D&D 5E ToA: Dance of the Seven Winds *SPOILERS*

[mattwandcow]

Assuming 8 hours, 4 hours per day, that's about 100 miles or 10 hexes.

Nagalore, the city with the quest item to do the ritual is 5 hexes away from Kir Sabal. So you have to go 10 hexes to get the flight spell.

So, if I'm mathing right and people aren't exerting for Exhaustion, if you decided to walk instead of doing the flight side quest, you're 3 days travel ahead of the fliers.

Assuming fast travel, you're going 1.5 hexes a day, 4.5 hexes, 45 extra miles, 10 hours of extra effort total, or about 3 a day.

Interestingly enough, your failing the 3rd save for extra travel is where you hit half speed.

If the party always travels at full speed, and has a person who always fails their con saves, they will be 5 miles short of the average group that decided not to go to Nagalore (not counting any time they spent dealing with the crazy queen.)

Ritual of the 7 winds appears to be a meta trap. Does not actually provide advantage. Attacking a party where most of them have several levels of exhaustion sounds fun.

I think I'm going to hand wave them into Omu, though. Jungle encounters haven't interested any of us for a while. (My party is level 5 or so, having come in from STK)

 

[CapnZapp]

Assuming 8 hours, 4 hours per day, that's about 100 miles or 10 hexes.

Nagalore, the city with the quest item to do the ritual is 5 hexes away from Kir Sabal. So you have to go 10 hexes to get the flight spell.

So, if I'm mathing right and people aren't exerting for Exhaustion, if you decided to walk instead of doing the flight side quest, you're 3 days travel ahead of the fliers.

Assuming fast travel, you're going 1.5 hexes a day, 4.5 hexes, 45 extra miles, 10 hours of extra effort total, or about 3 a day.

Interestingly enough, your failing the 3rd save for extra travel is where you hit half speed.

If the party always travels at full speed, and has a person who always fails their con saves, they will be 5 miles short of the average group that decided not to go to Nagalore (not counting any time they spent dealing with the crazy queen.)

Ritual of the 7 winds appears to be a meta trap. Does not actually provide advantage. Attacking a party where most of them have several levels of exhaustion sounds fun.

I think I'm going to hand wave them into Omu, though. Jungle encounters haven't interested any of us for a while. (My party is level 5 or so, having come in from STK)

What are you talking about?

We're talking about whether the ritual can help the party find/reach Omu.

That they will have criss-crossed the jungle on foot previously, including the quest for the ingredient, is a given.

The "extra" trek from the monastery to the gardens is just a small part of that earlier phase. We're not thinking the ritual is there to help with that...


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[mattwandcow]

I know the ritual isn't for trying to get the flower. That not what I was trying to say.

As far as I can figure, the distance they can cover with the flight ritual is the same distance as it took to go get the flower and return to Kir Sabal.

Most likely, it just a coincidence.

But as far as I can figure, if Table A did the flight ritual, and the Table B decided to not get the flower and push on towards Omu, Table B would be 3 days further along from where Table A finally starts walking again.

 

[CapnZapp]

I know the ritual isn't for trying to get the flower. That not what I was trying to say.

As far as I can figure, the distance they can cover with the flight ritual is the same distance as it took to go get the flower and return to Kir Sabal.

Most likely, it just a coincidence.

But as far as I can figure, if Table A did the flight ritual, and the Table B decided to not get the flower and push on towards Omu, Table B would be 3 days further along from where Table A finally starts walking again.

Ah. But without flight the party might dismiss the idea to just strike out randomly in the jungle.

You're right in that a party that already knows in which direction to head doesn't need the ritual, in the sense that they won't save any actual time.

But this ignores:
1) that they already have the flower
2) that flight is way cool ☺
and, as said,
3) that they don't know in which direction to go, and need the confidence boost that comes with flight (triple speed, challenge level of many encounters significantly lowered)

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[CapnZapp]

This ties into the basic fact which (I think) so far hasn't been discussed by the thread:

A) That the party can cover MUCH more territory if they don't have to end up back at the monastery - that is, if they treat the flight as a one-way ticket.

B) That the party can cover MUCH more territory if they split up.

This requires the heroes to feel confident in their individual ability to survive the jungle as they converge on a predetermined spot, after the flight ends.

Communication abilities (like sending stones) really helps.

Being sufficiently high level to dare the jungle alone, or at least in pairs, helps too!

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[CapnZapp]

This is (partly) why I haven't made the jungle encounters more difficult despite my party starting out at level 5.

Instead I have removed the ability to benefit from taking long rests in jungle hexes.

The effect is that shorter treks isn't deadlier for groups of low-level travellers (such as most NPCs), while still making the hex crawl experience relevant to heroes of mid single-digit levels, especially If we consider the possibility of splitting the party.

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[jasper]

Ok, I go with the 4 miles per hour stated in the Tomb vs. the DMG 3 miles per hour. 8 hours *4 miles *3 days is 96 miles. So the bird is helping them get to city but NOT two day shipping them to the city. Hey this is not the Amazon (lol). I would use the force march and exhaustion rules.

 

[mattwandcow]

My problem is I sold the whole wingaling side quest as a shortcut on the meta level, before I did the math. And the math is infuriating.

I'm going to wave my magic DM hands and have the dance of the SEVEN winds last SEVEN days with some nice color fluff.

I really want to start doing Omu

 

[jasper]

My problem is I sold the whole wingaling side quest as a shortcut on the meta level, before I did the math. And the math is infuriating.

I'm going to wave my magic DM hands and have the dance of the SEVEN winds last SEVEN days with some nice color fluff.

I really want to start doing Omu

Hmm Evil DM Here. Give the group 7 bags. Just before the npc opens the first bag, tell them a bag will allow to travel at 4 miles per hour for 8 hours. Open bag 1. Now if during the journey they open more than one bag per day.
hahahahhahahaha
Stuff happens.

 

[pukunui]

I'm going to wave my magic DM hands and have the dance of the SEVEN winds last SEVEN days with some nice color fluff.

That sounds like a good plan. I'll most likely end up doing that too.

In case anyone is wondering, the reason I've been trying to hash this out is because my group hired Eku as their guide. She is currently taking them to see the naga at Orolunga, who points out that Omu is easiest to find "from the air or from the nearest high ground". Since Eku is also acquainted with the aarakocra of Kir Sabal, it makes sense to me that, upon hearing that, she would suggest to the PCs that they visit the monastery to see if the birdfolk can help. Thus the PCs, learning about the ritual, would naturally expect it to get them to Omu, not just part of the way.