Random Wilderness Encounters

[galaga88]

How do you folks handle random wilderness encounters?

While I would usually shy away from random encounters, I use them in the wilderness to discourage endlessly wandering to and from town every time a character loses a hit point or two.

According to the RAW, you roll a % chance (usually around 10%) every hour. On a long trip, that could come out to a lot of rolls and potential encounters. Combined with the high XP rates, my PCs are almost gaining more levels in the wilds than they are on the actual adventure. I've switched to a roll three times a day (morning, afternoon, night).

Any suggestions or ideas from the peanut gallery? (I've already toned down XP from wilderness encounters.)

 

[Scharlata]

[...]Any suggestions or ideas from the peanut gallery? (I've already toned down XP from wilderness encounters.)

Hi!

I'm with you. Wilderness Encounters don't make me happy in general.

I scan through the provided encounter systems (DMG/modules) and tone down the frequency.

It slows down the game if you have to respond to 6 encounters per day. Player's get annoyed and may lose their focus.

Sometimes I set encounters to lure the party away from boring locations or towards special/relevant adventure sites.

It doesn't make sense to me if the party encounters too much wilderness critters, especially the dangeous ones, because there's no chain of food out there that supports their abundant existence. Furthermore, I don't like the idea very well of having "civilzed" people residing in the wilderness (small villages, out-of-the-way cottages) being surrounded by dangerous creatures all their life only to wait that some adventureres pop by to slaughter them at random.

I pick some of the more plausible wilderness encounters provided by the charts and make my own chart. I use them sparingly and use them to steer the adventure as needed.

Sometimes it's fun to let the critters do some uncommon nonviolent/nonaggressive thing, like party-spotting, begging, misleading, fraternize, intimidating and fleeing, trading goods, etc. instead of attacking the party.

In general, use wilderness encounters as YOU see fit, rejecting any charts that are to restricting, unplausible, and/or just not fun.

Kind regards nd good gaming

 

[Shallown]

I usually handle them by not having them.

Now I have encounters that are random within the context of the ongoing story etc. So you may run into something that has nothing to do with what else is going on like a group of bandits operating in the area or stumbling over an ankhegs nest but as a GM they are not random in generation I pick them and run them.

This serves to let players know more about their enviroment by controlling what they encounter. Instead of having to backtrack and explain why bandits are free to roam the fact they are there and you have chosen them to be there says the area is less patrolled or maybe something else is going on.

But every encounter does not have to be some big secret or indicator either. Maybe that enraged bullette just moved into the neighborhood. No great secret or story to tell.

I know it may be artificial to balance encounters against the parties abilityto handle them but it still needs to be done. I mean in my last campaign when my 10-12th level characters were traveling cross country (which the did not always using teleports and such) I would mention they ran into a group of goblin raiders and they more or less hosed them. I didn't waste game time with encounters they could easily handle. They still occur I just don't waste time on them. If something was more powerful like a Dragon flying overhead (Not that that happned but for example) I would play it out becuase knowingthat fear is oart of the game as well.

Just my opinions

later

 

[Ranes]

I create random wilderness encounter tables for areas in my campaign likely to be travelled by the party in the next session (which actually means I rarely need to create a table). They are not level-based tables; they're based on environment and the campaign background. I then roll for any random encounters that would occur on a given journey between games - whether they occur and what, if anything, occurs. Then I spend a few minutes thinking of how to stage that encounter in an interesting way. Many of these encounters will not necessarily result in combat. Quite a few are merely events and not strictly encounters at all. In the end, they're not really random any more.

My players have no idea I do this. If, on the night, a journey from A to B takes place at night, for some reason, and I've planned a daytime encounter or if the pace of the game suggests a 'random' encounter isn't called for at all, I shelve the encounter.

 

[shilsen]

I have planned random encounters. That is, I work out beforehand what kind of encounters the group may have in a particular location, and have a couple of encounters prepared (and statted out, if it's likely to be combat-oriented). Then, depending on how long the group spends in the area and how they pass through it, they may encounter some, all or none of what I have planned.

 

[IndyPendant]

Meh. If your worry is that they tool back to town every time they're hurt, give them in-game related time limits. Let me provide an example, from my current Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil campaign. It requires some background and there *are* spoilers, so read at your own risk.

Spoiler:

Spoiler

Background: The party cleared out Earth and Air temples, but in the process got the attention of Water. Now, in my campaign I decided that Water did do the raid on Fire, and failed. So Water decided to contact the party, kidnap the druid PC's companion, and use it as hostage to force the party to attack Fire. The party performed a daring TP rescue of their companion, neatly avoiding a *particularly* nasty trap I had set up for them. *shrug*

Time constraint: They then delayed for a few days--maybe as much as five--before actually attacking Water. Some reasons were IC, some were just...fear of the risk involved. Anyways, Water in the module is broken into two factions: (most of) the kuo-toans, and the humans/elves/etc. So, I had the kuo-toan half-demon get disgusted with the Priestess' recent repeated failures and switch sides back to the kuo-toans, who staged a coup, slaughtering all the non-kuo-toans in the Temple. The party was going to find a much weaker force there, but...never attacked. So, since I had had one of the Priestess-side people survive (basically a hireling the party has a big hate-on for: ), as the party delayed even longer, he joined Fire in exchange for information and help, and staged a raid on the kuo-toans at the weakened Water, slaughtering them all.

Result: The party *finally* scouts Water to find it utterly destroyed. And, since Water ended up getting most of the loot from Air ('why' would take too long to explain, but was part of the whole holding-companion-hostage thing), that meant that Fire now has most of Water *and* Air's loot as well. So the party misses the loot and xp they would have gotten by attacking Water, and because Fire has it *all* now, they are even more nervous about attacking Fire. And are very, very aware of the effects too many further delays might have on the game...: )

Use your imagination. *Play* the opponent, and work out what is happening as the PCs delay, hesitate, and dawdle. Then hit them with the consequences.

Done properly, it works out a lot better than mere random encounters.

--Oh, and random encounters have a serious flaw in them: 1) they either happen many times per day and are boring, or 2) they happen only once or twice at most per day--which allows the casters to power-dump their spells during the encounter, essentially reducing the risk of the battle significantly. A real pita, that.

 

[Jack Simth]

I think Vaarsuvius explained it quite well...

 

[Scharlata]

I think Vaarsuvius explained it quite well...

Yupp!

 

[dcollins]

According to the RAW, you roll a % chance (usually around 10%) every hour. On a long trip, that could come out to a lot of rolls and potential encounters. Combined with the high XP rates, my PCs are almost gaining more levels in the wilds than they are on the actual adventure. I've switched to a roll three times a day (morning, afternoon, night).

I recommend exactly what you're doing. The encounter rates in the DMG are way too high, and really poorly thought out. I lean on 1st Ed. encounter rates, with somewhere between 3 and 6 checks per day, depending on dangerousness.

 

[Li Shenron]

If your target is to tell the players that they are wandering the wilderness to much, you can still do your frequent encounters, but since they probably killed all the big beasts, now they only encounter dire rats, small monstrous spiders and similar critter. They have to waste time fighting them, but they get no Xp because they are too low CR.

Anyway, even if you fast-forward the trip back to town to replenish resources, remember that to the characters it costs precious time, which the enemies are going to use to their advantage. If the PC group retreats from the dungeon every two rooms, they should not easily restatr from the latest spot without some new surprise or change to the rooms they cleared before (IOW, the world doesn't stand still, waiting for them to come back).