Wilderness/Outdoor Environments

Procedure: Daylight hours consist of morning, noon, and evening; night consists of night, midnight, and pre-dawn. These times equate to periods of about an hour after the party sets forth for the day, the mid-point of the journey, and near the end when camp is being made with respect to daylight hours.

During hours of darkness, equate the periods to first, middle, and end sleep periods. Where only 1 or 2 chances for encounter exist, you may vary the time as you see fit in order to avoid player reliance on information which they should not be privy to.

When an encounter check is indicated, roll the appropriate die, and if a "1" results, an encounter takes place.

In this event, go to the appropriate table for the terrain, and determine randomly what sort of monster is being encountered. Note: In areas where you have detailed the monster population, a random determination should not be necessary, as this information should be recorded by you.

When an actual meeting does occur, consult the explanations accompanying the table for any special procedures to follow. Attempts by the encountering party to evade are dealt with under Additional Rules, Pursuit and evasion of pursuit.

Encounter Distance

If either party is surprised, the encounter distance is determined by subtracting the value of surprise (as determined by the die which indicated that the condition existed) from normal encounter distance. Normal encounter distance is 6" to 24" (6d4).

If final encounter distance is 1" or less, than a confrontation will usually take place.

Confrontation: Confrontation indicates that the adventurers and some monster have met at close proximity, and some interaction is likely to take place. There are, however, modifying circumstances:

1. If the monsters are intelligent and would normally deem themselves to be weaker than the party of adventurers, then they will always seek to avoid such confrontation.
2. If the party of adventurers surprises the monsters and elects to flee the encounter, they may attempt to avoid confrontation by using free segments of action to move out of confrontation distance and evade the monsters.

Confrontation interaction can consist of any number of actions, singly or in combination - parley and reaction, spell casting, missile fire, melee combat, etc.

Movement

As mentioned previously, movement rates have been given elsewhere.

The rates assume that a party of from 1 to 100 creatures are concerned. If more than 100 are in the party, reduce movement rate by 1 mile per day for each additional 100 or fraction thereof, but in no event should such adjustment slow the rate of movement of the party to below 50% of normal speed.

Becoming Lost

Any party not guided by a creature knowledgeable of the countryside through which the party is moving, or which is not following a well defined course (river, road, or the like), or which is not using a well-drawn and correct map, might become lost. This is determined prior to the commencement of a day's movement. Determination is based on the terrain:

Direction of lost movement is illustrated below:

Procedure for Lost Parties

As soon as the die roll indicates the party is lost, determine the direction. If it is onto a space which has previously been traveled over and mapped by the party, then they will recognize that they have become lost.

Tell them that they moved in "X" direction, rather than that which was desired, but they have seen landmarks and realize their error.

If movement is into an area where the party has not already been and mapped, then immediately roll again to determine if the party will be lost the next day also.

If no such lost direction is indicated, then the party will realize it has made an error the next day; but meanwhile describe terrain as if they had actually moved in the desired direction, i.e. as if they had not been lost with regards to direction.

This will, of course, result in the erroneous mapping of a space until corrected. If the party will also be lost the following day, the procedure above is followed until they are no longer lost.

At that point, they will realize that they have not been moving in the desired direction, or series of directions, but they will NOT know just where they become lost. They will have to back-track and attempt to locate the lost space which they mapped correctly and go on again from that place.

It must be understood that parties following a correct map will never become lost. Procedures are only for exploration of unmapped terrain.

Resting Requirements for Wilderness/Outdoors Movement

Movement rates are postulated on sufficient daily rest periods so as to obviate the necessity for any protracted rest periods of a day or more during the course of any journey. If normal movement rate is exceeded, however, then special rest periods, in addition to any subsumed brief breaks in travel, are required . This is detailed below:

Forced Movement. It is possible to make forced marches up to twice the distance shown for daily movement rate. Such forced movement increases the daily rate in 10% increments, from 10% to 100% at the option of the party, to a maximum of double normal movement rate; but as soon as a total of 100% of additional normal movement rate is reached, or as soon as the party determines to assume non-forced movement, whichever first occurs, a mandatory rest period must be enforced. Rest period depends upon the total percentage of forced movement:

To find the time required for enforced rest, simply find the total percentage of rest time and deduct this from normal daily movement rate.

Thus, 30% means that 30% of movement the next day is deducted, as the party rested during that period. At 3 hours per 10% increment of forced movement, 70% equals 210%, so two full days, plus 10% of a third day must be spent in rest from the forced march.

Failure to rest after normal movement is equal to 100% means that beasts of burden have a cumulative chance of dropping dead of 10% per 10% increment of additional movement of any sort.

Other creatures lose 1 level of ability or hit die in the same manner, until 0 is reached and exhaustion kills them.

Such loss of vitality, whether by beast of burden, creature, or character requires a full 8 hours of additional rest for each such 10% increment, hit die, or level of ability lost. For example, a 12th level fighter who moves an additional 90% of movement after exceeding normal movement by 100% must rest 72 hours, consecutively, in order to regain 12th level of ability. Prior to that period of rest, the character is effectively 3rd level!