Exploration

Red Age > Rules > Exploration

Mounting an Expedition

Sites

the Or / Sana system and the new age of Cisterni scrapping

Turns & Downtime

Year has 3 seasons. Each season, you can do a fair amount of downtime stuff, or go find a patron and go on an expedition and do just a bit of downtime stuff (if you pass your final "continuation" roll)

Expedition Season

• There is time for one expedition each season in Spring and Summer.
  • If no expedition is mounted in Spring or Summer, each company member gains an extra downtime action that season.
• An expedition can be mounted in Winter as well, but harsh weather makes it more dangerous, and patrons are reluctant to back such unwise ventures.
  • If an expedition is mounted, it costs 1 downtime action from each company member.
• If urgent, a second expedition might be mounted during a season. It costs 1 downtime action from each member, and it may be hard to secure backing on such short notice.

Risk & Reward

• Grey (1x xp) / Lead (quota: 0.2k)
• Green (1x xp) / Copper (quota: 1k)
• Yellow (2x xp) / Silver (quota: 2k)
• Amber (3x xp) / Electrum (quota: 6k)
• Red (6x xp) / Gold (quota: 12k)
• Black (10x xp) / Platinum (quota: 32k)

Confidence

• High, Moderate, Low

public info and further research

• Grey (1x xp) / Lead (quota: 0.2k)
• Green (1x xp) / Copper (quota: 1k)
• Yellow (2x xp) / Silver (quota: 2k)
• Amber (3x xp) / Electrum (quota: 6k)
• Red (6x xp) / Gold (quota: 12k)
• Black (10x xp) / Platinum (quota: 32k)

Companies

• All chartered companies in Cistern have a color rating. This is denoted by the color of their charter's seal, with "foil" embossed seals marking intermediate steps.
  • A company's rating carries the expectation that they can generally handle a site of matching risk. Successful expeditions with good hauls help advance a company's rating, while missing quota or suffering major losses to the expedition can harm it.
  • Patrons take this into consideration when deciding if an expedition is a good investment. A company with a rating higher than the site risk is a safe bet, and the patron will offers to take a smaller cut to encourage them to bother with a less profitable venture. A company with a rating below the site's risk is a gamble, with the patron expecting a bigger cut to offset the chance the expedition becomes a complete loss.
  • The modifier listed with the rating is added to rolls when approaching the patron. Some companies may have reputations or relationships with specific patrons (good or bad) that further modify their rolls.

• Ratings
  • Grey (+0)
  • Green (+2)
  • Foil-Green (+3)
  • Yellow (+4)
  • Foil-Yellow (+5)
  • Amber (+6)
  • Foil-Amber (+7)
  • Red (+8)
  • Foil-Red (+9)
  • Black (+11)
  • Foil-Black (+13)

Patrons

Decide what expedition to pitch, and which patron you are approaching. Some patrons have a tier cap on what they can backroll; in which case you might approach multiple patrons to back you (each combined group of equal level raises the cap 1 tier, so yellow+yellow = amber).

Roll availability (1d12 + standing bonus - middle level value for the risk tier). On a 5+, they’re available and willing to fund you. For multi-patron expeditions, roll availability for each patron; if at least 51% are available, it’s a go) If you roll less, they can’t raise the funds right now, aren’t taken with your pitch, etc.

penalty to roll when trying to mount during Winter

• If a patron is unavailable, you have to wait until next season for them to free up.

second expedition of the season penalty to roll?

Underwriting

Base Percentage = 50% + ((Standing Tier - Risk Tier) x 10%) - Excess risk (bad season for expedition, current events, etc): +10% or more. Quota Value = minimum reward value for the tier (so So;ver = 4k, Electrum = 16k) - When you return, they get to claim the Quota from your treasure, before you get any at all. If you can’t make Quota from your loot, either make it up from company funds or -1 Standing. - Above Quota, up to 4x Quota, they get their Underwriter’s Percentage. Above 4x, the adventurers keep it all. - If you come back with over 3x Quota or more, +1 Standing. - Quota is based on the presumed reward tier for the site, regardless of Confidence. So going to an underwhelming site could really hurt you if it’s a bust (really missing the mark on reward could result in multiple levels of Standing loss), but going to an unexpectedly rich site could give you a huge haul because of a low quota.

Adventurers get to keep any “adventuring-type” magic items (swords, potions, etc), to use or sell. “Civic” magic items (arcane apparatus, etc) is considered treasure, being sold and the underwriters take their cut.

The PCs always get XP for the full gp value of treasure, regardless of quota, losses, etc. Magic items don’t give XP directly. You can sell them and carouse, or keep and use them, or give them as gifts for RP reasons, etc.

patrons, quotas and underwriting

In the Field

carrying capacity personnel disaster pointcrawl navigation events and encounters "damage" to the expedition basecamps and extended rests in the field

"loss of supplies" - everyone carries 1 level of exhaustion for each time this happens, due to short rations and other hardships. if additional supplies can be found, a big hunt is made, etc the exhaustion level is cleared after a Long Rest. - if transport (beasts, teamsters, boats) are lost, this may translate into loss of supplies, as things have to be left behind to fit in the reduced capacity

• "expedition damage" to guards, etc also handled as fatigue, or the party can face the danger themselves and risk hp and mana to prevent it

Returning to Town

• You can come back, with intent to go back out (no time to do serious resupply).
• Make a Continuation Roll: d6 - Expedition Exhaustion Level - 1 for each prior return to town - 2 per Disaster suffered.
• If you roll 3+, you can go back out. Otherwise, enough personnel have bailed, supplies are low, animals exhausted, gear in need of mending, etc that you'd have to organize a whole new expedition.

Disaster Mitigation Plans, feats, spells, resources expended, hard choices, fictional positioning

Each time the expedition suffers a disaster w/o mitigation, it chooses 1 lose 50% of whatever profits it manages to make after it gets back (after quota and underwriting percentage, as usual) suffer -1 standing In either case, there is also a 2-in-6 chance of a further narrative difficulty or complication. More than 2 deaths (at which point all profit is lost or you’ve taken -2 standing) doesn’t affect money / standing further, but it guarantees a narrative complication.

each extended rest in the field calls for a fresh disaster roll how good a base camp (fortifications, food/water, local allies, etc) you're able to establish affects the disaster roll. a poor site could be worse than 2-in-6, an excellent one could be low or none.

Capacity The expedition has sufficient food, water, pack animals, camping gear, and personnel (guards, teamsters, scouts, hunters, cook, etc) for the trip. There’s not a specific amount of food, just that the longer you stay out, the more mishaps and encounters will gnaw on your hp. Finding food / water in the field could protect your from the next food mishap, etc. The party has 80 slots worth of space on the pack animals for its own gear (tool kits, lighting, etc). The party can bring its own specialists (healers, sages, henchlings, etc), which it pays for and whose gear goes in the party’s 80 slots. The expedition can carry home any reasonable amount of treasure. If there are hard-to-move-quantities, the party can try to figure out how to handle it with spells, clever ideas, etc. The expedition can be “heavily encumbered”, causing it to move at half speed, facing twice as many mishaps and encounters, but hauling a huge pile of stuff with rollers, sleds, etc.

base expedition - covers consumables (food, water) - camping supplies - guards and support personnel (cooks, porters, teamsters, scouts, a healer, etc) - supplies (arrows, healing kits, etc; enough to also cover the PCs adventuring) - pack animals to carry this all, plus some extra margin for treasure

- separate hires: specialists (sages, thieves, local guide, alchemists, etc) - separate purchase: toolkits - even more pack animals than usual what about torches/oil, rope, etc for dungoneering? can you add these things to the UR rating to finance them?