One of the first things I think about when preparing for a campaign is what, fundamentally, I want to be arbitrating. If I'm to take the seat as a mediator of rules and outliner of context, what rules and what context? Sometimes this is very literally what rules I want to mediate-- I refer to the previous post and my decision to run "The Promise of the Eastmark" using Worlds Without Number. This is a purely mechanical joy. There is a texture, a mouthfeel, that I want on my tongue and so I am sticking a hefty book by Kevin Crawford in my mouth.
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| "Oo 'ay not 'ike it 'ut thif if 'eak woleplaying" |
The consideration is also one of Mode of Play. This is a phrase that I picked up while reading some indie RPG designers' blogs and contextually means "please sweet Christ buy my game you don't need another D&D sourcebook please I need to feed my child". Its other usage is to describe the ecosystem of gameplay that players engage in-- not just combat, for example, but the reasons one gets into combat and how combat contributes/influences later game activities. The Combat Mode of Play is some game element or activity seen through the lens of how it slots into/accretes with other elements/activity.
What do you want to do in a campaign, and how do the things you want to do in a campaign relate to one another?
One of the appeals for me in the West Marches style was that it carried very intuitive and very distilled modes of play. Players roved out from a place of safety to a place of danger, and faced challenges on the hope of material profit. These modes are mechanically supported by a game like D&D (which Robbins' campaign used).
My own West March is largely adopting these (one of the reasons I ended up picking Worlds Without Number over The One Ring), but I decided I wanted to change how the "journey through danger" mode of play was systemically supported. I also decided I wanted to add a "formal audience before an authority figure" mode of play.
Journey to the Center of the Rulebook
In the traditional D&D-esque expression, overland travel is frequently a function of a) resource management and b) distraction.
Rules are given for how far a group of PCs can travel in a given time period, which underpins what resources they might need to expend (rations, water). Along the way--influenced by things like terrain, ambient danger, knowledge of the area--the group may encounter procedurally generated "random encounters". And in the classic mode these can be very varied-- from a gang of hostiles looking for your milk money, to more gonzo encounters involving lost wizards or uncovered tombs.
This is a feature, not a bug! In the D&D-esque expression, there's a lot of fun to be had in being wholly diverted from your planned course by a random encounter. Maybe you realize you can hunt down the camp of the hobgoblins who tried to ambush you, instead of delve into the Cave of Moist Wonders. Maybe your encounter with Plopdick the Whizzarb has left one of your party members transformed into a cabbage and you need to find a way to break the curse, or at least a good recipe for cabbage soup.
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| Plopdick is a real piece of work. |
But in the context of my West March, I don't think it's desirable. I really want to emphasize adventure locations as the source of Interesting Things; they contain the lost histories of the various peoples of the Eastmark, the treasures of past legitimacy, the tools of absent tyrants. At the same time, I don't want to lose a mode of play which thematically imparts a sense of cost and difficulty to roving into the wilderness. It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door. You step into the Road, and if you don't keep your feet, there is no knowing how many fanfics about you and your gardener will get written.
Thankfully, I'd already been looking at The One Ring and did my best to absolutely fuck up that system's elegant mechanics for overland travel. Foundational to them are World Without Number's "System Strain". Most usually, a PC accrues the unfortunately abbreviated SS by receiving healing (magical or mundane), and maxing it out means you can't receive anymore.
For this subsystem, the only major change I made to the core rules was in how System Strain is lost-- no longer do you lose 1 SS per good night's rest. Instead, you have to spend a season in a safe haven not adventuring (this, conveniently, helps me cap/pace players who might otherwise dominate the schedule).
If you read the mechanics below and go 'oh wow, Colin, as handsome as you are this is pretty baldfaced in stealing from The One Ring' then go fuck yourself, you're absolutely correct, I burn with unmitigated shame in the long dark of the night.
The System
Procedure
1. Set Course
2. Assign Roles
3. Marching Roll
4. Event Roll(s)
5. Finish the Journey
1. Set Course
The PCs should physically draw their course, via hexes, on the map. There are two reasons for this. The first is that some trips are simply too much for one sitting-- if they're tracing their way across the continent, maybe they've bitten off more than they can chew. The second is that you can seed some of your Events (see #4) geographically; if the party passes through certain geography, there may be unique challenges there.
2. Assign Roles
There are four roles in a group. The Guide makes Marching Rolls and little else; their successes will speed the group towards their destination with less System Strain accrued. The other roles are Scout, Look-out, and Hunter; setting aside the obvious fictional implications, their mechanical function is to tackle Events. Which role they tare will determine which Saving Throw they'll be tossing.
Only one person can be Guide, and that's the only role they can occupy. All the other roles must be filled, but players may double-up on them, especially if you've got someone in the party like Plopdick who has nothing to contribute but woe.
3. Marching Roll
The Guide rolls a Wisdom/Lead check to see how many hexes of travel before the party encounters an Event. On 2-5 it's two hexes, 6-7 three hexes, 8-9 four hexes, 10-11 five hexes, and 12+ six hexes.
Note that this means that the party will encounter an Event, it's simply a matter of how far along they are when they do! For "Promise of the Eastmark", I set ~15 miles per hex at 30 miles per day (on foot, normal terrain). That means that with the very worst guide possible (Plopdick) you're getting Events every day. With the map I'm using, most points of interest are 5-10 days of travel.
4. Event Roll(s)
Determine which role the Event is targeting and therefore which Saving Throw they're using.
- 1-2 Scout, Physical Saving Throw with a bonus from the higher of Exert or Survive
- 3-4 Look-out, Mental Saving Throw with a bonus from the higher of Notice or Survive
- 5-6 Hunters, Evasion Saving Throw with a bonus from the higher of Sneak or Survive
You'll note that having Survive makes you better suited at any of the roles, which feels right for those interested in being dedicated woodsmen. If there are multiple people in the targeted role, you may choose who the Event targets.
The generic Events are below, but as I said there's a great opportunity to toss in unique ones if you want. Roll 1d12. Where noted, the entire party accrues the listed System Strain
- 1, Despair, 2 System Strain. If the PC fails their Saving Throw, everyone also gets a "Misfortune" (metacurrency I'm adding which gives the GM re-rolls)
- 2-3 Poor Choices, 2 System Strain. If the PC fails their Saving Throw, they get a Misfortune.
- 4-7 Exhaustion, 2 System Strain. If the PC fails their Saving Throw, they get +1 System Strain and add a day to the journey.
- 8-9 Shortcut, 1 System Strain. If the PC succeeds their Saving Throw, subtract a day from the journey.
- 10 Chance Meeting, 1 System Strain. If the PC succeeds their Saving Throw, no one accrues System Strain for this Event.
- 11 Terrible Misfortune, 3 System Strain. If the PC fails their Saving Throw, they are "Frail" (condition in Worlds Without Number that makes hitting 0hp even more fraught than usual) until they get some proper rest and relaxation.
- 12 Joyful Sight, 0 System Strain. If the PC succeeds their Saving Throw, everyone gets 1 Fortune (metacurrency I'm adding which gives the PCs re-rolls).
These Events should be handled lightly, more like a montage than a proper scene. When I've run it, I've asked the players to help narrate the fictional context of the mechanical outcomes; "Why did you become Frail?" "I shouldn't have eaten that rabbit jerky I found in my boot".
5. Finish the Journey
Once you've arrived at your destination hex, everyone in the party gets a chance to roll Constitution/Survive (DC 10, but this drops to 8 if they've brought a mule). On a success, they lose 2 System Strain they've accrued over the trip.
If they have a horse of some kind (war horse, draft horse), this automatically succeeds. If they specifically have a riding horse, they instead lose 4 System Strain instead. I intend for this to give players a reason to purchase these animals, bond with them emotionally, and weep hot tears of rage when they forget how much owlbears like the taste of horseflesh.
This is a pretty long post, so I'm going to use a new one to talk about the subsystem for formal audiences with figures of authority!
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