Should I handle a journey through the Deathlands with a transport plan or a long term project? or maybe some combination of both? My love for Dungeon World makes me want to do this, and give PCs roles like trailblazer, resource manager, and scout. Or at least, challenge them with these things as needed.
Suggestions welcome.
EDIT: My instinct is a long term project composed of little Transport plan scores. And to drop in the beats of downtime for camp. Previous results and distance from the next settlement being the main factors in the engagement rolls for each leg of the journey, and 1-3s being a desperate roll to avoid an encounter or complication
Transport plan, and then post about it, because I’m really curious about other people’s takes on the Deathlands. That’s not selfish, right?
Maybe it depends how long they’ll be travelling for and what they expect to do en route.
I would go with transport plan as well because the trek is far too interesting to handle with just a clock.
Transport plan!
Steven Dodds me too [curious], and yea Deathlands talk should be more of a thing 🙂 got you covered
Jason Lee to Wintercliff at least, and perhaps as far as the Imperial City
No no. You only need a plan or dice rolls if there’s some level of risk.
Once you leave the city, the PCs will discover that the “Deathlands” are verdant, green, and welcoming. It’s all been a lie! Box, the silver ice robot, has been lying to everyone, to keep them contained within the lightning barriers.
en.wikipedia.org – Logan’s Run (film) – Wikipedia
I guess you could treat it as a score. Alternatively you could say that it is covering the downtime portion and limit your players to doing activities that would be available on the train. That is, unless/until something significant happens (e.g. hijacking, creature attack, train malfunction in dangerous territory, the line ends unexpectedly, etc.), then jump in to a score. As always, defer to yours and your players’ interests. If it’s interesting to you all, go for it.
LOL Tony Demetriou sure~~ and I guess I will just throw away this Doom clock too (Accosted by Horrors)
Jason Lee whoa: “Train”? 😀 who said anything about a train? they wish!
Mark Cleveland Massengale Keep the clock, but change the word “horrors” into “bunnies”
One thing’s for sure, one does not simply walk to Deathlands.
Mark Cleveland Massengale Whoops. Not sure why I thought there was a train involved. Are they wagoning or walking?
Tony Demetriou yea I heard those Deathland bunnies give the Best hugs
now I seriously want to insert a “Deathlands bunny farmer” out there
wagon at worst; though they may be traveling inside the PC Hull if that player shows up
That would be cool. If the player doesn’t show up, maybe they’ll hijack their hull.
In all seriousness, Deathlands bunny farmer makes sense. Rabbits are hardy, breed quickly, don’t eat much food that the farmer needs, and provide good meat. It’s very common to keep them to supplement food supplies, especially for people on islands or arid farming areas.
Unlike cattle, you could also keep them in ghost proof cages. (Cattle might be in pens protected by ghost wards. But ghosts can spend stress to push past those)
Tony Demetriou my mind wandered when you first mentioned the bunnies. Now I am picturing an old woman, Eleanor, who is disarming in appearance and mannerisms. She has a ranch with all these cages full of rabbits out front, but under the shelter in the back of the property is something else.
Fluffy.
The stray rabbit she rescued from the Deathlands last winter. He seemed normal at first, and was bred. However, after the litter (?) his fur has changed color and is growing much faster than usual. Also, his teeth keep growing longer (pointier?) and his temperament worse. In fact, just before the PCs arrive, Fluffy has ripped the throat out of one of the previous generation! So he was separated from the others in the back.
Being a Deathlands farmer, Eleanor has things that need doing (reasons to keep the PCs around long enough for things to get worse). If they start helping her out, I start a doom clock called “Bunny Badness.” When it fills: she gets possessed by whatever demon is inhabiting the bunny, and it has her release Fluffy and its demonspawn on the unsuspecting Deathlands.
Rabbit teeth never stop growing, and if they don’t have something to chew, will grow through their jaw. I’m sure that detail can be used for something horrific.
Also, they digest their food twice. Which means they eat their poop for that second pass. If the demon doesn’t eat vegetables, that might also be horrific. Especially if it doesn’t die during the first pass.
ha – ew
also, so many horror seeds there for how the creature eventually breaks out