PEACH: Exploration Turns in 5e

[WarrentheHero]

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cLd...ew?usp=sharing

Hello! I'll be starting a new campaign soon (Storm King's Thunder) and wanted to revamp travel rules a little, so I decided to revisit the old concept of Exploration Turns.

Some of you might rememer from the DnD Next playtest that there was for a time a system of exploration called Exploration Turns, where traveling overland or through a dungeon was done in discreet stages, each with its own chance for a random encounter, and various abilities or actions available to the players were timed such as to last through a Turn. This is why Ritual casting adds 10 minutes to a spell, or why many spells have the seemingly-arbitrary durations of 10 minutes or 1 hour, and why Mage Armor lasts 8 hours (8 turns) instead of just "until your next long rest."

The TLD;DR is:

• Terrain has three tiers; travel speed is slower the higher the tier. Roads are fastest, mountains are slowest.
• Three resting rules. While traveling overland, one night = short rest and seven days = long rest. While traveling subregionally, like leaving from a city to adventure for a day or two then come back, normal rest rules. Within a dungeon, short rest is 10 minutes. Long rest is still 8 hours, but you can use expensive luxury supplies to get a 1/day long rest with only 1 hour.
• Exploration Turns! At the start of each Turn, everyone chooses what they want to do and rolls. Chance of random encounter each turn. Traveling overland, 1 Turn = 1 day. In a dungeon, 1 Turn = 10 minutes. Each type of Exploration Turn has different actions you can do like maintaining gear, cooking food, scouting, sneaking, checking for traps, etc.

Mostly what I'm looking for right now is a sanity-check for these rules I seek to implement. I just want to make sure this isn't actually a very stupid idea or that the math is super terrible.

I don't think the document states them but the idea is the party still gets to move as normal during the Exploration Turn, and for each Turn, the GM makes a random encounter roll, usually with an encounter on 17+.

Design Goals:

• Make overland travel more interesting than just 'absolutely nova the random encounter, move on, long rest, repeat ad nauseum'
• Give each 'role' in the party at least one, ideally multiple, options they can take for each Turn. The support can buff or provide healing, the frontliners can tank better, the mage can keep spells up, the striker can sneak, etc.
• Maintain/codify current out-of-combat situations such as stealthing, checking for traps, or casting ritual spells. Now that they're divided into Turns, it also means the Rogue no longer solo-sweeps the dungeon by checking for traps, staying hidden, and bypassing all the locks.
• Provide at least some support for lesser-used skills such as Investigation, as well as some Tools.

Please let me know if there's an archetype I didn't fully support, or if any part of this seems too powerful or too restrictive. I'm okay with generally upping the power curve slightly, but don't want it to be out of proportion.

Thanks everybody!

[Calen]

At first read Secure a Camp seems backwards.
Shouldn't the DC be 18 to make it harder for a random encounter to occur?

Also it seems a little odd that Intelligence is for weapon maintenance, it makes sense on the surface but that would mean that your standard wizard could care for a sword better than the fighter.
You could maybe have that tied to weapon proficiency with a bonus (expertise) if you have the appropriate tools.

[WarrentheHero]

At first read Secure a Camp seems backwards.
Shouldn't the DC be 18 to make it harder for a random encounter to occur?

You're correct. Simple edit, thanks!

Also it seems a little odd that Intelligence is for weapon maintenance, it makes sense on the surface but that would mean that your standard wizard could care for a sword better than the fighter.
You could maybe have that tied to weapon proficiency with a bonus (expertise) if you have the appropriate tools.

I get where you're coming from, and maybe I'll add the stipulation that you must be proficient in a weapon/armor to Maintain it. Of course then you could get the Wizard who can't improve anything besides a dagger and the Fighter who can't maintain anything at all.

This also represents doing something that is beyond simply oiling and greasing your gear to keep it working, in the same way that Cooking a Meal is beyond just prepping rations normally and that Sing a Song, Tell A Story is something grander than recounting that time you killed a goblin real good.

I think Intelligence makes the most sense because the care and maintenance for a thing is not the same as knowing how to use it. I used to operate a forklift at my old job but if it ever broke down, I wouldn't be able to fix it. I also can't think of which ability score would be better to use; maybe Wisdom to 'intuit' how to care for them, but that's a stretch and leads to the same problem except now it's the Cleric or Druid who is best and not the Wizard. And if the Wizard is proficient in Smith's Tools and the Fighter isn't, then Abilities aside, that means the Wizard does know more about the care for those sorts of things than the Fighter: that's what that Proficiency is for.

Also, you could have the Wizard maintain the weapons while the Fighter trains, so in the first round of combat the Fighter gets advantage to attack with a +20% crit chance. So it's not like the Fighter is hosed here.