Other Adventuring Topics

How to Play

There are a number of other factors that affect adventuring you may encounter during the story. Below are descriptions of some additional aspects of adventuring you should be familiar with.

Time

In QoD the passage of Time can be measured in a variety of ways. In Combat time is measured in Segments and Rounds. A Segment is a small unit of time, measuring approximately 1 to 2 seconds, that is used to measure the time of a sword swing, move a short distance, and the time it takes to cast and recover from using a magical power. The Recovery Time of Weapon Attacks and most powers are measured in Segments.

Each Round is 10 segments (approximately 10-15 seconds), with 10 Rounds constituting 1 Moment of time. The duration of many short-term effects are measured in Rounds and most combat situations complete within about 5 to 15 rounds. Note that regardless of how many rounds actually pass, a combat is usually considered to take 1 moment of time (GM's discretion).

A Moment is a mutable amount of time that is approximately 2-3 minutes in length. Effects with durations in moments last an entire battle, and are also useful when exploring. There are 5 moments in a Phase.

A Phase is a mutable amount of time that is used to measure the time it takes to catch your breath after a battle (see Resting below) or search through a small room. There are 5 phases per hour, and a phase can range in time between 5 and 20 minutes. For simplicity, we track the passage of time in phases while out of combat (or hours when there are long stretches of time between challenges). Exploring an area can take a phase or two (more for very large areas). Taking a short rest takes a phase. Depending on the complexity of the task, some skill checks may take a phase to complete (such as disarming a trap or applying a disguise). Additionally, some powers will have durations measured in phases.

For longer spans of time, especially when traveling long distances, time is measured in hours and days.

Traveling

While adventuring it's common to travel long distances between towns and adventuring locations. Every creature has an Overland Travel speed, which indicates the distance that they can travel in a day. For humans, whose Overland Travel speed is 30 miles per day, this means they travel at a pace of about 3 miles per hour for about 10 hours on a typical day. Each additional hour of travel beyond the 10th forces a creature to succeed a DC 10 Resilience Check or gain 1 point of Fatigue. Fatigue can be removed by taking an Extended Rest (see Resting below).

In well traveled areas, it is not uncommon to have an inn or small town approximately every 25-30 miles in order to take in travelers. Out in the wilderness, however, traveler's usually have to camp for the night.

Sometimes, the terrain you are traveling through can slow down your travel. See Terrain Types for more information on the different types of terrain and how they affect Overland Travel.

Mounts

Traveling via horse or similar mount is not much faster than foot travel for long distances, but for short time frames (less than two hours), a horse can be spurned to travel at about 6 miles per hour. For traveling longer distances or for pulling carrying carts, wagons, or carriages, most mounts travel at about the same overland speed as a human, 30 miles per day.

The main benefit of mounts is that they can pull or carry heavier loads than a human can. For that reason, they are often used more as pack animals or for pulling wagons and carts, then they are for everyday travel. Wealthier travelers will use mounts to make traveling less strenuous and exhausting.

Mounts are typically just as affected by Terrain as Player Characters, but if a mount is particularly accustomed to a certain terrain (such as a goat would be in mountainous terrain), the effect of the terrain may be reduced (or negated).

Environment

The environment can play a large roll in your adventure. Lighting can affect your ability to see and target creatures. Hazards in the environment can cause you damage and injuries, or require you to come up with creative ways to avoid or overcome them. Weather can affect visibility or harm your adventurer with extreme temperatures if ill prepared. The availability of Food and Water can affect a character's health and survival. While the details of these are not likely important to you right away, it is important to know that your environment can affect gameplay. Examine your environment carefully, be aware of your surroundings, and ask questions of your GM when faced with potential environmental dangers. Specific rules on these and other environmental factors can be found with the links above or in the Master Index.

Resting

All adventurers need to rest to recover from exertion and restore the day's physical and mental resources. There are two types of rests: a Short Rest and an Extended Rest. The Short Rest lasts about 1 phase and gives a character enough time to catch their breath after a combat or similarly strenuous activity. An extended rest constitutes a character sleeping to restore physical and mental acuity and heal from the trials of the day. More details of what occurs during a Short and Extended rest are outlined below.

Short Rest

A short rest takes 1 phase to complete, during which time you may not perform any strenuous activities, such as using powers or rituals, moving faster than a walk, manipulating or moving heavy objects, or using skills and you may not upkeep powers and abilities. At the end of this time you may regain spent stamina and/or resolve and lost hit points. If your rest is interrupted and you are not able to complete the full phase, you do not regain stamina, resolve or hit points.

When you successfully complete your short rest you may do any (one or more) of the following:

  • Burn 1 Stamina and restore all lost Hitpoints.
  • Burn 1 Stamina and restore all spent Stamina. You do not regain Burnt, Damaged, Allocated, Drained, or Lost Stamina.
  • Burn 1 Resolve and restore all spent Resolve. You do not regain Burnt, Damaged, Allocated, Drained, or Lost Resolve.
  • Burn 1 Resolve and restore one point of Morale. You may do this multiple times, up to the limit of your normal Morale.

Extended Rest

An extended rest has a minimum duration of 6 hours of sleep for most creatures. At the end of this time you regain all Spent, Burnt and Damaged Energy and all lost hit points. If your rest is interrupted for a short time (less than an hour) you may resume it, but you must rest for an extra hour. Each interruption may add an additional hour (GM's Discretion). While sleeping you are vulnerable (-10 penalty to Awareness), so it is customary to set up a watch rotation in dangerous locations, with members of the party taking shifts guarding over their sleeping comrades.

When you successfully complete an Extended Rest do the following:

  • Recover all Spent, Burnt, and Damaged Stamina points. You Recover Allocated Stamina if you no longer need or want to Allocate it. You do not recover Stamina Drain or Loss.
  • Recover all Spent, Burnt, and Damaged Resolve points. You recover Allocated Resolve if you no longer need or want to Allocate it. You do not recover Resolve Drain or Loss.
  • Recover all lost Hitpoints.
  • Restore your Morale to its maximum value.
  • If you have one or more Injuries, make a healing (Resilience) check against each injury to potentially reduce the injury or heal it completely.
  • If you have one or more Diseases, make a progression (Resilience) check to determine the progression of each disease, then apply the effects of the disease's progression.
  • If you have any levels of Blood Loss, make a resilience check [DC 15]. If you succeed the check reduce your blood loss by one level.
  • If you've earned enough Experience to advance to the next level, you may do so at this time (see Rewards below).

Managing Resources

While adventuring in dangerous locations, you may be unsure when your next chance to rest will be. Because of this, it is important to manage resources wisely throughout the day. You may not have a change for a short rest between combats, and so conserving energy to get you through another fight might be important. Similarly, burnt energy will accumulate throughout the day, and it can be important to conserve or retreat as burnt energy accumulates.

Adventuring Rewards

A multitude of rewards are available to player characters who can overcome the GMs challenges. Rewards can come in a variety of forms, listed below.

Experience

Perhaps the most common reward received for adventuring is Experience. Experience (XP) is a representation of the practice, understanding, and growth a character gains from every challenge he overcomes. The difficulty of the challenge determines the amount of Experience gained, with higher amounts of experience representing more difficult challenges. As a character accumulates Experience, he Gains Level which grants him access to new powers and abilities.

Karma

Karma is gained by overcoming difficult challenges, upon completion of quests, and occasionally for exemplary roleplay. Karma represents the good fortune of the universe, and can be used to reroll any die roll, earn extra experience, and fuel rare abilities and Ultimate Powers. You are limited to storing 5 Karma at a time (after which they must be spend for Experience). See the Karma section for more information on the uses of Karma.

Treasure

Treasure can take the form of coins, gems, interesting equipment, magical items and other valuable objects. In addition to treasure that can be utilized directly (such as equipment and magic items), valuables can be sold or traded for new and better equipment or other items that may help you on your quest (though magic items are rarely available for sale or trade).

Social Events

Completing quests and winning Social Encounters can earn a PC a Social Event which can gain the character favor (or disdain) from NPCs. Social Events serve to adjust an NPCs disposition toward your character, which can be useful (or harmful) when interacting with that NPC later on.

Multiple or large social events can earn you a Reputation within an area and serve to adjust the starting dispositions (known as Prejudices) of NPCs in the area, even when they have never had direct contact with your character before.

Destiny Points

Completing quests and challenges towards your character's specific Destiny will gain you Destiny Points. These may be used to purchase Talents as your character gains level, or may be used in times of dire straights to change the fate of your character.

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