Level Up (A5E) Advanced Journeys &Exploration Challenges

[Morrus]

Better, but you’ve basically now given the players potentially infinite spell scrolls of guidance at half cost that can also stack and don’t require concentration (assuming you keep 1 Supply = 5 gold).

They can't carry infinite Supply, and running out of Supply is not good.

 

[xiphumor]

They can't carry infinite Supply, and running out of Supply is not good.

Mules are cheap, and Supply isn’t hard to come by. If the amount of Supply exceeds the demand, it’s practically infinite. This is especially true when using Supply effectively can reduce your travel time or avoid other obstacles, reducing the amount of Supply you need in the first place.

And maybe I’ll be wrong when the whole system is in place, but I would definitely playtest that balance before committing to it.

 

[Morrus]

Mules are cheap, and Supply isn’t hard to come by. If the amount of Supply exceeds the demand, it’s practically infinite.

This is essentially the purpose of this concept--what you just described also applies to the core journey rules as they are. The idea here is to make Supply more of an issue.

 

[Faolyn]

I think when you use the core LU exploration rules your opinion may change on this. They are (deliberately) very lenient, and running out of Supply really isn't a danger. In the two years I've been running Level Up, it's never happened. This is (partly) intended to provide an option for those people who like Supply to be more of an issue.

Fair enough, and I can't wait to use the exploration rules--although it may take a while because at least at the start, the game will be primarily city-based. Plenty of ways to get Supply there, even in the seedy underground where a lot of the action will take place!

I do like your new Supply idea quite a lot, and we very well may end up adopting it, even in an unfinished state!

 

[W'rkncacnter]

2. There’s no reward for finding a clever way to overcome a problem with the proverbial toothpick and some chewing gum. If a player finds a way to safey navigate a CR 20 Divine War by offering the goddess of a chaos a really cool rock they found in a way that makes narrative sense, they shouldn’t still be paying 20 Supply. The cost should be determined by how well you overcome the challenge, not a tax rate you pay in advance.

to be fair, the rule in the current version (v2) is for each PC to spend supply equal to the tier of the challenge, and critically succeeding halves that cost (even down into halves, which is...bizarre).

 

[Pedantic]

Thinking further, I might be more inclined to simply add supply loss text in to more exploration challenges. This system feels a bit too 1 size fits all, which is probably where that sense of taxation comes in.

I can think of 3 places I'd work it in: a penalty on failure for exploration challenges more broadly, as a cost to make a skill roll for some possible exploration challenge solutions, and in some cases, as an alternative to rolling altogether.

If we had the luxury of starting over altogether, I think I would work Supply as a currency into the knack system as well. That would encourage players to find ways to use those abilities to resolve exploration challenges without paying other costs, and you could have a whole section on ways to alter Supply refreshes for things like urban campaigns.

 

[Selganor]

How about setting "recoverable" Supply (like using Supply to help open a crate with a crowbar) to the side as a "Recover Supply pool".

At a long (or short?) rest the character looks through the "used" Supply and sees how well they have fared and then rolls a number of d6 of the set aside pool. Each 6 symbolizes an item is damaged or broken and the Supply can't be recovered (maybe allow craft to still repair/save the damaged/broken items) other numbers can be recovered.
If you want Supply to be gone faster adjust the 6 to lower numbers.
And if situations were really dire maybe even roll more than once for the pool.

Supply that is used up (like food, a rope you had to leave behind, ...) would just be gone/deducted and never see the inside of the pool.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Thinking further, I might be more inclined to simply add supply loss text in to more exploration challenges. This system feels a bit too 1 size fits all, which is probably where that sense of taxation comes in.

I can think of 3 places I'd work it in: a penalty on failure for exploration challenges more broadly, as a cost to make a skill roll for some possible exploration challenge solutions, and in some cases, as an alternative to rolling altogether.

If we had the luxury of starting over altogether, I think I would work Supply as a currency into the knack system as well. That would encourage players to find ways to use those abilities to resolve exploration challenges without paying other costs, and you could have a whole section on ways to alter Supply refreshes for things like urban campaigns.

Agreed. I'm sure there are ways to make Supply more meaningful without increasing the level of abstraction.

 

[Pedantic]

How about setting "recoverable" Supply (like using Supply to help open a crate with a crowbar) to the side as a "Recover Supply pool".

At a long (or short?) rest the character looks through the "used" Supply and sees how well they have fared and then rolls a number of d6 of the set aside pool. Each 6 symbolizes an item is damaged or broken and the Supply can't be recovered (maybe allow craft to still repair/save the damaged/broken items) other numbers can be recovered.
If you want Supply to be gone faster adjust the 6 to lower numbers.
And if situations were really dire maybe even roll more than once for the pool.

Supply that is used up (like food, a rope you had to leave behind, ...) would just be gone/deducted and never see the inside of the pool.

This is promising as a means to give PCs more access to Supply without significantly increasing capacity. Supply is either spent (like the current daily requirements) or "risked" which gives it some chance of being lost altogether. That's a lot of fun levers for PCs to play with, potentially spending supply to avoid risking more, risking extra supply for bonuses on rolls, coming up with clever pens to decrease the total risked amount, etc.

You could also integrate the variable timer dicepools mechanic for ongoing challenges, like crossing a desert, or trying to lash things down on a ship in a storm. Each die represents a risked supply, and players are either trying to succeed at something else before the time runs out, or it could be inverted and they might be tempted to add more if they're trying to succeed at something before the pool runs dry.

 

[Stalker0]

What about spending supplies to get boosts to skill checks in an exploration challenge?

The challenges focus more on fatigue/strife…and supply is more of an asset on the checks to get through the challenge