I had my very first session of the game last night with a regular group and we started playing through the intro adventure after allowing most of the players time to finish creating their characters.

When we set out on our first Journey we noticed this was the point at which the game became a bit confusing. We only completed the first leg of our trip but in just that relatively small distance we each failed numerous rolls for Travel, Corruption, etc. Even with 2 ranks in a pertinent skill we were still failing rolls pretty badly like 85% of the time at least. We had to blow through a couple points of individual character's Hope pts and some of the Fellowship Pool as well just to keep our heads above water. There was a huge amount of skill checks just for this small portion of the Journey.

After the session was over the GM mentioned he was stunned by just how much of a "dice fest" Journeys were and the players were quite stunned as well. This was also the most confusing part of the game, requiring the Loremaster to stop the game several times to try to see what he needed to calculate next or what kind of check we needed to make next.

Has anyone found or created any kind of Journeys cheat sheet to simplify this process a great deal? We are looking for a tool to speed this part of the game up a tad instead of having to use the Adv Book AND Loremaster's Book together to get the whole picture each time. We all still loved the Journeys part of the game and find it appropriate to the source material but we hope to simplify the process some by having a better reference to use.

All the other parts of the game went VERY smooth and easy, especially combat.

I've not made a cheat sheet yet, but plan on creating one.

I'm also going to make some 'Hazard Cards' with some additional hazards to add variety.

When a hazard occurs, the one that rolled the 'Eye' determines which hazard it is by rolling the feat dice and then I just pluck an appropriate card from the pack.

This is easily my most worrying thoughts about the game so far.

As I have mentioned in other threads around these forums there IS a lot of unclear "rules" here.

Your description of a session does nothing to calm me... I'm still waiting for my first actual session.

A step by step example of an actual Journey would go along way to clear this up.

(Funny how Combat gets examples of a couple of rounds in the rules but nothing for Journeys.)

/wolf

I'd love to see a supplement with maybe 50 new hazards ! It would be great. Not that I don't have enough imagination or creativity to pull out my own hazards, it's just that official rules are usually much more balanced than homemade ones.

Just double checked the rules and I was using the Hazard rules incorrectly in the first game session.

I assumed that any Eye roll was a hazard, but it's only a hazard if the Travel test fails AND at least one Eye rune is rolled.

However, assuming a party size of four, the odds of an Eye being rolled is 1 in 3 and if you increase party size to six that becomes a 50/50 roll.

I know the company can use Hope to invoke an attribute and perhaps turn that fail to a success, but it does seem to crop up a lot and that would mean burning a lot of Hope.

Perhaps the 'powers that be' at C7, who will have had more experience in the play testing process, have an insight into this?

I think one of the keys for making journeys work in the game will be to focus on the description first, before calling for die rolls. Establish in the players' minds what the terrain they are traveling through is like, the weather, etc., then do the mechanical side of things. The system is new (to most of us at least), and anytime I run a new system I end up focusing on the mechanics for the first few sessions. I expect after a few runs, journeys will become more seamless and "flow" better.

I've only played one session (at Gencon) and run one so far, so my experience with journeys is limited. The GM in our demo at Gencon made the same mistake that Garbar did (any roll of an Eye resulted in a hazard, rather than only Eyes on failed rolls), but it was still fun (although we were so beat up we had to beg Beorn to let us stay a couple of days to heal up In the game I ran, I didn't do enough description of the journey (it was a demo situation as well, with a limited time to get the adventure done), but I hope to do better in future sessions.

John

I ran the aforementioned session. From the LM perspective, these were my thoughts:

1) Journeys - These were a dice fest for us. To GW's point, it wasn't that it was difficult to find the rules on what we needed to do (they were all available and easy enough to get to), it was just the simple fact that they had to make SO many rolls. Let me boil this down: 5 players, each had to make 2 Fatigue Tests for the Journey. In addition, each player had to make 1 Corruption Test each day because they were in Shadow Lands. This resulted in well over 20 rolls being made. However, on the positive side, each of these rolls had a tangible result in the game. There was never a failed roll that basically had no tangible result (like, for example, some times occurs during skill challenges in DnD4e).

2) Encounters - The Encounters seemed hollow. It seemed like we should have been able to set an objective for the Encounter, then use a series of Actions (like Combat Actions) to resolve the Encounter. As it stands, basically you can fail out of an Encounter simply by the composition of your group and a single failed roll (based on the Tolerance rating of course). The side effect of this, then, is determining how to get critical information into the player's hands for them to use during the adventure.

3) Combat - This worked like a dream, for me (but, of course, they only fought a Troll). It was fast paced, exciting, and there were plenty of options to use that, I felt, really captured the feel of Middle Earth. To my relief, it was not nearly as deadly as I'd imagined (which was a concern for me). And, I think there was a real concern and adrenaline rush for the players when they first heard the Troll approaching. I can't wait to explore these rules in more depth.

4) Target Numbers - As DS mentioned, the TN of 14 on nearly every Test made it extremely challenging to succeed at almost any task. There were a LOT of failures. I think the average TN of 14 assumes an average Skill Rank of 3 (producing an average result of 16), but only a very few skills start at Rank 3, most are Rank 2 or less (producing an average result of 12.5, 9, and 5.5 for Rank 2, 1, and 0 respectively). I think the average TN for most tasks, then, would probably be better set at 12 for beginning characters. However, I don't want to make any house rules on this just yet until we play a few more sessions and we can watch the characters develop.

5) Traits - Traits were MUCH easier to adjudicate than I'd imagined from reading the game. They worked very simply and elegantly in the game. In about 2 hours of actual game time (we spent the first 2 hours creating the characters for their Fellowship) I estimate that each player earned 1-2 Advancement Points. I can't wait to see what they will do with them during the Fellowship Phase!

6) Shadow Points - I was EXTREMELY surprised to see how quickly these began to pile up on the characters, most simply due to being in Shadow Land terrain and having to make near impossible Wisdom Tests (the most a character can begin with is 2 in Wisdom). However, I think that as the characters progress (and increase their Wisdom) they will accumulate less quickly and will begin to get removed. This will be interesting to watch during their adventuring careers.

I really enjoyed the game. I've played nearly every Middle Earth RPG out there (including the fan created ones) and this definitely creates the feel of ME better than any of the others. The rules really aren't disorganized at all (you may have to look something up, but it should be easy to navigate to the rule you're seeking). The Journeys are a bit of a dice grinder, but at least each roll counts for something. And, the combat system, in my opinion, is exquisite... one of the simplest, yet elastic, combat systems I've played. I was very excited to play the game and TOR did not disappoint! I am eagerly anticipating next week's session.

Basically, I made the same mistake several times, but that's all D&D's fault

So used to the idea of a 1 being a fumble!

An Eye is not a fumble.... it's a zero!

On journeys and in combat it triggers a consequence, but it's not necessarily going to happen.

Roll an Eye in combat and bad guys make a called shot, but may miss!

Roll an Eye on a Journey and you may encounter a hazard... that the players may avoid with another roll!

Yes, BBarlow really knows his stuff and did a fantastic job running us through the first bit of the adventure. It was awesome. I think I was the only player that didn't earn an Advancement pt, which of course was my fault. I was having difficulty finding how to invoke my Traits for an Advancement pt.

I play an Elf of Mirkwood archer. A Warden by Calling. My Traits are: Woodwright, Mirkwood-Lore, Shadow-Lore and my Distinctive Features are: Quick of Hearing, Swift. I did have an opportunity to roll to see if I could earn an Advancement pt for my Quick of Hearing Trait but failed the roll. I should have spent a pt of Hope to see if I could earn the Advancement pt but we were blowing through Hope pts alarmingly quickly on our Journey.

I was surprised by this as well. It did seem to go pretty fast. The entire Fellowship Pool was expended as well as some personal Hope points. This, coupled with the pace at which Shadow Points were earned, was very alarming. The one thing in the future that might impact this, will be the lands through which the PCs plan their Journeys. I could envision them taking much longer paths to avoid blighted lands (and, hence, Corruption Tests). But, this is certainly in keeping with the Professor's writings.

Indeed, BBarlow. We may have to stop a few times on our Journey to rest in order to get our Fatigue down a bit and should try to open a Sanctuary as quickly as possible so we can look into clearing out the Corruption we are gaining after the adventure.

Some comments:

1. Failing a Travelling roll isn't a major issue. You gain 1 or 2 Fatigue rolls. Definitely not something worth spending Hope on.

2. The Journey in Marsh Bell should only require 1 Fatigue roll per PC, and one optional one in prep.

3. I think the number of Corruption rolls called for in Marsh Bell is too high and just called for 1.

4. At Skill Level 2, you should be succeeding 42% of the time. If you are having bad luck, it is not really a system concern.

5. I would see the other Skill checks in Marsh Bell during the Journey as more GM guidance. You can change them as you desire and they should feel natural from what is going on. It is not meant to be read prescriptively IMO. This is especially true when you factor in other rolls required by a Journey.

6.Don't leave your GM skills at the door in TOR, as you shouldn't in any RPG.

7. Its also important to note that these other Skill rolls are not part of the Journey. As per the rules, the Journey only requires 1 roll per PC and 1 optional one. I would keep them distinct before concluding that Journeys contain a lot of dice rolling. 80% is just normal RPGing.

Have you checked out my Encounters patch? Whilst not elevating Encounters to a Combat level (which I wouldn't like) it does give the Tolerance rules context that played out really well in play.

Skill Level 2 should succeed at TN 42% of the time before you factor in Traits.

Personally, I think that reduced dice rolling will help alleviate this issue considerably. I wouldn't reduce the Journey dice rolls but the peripheral rolls called for by Marsh Bell were much more than there should have been. GMs need to adjust accordingly.

I wanted to start my first session in the middle of a journey to put them on the spot straight away. (I had a party of Orcs following them and they had to choose where to fight them.) So I had them roll a single roll for the Travel tests to that point and read the results like this:

One roll Travel (use highest TN for the Journey):
   - Eye: Hazard + Fatigue as if all Travel tests failed + 2 if Winter / Autumn
   - Fail: Hazard + as if failed half tests + 1 if Winter / Autumn
   - Ordinary: 1 or 2 if Winter / Autumn (as if failed one)
   - Great or Extraordinary: No effect

Probably need to tweak this a bit, but it worked so well I'll use it again (and a similar test for Shadow) to keep travel simple.

What happens after you rolled for 20 Corruption tests ??

Whilst it is simple to lump every PC under a single roll, I think that there are some considerable benefits to having some distinction between the PCs in terms of how they are dealing with the Journey and allowing them to display the Skills which they have invested.

I definitely had each PC roll separately, and the distinction made for an interesting first combat as those most fatigued took on a different roles. As I understand it you only get to show off your other skills if a Hazard occurs so this bit doesn't bother me.

Cool, given the Journey in Marsh Bell is only 1 roll per PC anyway

Travel is itself a skill. If you don't have it, then you will be trying to persuade the other PCs to visit more sanctuaries, asking for aid in the prep phase and dealing with the consequences more. In and of itself this is all good stuff in a Tolkien RPG IMO and something that needs to be balanced with the benefit of reducing down to a single roll.

I agree there is definitely a trade-off here, but my journey was much longer than the Marsh Bell and I wanted to reflect this but didn't want the first experience of the players to be 'roll Travel six times in a row'. I'll probably break long Journeys into two rolls in the future to allow the 'change direction because we are exhausted' discussion.

Yeah, that makes a lot os sense

I do worry I'll be missing out on an evolving feel to Joirneys with this, but Luke Crane's Let It Ride is more important to us as a group.

One cool thing this shows me that I like is how easy it is to mod this game to your preferences.

I am a huge Let It Ride fan Its one reason why I was wary about the number of dice rolls outside of the Journey.

However, Let It Ride is not synonymous with less dice rolls necessarily. In Crane's games when a scene is dramatically important the number of dice rolls increases, whilst remaining consistent with the Let It Ride principle. In Crane's games, such scenes are defined as combat and duel of wits.

In TOR, these scenes are defined as combat and journeys. As such, the dice rolling should be used to (and I think it can as written) heighten drama. If you aren't getting drama out of your Journeys that justify the dice rolls, then perhaps you should start by considering if you are giving them proper weight first and then look to cut down the rolls as appropriate second.

Good call. I've only managed to play once, but I should try play out a Journey in full to see the tension build before I mod too much. Has anyone got an experience of a cool tension building Journey to inspire me / us?

Its worth pointing out that the drama in The Hobbit is something like 75% from the Journeys

The difficulty is making them exciting. I think this requires the GM to be flexible but also react to the PCs action from roll to roll, much as I proposed in the co-op method I put in another thread. This is one reason why I don't think all Travel Rolls should be made up front.

If Journeys generate story and give the PCs power to make choices that matter then they will be fun and the rolls are justified. If they are just an excuse to make rolls to determine Fatigue or more rolls then they will be dull and should be simplified.

Oh and yeah, check out this thread about elevating Journeys to make them more dramatic: http://cubicle7.clicdev.com/f/index.php?tr...&showtopic=2169. Its really the same subject and it is not coincide that that method appears in MouseGuard, an RPG written by Crane who extols the virtue of Let It Ride.

I love your ideas in that thread, thanks! I think you've nailed the problem I'm having is that I was starting to see Journey's as a tool to introduce Fatigue, but I agree they are opportunities to put in twists via the Hazards and the Fatigue is secondary. Part of this for me is that the PCs roll simultaneously... hmmm...

Still really keen to hear an actual play example where someone has made Journeys work well.

Its probably not the greatest example, as I went with the short jounrey in Marsh Bell, but it worked well in my run of the scenario as reported here: http://cubicle7.clicdev.com/f/index.php?tr...&showtopic=2191

I ran the Journey rules very low key (I don't think the players even realised that they were in a system) and cut down the peripheral rolls. Though the shortness of the Journey prevented me from using it to cretae a major diversion, the character drama surrounding Lifstan was inspired by the Journey rules in the following way.

Lifstan sucks at Journeys, so his player narrated him not really pulling his weight. When several players got Fatigue from failed Travel rolls, they actually looked on his PC with annoyance.

This all started the development whereby Lifstan frag whored the troll (gaining more annoyance), gained Shadow which he decided was Lifstan being even more full of himself and then found the necklace which he gained even more Shadow from on thinking he deserved it. Ultimately, Lifstan had a minor redemption in acting so charismatically in the Cellars and herocially driving the PCs to escpe.

As a GM I did influence events a little making it more likely that Lifstan found the necklace given that he was developing so nicely. I also played up the despondent nature of Oin and Balin to contrast with the PCs own situation, which gave Lifstan the later opportunity for a minor redemption.

So, perhaps not the best example, but a nice succinct one on how Journey rules can create character development and give the GM some ammunition to work with.

Each player made 4 Corruption Tests (1 per day while in Shadow Lands). At the end of that effort, I think each Hero had acquired at least 1 point of Shadow.

Then, because they had boats, they each had to make only 1 Fatigue Test (at TN 16 for being in Shadow Lands). A failure including an Eye resulted in a Hazard, which the lookouts were able to swiftly manage.

From there, the guide made daily Athletics Tests to guide the boat through the Marsh (per LB pg. 130). He failed twice, resulting in all Heroes suffering 6 Endurance.

Simultaneously, the two lookouts were allowed 2 Awareness Tests apiece each day, and the scout was allowed two Explore or Search Tests each day to find the missing dwarves' tracks.

As you can see, purely by using the rules as written, there were a TON of rolls made during the Journey (53 in fact) which took up less than an hour of game time.

It just felt like a lot of rolling, but, again, each Test had a tangible result that was pertinent to the game. The other thing that I liked was that it wa easy to translate the success or failure into simple story details; there was never a time when I had to shoehorn an explanation to fit the result, it was always clear.

Oh, I see it, thanks. Just wanted to understand what happened in your session.

It seems fine IMO, in fact I'm looking forward to run my first session and it will probably be very fun to translate all these dice rolling into the narrative of a journey.

Journeys mechanics and combat mechanics IMO makes TOR a great RPG ruleswise and an innovative one too.

There are many other things that make the game outstanding, but in terms of rules, these two sub systems are the ones who attract me the most.

Excellent summary Barlow.

I think some tinkering with Encounters (along the lines of Skywalkers thinking) will fix that part. Where the more you succeed the more Info/Help you get. I like that a lot better than the "get it all or fail" approach. That way you can set up core clues and crucial pieces of info or help up front to more or less ensure the players get at least the minimum to continue the quest, and have the rest as extra bonus stuff if they do really well.

(The following has been discussed in other places with other users... I'm repeating myself, I know and apologise if I sound like a broken record.)

My gripe with Travelling is that I cannot find anything in the rules that explains WHEN to apply the rules. This might seem a little strange. But let me give you a few examples of different approaches:

1. You make all Fatigue Tests up front for each leg. Note down any failures, and hazards. The LM looks at the map, picks hazards and decides where/when they will occur during the travel and applies their effect to that leg only. (For example the one that says you can only rest half the number of times.)

2. You calculate how many rolls to make for this leg and then divide that number with the number of days it will take. The result is the interval in days at which the LM should require a Fatigue Test. Failed test would still only apply its fatigue increase at the end of the journey, but this feels more natural, and some hazards can happen that day when you roll them. But it also makes other Hazard effects a little weird. Like, what would the "half the number of rests" effect really mean then, if we roll that one on the last night of the leg?

3. There are probably other ways of slicing this as well...

My point is that this "timing issue" is not addressed anywhere in the rules. It simply says; "Go on a Journey and make some rolls."

Reading in one place in the rules it feels like it should be done as in my example no2. But reading the Adventure in the LM and how the Journey should be handled there it feels more like it should be handled like my example no1.

/wolf

Other ways of doing this:

3. The LM notes how many Fatigue Tests are required and looks at the map, he distributes the rolls along the way in geographical s that would be a little extra a) dangerous or b) interesting. Calling for rolls crossing a ford, climbing a crevice or some such, this way you could also pick encounters that better suited the current situation, should they occur. This way would not care so much how many days went by between rolls, (as long as you know how many Rests they Company gets from one test to the other,) nor would it ask for all info "up front", so some Hazards in the LMB might have to be slightly modified.

/wolf

4. Any of the above, depending what works best dramatically for the Journey.

FWIW I think the reason why timing is not set in stone is for this reason. And I think it's the right reason

That could very well be. And I wouldn't have a problem with it really.

But it is still worth talking about since depending on how you do it you get different effects.

Example 1 above you for instance never make a Fatigue Test while "Weary". They are all made up front and a "Weary status" acquired during the resulting travel, due to combat hazards or whatever, does not affect the Fatigue Tests already made.

Example 2 it will affect Fatigue Tests if you didn't have time to Rest enough to remove the "Weary Flag" before the next Test. And here you always know how many rests (nights sleep) you'll have before the next Test.

Example 3 is the same as 2 but the number of rests between each test is more fluid and not as static, this makes for a greater uncertainty with the players that might be or not be cool, depending on the groups preferences.

etc etc...

I think at least some of these type of design-discussions could have been mentioned in the LMB. What I'm saying here Skywalker is that even if you are correct... they never told us that this is what it's supposed to be like. You say "set in stone"... I say "it's not even set on paper."

/wolf

I agree with you in terms of it being vague. I guess I just don't see it being much more vague than most parts of a rule system. The level of prescription of timing of rolls is normally a matter left to the GM, which naturally has all the same impacts you raise. In most cases, no one notices and to be honest neither did I on first reading the rules

FWIW a lot of those effects you mention are reduced by the way Journeys are meant to be broken down into stages though.

I guess what I am saying is that I personally don't see it as a big issue. I don't know how you could do much to change what is there without being overly prescriptive which would have other consequences. But I have come to understand your issue and agree that for better or worse the matter is vague.

In most cases when you roll for something you roll it in the instance it happens. And Timing is rarely an issue.

Even during Extended Contests, such as debates and/or battle the mechanic is usually contained to that Contest with no interruptions from other elements of the game.

Let's leave simple skill checks aside because they are usually "instants" you roll it and get a result. Easy enough even when it comes to Hunting rolls that can sum up several Hours of hunting. I don't have a problem with this.

But the mechanics for Combat, Encounter (Social stuff) and Journeys in this game consist of series of different tests to reach a conclusion. They are Game Entities if you will.

In the case of Combat and Encounters it is quite obvious that they are not mean to be "divided" or "interrupted" by other Entities.

You run one, and get a result. Then move on to the next challenge.

Journeys are different because they spread out over several days, days that are often filled with both Combat, Encounters and other events. At least in game-time. Whether it is mechanically interrupted by these entities or resolved separately... I don't know, because the rules doesn't say.

It is also something "new" to me... all other stuff I've played over and over in dozens of games, I know how to handle it. I've learnt the trade. But this... this is new to me and a little more guidance from the game on how to handle it would have been helpful.

/wolf

Interesting reading here about travel. Still much to learn with TOR

Im not trying to draw comparisons here, just musing.
In our MERP game we are also accustomed to frequent dice rolls. To successfully maneuver through terrain Moving Maneuver rolls had to be made, in some terrain, lots of them depending on the Difficulty of the terrain, which also rewarding in EXP for successful rolls.

In MERP travel through hostile territory gave EXP per mile, so in effect a reward for traveling through it.

I believe in rewards for risky ventures. Is there room in TOR for rewarding Hope on the spot along the way?

BTW- I wrote a program and named it MERP Manager that helped me a lot with things like Terrain Generation and Herb searching as well as Cavern Complexes and single tunnels among other useful things like Weather, Encounters, Treasure
It also has a pretty complete MORIA level generator that's based on the MORIA module from ICE

Some parts of it might be useful for TOR, like Weather and Terrain descriptions. Its all very user friendly and self explanatory.

It is stand alone so You don't have to install it, just create a folder on you hard drive of choice or thumb drive and drop it in there and extract it.

For some terrain generation it creates text files that are place in the folder MerpMan is in for pasting into documents!

Unfortunately it only works on a PC running the .net 2.0 or above but please feel free to grab a copy if you are interested.

ftp://www.motherpluckerrecords.com
username: freepeoples
password: Mellon1

Let me know what you think!

Sorry, but I disagree with you here. Timing is always an issue. In fact, I consider one of my greatest tools as a GM is understanding when to call for rolls, how that interacts with the mechanics and what "drama" it can create. This is fundamental to the Let It Ride principle too, which I adhere pretty strongly too

Perhaps this is where we differ. For me, this all slides nicely into how I have GMed for the last few years.

So, I agree with you that calling for these rolls at different times has different impacts. That's my tool as a GM.

I hear you. But wouldn't the Let it Ride principle frown quite heavily upon rolling 7 boring Fatigue Tests for one and the same Journey though? I mean... it doesn't really "ride" at all then does it?

/wolf

One step ahead of you there GW

http://cubicle7.clicdev.com/f/index.php?tr...indpost&p=17874

Indeed.

That is not how we played the "Let it Ride" principle though. Our Burning Wheel Sessions would never promote several rolls of the same skill reaching the same goal. Ever. Drama be damned.

But maybe it has evolved a little since then? I have not read Mouse Guard.

(ps. I hated the Combat System in BW so we had to put that game to rest.)

/wolf

Buh wuh? How did you manage Duel of Wits or Combat in BW with just one roll?

Let It Ride is related to an approach to mechanics that is about giving meaning to rolls dependent on their dramatic place in the game. The overall concept is sometimes called Bringing Down the Pain. Simplistically, when you are in a nondramatic moment, you roll one dice. If you are in a dramatic moment, roll away. Roll away

FWIW I hate BW with the power of a thousands suns Still the concepts in it and elsewhere are very well thought out and I found were helpful to make my GMing more healthier