Passage of Time - Forked: Why Calculated XP is Important

S'mon · Mar 10, 2009

Forked from: Why Calculated XP is Important

Lanefan said:
I know Gygax suggests in the 1e DMG that game time should pass about in synch with real time during non-session times, but that makes so little sense as to be utterly ridiculous...the game log would read something like "Party goes to open a door, then decides to stand there for a week before trying the handle to see if it's locked."

I actually am doing this for the first time in my current tabletop campaign; 1 game week = 1 real week. I do this because I have circumstances similar to those Gygax experienced - I'm running an open access game at a D&D Meetup club with constantly varying players, much like Gygax's Greyhawk table. The campaign is primarily episodic, with a loose arc of sequential scenarios. 1 Game Week = 1 Real Week enables me and the players to keep rough track of the passage of time in a practical manner.

Here's how it works: I run 2 games per month, and an adventure typically takes 4 sessions. No time passes between sessions during an adventure, 4 sessions of play typically takes 2 months and covers 2-4 days of game time. However there is then an 8 week gap in game time so that it catches up with real time in time for the next adventure.

This works because the same scheduled adventure takes place whoever turns up to the game. They are site-based adventures, so there is plenty of freedom of action within the adventure, the PCs are sent on missions by the King and given discretion how to complete them.

I'm also using real year (2008 - 2009 AD) as game world year (2008-2009 AUC - Ab Urbe Condita), again for convenience.

Here's how it's gone so far:

Intro Scenario 'Castle Kaladrac' M7 2008 AUC, 1 session played July 2008

'Rahasia' M8 2008 AUC, 4 sessions played August-September 2008

'Horror on the Hill' M10 2008 AUC, 4 sessions played October-December 2008

'Palace of Shadows' M1 2009 AUC, 4 sessions played January-February 2009

The next session will be this month, March 2009, so that will be M3 2009 AUC.

Anyone else do something similar?

Desert Hare · Mar 10, 2009

How do you resolve in game down time? Like when the characters need to rest?

S'mon · Mar 10, 2009

Desert Hare said:
How do you resolve in game down time? Like when the characters need to rest?

That's done normally - I tend to discourage excessive with wandering monsters, and resting once the PCs have alerted the enemy can be suicidal.

But often the PCs will rest 2-3 times during a 32 page, 4-session adventure. That's fine, 2-3 game days pass during the adventure (which takes 2 months real time); then after the adventure ends some 8 game-weeks pass before the next adventure (which starts next month in real-time, typically 2-3 real weeks).

The important thing is that the beginning of each adventure is a punctuation mark, a point where the real date and the game date coincide. I'm only tracking by the month, so there is not much book-keeping. If PCs wish to eg craft items, they get 8 weeks of down-time to do so in between adventures.

My next adventure is about to start this month, so in game that will be Month 3 2009 AUC. I expect it will run from March through May (I'm away in April), while taking a few game days. All those game days will be in M3 2009 AUC.

Assuming we finish the adventure in May, that means I'll start the next adventure this June. In-game, that then means a start date of Month 6 2009 AUC.

Ryan_Singer · Mar 10, 2009

Magic item creation no longer requires significant downtime in 4e. It now takes exactly 1 hour to make any item, presuming you are high enough level to make the item in the first place.

S'mon · Mar 10, 2009

Ryan_Singer said:
Magic item creation no longer requires significant downtime in 4e. It now takes exactly 1 hour to make any item, presuming you are high enough level to make the item in the first place.

I run 3.5e. I think the 3.5e times are rather short, especially for items in the low thousands of gp range. 1 hour seems more appropriate for casting a summoning spell than for actual creation IMO.

Ryan_Singer · Mar 10, 2009

S'mon said:
I run 3.5e. I think the 3.5e times are rather short, especially for items in the low thousands of gp range. 1 hour seems more appropriate for casting a summoning spell than for actual creation IMO.

I played a bunch of Wizards and Artificers back in 3.5. The 1k per day limit only really bothered me with the one GM who wouldn't let me combine <1k items into the same day.

S'mon · Mar 10, 2009

Ryan_Singer said:
I played a bunch of Wizards and Artificers back in 3.5. The 1k per day limit only really bothered me with the one GM who wouldn't let me combine <1k items into the same day.

Since a PC IMC with the usual 8 weeks down time could create ca 7x8=56 such items between adventures, I do not see a problem.

Lanefan · Mar 11, 2009

I can see how this would work, provided there wasn't anything going on in the back-story that was at all time-sensitive; because an adventure taking a session or two longer than you expect can really throw your timing off.

Oddly enough, though I separate in-game time completely from real time, it still works out more often than not that an in-game year takes about one real-world year to play. My current campaign, for example, started last March in real time; the game date was Coira 32, and of the now-three active parties in the game one just passed Coira 32 of the following year and the other two are in the Coira 'teens.

It's the mid-adventure, mid-activity breaks where EGG's advice falls apart.

Lanefan

Ydars · Mar 11, 2009

Lanefan: I had always assumed that for EGG, one session WAS one adventure and that the beginning of a session was always entering the dungeon and the end was leaving. I thought that was why EGG dungeons always had lots of ways in and out and why the stairs to lower levels were often near the entrance.

S'mon · Mar 11, 2009

(spoilers for my Willow Vale campaign)

Lanefan said:
I can see how this would work, provided there wasn't anything going on in the back-story that was at all time-sensitive; because an adventure taking a session or two longer than you expect can really throw your timing off.

I'm running a sequence of adventures; the date when the Hill giants attack (Against the Giants) or the Master's forces strike (Master of the Desert Nomads/Temple of Death) is determined by the real world date we get to them.

Which is kinda interesting as I don't know when that will be!