Looking for examples of travel mechanics that go beyond simple procedure

[dbm]

I have a suspicion that the trick to making travel interesting is not in the mechanics, but rather in the scenario or setting.

In The Broken Empires, Trevor’s advice is pretty strong that it’s the GM narration that makes travel interesting, just in the same way that description makes combat more interesting than ‘I swing, I hit’. But his further point is that the system can (in his opinion, should) provide the GM with enough meaningful information that they can weave the narrative out of it. His moto is ‘the dice tell the story’.

 

[Vrindlevine]

In The Broken Empires, Trevor’s advice is pretty strong that it’s the GM narration that makes travel interesting, just in the same way that description makes combat more interesting than ‘I swing, I hit’. But his further point is that the system can (in his opinion, should) provide the GM with enough meaningful information that they can weave the narrative out of it. His moto is ‘the dice tell the story’.

This is a good start for sure. I would say narration is about 10% of what I do during a travel sequence. Realistically I am never quite sure how long my players would be willing to hear me go on about "cold winds", "haggard refugees" and "the rumbles of war on the horizon", short and sweet is how I like to do it. The mechanical part of travel is always what got me scratching my head. I know how I do it, which is via prepared scenarios along the way designed to create decision points for players, but this is a lot of work.

In his deep dive. Trevor seems to be the sort to favor random tables which is fine I suppose, but I don't think I would ever pay for a random table, its something any GM can make pretty easily. It also not particularly "mechanical" it can create scenarios where you need mechanics to resolve them sure, though maybe that is just splitting hairs.

It seems that broken empires has some pretty niche rules relevant to travel (there was one I loved about open wounds becoming infected with sepsis). This can be great because with enough niche rules you have a pretty good chance of interesting scenarios just sort of happening without as much effort from the GM.

A little later in the video Trevor shows a section about "events" and this is fantastic, the handful listed are some great starting points but I would like more detail and more of them (he only shows about 20 in the video, could be more), especially at the price point of almost $55 CAD for a PDF. Maybe someone who has the book can shed some light on how much content there is in this area.

 

[dbm]

There are 52 pages on travel out of a 659 page book, so $55CAD seems pretty good value if you want all 600-odd pages but not so if you are only interested in the travel rules?

 

[Morrus]

Level Up: A5E has an entire book on exploration. Travel rules, exploration challenges, monster and social encounters, travel scenery, the whole works.

 

[Piperken]

...and the most recent set of rules for travel revolved around simple skill checks, but we've found the tests to get repetitious and now I'm looking to do a major revamp of my travel system, particularly looking to make the process into more of a game. Errant's lockpicking procedure and TBR's Line of Sight (link) are particular points of inspiration for me right now.

... my format uses a points-of-light map rather than hexes, and my intention is to require the groups navigator to choose from differing routes between zones (or optionally bushwhack, if known routes are deemed infeasible). I'm also not trying to reinvent the wheel, so any existing systems or homebrew you like would be of interest!

I've not thoroughly perused everyone's replies, so if what's offered below is redundant I apologize. :3 Your question recalled these two posts on different blogs I came across a little while back: my sentiment is the 1st provides grounding for the 2nd, even though by different authors. I think there's a number of possible strategies proposed in both you might find of interest!

 

[Vrindlevine]

There are 52 pages on travel out of a 659 page book, so $55CAD seems pretty good value if you want all 600-odd pages but not so if you are only interested in the travel rules?

True the total value is pretty good. I was just hoping for some more concrete examples to inform the posts question or my own purchase.

Level Up: A5E has an entire book on exploration. Travel rules, exploration challenges, monster and social encounters, travel scenery, the whole works.

Sounds good. I'll take a look. How many ready to use encounters, points of interest are we talking?

 

[Morrus]

Sounds good. I'll take a look. How many ready to use encounters, points of interest are we talking?

Many. I don’t know how many but many.

 

[dbm]

I was just hoping for some more concrete examples to inform the posts question or my own purchase.

There are a number of tables to act as inspiration, and guidance on how to create encounters for travel. Then about 19 examples, ranging from a couple of short paragraphs to maybe a half page for the most detailed.

The interesting thing about TBE to my mind is how it brings together lots of ideas in a (hopefully) coherent whole to have interesting gameplay across combat, travel, social encounters and more.

 

[Viamond]

I am also very interested in this. I have a suspicion that the trick to making travel interesting is not in the mechanics, but rather in the scenario or setting.

Mechanics by definition will end up being repeated quite a bit so they should either be simple or part of a more interesting whole, if they are too simple, or without fail states then it becomes easy and desirable to ignore them (5e has this issue sometimes).

With an interesting setting or scenario you can rely on existing mechanics. Take the classic example of the broken bridge, there's a lot of potential solutions that dont specifically use travel rules. Thrown in 4-5 encounters of suchlike and you may not need specific travel rules. Of course this requires extensive prep, either for the GM or the scenario Designers or use of random tables/improv.

Either way I am interested to see what people come up with. Broken Empires was mentioned previously and looks really interesting as did Wildsea which I have looked at a little before.

I'm glad you pointed out the broken bridge scenario because that was literally the first encounter I ever had my group do and they had a ton of fun. Like you pointed out, ensuring stuff like this is prep-intensive and I am very specifically trying NOT to have to prep much. My group already has narrative campaigns and my sessions are intended to be easy one/two-shots.

 

[Viamond]

I've not thoroughly perused everyone's replies, so if what's offered below is redundant I apologize. :3 Your question recalled these two posts on different blogs I came across a little while back: my sentiment is the 1st provides grounding for the 2nd, even though by different authors. I think there's a number of possible strategies proposed in both you might find of interest!

I've not thoroughly perused everyone's replies, so if what's offered below is redundant I apologize. :3 Your question recalled these two posts on different blogs I came across a little while back: my sentiment is the 1st provides grounding for the 2nd, even though by different authors. I think there's a number of possible strategies proposed in both you might find of interest!

These articles have sent me down a rabbit hole of discussions I haven't come across before. Thanks!