This post is going to be about a somewhat significant adjustment to Group Movement but I wanted to first take a moment to talk about the overall development effort. It has been some months since the last update and the hope was for a Ruleset 1.2 release to come out roughly about now. This hasn't happened, and as things keep coming up in demand of our time it would be difficult to venture a guess when it might. We were going to hold on talking about the new Group Movement mechanism so that it could be explained properly in the Game Manual, but instead of having the idea float indefinitely we're feeling that we'd rather put it up here in the meantime.
Okay then. Let's talk about this new Group Movement business and what it means for the Adventure phase of the game. Just a small hint before we get started: It's going to be a little more complicated, but quite possibly more interesting with a chance at lessening the time spent trekking onward toward the Final Encounter.
When we originally constructed the mechanism for group movement the idea was to keep travel time moving at a smooth but slow and steady pace. Characters would get a boost from having Mounts but otherwise the focus remained on picking up encounter cards as they went along. This has always been one of those devices that worked satisfactory to the design goals and never quite tugged at us that it need to be changed or improved... until we began considering some of the opportunities. For example, if we played with the idea of giving mounts a movement value (a dice roll) based on its relative speed to other mounts this could introduce some interesting dynamic to the idea of a 'movement round.' Things like who has the best mount? How much more ground could the group potentially cover? Whose mount is the most consistent or wishy-washy? And, alongside those, how might individuals be empowered to make a play for those treasure chests? We thought these were interesting questions to explore but knew that doing so would convey the the group travel mechanic into something more of a mini event.
So we thought about it and looked at it and thought about it some more. And at last it came down to a trade-off between a simple (almost auto-pilot) mechanism for group movement and things like: giving Treasure Hunters more intuition, having a broader variety of pacing (with some chance at a shorter journey), less predictable movement rounds and even opportunities to do a bit of roleplaying around the behavior and capabilities of mounts. Hurry up you!! Which, for us at least, while more complicated than the original method, translated to more fun along the way.
Here's how it works.
We already know that Characters start the game in Town Time with a set movement value. This can be upgraded by renting a Mount and previously we only had to know whether the character was heading into the Adventure phase with a Mount or On Foot. What has changed is that now each means of travel has two movement values, one for Town Time and another (a die) for Group Travel. Note that the Town Time movement values have not changed in that they remain a static number, depending on the Mount or depending on the Character Class. But once the journey begins we now need to ask what die the player is going to roll during each movement round, because every player participates and every movement die is going to be taken into consideration.
The answer should be simple enough.
If On Foot always the player will roll a d6 (no matter what kind of character).
Otherwise, refer to the die assigned to the Character's Mount (rented or owned).
If On Foot always the player will roll a d6 (no matter what kind of character).
Otherwise, refer to the die assigned to the Character's Mount (rented or owned).
These movement dice have no bonuses and as before are unaffected by your companions.
Once we set off on the journey we look as always at the space directly in front of our Group Leader figurine. This points to the appropriate deck and the icons on the back of the deck give us one or two values to play with. Here comes the next change. Instead of the group movement being dictated by the value on the icon they become something else, something more like a roll check. But for now, we start by going to our travel dice.
Movement for Group Travel - Each movement round begins with all players rolling their dice together. As before, the group is only as fast as its slowest member (except unlike before this can be a different character each time). So, everyone rolls their die and we look for the lowest number. But before we move the figurine let's see if one or more of the players will have a chance at a re-roll.
This is where the card icons come in.
Just like we've always done: if your character is on foot refer to the Boots icon or, if riding a mount the Horse icon. Any roll that is equal to or lower than the number on the icon may be re-rolled one time. This is entirely optional and up to the player. Players are free to take turns or do their re-rolls all at once. But whatever the outcome the principle of group travel remains intact, that the group can only move at the rate of the slowest member. Once players have had a chance to re-roll their movement die, look again for the lowest number showing and that is the group movement value for the round. The figurine now moves.
Afterwards a card would be pulled or treasure searched for, after which the Initiative token gets passed to the next player in the rotation, followed by the next movement round and on through the journey. As you can see, the overall flow hasn't changed (only the mechanism used to determine how many spaces to move the figurine).
What of transitions into caves and dungeons? The principle remains: Whenever the space in front of the figurine denotes a cave or dungeon all the characters will be on foot (d6) as our mounts follow faithfully behind. Once our party has emerged from the depths the movement die goes back to that of the mount.
And that is how it works.
When the game files are eventually updated to accommodate this change several things will be affected. For example, the Character Sheet will likely be modified to give a place to mark a mount's group travel value. Then there are those special movement items: Boots of Speed (I013), Staff of Walking (I014) and Flying Carpet (I015) which probably will be assigned a d12, d8 and d8 respectively.
This has been a change that we've spent a lot of time thinking about as it wasn't merely a question of replacing one mechanic or mini-game with another but something more along the lines of adding complexity. Thinking back it was one of those times we opted to go from something streamlined to something that gave pause to the flow and felt more like a small event each time... from merely moving a figurine between encounters to a participatory thing that involves everyone.
The design perspective: ultimately, it came down to a trade-off between a simple (almost auto-pilot) mechanism for group movement and things like giving a slight bump for Treasure Hunters, more variety of pacing (with possibility of a shorter journey), less predictable movement and even opportunities to do a bit of roleplaying around the behavior and capabilities of mounts. And, it felt right.
Once you've had a chance to adjust to the new mechanic we hope you'll agree it sprinkles in a new layer of fun and depth to the journey portion of the Adventure without being overly complicated.
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