I’m trying something new for my random encounters, traces,
spoor, and encounters. I’m also counting successes by setting a base DC for an
encounter and then subtracting my roll to get a degree of severity. Each degree
checks off a box in order of traces, traces, tracks, spoor, lair, and creature,
each step revealing more of the possible encounter. I’ve decided to start this
because of how I roll encounters (with a time pool) for dungeons. Right now
I’ve set DCs for five categories. Let’s take a look.
Desolate
|
Unsettled
|
Frontier
|
Scattered
|
Dense
|
19
|
18
|
17
|
16
|
15
|
So if the frontier encounter roll is 19, three boxes are
checked (17, 18, 19); so traces, traces, and spoor is found. The next encounter
check will add to the same set of boxes and will clear after the encounter roll
for overnight. Using six mile hexes rolling once for each hex and once for rest
will get me five rolls. Of course, thinking more on that, that’s only on easily
traveled land. This leads me to think there will never be an encounter on a
mountains hex as it takes one day to cross a mountain hex. Also wild encounters
may be more prevalent in unsettled territory than in densely populated areas,
but encounters in general may not be. So let’s change some things. I think I will roll encounters based on time
and use these descriptors and DCs instead.
Creature population
|
Dense
|
Scattered
|
Desolate
|
Encounter DC
|
19
|
17
|
15
|
That makes it so I can roll every four hours bringing the
daily total to six encounter rolls two of which being at night. So this seems
to work out for monsters, but in civilized areas there will be more encounters
with humanoids. We can count the lair as a camp, outpost, or hideout. I’m
thinking we can skip some of the smaller steps in the ladder if we want. Say
finding some traces and spore next encounter rolling past lair and heading
straight to creature. Switching lair and creature in the order is an option
too, resetting the boxes after a creature is rolled.
I’ve got a lot of stuff to keep track of now and the way I’m
keeping track of time on my encounter worksheet is not working out anymore.
Here’s a list of things I need to keep track of:
·
Time
·
Days
·
Encounter level
·
Encounter DC
·
Rounds
·
Torches/Light (1hour/4hours)
Rounds
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
7
|
8
|
9
|
10
|
Minutes (mark torch or lantern in top)
5
|
10
|
15
|
20
|
25
|
30
|
35
|
40
|
45
|
50
|
55
|
60
|
Hours (mark torch or lantern in top)
12
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
7
|
8
|
9
|
10
|
11
|
12
|
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
7
|
8
|
9
|
10
|
11
|
Days
1
|
2
|
3
|
4
|
5
|
6
|
7
|
8
|
9
|
10
|
11
|
12
|
13
|
14
|
15
|
16
|
17
|
18
|
19
|
20
|
21
|
22
|
23
|
24
|
25
|
26
|
27
|
28
|
Easy! I’m not sure where to put torches at, I’ll leave them
in both hours and minutes for now and see where I use it the most. Hours seem
like the most for me because I use a time pool to track hours, but that’s only
indoors. Now I’ll just format, print,
and laminate it and have exactly what I need. I printed it out with graph paper
on the back and presto, a new tracker for my table, hopefully it lasts through
testing.
