I'm fairly new to AL, and I've been running the old Season 4 modules in order. I realize these older modules... leave something to be desired by way of editing, to put it nicely. 04-12 particularly leaves out an entire travel table that the text explicitly says should be referred to.
The simple solution is just to use the travel table from the basic rules, of course, which is exactly what I intend to do.But of course, I'm an over thinker, and when I was reading the last box in the section titled "They Get There When?", it makes mention that, once the characters escape the hunting grounds, presumably having traveled 8 miles closer to their destination, they should either be 4 hours of travel away at a normal pace, or 16 hours at a "slowed" normal pace.
This math doesn't exactly add up to me, so I'm curious how other DMs have chosen to play this. I'll probably go with a simple answer of just saying "they're another 8 hours away if they're inhibited by difficult terrain, not 16", because by the basic rules difficult terrain only slows a party to half speed, so this is probably just another mistake in the adventure. But for funzies I'm doing the math, under the assumption this wasn't a typo. Is the game suggesting that the difficult terrain should slow them down to a quarter of the pace instead of half? It would make it an even more difficult challenge, which could be interesting for a group that's a bit over powered. At the same time, maybe that's too much if the group is having to travel 8 miles, making exhaustion checks every hour, at a quarter of the speed (to put in context, at a "fast" pace with their speed quartered, they would spend 8 hours traveling and have to make 8 increasingly difficult CON saves to avoid levels of exhaustion, getting attacked by 6-7 buffed winter wolves once the first character hits level 2 exhaustion).
All of this overthinking even though I know my players are probably going to hop in a genie lamp and fly over the hunting ground, pretty much bypassing this entire section. (: I'm just curious how other DMs feel about the travel in this section.
EDIT: Even better, if I'm understanding this section properly then their own math doesn't even add up. At the top of part 2, it states that the travel time should have been 8 hours from their meeting place to their destination, but the bad weather turned it into a 16 hour trip. (The characters have 32 hours to make it to the ritual, so it tracks that adding in two 8 hour long rests puts them right up to time, assuming they stop after each 8 hours of travel and make camp right before the final confrontation, as the writing suggests, so at least that math kind of checks out).
Where it gets a bit wonky is when you start looking at how far the characters have travelled, how far they travel during the wolf chase, and how long the adventure says they still have to travel. If the adventurers normally would get to the destination in 8 hours if unslowed, then the travel table suggests the destination should be about 24 miles away. The party makes it half way before the chase begins (meaning they've made it twelve miles). At that point, if they travel 8 miles before escaping the wolves, they would have made it 20 out of the 24 miles to their destination. Thus, if they travel at a normal pace unslowed, they should be able to make it to their destination in about an hour and 20 minutes, not even close to the 4 hours that the adventure states. If it was 4 hours away, that means that the destination is actually 12 more miles away, meaning that the total distance was actually 32 miles, aka the party would only have made it there within a day if they were travelling at a recklessly fast pace on foot, and they still would have technically had to travel a little extra after their 8 hours, since a day of travel cover 30 miles at a fast pace.
So yeah anyway, this module just has some really bad math in it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I'd suggest coming up with something that works for you and how you want to run it. You want to retain the spirit of the module with the time pressure and the various threats but whether you use 4 hours, 8 hours, 16 hours, 32 hours or 48 hours is mostly up to you.
I think the travel pace table that it meant to include is the one from the PHB which lists distance covered vs pace of travel - 30 miles/day fast, 24 miles/day normal, 18 miles/day slow. The distance is listed as 48 miles which would be 2 days of travel at a normal pace. The Forced March rule from the PHB is the one replicated in the module from the same section if the party decides to travel more than 8 hours/day.
If the party travels 8 hours at a normal pace, takes a long rest of 8 hours and then travels another 8 hours, they should reach their destination in 24 hours total. If the DM uses a standard travel day of 24 hours with 8 hours of rest, 8 hours of travel and 8 hours for other camp activities plus 8 hours of travel on the next day the total comes out to the 32 hour time limit cited above. If they go with a fast pace, they end up arriving after about 26-27 hours.
If you impose difficult terrain for the weather then they probably wouldn't make it - so I think the bad weather is mostly for flavour.
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"The first night of the new moon is two days from now, but it is at least a day’s journey from here to the location. It is about forty-eight miles to the valley; two day’s travel at a normal pace or just over a day and a half’s travel at a fast pace."
"The first half of the journey is a snowy slog under overcast skies and over hilly terrain. But freezing rain turns what would be an eight-hour trip into a sixteen-hour ordeal. From the end of the meeting the characters have thirty-two hours before the ritual starts."
"In good weather the trip should take a day of hard travel. The freezing rain that alternates from sleet pounding down on you to simply drizzling enough to be miserable is less than ideal. The rain creates an icy coating on everything, including yourselves. At this rate, getting there in time, has changed from a “sure thing” to a “we should be able to do this”. "
"The Raven" seems like it could bring some really fun and intriguing challenges to the table. For those of us balancing gaming with real-world commitments, travel time can sometimes be a factor. Speaking of travel, if anyone is interested in a more flexible work setup, you might want to explore opportunities through TLC Nursing Services https://tlcnursing.com/, where you can pursue a career as a traveling nurse and see new places while gaining great experience.
Hello!
I'm fairly new to AL, and I've been running the old Season 4 modules in order. I realize these older modules... leave something to be desired by way of editing, to put it nicely. 04-12 particularly leaves out an entire travel table that the text explicitly says should be referred to.
The simple solution is just to use the travel table from the basic rules, of course, which is exactly what I intend to do.But of course, I'm an over thinker, and when I was reading the last box in the section titled "They Get There When?", it makes mention that, once the characters escape the hunting grounds, presumably having traveled 8 miles closer to their destination, they should either be 4 hours of travel away at a normal pace, or 16 hours at a "slowed" normal pace.
This math doesn't exactly add up to me, so I'm curious how other DMs have chosen to play this. I'll probably go with a simple answer of just saying "they're another 8 hours away if they're inhibited by difficult terrain, not 16", because by the basic rules difficult terrain only slows a party to half speed, so this is probably just another mistake in the adventure. But for funzies I'm doing the math, under the assumption this wasn't a typo. Is the game suggesting that the difficult terrain should slow them down to a quarter of the pace instead of half? It would make it an even more difficult challenge, which could be interesting for a group that's a bit over powered. At the same time, maybe that's too much if the group is having to travel 8 miles, making exhaustion checks every hour, at a quarter of the speed (to put in context, at a "fast" pace with their speed quartered, they would spend 8 hours traveling and have to make 8 increasingly difficult CON saves to avoid levels of exhaustion, getting attacked by 6-7 buffed winter wolves once the first character hits level 2 exhaustion).
All of this overthinking even though I know my players are probably going to hop in a genie lamp and fly over the hunting ground, pretty much bypassing this entire section. (: I'm just curious how other DMs feel about the travel in this section.
EDIT: Even better, if I'm understanding this section properly then their own math doesn't even add up. At the top of part 2, it states that the travel time should have been 8 hours from their meeting place to their destination, but the bad weather turned it into a 16 hour trip. (The characters have 32 hours to make it to the ritual, so it tracks that adding in two 8 hour long rests puts them right up to time, assuming they stop after each 8 hours of travel and make camp right before the final confrontation, as the writing suggests, so at least that math kind of checks out).
Where it gets a bit wonky is when you start looking at how far the characters have travelled, how far they travel during the wolf chase, and how long the adventure says they still have to travel. If the adventurers normally would get to the destination in 8 hours if unslowed, then the travel table suggests the destination should be about 24 miles away. The party makes it half way before the chase begins (meaning they've made it twelve miles). At that point, if they travel 8 miles before escaping the wolves, they would have made it 20 out of the 24 miles to their destination. Thus, if they travel at a normal pace unslowed, they should be able to make it to their destination in about an hour and 20 minutes, not even close to the 4 hours that the adventure states. If it was 4 hours away, that means that the destination is actually 12 more miles away, meaning that the total distance was actually 32 miles, aka the party would only have made it there within a day if they were travelling at a recklessly fast pace on foot, and they still would have technically had to travel a little extra after their 8 hours, since a day of travel cover 30 miles at a fast pace.
So yeah anyway, this module just has some really bad math in it ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I'd suggest coming up with something that works for you and how you want to run it. You want to retain the spirit of the module with the time pressure and the various threats but whether you use 4 hours, 8 hours, 16 hours, 32 hours or 48 hours is mostly up to you.
I think the travel pace table that it meant to include is the one from the PHB which lists distance covered vs pace of travel - 30 miles/day fast, 24 miles/day normal, 18 miles/day slow. The distance is listed as 48 miles which would be 2 days of travel at a normal pace. The Forced March rule from the PHB is the one replicated in the module from the same section if the party decides to travel more than 8 hours/day.
If the party travels 8 hours at a normal pace, takes a long rest of 8 hours and then travels another 8 hours, they should reach their destination in 24 hours total. If the DM uses a standard travel day of 24 hours with 8 hours of rest, 8 hours of travel and 8 hours for other camp activities plus 8 hours of travel on the next day the total comes out to the 32 hour time limit cited above. If they go with a fast pace, they end up arriving after about 26-27 hours.
If you impose difficult terrain for the weather then they probably wouldn't make it - so I think the bad weather is mostly for flavour.
--------------
"The first night of the new moon is two days from now, but it is at least a day’s journey from here to the location. It is about forty-eight miles to the valley; two day’s travel at a normal pace or just over a day and a half’s travel at a fast pace."
"The first half of the journey is a snowy slog under overcast skies and over hilly terrain. But freezing rain turns what would be an eight-hour trip into a sixteen-hour ordeal. From the end of the meeting the characters have thirty-two hours before the ritual starts."
"In good weather the trip should take a day of hard travel. The freezing rain that alternates from sleet pounding down on you to simply drizzling enough to be miserable is less than ideal. The rain creates an icy coating on everything, including yourselves. At this rate, getting there in time, has changed from a “sure thing” to a “we should be able to do this”. "
Castle Ravenloft Battlemaps. It comes with printable maps for every room, and maps for use on foundry and roll20
tutuapp 9apps
"The Raven" seems like it could bring some really fun and intriguing challenges to the table. For those of us balancing gaming with real-world commitments, travel time can sometimes be a factor. Speaking of travel, if anyone is interested in a more flexible work setup, you might want to explore opportunities through TLC Nursing Services https://tlcnursing.com/, where you can pursue a career as a traveling nurse and see new places while gaining great experience.