OSE Game Prep Part 3

I've started looking into the various low-level OSE adventures I do have. Both for ideas as well as sprinkling about in the game as options. The OSE Kickstarter is slowly releasing several of the short adventures, some of which are low-level. And of course, Delve magazine has been publishing a short adventure per issue. And for whatever reason, I've backed a few other projects. What I need to do is, similar to my bibliographies for races/classes/careers, I also need a bibliography for the various games/adventures/whatnot. Though this does not need to be in a blog, but something I can have access to. Possibly even another Trello board where I can have columns based on the expected player levels.

Regardless of my incessant need to organize in theory vs my inability to do so in reality, I've been reading through the City building book by Kobold Press. I backed at the limited-edition level just to see how that would look. And I'll admit it is a beautiful book. There was a chapter devoted to magic use in cities, ranging from "everything everywhere all the time" to "only a select few". I am not a big fan of omnipresent magic in my games: may as well play SF as it is just about indistinguishable (thank you Authur C. Clark!) And magic in TFT vs OSE is a lot different in terms of application and usage, but similar enough that, unless you are a magic user, it does not really matter much. And my fantasy world, magic is there, and used, but not all the time. It is a valued resource but not necessarily ubiquitous.

I've also started to get some pricing for things. Interestingly, and probably because of the time frame both systems came into being, pricing is about the same between TFT & OSE. At least for weapons there is parity, so looks like there is a root price, probably stemming from the original D&D (which of course, OSE is based on). I've priced the healing potion at 60 gold. In TFT, a healing potion costs 150 silver, or 15 gold. As TFT only cures 1 point, and OSE does 1d6 + 1, averaging out to 4 for 4x the cost, so 60 gold. Pricey things, as a magic healing potion really should be! And the city book also has pricing for other things, and even takes into account relative scarcity. That is - in the farmlands, wheat is very common, so bread costs, for instance, will be far cheaper than in the middle of the desert where breads very ingredients are much more difficult to get. Not sure I want to go that far, though I do have some of the stores in Windemere Crossing being more expensive as they are more carefully made. Or scarcer, but being on a trade route, everything may possibly pass through at some point.

Which brings me to today's preparation: as the characters are coming in from a caravan, I'm going to see if my caravan tables actually work. I feel there may be some adjustments!

From another KS I backed. Guillaume Tavernier

First, where is the caravan coming from? I of course rolled no caravans for a few times until I had a west to east caravan. And I really have no idea what is west of Windemere Crossing. I've hinted at a couple nearby kingdoms, and do think I set something to the west, just not defined. I was leaving those details open-ended until they were needed in the game. so that I could do something for that game. Aha - our sheriff is a veteran from the Kingdom of Ismelkonia, which is westward. In fact - plot point! The sheriff keeps in touch, and one of the characters has been charged with bringing some communication to Ira Sprigbasher? Or perhaps they've made friends with the actual messenger, and he gets killed while trying to bring that message? Think the 2nd option or a variation on that.

Our eastward bound caravan is a medium-sized caravan with 10 animals, 12 wagons, 12 guards, 8 passengers (3 of which are our players' characters), and 9 types of goods. The goods consist of magic crystals, various herbs including the tobacco for our Goblin shopkeeper, various hardwoods, a few magical contraptions, crystals, Dwarven tools, some armor plating and a second load of crystals. With those goods, no wonder we have a dozen guards. And there are fewer animals than carts. So - are the animals in addition to the beasts pulling the carts? I think so as it makes sense that the caravan may be herding things along. Although one would think that would be in the trade goods table. And maybe a table for the types of animals?

With that in mind, I also think we should add caravan rumors: the caravan gets into town and there will be stories about what happened in its travels. I have a LOT of rumors books & PDFs, so will just grab one from the book of collected rumors by the apparently tireless Philip Reed. See - using those things I bought! The rumors start on page 6 and go through to page 206, so using an on-line one, I get 120. In one of the towns along the route, one of the guards saw what he called one of the Cursed Souls. A red-robed man had called out the guard's name, and the guard ran, fearing the touch. The Cursed Souls are a cult of demon worshippers. Who apparently wear red robes. And looks like I need at least enough information on the Red Robes in case the players start asking questions! A chance to expand out my pantheon to the other, demonic side! Fortunately, no satanic panic here. 

I also need to pull this info out into a simple game document. Perhaps not as complex as the Cowboy & Dino game got (it ended up being 80-odd pages, though a good deal of that was copy/paste). But I also need to finish prepping for the weekend's skirmish game. My lead centaur is painted at least, and I also have his card at least in electronic form.