Long Term Survival Challenges || D&D & Dael Kingsmill

This time on MonarchsFactory I took a question from Falconer on Twitter and through together some ideas for extended tests of management and how to keep them interesting for Dungeons and Dragons.
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[@adirmugrabi]

"Less now, since you let so many Wilhelms die"😃

[@jonathonm6613]

"You rolled a what on your con save? Oh. I'm sorry. You have died of dysentery."

[@MKempICI]

"Your refugees have been drinking water from the well in the ghost town..." Little Willhelm suddenly starts screaming, and speaking in tongues. Your players discover that some of the refugees are now possessed by ghosts. If the players use their spell slots to remove the ghosts, they leave themselves vulnerable and less able to gather food and water for the day.. Also, potentially cost yourself the ability to create water, food, or cure wounds/disease. If you don't deal with it, Wilhelm's woeful wails will weaken wills. I would include disease as a key factor. Refugees will get increasingly tired and worn down from travel, and every night without enough food means more dead from starvation and illness. Wailing ghost-possessed children mean everyone is short on sleep, as wel The final item I would suggest is shortcuts through hostile territory. These shortcuts should all require BIG tradeoffs. One example would be: We can travel on the low-road or the high-road. With the flooding, the low-road is a mess, but MUCH faster. It also means tired horses and we might have to abandon some of the heavier carts. OTOH, take the high road and expect to spend 2 weeks trudging through mountains, with possible bandits. Of course, the logical solution to all of these problems is to feed the refugees to the wolves, whom you will make into an army to liberate the vineyard. Capture it, and invite any survivors to a party. Make sure the wolves drink water from the ghost town, and rule over the land with your ghost-wolves for eternity.

[@gabriel300010]

bbeg ideas

[@Parbruek]

And you though 'ghost' town just meant abandoned... :P

[@artor9175]

Of course, we all know exactly what Wilhelm's scream sounds like.

[@kevingriffith6011]

Another thing to consider is to not make them 100 faceless refugees. They're people with differing ideas on how things need to be done, factionalism will happen, particularly as morale declines. Consider putting an antagonist in the ranks (Someone who challenges the party's authority, or openly undermines the party's decisions or intentions. They can still be a level 1 commoner, but could easily give the party as much trouble as the most powerful wizard). Maybe a couple of charismatic figures with opposed ideologies are splitting the group apart. Maybe include people the PCs can trust to hold things down while the party splits off to take care of little timmy who got lost in the woods. The absolute most important thing, beyond anything else, is that the PCs have meaningful decisions with immediately obvious consequences. Depending on the tone of your game, having the lives of these refugees rest on the party's every decision and the party's choices actually costing lives in game can really help sell the gravity of the situation... particularly when every failure the party makes is documented by the refugee's morale and the party not only has to keep them fed but also has to keep spirits up.

[@farmerboy916]

Moreover a party isn't going to be taking care of that many people on their own. They're at best going to need to delegate and organize the people they're dealing with and therefore interact with them and get involved that way

[@farmerboy916]

PurE DemOn That's simply not correct. People stab each other in the back during desperate times, or disagreements are amplified by the lack of food for instance. Moreover having to deal with an extra problem while still dealing with survival, complicated by factions potentially causing issues with survival (food being stolen or unevenly distributed, etc) only intensifies things.

[@kevingriffith6011]

@@puredemon6349 I think it's quite the opposite. People get reckless when they get desperate, they question leadership and do regrettable things. All it takes is someone who thinks they can do it better and enough people who believe him and then either those people take over or split off and try to do their own thing, taking more than their share of the food and supplies with them. If the refugees are suffering, they'll try to find a reason for it... that's just human nature. Very often that blame winds up on whoever is in charge, even if they had no power over the situation, even if the alternative would have been even more devastating. There's always someone who thinks they could do it better, and if they're loud enough and their words mirror the fears of enough other people then real problems start... all this becomes much more likely the more desperate people get.

[@kevingriffith6011]

@@puredemon6349 To use your example, because I think it's a good one, what if the cause of the wife's death was somehow, even tangentially, related to a decision that was made by the current leadership. Then a man climbs up on a cart or whatever and starts shouting about this resource scarcity problem the party is dealing with, alluding to the failure that caused this situation to begin with and the party's continued failure to address the issue effectively. He doesn't claim that "I would be better as a leader"... he claims that anyone would be a better leader than the party, because the party keeps making choices that "aren't in the best interests of the people here... and if we keep following them we're all going to die." Maybe the man lays out a solution to the problem, maybe he doesn't, but the point is that he casts doubt on the party's ability to care for everyone here... and that resonates with the man. A man who just lost his wife to this very thing and may lose his daughter and his own life to it as well. This isn't a political move, it's a survival one... one leader has "proven" themselves unfit to lead, maybe someone else should give it a try. "I could have done it better-ism" is a real thing that people do. Decisions are much easier to make in retrospect than they are in the moment. This is how mutanies and desertion happen when morale declines.

[@Dohlenblick]

I had this idea of my Party riding a semi-organic colossus through a far-spanning desert, all while working out how to build shelter into the creature's crystatline protrusions, figuring out it's resting schedule for gathering trips and fending off pursuers. This has brought me a few steps Closer to figuring out how to do it. Thanks Dael.

[@RatherWatchThemSA]

That sounds incredible!

[@ChemoshKamos]

That is COOL! I'm stealing that idea for my own campaign.

[@lank5582]

I just discovered this channel probably about seven hours ago and I've just been poring over videos instead of working. You discuss so many things I've wondered about and offer great insight and it's been an amazing resource for a new DM such as myself. Thank you and keep it up!

[@marctelfer6159]

Just wait until you stumble across the Too Easily Distracted videos. I get the feeling sometimes that the DnD videos are like Dael's focused TED videos :P

[@WayneBraack]

Actually at work not doing what you're paid to do but instead hanging on the internet? or just avoiding chores while chilling at home? Cuz that'd be fine but the first is just WTF useless much? Lack of integrity much?

[@ctberchem7303]

@@WayneBraack Maybe she is a professional DM. That's my dream job. Maybe Lauren found a way to make the dream real. Maybe her job is a creative one that encourages employees to search the web for other creative people. We don't know, so I for one will not criticize.

[@lank5582]

@@WayneBraack Um... avoiding working from home, but I only get paid for the hours I log, and I only log the hours I work... but thanks for the concern there...

[@akraftybasterd3489]

@@WayneBraack Seems you should get down off that high horse there. Sanctimonious much?

[@alexigiusti9700]

Having NPCs that represent and give voice to the different interest groups allows for character being given to the large group so the PC will invest more.

[@rossalgiers6413]

Maybe have the pc's lead a young guy to step up into a leadership position? How does magic/ technology fix or hinder the situation? So the threat that made you refugees are they tracking you down so is there a time crunch? I think just having the npcs being so passive as the world (walking into the environment hijinks) by pushing the narrative feels flat and less dynamic to me. Why do you feel connected to the group? Why don't you abandoned them? What happens if you do?

[@Katwind]

Why little Willem went to the woods? He can be an interesting recurring character if you save him. Maybe he didn`t want to escape with the refugees because he left something/someone precious behind, maybe he wants revenge or prove himself, so the group can find the miniquests in a interesting way. The kid has been bothering the kitchens, then he says he did it because he overheard someone talking about murder and he wanted to make sure there are no missing knives or something; he always is scouting for food and finds a wolf; he stole bandages for the sick and the party has to deal with the consecuences.

[@justincappadonna2230]

I use index cards to represent complications. On one side is a topic (e.g. "resources") and on the other is a specific complication/encounter hook (e.g. "rats got into the food supply and ate 1d4 weeks worth of food). I then provide several of these cards to my players, each with a different issue (resources, orientation, shelter, bandits, etc.). I let my players only see the topic, but not the side with the side with the specific encounter. Then each session I make my players choose the complication to solve, and sometimes they need to deal with an additional "planned" encounter. The next session I make them choose another card, if they were successful I remove the cards that they had previously solved. Overtime, they play several regular adventures, along with their chosen complications. To further increase their sense of agency, I let them get to their main objective without using up all the cards, so it is clear that they shaped the general arc of the story line. This can work with travel, sieges, and other "background" tasks that may be too dull to otherwise be the focus of a session.

[@WayneBraack]

Dael consider doing a stream of an actual game session. Then we could both meet your players and get to see you in actual DM action mode.

[@AllThingsFascinate]

Yessss!!

[@shallendor]

The video game The Banner Saga is a great place to mine for encounter ideas with escorting a large group!

[@GTRichardson7]

great idea!

[@woutliefhooghe1184]

Adam Koebel homebrewed a tabletop RPG out of this on HyperRPG. there are a lot of interesting mecanics in there.

[@shallendor]

@@woutliefhooghe1184 Yep, and it was so much fun to watch!

[@Myzelfa]

My exact thought a few minutes into this.

[@jakesidwellmusic]

I came down here to leave this exact comment. Glad it's getting boosted. Lots of gems to mine there!

[@QuestingBeast]

The talk of long journeys in DnD got me thinking of the Ultraviolet Grasslands, which is this gorgeous RPG mashup of psychedelic heavy metal, the Dying Earth genre, and Oregon Trail. Really worth checking out. It also measures time in weeks.

[@unclejoshy7778]

The survival aspect made me think of your review for 'Do not let us die... '. Just homebrew some rules to make it mobile.

[@wafflebunny1]

Can't wait for that book to come out. :D Love Luka's art, and want to see what the premise can bring.

[@cojaadams]

This was perfect timing; my group has been blazing through Red Hand of Doom pretty efficiently, and some of these ideas would be great for filling out some of the timeline with complications. They’ve already dealt with an enemy spy’s ambush, so having to deal with stolen/ruined supplies would be a good follow-up to that

[@Placeholder_Title]

The compounding problems with consequences sounds awesome; for flavor and fun it might be nice to help raise group moral. Using such things as leadership class features, charisma, and bard stuff. Unless it's a hardcore game, then no one is allowed to smile.

[@Varis78]

I love this idea, although one thought I couldn’t shake the entire video was “why can’t they do both?” At least with the examples you gave, they seemed like things where, if I were a player in that game, I’d instantly be advocating for 1-2 characters to go search for the kid (preferably a ranger as one of them, maybe a rogue), while everyone else dealt with preparing defenses for the wolves, or hunting the wolves. I guess it would depend on what classes are available in the party, and how many party members there are, but it shouldn’t be impossible to deal with both problems in theory. I actually like the idea of allowing a particularly clever/resourceful party to successfully deal with both problems... or spectacularly fail at both if they spread themselves too thin by getting overly ambitious. Like, they can probably almost guarantee success of one problem if they focus all resources on just one, or they can gamble a bit on trying to do both, and possibly succeed, but still might only solve one problem, and maybe fail both.

[@timmyjacobs0]

That was my thought as well, sure you could try to do both, but you risk halfassing when you could have wholeassed. And maybe you just fail entirely. The fortunate part is if you only to one or two crisis a session, you'd have time to work up new points if they manage to succeed splitting.

[@grobanlover292]

Well now Im getting my "Moses and the Isrealites" campaign ready. I finally have a system to run things. And yes, Moses is a high level Druid with advanced Control Water. Whats it to you?

[@pichuboy8868]

I assume Aaron is a cleric and Miriam a bard? :P

[@grobanlover292]

@@pichuboy8868 I would have thought that Aron was a Bard considering that Moses wanted Aron to talk to Pharaoh instead of himself. Maybe he's a paladin, since they both need high charisma?

[@pichuboy8868]

@EverythingIC I was thinking cleric because Aaron was the High Priest. That's a good point about his Charisma though. Are you gonna give Moses a Staff of Snake Transformation? :P

[@grobanlover292]

@@pichuboy8868oh absolutely. And major illusion to create the column of flame or smoke that they follow

[@Kiyiya5579]

I believe that the tables and rules for running a business could be reworked to account for the success of getting a large group of non combatants. Use one week increments in stead of one month and make a table that accounts for positive and negative outcomes. Give the players a chance to get hands on and increase the chances of success.

[@adamjchafe]

That is a great thought. It would also allow for chances of failure even when the players do the right things or succed in their side quests, which creates a nice bit of dramatic tension.

[@tsstahl]

I like the way you think, Dael. I handle this type of adventure arc--and it is an arc--two ways. The first way is with deadline. Caravan needs to be Here by This Time. Daily travel distance is set and all the adventure hooks cause delay, or optimize travel. The caravan needs X units of food, or resources in general for a more abstract mechanic, for the journey. Losing wagons, delays, all influence the amount of food (or resources) on hand or needed to sustain the journey. The adventures can be any of the three pillars: exploration, combat, roll play. The second method of handling this kind of arc is without a deadline, but resources X,Y, Z, etc. must be protected/preserved/delivered. This type of scenario brings the action to the party, or sends the party off in a preemptive move. The protection scenario is generally more combat/hostile encounter focused and is useful for limited or infrequent play as the encounters can play out fairly quickly. These abstractions allow the adventure hooks to be anything you can dream up, or need while still furthering a consistent long term goal. I'm interested in reading what tropes other folks use.

[@MGDrzyzga]

This is definitely useful for me - a couple years back, I got an idea for a campaign with this sort of element, but I was never sure what to do with it: Let me just start with the opening of the campaign: It is mid-morning in the town square as you go about your business. A crow flies up an lands by the fountain. It croaks out a mimicry of human speech. "Rejoice." A second crow lands next to it. "Rejoice." A third. "Rejoice." More and more join in, "Rejoice. Rejoice. Rejoice." It has become a cacophony of corvids, which cuts out suddenly as a late comer lands. "Rejoice, for you have been annexed by the Avolakia Coalition Rejecting Orthodoxy for Ncigneri Ysabel and Maxim. The new burgomaster will arrive tomorrow. Rejoice and prepare." It is the first sign of a new empire, ACRONYM (and its two leaders Ysabel and Maxim, under the title "Ncigneri"), having launched its attack. The players have the opportunity to become leaders of the resistance. Which includes refugees seeking them out.

[@DPadGamer]

Just realized I have that exact same wood-block-man on my own bookshelf. Also, great video!

[@collabswithoutpermission]

This topic reminds me of the downtime mini-game "Do Not Let Us Die in the Dark Night of This Cold Winter", where there's a focus on resource management and keeping the passage of time in focus with the passage of seasons. A few good similarities with your refugee scenario. :D Also be careful with your notebooks, Dael!

[@TimYourPal]

The podcast Friends at the Table just ran a hack of this that I really liked.

[@collabswithoutpermission]

@@TimYourPal Oooh, is that a good tabletop podcast?

[@Bloodanna]

@@collabswithoutpermission Suuuch a good tabletop podcast. Austin Walker is an amazing DM and the episodes are fun to listen to even when the characters are going though really intense things.

[@cacklebarnacle15]

I love those scenarios. Been playing a campaign a while back (in a different system), where we were tasked with long distance travel through a range of regions over the course of a year. One of the legs of the journey got us together with a group of refugees, heading in the same direction. And since our group was depending on one of the gods to guide us, and the NPC cleric got a vision, that these people needed us, we traveled with them. This was a situation, where a lot of our non-fighty-abilities came into play. My rogue/spy for example was a professional cook, since people get talkative, if you serve them good food, and knew how to plan how to feed large groups (basically she would get hired to cook for a small army and get to find out stuff about what they were up to and report back to her bosses). My task was to manage the acquisition and distribution of food, to let those able to gather and hunt know what we needed, to make the food last longer. Another was a good navigator and was responsible for getting maps and lead us to our destination. His task was to think about wether a two day delay was worth making it to an oasis or a cave system where we could rest for a day etc. We had an NPC with us, that was proficient in building large structures, he later helped plan out and build the new houses, once we made it there. Another NPC knew the surrounding area's flora and fauna, and especially what was poisonous and venomous. He was tasked to teach some of the refugees, so they could provide for themselves without accidently killing the whole group. Another part of the campaign played out on the open sea, when we wer hit with two weeks without any wind, we were running out of drinkable water and had to decide wether to wait it out until we got wind again, or try to use whatever options we had to make it to shore faster, but would make us run out of water faster.

[@thebakerofbananabread3237]

This system could also be used for a campaign of it's own. Of any variety, but my mind goes to Oregon Trail itself, the part is a family or members of a settler train on to greener pastures. Or, as I plan on potentially using it, as a group of explorers on a [doomed] expidition to find the Northwest passage to the sea!

[@matthewninness6910]

I really like the concept honestly, it wouldn't be a stretch to see it extend out to guarding caravans either or running a caravan. Often when dealing with travel from one location for another players will just decide to go on their own but if you can emphasize the danger of travelling in small groups and get them to go along with a caravan for a month's worth of a travel this would be a good system to use for it. Also from the GM's perspective setting up a half dozen mini encounters to go over a couple of weeks would give a great opportunity for the GM to set up a grander adventure and hell even put hints of said grand adventure among the travel. Now that I'm thinking about it even separate from my idea of using it for guarding caravans, those mini-encounters could be an easy way to set up bigger bads. "Why is their a Worg this far North?" "What's pushed them South?" have evidence that it hasn't adapted to the surrounds yet. "Awfully brave of a evil witch to be snatching children by themselves?" "What's with this eye medallion I found around her neck? Looks like a religious symbol" that can be setting up a cult or a hag coven. All of these questions will usually end with "well we have to stay with X for now but once that's sorted we should absolutely look into this" Cue players not looking into it and the whole thing coming back later on. Anyway thanks Dael and keep up the good work :)

[@mhepler1989]

An interesting challenge for air might be an encounter where there was a CO2 eruption from a lake that displaced all the oxygen. Apparently these are super deadly

[@Paledomain]

Having a "bad circumstances table" with a 100 something items might make coming up with ideas on-the-go faster!

[@garrettrobinson3826]

A problem: one (1) seventh level cleric solves all of the problems.

[@Mythman1995]

Hardly, spell slots are going to be in short supply, they only have 7 lesser restorations a day, less if they want to be doing other things like creating food and water, not to mention the bulk of the session is in the side-adventure, so that’s a day or two (or more) per week where they’ll want to be conserving their slots. You’re right that 7th level cleric will be incredibly useful, but so would a 7th level Druid, or Ranger, or any 7th level character, that’s why they’re responsible for the whole community. In fact, the clerics limitations might end up making new problems, maybe some of the refugees get upset about how the cleric decided who to heal first, maybe the food made by create food and water isn’t very good and people complain about that or they try and horde it and get upset when it spoils after 24 hours.

[@jeroenimus7528]

Increase the number of refugees to a thousand. All of the sudden problems come on a different scale. Like with all stuff, the higher lvl the PCs, the higher the stakes of what they need to deal with... if worse comes to worst you can always have the refugees be attacked by a flight of red dragons 😉

[@academic0chris]

This is where the spirit points come into play, with a little inspiration from real world religious texts. So, when Moses leads his people out of Egypt, they wander the desert. His deity causes food to fall from the heavens (literally Create Food). After a while, the people start complaining and seek to rebel, because they are tired of the bland, tasteless food. I’m paraphrasing a bunch, but yeah. Magic works, but it can either sustain the body or the spirit, but not both. Or both, but the cleric is now out of spellslots and can’t contribute to the crisis event beyond cantrips, or houserule has taken a point of exhaustion from ministering to the sick and needy.

[@nymalous3428]

Funny you should mention my grandma... she and I (and a few other family members) recently had a real-life prolonged "survival" experience. It included overland travel, finding adequate shelter, securing food, and even safety concerns. At one point we were deluged with torrential rain, and later on with a surprise blizzard. We had disagreements within the group, exhaustion, a little bit of sickness, and some problems with our arrival (it was supposed to be secret and it was hard to keep it that way). Suffice it to say, there is no need to e-mail my grandma this one (she's had just about enough of that kind of thing to last her a while).

[@joshuaselesnick7614]

What an incredible journey that must have been! Say more

[@robbieandrewmacleod]

I'd also recommend Battlestar Galactica for inspiration as a series built around long term survival challenges, with ongoing problems building up and difficult priority choices put before the main characters.

[@tubebobwil]

Avalon Hill's Outdoor Survival game was named in early D&D books as a system to handle arduous overland travel.

[@TheShadowwalker007]

“Rats of Tobruk” I don’t think the non-Aussies will know that historical reference. 🇦🇺 it is a great example

[@wkehrman]

I do, but I'm a history nerd.

[@andrewenderfrost8161]

In a mouseguard caravan you would roll the morale points of your mice and the DM rolls the encounter hit points. Then you make a rock paper scissors type check. Your three choices are recover hit points, attack the encounter to reduce it's points (in this situation that would marching closer to your destination) or aquiring resources (which will give you a bonus on your next check) depending on the outcome of the rock paper scissors the DM decides what kind of check you make or whether you even get to roll dice at all. If you reduce the encounter to zero points without losing any of your own you are completely successful. If you lose some of your own points but still succeed there is a compromise.

[@landshark760]

Great ideas! I also like giving my players a renown score with the people and the more actively they try and help the more their renown growns which gives them more and more influence with the group of people

[@shawnhuls1606]

I think Absolute Tabletop had a similar idea for sieges - a no win scenario where the characters had to choose where they would lend their hand. No matter what, that caravan is going to suffer because there are more problems than the characters could handle. Instead of returning with 100 refugees, they are going to limp to their destination with a couple dozen haggard survivors.

[@Ohthisllbefun.]

This video seems like a great way to link together a lot in the Icewindale campaign. In that like i want to push the severity of being in a perpetual winter.

[@00laptop007]

Okay i have two ideas about this: 1) if you plan on using this kind of system a lot in your campaign, i would advise on banning the spells Goodberry, Create Food/Water and maybe Purify Food And Drink 2) i would implement two ressources, Group Health and Spirit, Group Health starting at the amount of people you shepherd and Spirit being a number between 0 and 100 and the starting number is determined by how much they trust you in the beginning (50 for low trust but no misstrust, 75 probably on average, 100 if they have complete trust because you are accomplished heroes of the land or something) whenever something happens that leads to members of the group being killed or walking off, reduce the Group Health by the appropriate amount. this can not be regenerated unless new people join. after every week (or at the beginning of one) have one player roll 1d100 for how much people trust the players' leadership, adding or subtracting from that roll depending on which player rolls and the circumstances. if the roll is HIGHER than the current spirit, the people make their mistrust known, maybe some of them leave because they think that they have better chances on their own (reducing the Group Health), and reducing the spirit value. group health also indicates how much food and drink is needed to sustain everyone and depending on the rationing, a killed wild boar is worth maybe 10 points of refugees (if you ration too much, that would probably be a negative modifier for the morale roll) any ideas or additions to my ideas are welcome

[@Pentten]

This made me think of the Fire Emblem maps where the goal is "Survive", which generally come down to defending a small area (maybe an abandoned fort you're holding up in) or even just escaping or waiting for an allied army to show up and save the day. Now that I think about it, these sound more like encounters...

[@StephaniePlaysGames]

DAEL! How are you such a genius baby angel creature? I was definitely thinking about the different dials in survival games but wasn't sure how to make them feel more meaningful than randomized dice rolls. A few mini one-shots is *perfect*! Especially since the complications can stack - what if little Willhelm's mother is the one trying to take control from you later after that spirit dial bottoms out? *Chef's kiss* I love it, perfection. I also think a cool way to do it in this case when you have large parties of people you're in charge of is taking a leaf from something like Stronghold's & Followers - maybe you designate some hunting parties while you take care of something else and then there can be particular boons/complications that arise from that as well that can be added into the story. Soooo many possibilities!

[@RobKinneySouthpaw]

You could have a seige get just about the point of desperation, and then the last one-shot gives them access to a gate spell. So yay, they've escaped the seige, but now have a survival adventure on a random plane of existence.

[@Chadok89]

That's really a nice idea. I think I will build on that in my campaign. It's also a good way to put few small "1 shoot" adventures between (or in the middle) of long plots

[@gegegebebebe5087]

This is an absolutely terrific idea for a part of my adventure. Thx for this. I need to fletch out some resource management rules for the track of refugees moved to another city away from a battlefield. Love it.

[@DesertRatGhost]

So... the banner saga for D&D. Love it.

[@PyrotechNick77]

This was a great video. Here's a few things to I'd like add. The spirit/morale points remimds me of the concordance system for sentient magic items in 4e. Multiple ways to gain and lose points that can affect how the item interacts with the player. This could work with large groups of commoner NPCs. Once certain threshold is reached well the refugees move on or revolt or disperse. And while classes at certain levels can easily circumvent certain roblems (e.g: druids and cleric dealing with food and water via goodberry,create, and purify, it still can consume precious spell slots or time via rituals. No one class can do everything, and if they could, personal resources like class abilities and slots are still consumed. Also like others have mentioned, factions within the group will occur, offering multiple social/RP encounters with allies and rebels within the group.

[@caradine898]

This could be very useful for my seafaring campaign coming up. I came up with a system of "Complications" where each failure that the players incur overall determines how I decide the outcome. The more complications the worse table I decide to roll on (for random sea events). Very insightful. Dig.

[@matthewboland5598]

I love this! I had an idea for a survival based campaign after I read Sir Henry Stanley’s “How I Found Livingstone”. *Your adventurers are hired to be the security force for a caravan traveling across dangerous & unknown territory to find an ancient lost city.* I still hope to run this some time.

[@geoffreychance9770]

My current campaign is basically this. The PCs are in charge of founding a settlement on an island. I'm using the gritty realism rules to slow the game down and asking them what the settlement is doing each week. I also gave them the choice of where to settle and the spot they chose is great for food and water but it's in the middle of some warring factions, so that's gonna be interesting to play out.

[@imboredidid1]

I really like the idea of forcing the players to make decisions and have to suffer through the consequences. It definitely reenforces the fact that the PCs are leading this caravan and they must take responsibility for their actions whether good or bad. It seems that a mission like this could be used to give a little perspective and morality to a group that's getting a little too murder-hobo-y.

[@hertzeid]

We've adapted the Skill Challenges system introduced from Star Wars: Saga edition for these types of 'events'. The rules are quite detailed, but in short the GM lists some skills that could aid in this, with difficulties attached. Players, not knowing what the GM has listed, says what and how they contribute towards solving the challenge. Perhaps someone is foraging for food (Survival), managing shelters (survival or tool proficiency), scouting for dangers (perception), managing the health of the refugees (medicine) etc. If a player lists something that makes sense, but isn't on the list, allow it and assign a difficulty for it. A skill challenge can be easy, moderate or hard, requiring 5, 9 or 12 successes to complete. But if the players accrue 3 failures, the challenge ends. The end result can be just success or failure, or grades of failure depending on how many successes they got before the final failure. For some skill challenges GMs may allow a success cancel out a failure rather than counting as a success. A critical success may add two successes. Etc

[@faerae666]

Great vid as always Dael! The thought that came to mind once you started was a "Macro Skill Challenge". I LOVE this idea. My group really likes the few skill challenges I have put them through and this would be a great extension of that narrative mechanism mixed with actual adventuring time. Thanks for the inspiration!

[@Zoidberg023]

This is a really solid foundation for a ruleset/mechanic. I'm definitely going to incorporate some of this for my ToA jungle travel. I think a spirit level or gauge (Happy/Neutral/Unhappy) might feel a little more organic than a spirit points system. Either way thanks again Dael

[@kylemccool1037]

Giving the players the choices of problems to solve keeps agency in the players hands while making the overland travel have meaningful points of tension. There is no right or wrong answer, only the choice. Failure would of course have a consequence, but I would probably say that whatever problem they didn't choose would simply work itself out. I like the idea of maybe having the players participate in a skill challenge every week of travel to maintain the group morale. Thanks to Colville I have grown to love this 4e mechanic for overland travel in general, but keeping morale up would seem like a good way to use it as well. The first week would have a really low success goal, and would increase week by week. Additionally, one of the consequences of a failure on a mini-quest could be an increase in the difficulty of the morale skill challenge, either permanently or for that week. Love your content, great video.

[@oldmanofthemountains3388]

Another great video! How about more options for Natural and Manmade disasters? You mentioned flash floods, but what about getting caught in a Floodplain before a storm? Tornado? Sleet or hail? Snowstorms? Flashfires in the dry grasses? What about animal based hazards like massive bison herds, snakeballs (mating season), bulettes, or even something as common as gopher holes breaking the ankles of pack animals? Certain terrains could promote specific events, too, like lightning strikes, meteor showers, or even heightened undead presence.

[@nickjeffery536]

So, Dael - while I have a fantastic, inventive, and fun DM already (even if he DID try to drown my Tiefling Sorceress in lava this week... OW!!!) you seem so creative with your ideas and thoughts that I imagine you must be an absolute hoot to play a campaign under...

[@cero54]

Hi Dael, very intuitive and I love the translation into mechanics. I have a question for you regarding this. The system that you mentioned with the morale points, do you let your players know about that? Or is that just your way of keeping track of it?

[@theobsceneunicorn3449]

Sounds like the event system in the board game dead of winter. Excellent idea compartmentalizing these as one shots

[@conorleonard1699]

this idea reminds me so much of the chain of dogs from the Malazan books, definitely wanna try something like this

[@joereilly7082]

You could use a point system for the refugees (This has had 1 minute of thought so REALLY raw) Refugee Speed Points: 10 Refugee Morale Points: 10 No matter which adventure you choose you are going to loose 1d4 (make the players roll) on something. So not saving little Willham (Should be Willhelm but I think that it depends on if he was eaten by the witch or not) reduces morale but having wolves take food or injure people reduces speed which might mean one more last desperate push at the very end or even stopping the caravan until speed can be boosted. Completing an adventure gets you 1d2 back in one of the categories at the discretion of the DM (DM Rolls) and I would even let them get over 10 in a category. You could also have the players do things to bring back moral or speed if they can justify it. Like the healers could use some or most of their spells before they go on the adventure to heal or cure disease on the refugees. That will help with the refugees but make the adventure harder. Probably have to run the numbers and play with it some but I think that the idea is sound. What color is Wednesday?

[@polvotierno]

In my character sheets, I added more skills. Some apply in a situation like this... Leadership (charisma), Endurance (constitution) and Immunity (constitution). I knew a monk in a monastery that would eat a little poison ivy everyday, and developed an immunity to it. Leadership is for making decisions and inspiring morale and keeping spirits high. You can also have opposed Leadership checks when there is a battle for Leadership. In journeys, I also take from the Middle Earth system by Cubicle7. The party members each take on a role during the journey, and each member then rolls for checks related to those roles. The roles are Guide (leader), Scout, Hunter (in charge of food and water), Look out and Camp Organizer (cooking, supplies, sleeping arrangements, repairs, services, latrines clean up, campfires, etc.) These roles make the journey fun for each player because they each have their own responsibilities.

[@Ooey3]

Brilliant once again! Thank you for your insights.

[@EscapeePrisoner]

I think the thing I connect with, is, ughh...how do I put it...engaged real play...I think describes it. Your game designs have a depth of real to them that drops me in to a hard, ummm...ugh. How do I explain it? I can't. I just want to play in the worlds and scenarios you create. Because it feels real. The way you describe the realities you create, feeeeeeel real.

[@tylergiesbrecht7177]

This is great! Thanks for the ideas. I have been trying to prep a campaign based on moving a people group to a new land and trying to start a new civilization there. This would work excellent as a first arch of "setting up the town" and the struggles they face in trying to start from scratch in a new place.

[@michaelsommers2356]

As soon as you started, I instantly thought of the Donner Party.

[@greggoodman4335]

Your obsession with detail is at once awe-inspiring and terrifying.

[@psychedelicspirituality]

There's a Moon Druid / Battle Master in the party with proficiency in leatherworking tools and woodworking tools. They're about to get lost and rely on these skills immensely

[@MacbethCreative]

Your D&D videos are my favorite. Keep them up! :D

[@NordicDragon89]

This is so niche, but it's exactly what I've been wanting to do in a campaign.

[@penzancepirate]

Awesome ideas. I would be stricter with the "morale system", like you have X morale points and every time the character do NOT do something the group takes a morale hit. Some things give bigger morale hits, others less. IE not saving Wilhelm just removes 1 morale point, instead NOT protecting from the wolves would give a -2 morale. So there are also some interesting "morality" choices to be made. But then maybe Wilhelm's parents are really charismatic (old town elders?) so now there is a small revolt to contend with. Then I'd give players ways to improve the morale once a week: like a Charisma check, or maybe even harsh treatment like an execution (that may lead back to a revolt in the long term), maybe the cleric can try a miracle and so on.

[@roguevector1268]

I tried something like this after listening to the video; about escorting a caravan and losing the supply wagon at the midpoint. The caravan leader decides to press on rather than turn back. What I did was introduce Wilhelm, one of the few NPCs who knows how to ride a horse. Wilhelm is not a 'main' NPC but one that pops up often enough. About the third session in, a goblin raiding party attacks the caravan and nails Wilhelm on the thigh with an arrow. Wilhelm screams.

[@james35813]

I feel like making the NPC characters competent at certain things. Some are hunters, blacksmiths, cooks, displaced farmers, ex-soldiers, maybe their local nobleman is traveling with them, etc. It can cut minutia or create conflict depending on situation and stuff

[@workyoutube7798]

THIS WAS SUCH A GOOD VIDEO!!!!! THANK YOU!!!!

[@aaronwilliams007]

Thanks for this content and inspiration.

[@melliedoucette4525]

I have never found long term travel sound so exciting. Amazing stuff!

[@robertabugelis3962]

Such a great video. You have a brilliant mind Dael. Keep using it. 👍

[@DragonsinGenesisPodcast]

Pathfinder 1E has some great wilderness survival tools that I’m thinking of using for an Oregon Trail style campaign.

[@wizardman8482]

I love that his name is Wilhelm.

[@boopiloopi]

if water´s running low and you introduce heavy rain then everyone can just open their mouths, good for another 3 days ;). they can also fill up some waterskins.

[@alexanderlundberg5644]

I like the idea of narrating most of the journey while playing through some select choices or dangers. I think I may try that for regular overland travel.

[@JonesBoy97]

I missed the notification for this when this came out, but it's absolutely fantastic!

[@Beaurisque]

I have run a two-shot game based on the incredible swiss novel "Terror on the Mountain" (La grande peur dans la Montagne) from Charles-Ferdinand Ramuz. Leading a small group and an herd into a rocky (and maybe haunted?) mountain was a total blast. I used some of the great (and a little odd / weird) descriptions from the author and my players was completely hooked! I recommend reading that novel, that can be inspiring. :)

[@artesque]

You’re just the coolest person. Neat ideas.

[@seraphonica]

My instinct is to go worker placement with this. Devote three refugees to finding shelter? Great, roll three d6 (or d12 if they're PCs, maybe?) and see if you hit the DC for that task. Could also build the morale system into that - make people go too hungry or too sick, or too de-Wilhelmed, and they drop from a d6 to a d4. Keep them happy, or train them maybe? And they might get to a d8.

[@extrams0]

Perhaps a fun way to handle this is Battlestar Galactica, the board game - instead of a ship, you determine places in your caravan, and "actions" players can do. - have moral, food, physical strength (a.k.a. feul), population - there are sub-par exchange mechanisms --- give the people more to eat (- 3 food + 1 moral + 1 phsycial strenght) (moral and strength can get over a certain number, so it's only -3/+1 if the other is maxed out) --- genergic foraging ( -X physical strength, +Xd20; for every 11+ , +1 food) --- leave the weakest (-1 population, -1 moral, +1 physical strength, +1 food) - have challenges that play with these resources. --- many negative. for example there's been a setback, enough succesful checks have to be rolled (ex. persuasion, etc...) for -3 to -0 moral (+1 moral for an exceptional succes). --- some a risk, for example remote oasis (optional. Up to -3 population; next turn per population: a survival/cartography/... check for +1 food +1 population) --- some, dark, for example you're attacked by kobolds. the party gets a small part fo the fight. If they can't finish it in 3 rounds, lose 1 population per extra turn. afterward ... you can chose to eat them. (+1 food, -1 moral)

[@MonarchsFactory]

This sounds like a really great idea!

[@cyberdeckcipher]

I've just started my first D&D campaign and your videos have inspired me so much to create a better experience :) Thank you very much! you are awesome :)

[@scificephalopods]

I absolutely love this!! One day when my campaign becomes a reality I am totally using this idea :D

[@Alexlalpaca]

One little correction on the rule of 3. It's 3 hours without shelter *in a harsh environment*. If the climate is nice, you can survive much longer.

[@Apexx27]

You are a beautiful person. I love all your content. You are my favorite D&D youtuber. Thanks for all the hours of entertainment and inspiration.

[@Saturn554]

Got some great ideas there! Thanks for posting!

[@thebakerofbananabread3237]

Beautifully done Dael, I was just setting up a my party needing to establish a base for themselves and how to get the logistics there, so this couldn't have come at a better time! I'd go further adding elements from the overland travel bit and have the party still fill their roles of security, scout, quartermaster, navigator, etc. that they make their decisions and rolls for they and their people and their can be tangible effects hindering, helping, or contradicting. Player X has decided to go through a pass over the mountain but it's now blocked up with snow, the party now must work to solve this, or something Also if you could convince one of them to keep a journal and/or ask the "what was a minor issue that arose, how did you overcome it" round robin at the start of each session it'd also lend to the passing of time. I love it that all of these things come together!

[@Paledomain]

spirit points could be measured with the priorities of the group's needs: Maybe they start with more spirit points (say, 10), but staying without water hurts the morale faster than hunger does.

[@geoffdewitt6845]

I like this a lot. Good call.

[@mingramh]

Very smart discussion, thanks

[@ethanmoore8929]

I like the way you say Warg.

[@TheTsugnawmi2010]

"What could go wrong?" Dael: :)

[@sebbychou]

Instead of "spirit points" it could be simply shifts in the Attitude scale (the hostile/grumpy/neutral/friendly etc. chart) which affects any rolls done that requires the cooperation of the group.

[@ed-chivers]

Dael, I absolutely love this - this kind of multi-session struggle is something I think could work well in my Eberron game, should my players go wandering off the beaten track and get themselves into trouble (which is extremely likely).

[@rebockar9284]

On a similar thread, though much lower key, 4th edition style Skill Challenges can be used for shorter term (real time, not necessarily in-game time) narratives of these kind of situations. I had my group of 3rd level adventurers trying to escort a herd of 250 sheep through a forest to a nearby village, and depending on how many successful ability checks they got before accumulating 3 failures (or achieving 8 total successes), they would arrive in town with more or less of the sheep they set out with. They ran across similar problems, such as wolves attacking, fording a river, sheep just wandering off, except one of them just make an ability check to see if they overcame that problem. Took about 45 minutes to run, and my adventurers ended up with 5 successes and 3 failures, which resulted in the party arriving with only 100 of the 250 sheep they started out with.

[@farmerboy916]

I think that's a bit excessive for 3 failures tbh

[@tedhenkle]

I loved your “Rats of Tobruk” reference!

[@victorbazan2676]

This is beautiful. Bet you’re fantastic DM!

[@GreylanderTV]

Don't forget that there is an agent of the Dark Lord hiding among the refugees.

[@Rashen2]

Your idea reminded me of the board game Dead of Winter, where every round, players have to deal with a new crisis (lack of medicine, food, etc) and every turn there are "crossroads" cards that have choices that the player must make (if the trigger for the card happens). I think reading the cards of the game might give some good ideas!

[@richardcampbell4506]

Thanks Dael, yet another great thought provoking video. Cascading decision trees are always fun. If the PCs are high enough level let them use magic to resolve the problems at the cost of resources available for the 'One Shots' Taking Dael's example of the wolfs attacking, injuring the people and dogs getting into the food. The druid/cleric can create food and/or heal people but they loose access to several spell slots for the next One Shot. Or if the ranger gathers food then they are exhausted for the next One Shot. If you need to make it more challenging just add an additional challenge each week. Then the PC's must commit resources (magic / skill checks) to resolve one, choose one to investigate/solve themselves and ignore one with then inevitable consequences described by Dael.