehand, with an appropriate in-world explanation. This would give them an interesting problem to solve by preparing different spells or stocking up on specific items or equipment than they would normally.
The problem with this is that the first 1-3 Encounters don't help me convey the experience I'm trying to create. It wouldn't be until the 4th encounter where the players would start to feel the effects of a super long adventuring day. So I thought, why not just rapid-fire the first few encounters. This is my first attempt of putting into words what I'm envisioning.
DISCLAIMER
A similar experience can be given by using levels of exhaustion or a Skill Challenge. This is ONE of the ways a DM could possibly quickly drain a party's resources.
Step 1: Resources
Before you get started you have to look at your party and determined what resources you are okay with draining, how many rapid fire encounters you intent to run, and whether there are any resources you want to add a minimum-threshold to. Note that any short rest resources should not be touched, since we are only limiting long rests between encounters, and not short rests. For demonstration purposes I'll show you my 3rd level party.
Barbarian: Rages, Hit Points [Threshold: Half], Hit Dice
Arcane Trickster: Spell Slots, Hit Points [Threshold: Half], Hit Dice
Sorcerer: Spell Points [Threshold Half], Hit Points [Threshold: Half], Hit Dice.
My sorcerer uses Trickery's 3-Point Fix. This fix turns all the Sorcerers Spellcasting resources into Spell Points, and allows the Sorcerer to regain some Spell Points after a short rest. Because of this, a minimum threshold is set.
After this I've decided to run 3 Rapid Encounters, expecting each player to lose resources at least once for each encounter.
Rapid Encounters
Each Rapid Encounter consists of a series of coin-flips for each player, 1 for each round of the encounter you have planned. In addition, connected to each encounter are means for the players to automatically succeed on one or more of their coin flips. These could be spells prepared, racial abilities or consumables.
When the results have been determiend, the DM narrates the full encounter, using the coin flips as guidelines for degree-of-success. For each failed coin flip, you drain one of each of that player's resources.
The goal of this is to encapsulate all of what goes into an encounter, but in fraction of the time. After going through a few of these Rapid Encounters, the DM can then introduce the main encounter, played normally. This method is great for softening up an adventuring group quickly during a one shotC to make the final battle more dramatic. The minimum threshold makes sure that no player dies in a Rapid Encounter, as they are not designed to do so.
The Hanging Tree
---3rd Level Rapid Encounter---
This encounter consists of a tree cursed with evil magic. When it detects a humanoid nearby, it will compel it to climb up its branches and unalive themselves. In its branches are the dried up remains of previous victims, that grab and claw at anyone that falls prey to the tree's magic. The encounter has three noticable steps: Resisting the call of the tree, breaking free from the noose and the undead grasp of pervious victims, and destroying the tree.
For each failure a player loses 1 of each of the predetermined resources, and takes damage equal to his/her Class' Hit Die Size
Coin Flips per Player: 3
Automatic Successes:
A player with access to fire damage gains one automatic success.
A player with resistance to charm effects gains an automatic success
Other methods determined by the DM
Narrating the Encounter
The player with the highest number of failures is the one who climbs the tree, while the rest of the party is still stunned by the Hanging Tree's Magic. Once the player tightenes the noose he manages to break free of the spell and lets out a shout as he drops. The rest of the parts snaps out of it and runs to try to save their friend before he suffocates. Once he is cut down the players might flee, destroy the tree, or fight some of the zombies (DMs choice).
Conclusion
I love this idea since it is crazy fast and just gives me the chance of telling the players a story with their characters as the main focus. I think 3 of these will be perfect to give them the feeling of trekking for days and then having to fight one last threat before returning to civilization.
First I thought about making a series of decision points, like in a choose-your-own-adventure book, and use that to determine how the travels would go. I liked that idea, but I didn't love it.
Next I thought about how the safety of an urban or outpost environment has meant that the party has only ever seen single-encounter adventuring days. So I thought about throwing at them a series of wilderness encounter, but deem the environment so hostile that no one could benefit from a long rest until the journey was over. I liked this idea better. It challenged the players in a new way and it highlighted some of the strengths of short rest classes. I would also explain my intentions beforehand, with an appropriate in-world explanation. This would give them an interesting problem to solve by preparing different spells or stocking up on specific items or equipment than they would normally.
The problem with this is that the first 1-3 Encounters don't help me convey the experience I'm trying to create. It wouldn't be until the 4th encounter where the players would start to feel the effects of a super long adventuring day. So I thought, why not just rapid-fire the first few encounters. This is my first attempt of putting into words what I'm envisioning.
DISCLAIMER
A similar experience can be given by using levels of exhaustion or a Skill Challenge. This is ONE of the ways a DM could possibly quickly drain a party's resources.
Step 1: Resources
Before you get started you have to look at your party and determined what resources you are okay with draining, how many rapid fire encounters you intent to run, and whether there are any resources you want to add a minimum-threshold to. Note that any short rest resources should not be touched, since we are only limiting long rests between encounters, and not short rests. For demonstration purposes I'll show you my 3rd level party.
Barbarian: Rages, Hit Points [Threshold: Half], Hit Dice
Arcane Trickster: Spell Slots, Hit Points [Threshold: Half], Hit Dice
Sorcerer: Spell Points [Threshold Half], Hit Points [Threshold: Half], Hit Dice.
My sorcerer uses Trickery's 3-Point Fix. This fix turns all the Sorcerers Spellcasting resources into Spell Points, and allows the Sorcerer to regain some Spell Points after a short rest. Because of this, a minimum threshold is set.
After this I've decided to run 3 Rapid Encounters, expecting each player to lose resources at least once for each encounter.
Rapid Encounters
Each Rapid Encounter consists of a series of coin-flips for each player, 1 for each round of the encounter you have planned. In addition, connected to each encounter are means for the players to automatically succeed on one or more of their coin flips. These could be spells prepared, racial abilities or consumables.
When the results have been determiend, the DM narrates the full encounter, using the coin flips as guidelines for degree-of-success. For each failed coin flip, you drain one of each of that player's resources.
The goal of this is to encapsulate all of what goes into an encounter, but in fraction of the time. After going through a few of these Rapid Encounters, the DM can then introduce the main encounter, played normally. This method is great for softening up an adventuring group quickly during a one shotC to make the final battle more dramatic. The minimum threshold makes sure that no player dies in a Rapid Encounter, as they are not designed to do so.
The Hanging Tree
---3rd Level Rapid Encounter---
This encounter consists of a tree cursed with evil magic. When it detects a humanoid nearby, it will compel it to climb up its branches and unalive themselves. In its branches are the dried up remains of previous victims, that grab and claw at anyone that falls prey to the tree's magic. The encounter has three noticable steps: Resisting the call of the tree, breaking free from the noose and the undead grasp of pervious victims, and destroying the tree.
For each failure a player loses 1 of each of the predetermined resources, and takes damage equal to his/her Class' Hit Die Size
Coin Flips per Player: 3
Automatic Successes:
A player with access to fire damage gains one automatic success.
A player with resistance to charm effects gains an automatic success
Other methods determined by the DM
Narrating the Encounter
The player with the highest number of failures is the one who climbs the tree, while the rest of the party is still stunned by the Hanging Tree's Magic. Once the player tightenes the noose he manages to break free of the spell and lets out a shout as he drops. The rest of the parts snaps out of it and runs to try to save their friend before he suffocates. Once he is cut down the players might flee, destroy the tree, or fight some of the zombies (DMs choice).
Conclusion
I love this idea since it is crazy fast and just gives me the chance of telling the players a story with their characters as the main focus. I think 3 of these will be perfect to give them the feeling of trekking for days and then having to fight one last threat before returning to civilization.