Celebrating 2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary of Blackmoor and of Role-Playing!
Today is Part 66 of my series on OD&D, with The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures Vol. 3.
**For those coming in, in the middle of this series I am giving you my take on OD&D during my first exposure starting in Sept of 1975. For this first part it is just the first three books of the original woodgrain box set and prior to obtaining the Greyhawk, Blackmoor and later Supplements.**
Today a short look at Movement:
I always need to remind myself that this Table is based on a Scale of a 5 mile Hex as noted below, so if you change the scale you change this table also. The only real change I make to this table is that IMC the largest and most powerful dragons can fly further and faster than anything else on the table.
If you have ever tried to do anything with a large group of people of the sizes noted, you know this makes perfect sense.
That is right, a man on foot is incapable of movement in certain terrain, if he enters, he will never leave again. Uh NO! That is not what is meant. What it does mean is that in certain terrains, with all the back tracking and detours you may have to take added to the general difficulty of travel, your effect movement rate can at times look like zero as far as moving towards your goal is concerned.
I do not know where they get this stuff from. It is not part of the real world for physical reasons. It is a part of the real world for religious reasons. If your adventuring party is observing a religious rest, then it should be stated as such. But given adequate food, water and sleep, there is no practical limit to how many continuous days you can travel. Nor is there one for animals as long as you do not push them at too hard of a pace for an unreasonable number of hours, they do have to have grazing time. As for dragons, why would a dragon walk for three weeks straight? Are they under some outside force making them do that - good luck making that happen. Dragons IMC do not have to sleep three weeks after a week of flight, they are the most powerful creatures in the world and they are creatures of elemental magic tied into the fabric of the world.
There are a lot of scales, used some additional ones are 1 mile, 6 miles, 10 miles, 12 miles, 25 miles, 50 miles and 100 miles. Also larger scales of 1200 miles and up are also used.
Here is yet another use of the term "Turn", this would be the Travel Turn.
Tomorrow Wilderness Monsters.
Today is Part 66 of my series on OD&D, with The Underworld & Wilderness Adventures Vol. 3.
**For those coming in, in the middle of this series I am giving you my take on OD&D during my first exposure starting in Sept of 1975. For this first part it is just the first three books of the original woodgrain box set and prior to obtaining the Greyhawk, Blackmoor and later Supplements.**
Today a short look at Movement:
If you have ever tried to do anything with a large group of people of the sizes noted, you know this makes perfect sense.
That is right, a man on foot is incapable of movement in certain terrain, if he enters, he will never leave again. Uh NO! That is not what is meant. What it does mean is that in certain terrains, with all the back tracking and detours you may have to take added to the general difficulty of travel, your effect movement rate can at times look like zero as far as moving towards your goal is concerned.
I do not know where they get this stuff from. It is not part of the real world for physical reasons. It is a part of the real world for religious reasons. If your adventuring party is observing a religious rest, then it should be stated as such. But given adequate food, water and sleep, there is no practical limit to how many continuous days you can travel. Nor is there one for animals as long as you do not push them at too hard of a pace for an unreasonable number of hours, they do have to have grazing time. As for dragons, why would a dragon walk for three weeks straight? Are they under some outside force making them do that - good luck making that happen. Dragons IMC do not have to sleep three weeks after a week of flight, they are the most powerful creatures in the world and they are creatures of elemental magic tied into the fabric of the world.
There are a lot of scales, used some additional ones are 1 mile, 6 miles, 10 miles, 12 miles, 25 miles, 50 miles and 100 miles. Also larger scales of 1200 miles and up are also used.
Here is yet another use of the term "Turn", this would be the Travel Turn.
Tomorrow Wilderness Monsters.
The idea of a religious rest is an interesting one, and gives me an idea for a campaign setting wherein the vocation of Adventurer itself is a form of worship. Instead of the trope that "All D&D players are thieves" this version would be "All D&D players are pilgrims." I wonder what kind of pantheon would exist in such a world and how the rites of questing and dungeon delving would factor into the faith? It's certainly all very symbolic and there have been many real world religious practices and coming of age ceremonies that mirror things commonly done in D&D. I know this was likely not Gary nor Dave's intention at all, but it works in a strange sort of way, don't you think?
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