Do you keep track of normal ammunition?

[Umbran]

It depends on the situation.

In most games, I work on an "upkeep" model - the PCs are charged a monthly rate depending on how high on the hog they've been living. Their upkeep costs cover repairs on equipment, replacement of normal ammunition, and so on.

So, in times and places of plenty, when they can stock up whenever they want, and the action isn't *too* fast and furious, such that they're not firing of 20+ shots a day, I don't worry about it.

When they're off in the wilds, dirt poor, or resupply is otherwise sketchy, I keep closer track.

 

[Desdichado]

If it's magic, or special ammo somehow, I want them to keep track. And if they're way out in the wilderness (or, say, the Elemental Plane of Earth) for extended periods of time, I might start keeping track.

But when it comes to normal ammo under normal circumstances, I've never personally found it anything more than an accounting headache.

Ditto. I don't play RPGs like some kind of simulationist challenge. I play RPGs to emulate a collaborative novel or action movie type of thing.

Which, I guess, often comes down to "we only run out of ammo when it's dramatically appropriate to do so" but in reality, I don't do that either. I just don't care about the book keeping of mundane equipment (of any kind, not just ammo) enough.

Also: should've been a poll, so we could see the breakdowns graphically.

 

[kitsune9]

I let my players keep track of all their resources regardless of what it is.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

It depends on the situation.

In most games, I work on an "upkeep" model - the PCs are charged a monthly rate depending on how high on the hog they've been living. Their upkeep costs cover repairs on equipment, replacement of normal ammunition, and so on.

So, in times and places of plenty, when they can stock up whenever they want, and the action isn't *too* fast and furious, such that they're not firing of 20+ shots a day, I don't worry about it.

When they're off in the wilds, dirt poor, or resupply is otherwise sketchy, I keep closer track.

That's usually what I do. It's up to the players to determine what is normal for them, and how they carry it, but after that we don't worry about it unless they can't restock and/or lose a bunch of supplies.

Sometimes, however, we handle the actual tracking more abstractly, too. In one Fantasy Hero, D&D-ish campaign, we added a "Packing" skill. The players set the load, as above. But then when they used a lot of ammo or other resources in a short time, each character had to make a roll on the skill. Get too low, and they were running out, and had to track it formally from that point on. Roll a "fumble", and they "forgot" to pack extra or otherwise had trouble. "What do you mean, we are out of arrows? I packed six extra quivers on the mule!" "Yeah, but you didn't tie them down properly. We've still got the quivers, but there are only three arrows left in the lot of them."

That was a fun way to have all the trouble and worry of tracking ammo in character, without having to fool with it much as book keeping.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Always. I think it is one of the many resource management issues of D&D which make the game fun. Limitations and boundaries are often where drama resides.

 

[Umbran]

Which, I guess, often comes down to "we only run out of ammo when it's dramatically appropriate to do so" but in reality, I don't do that either.

I'm playing in a Star Wars Saga Edition game, where "normal ammo" is an energy cell good for a large number of shots (50 or 100, or nearly indefinite use if in a lightsaber). So, for most intents and purposes, nobody worries about ammo use...

But, that opens up an interesting item - a Force power that drains energy cells! Dramatically appropriate is facing off with the big bad Sith lord, who draws his lightsaber, and tries to ignite it, and it fails! Woot!

The D&D equivalent is a druid with Warp Wood against an archer, I suppose....

 

[Stormonu]

Previously, Players are responsible for tracking ammo burned in my games. If I find out they haven't been tracking it (I sometimes audit ammo during a session), they're out of ammo, even if it was magical.

In non-D&D games, I tend to use "dramatic ammo" rules where fumbles indicate running out of ammo (or just empty on a clip, depending on game and situation).

 

[TheYeti1775]

Bag of holding + a few dozen quivers and we don't bother counting any more! Like most people - I tend not to bother after 1st level, unless there's a good reason for it. Just doesn't really add much to the game IMO.

One of my old GMs introduced the 'quiver of plenty' from Baldurs gate to provide an ingame reason for not counting - basically a quiver that offered unlimited arrows... although the RB got to laugh as the PC couldn't use his bow in an anti magic field.

Unfortunately, no one was willing to follow my idea - employ peasants in shifts to pull limitless arrows from the quiver. Sell for big $$$. Retire! They just lacked my killer business instincts.

Done both of those methods, though the Quiver of Plenty we used from Icewind Dale trilogy, the one Catt-brie had.

I require PC to track ammunition use, but I also provide a loophole:
I make a magical weapon quality available. For 1000gp, they can get a bow enchanted with Devlin's Barb from Monte Cook's BoEM (I don't remember oof-hand which one) The weapon then creates ammo as the string is drawn. The shot disappears shortly after hitting the mark, which makes it nice if you want to avoid having your arrows tracked back to you, but the chief benefit is just never having to track ammo (outside area of antimagic of course) The price is from the formulae in DMG, but is really only justified in the convenience. To run up the same expense on non-magical ammo, you'd have to fire hundreds of arrows per encounter for more than twenty levels of progression.
I call this weapon special quality "Everlasting."

Generally we don't keep special track of 'ammo' except Magical 'Ammo'. But we also don't have any primary archers for the most part in our parties. So the 10 arrows a round doesn't effect us as often.

Now for the magic weapon of draw and a normal arrow, we used a +2 Enchantment cost or a +15k cost to the item. Made for a nice variant in styles.

I'm playing in a Star Wars Saga Edition game, where "normal ammo" is an energy cell good for a large number of shots (50 or 100, or nearly indefinite use if in a lightsaber). So, for most intents and purposes, nobody worries about ammo use...

But, that opens up an interesting item - a Force power that drains energy cells! Dramatically appropriate is facing off with the big bad Sith lord, who draws his lightsaber, and tries to ignite it, and it fails! Woot!

The D&D equivalent is a druid with Warp Wood against an archer, I suppose....

 

[Janx]

Always. I think it is one of the many resource management issues of D&D which make the game fun. Limitations and boundaries are often where drama resides.

I think this is a valid point.

One kind of fun in D&D is resource management. Counting your arrows is a pretty simple form of that, and not unreasonable, considering what the spell casters have to do .

Additionally, considering a quiver carries about 20 arrows and it's pretty ridiculous to be carrying multiple quivers on your person, running out of ammo on your person SHOULD be a factor in the PCs tactics.

It should also be noted, that arrows do break. They can break when they strike something or are deflected on their path. They break when they are pulled out. They can break when the target falls over on them. Arrows are not a freebie resource.

Arrows should be managed as a scarce resource because of the added value they give to combat by way of extending reach. A longsword has a reach of 5' and does 1d8. An arrow has much farther reach and is balanced by being a consumable resource that occupies inventory and thus is not infinite in how long the PC gets the benefit.

 

[Asmo]

Yup.

Asmo