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Thanks for getting back on track guys

I've been writing something up for dealing with travelling in places like Moria (or Erebor or Mt Gundabad or Goblin-town etc etc).

I've gone down the route of the heroes making tests and modifying a counter for both their own 'lostness' and their perceived 'lostness' as previously suggested by Elfcrusher. I'll use a test against an unknown TN with a result of 14 or better adjusting the perception of 'lostness' and meeting the hidden TN as adjusting the actual 'lostness'. The hidden TN could be higher or lower than 14 though depending on how I structure the environment as travelling through natural tunnels will be harder than properly constructed Dwarven passages for example. I.E. Twisty passages all alike compared to straight highways under the earth really.

I'm also working in distance and Corruption tests to try and match existing mechanisms wherever possible.

I'd really like the brain power of the forum to focus of a term for 'lostness' as that really grates on me

Hermes Serpent wrote:
I'd really like the brain power of the forum to focus of a term for 'lostness' as that really grates on me

How about "Bearing(s)" and make it a negative number?

EDIT:
I still can't think of a more accurate word than Disorientation, but that's a lot of syllables. I tried to find variants of "stray" or "astray" but there aren't any good noun forms. (I did google "noun form of Lost" and found that somebody suggested "Lostness"...)

We could refer to it as the "Lost score".

Forlornness maybe? Different connotations but seems fitting. To me at least.

Marcus wrote:Forlornness maybe? Different connotations but seems fitting. To me at least.

I agree! I also thought of the root "Forlorn" but I think part of the goal is to avoid making a noun out of an adjective by adding "-ness".

I have no idea how else to build an english noun.

Marcus wrote:I have no idea how else to build an english noun.

Forlornication.

Sounds like a Red Hot Chili Peppers song title.

I think "Lost Rating" works fine, actually. Phonetically/syllabically, it works as well or better than "Fatigue Rating".

Another component (sorry if it was already stated) could be a Corruption check for despair. If you're lost in the dark you're going to get desperate from time to time.

This is the TL:DR part of what I've written up for travelling underground.

The mechanics of travelling through an underground complex can be either dealt with randomly and narratively or by using some type of network diagram where the start and ends points are labelled and a series of junctions posited where navigation tests take place.

The starting values of 'Lostness' and 'Perceived Lostness' are set to 0 and a TN set for tests according to the location. The TN for the 'Perceived Lostness' is set to 14. Each time a Travel test is called for all the company tests and those that fail the TN14 increment the 'Perceived Lostness' value by one. Those that fail the location TN (16 for Moria for example) increment the 'Lostness' value by one. Finding a recognised location will reset the value of both 'Perceived Lostness' and 'Lostness' to zero. If following a recognised route the Navigation tests are not rolled for. Players know the TN for 'Perceived Lostness' but not the TN for actual 'Lostness' which might be the same, higher or lower.

Note that direction can be determined by a successful Orientation (Explore skill) test LMB p29 and the Tunnelling Trait reduces the TN for being lost by two levels.

Travel tests (Fatigue)TN18 is going to be two per day in Moria and Corruption tests also twice per day but at TN20.

I'm still thinking about the values of 'Lostness' and 'Perceived Lostness' and how to work them in mechanically.