Exploration and Leveling Up in Illevar
These are my exploring and dungeon delving notes from Illevar.
Exploration:
In Illevar, the PCs are free to roam and explore the land. The ancient law of the First Emperor prevented expansion past the safety zones established after the end of The Great War. Although much of the shape and general geographic knowledge of Illevar is known, much of the interior has yet to be well documented.
Ancient cities and monuments were destroyed or swallowed by the earth following the Blast that ended the war. These hidden treasure troves have become targets of wealthy businesses, inventors, historians and more. Long lost secrets, machines, tomes and more await in their murky and dark depths.
Though tempting to the would-be delvers, these are not just sitting prizes waiting to be picked up. Monsters, machines, and unscrupulous characters have claimed these ruins as their homes and are usually not very fond of their domiciles being invaded and plundered.
How to Explore:
Hexcrawls:
Using a Hex Grid, players can travel through the open spaces and have random or scripted encounters as they explore the regions of Illevar. This is an excellent strategy to fill out the adventures as PCs travel between areas.
Fill out important areas with towns or other friendly settlements. Using your imagination, or a table, fill out the rest of the hexes with different terrain. Each Hex represents a set distance that can be modified to fit your setting. A nation hex grid might use hexes that represent 5-10 miles, while a city hex grid might just be a few blocks.
Create a random encounter table. I highly recommend using d6 tables. This should have level appropriate enemies that the players could encounter in their area.
Have players encounter different NPCs and locations as they travel. Usually 1 every two or three hexes or as desired. Leave hints of interesting things that the players may want to come back to explore or revisit. Perhaps they are in too much of a hurry to explore that dungeon cave, but can mark it on their maps to go back to.
Dungeons:
Dungeons are done using cards. These cards make up the general layout of a dungeon and can be placed in a variety of sequences. A benefit of this technique is that instead of drawing out a whole room or map and covering it up, the rooms can be organically opened up and discovered as the PCs traverse the area.
Each card represents a room of a dungeon. These rooms are filled with traps, monsters, friends, treasure, etc. All of this is decided by the Storyteller who will create descriptions of the rooms to read as the PCs enter.
The dungeon should have multiple branching paths and possibly more than one entrance/exit.
When fully designed and set up, these should look really cool. I feel that these may be similar to the "dungeon tiles" that Wizards of the Coast sold.
Random Encounter Table Ideas:
3d6 = Devil Dice Tables
First table: Encounter. What are the PCs going to be dealing with?
Second Table: Behavior. What are the encounter creatures doing?
Third Table: Complication. What is going wrong or different with this encounter?
EXAMPLE FOREST Table
This style of table lets us quickly create encounters that are more than just combat. We can describe what the NPCs are doing and maybe give them a bit of narrative relevancy for why they are there.
Ex: I rolled a 3, 5, & 5; Hunters, talking, scared.
The PCs come across a group of hunters who are very jittery and softly talking among themselves about something that startled them so bad that they left their shack and supplies in the deeper sections of the forest. The PCs startle them, but after a short discussion they learn that a mysterious beast had attacked their lodging for 3 nights and they finally had enough and fled.
They offer the PCs the location of their former shack and request that, if they venture into the woods, the players return to them their father’s lucky trinket (a scrimshaw made of swiftwater bone).
While some of this has been improvised, the basic ideas from the random tables have created a more interesting encounter than just pure combat.
Leveling Up and Experience Points:
There are a few ways to gain experience points (XP) in Illevar. They depend on how the Players role-play their characters and how well they do in Combat. Each XP gained for Role-playing can only be obtained once per session, while combat XP can be gained multiple times per session.
Xp for Role-Playing (each equals 1 XP):
Showed Character Virtue - What is a virtue or strength of their character and did they show it during an encounter?
Showed Character Flaw - What is a flaw or weakness of their character and did they show it during an encounter?
NPC-Encounter/Role-Played Well - Did the Player Role-Play out their interactions and stay within character?
Creative Problem Solving
Explored a New Place
Completed the Session Goal/Objective
XP for Combat:
Successful Normal Combat - 1 XP
Successful Elite Combat - 2 XP
Successful Mythic Combat - 5 XP
XP to Level Up*:
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