# Travel times and distances



## Gilladian (Aug 29, 2015)

Various different incarnations of D&D have different overland travel rates, and distances covered under different circumstances. I'm wondering what people think of these varied rules/expectations, and which games might have the most realistic rates?

Actually, what I want to determine, is how long it would take to cover 120 miles, if you're traveling through trackless forest - with a largish group - 5 horsemen, 8 mules, 4 men each walking, leading 2 mules apiece; so really, you'd be going at human-walking-pace, for as long as the horses would travel in a day, I expect. The terrain is rolling temperate mountains (think Appalachians or Adirondacks), and very little traveled by anyone but orc tribes and the occasional fey. The season is mid-spring, if that makes a difference.


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## Celebrim (Aug 30, 2015)

In general, over the long haul, it is difficult to average more than 20 miles per day even in good open terrain.   If you really want to hustle, you could do 30 or 40 if you were quite fit.  Indeed, if you force march and are fit and trained to it (in D&D terms, the endurance feat), covering a 100 miles in a day isn't out of the question.  It's just at the end of the day your boots will be filled with blood, and you'll need several days to recover to full strength.

An unencumbered person might easily hike 15-20 miles in a day even in such arduous terrain as you describe.  But the thing is, neither your PC's nor their mules are likely to be unencumbered.   It's not unusual for a PC, much like all soldiers since antiquity, to be carrying 60 or even 80 pounds of gear.  The mules are likely to also be encumbered.  It's really the gear here that is the limiting factor.  By your second or third 2000 ft. elevation gain and descent, if you are carrying a pack with that much gear, it really doesn't matter how fit you are.  My expectation is that its only reasonable to cover 8-10 miles per day in trackless forested wilderness hills.  They could force march a few hours a day to add to that, but only at the risk of fatigue and injury.   

Remember also that real world travel over long distances isn't like a day hike.  They need to make camp, break camp, eat meals, take care of hygiene, care for their equipment, see to the mules, and so forth.   You've likely got wizards and clerics that have to do daily rituals to tend to their spells.


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## Gilladian (Aug 30, 2015)

Yep, I just never know how much time to calculate devoting to those "other issues" even when I don't really want to dwell on them during the game. So 10 miles per day, so around 12 days, figuring they don't stop and rest for a day or two anywhere along the way. Hmmm.... I'd been letting them travel a good bit faster than that when they were traveling along a river, through countryside that was used by the local (friendly) tribes-folk, so they could follow hunting trails and had a good guide to avoid getting lost. I was actually presuming that a lot of the time they were rafting down the river, only traveling by land when they needed to go around river obstacles. They were making about 20-25 miles per day that way. 

At this point, they've left the tribal lands behind, and are on their own as far as getting lost goes. Although, since they're skirting the edge of a magically-created barren zone, they do have a very clear-cut terrain feature to keep them on track. If they veer too far that way, I'll whip out my "barrens encounter tables" and we'll have fun that way! And in fact, they may choose to plunge into the barrens specifically. If so, they're going to discover that travel there is still VERY slow, because of dust, debris, potential pockets of poison gas and sinkholes, and of course, monsters.


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## MoutonRustique (Aug 30, 2015)

If you're in virgin terrain like the Appalachians you... well, on average, you're not doing more than a mile a day...

There are no roads, and, in most instances, the trees will not allow you to pass at anything more than a very, very slow walking speed as you'll be shouldering your way through undergrowth, closely-set trees, very rocky terrain and etc.

If you don't know the path to take, you will be making many back-tracks as you are confronted with an impassible climb, rivers/gullies with very steep banks, etc, etc.

If you ever feel the need to be impressed by the original settlers (or really _understand_ why water travel was the way to go), grab yourself a gps with extra-batteries and just set out cross country from a trail in a parc (don't get caught - you're not supposed to walk outside the trails, and they _don't_ like it... not one bit.) Set yourself a simple goal like "2 km beyond this ridge" - it's impressive how hard it is to do...

In my personal experience, the _furthest_ I've been able to walk in this kind of terrain is 5 km in about 6 hours of walking - and I was alone, on foot, with excellent trekking gear, no baggage/weight slowing me down, a excellent knowledge of the lay of the land, a map and a compass.

Take away my knowledge of the layout and the passes and I probably wouldn't have been able to get to my goal in less than 2 or 3 days - and I was walking through what would be termed "gentle hills".

Granted, I'm not an outdoors expert by any stretch, but I do have impressive resources when compared to your average "explorer" : pin-point accurate satellite maps with detailed topographical information. No need to carry any kind of weight beyond a few pounds of water. Very light clothing and shoes. A certainty of safety - I know where I am, where I'm going, no dangerous animals or orcs. The fact that I can yell and someone will probably hear me (always less than a few km away from _someone_). Very favorable weather - I'm not going hiking a day w/o sun, w/ too much sun, etc.

I'm guessing that all that counts for a fair bit... 

*Note* : I'm talking about _useful_ distance traveled - not the distance you actually traveled. Backtracking and detours are a very real thing and they will account for a very significant amount of your travel time - unless your blessed by the travel gods and always find the right path on the first try!

Also, if the object of the game is exploration and travel - don't use real-world conditions, it won't make for an exciting story (unless you play from a "larger" viewpoint.)


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## Li Shenron (Aug 30, 2015)

Gilladian said:


> Various different incarnations of D&D have different overland travel rates, and distances covered under different circumstances. I'm wondering what people think of these varied rules/expectations, and which games might have the most realistic rates?




If the game offers such rules I'd probably just trust them, but more generally I actually measure distances in _time units_ to begin with.

Really, who cares if the city of Waterdeep is 100 miles away or the forbidden forest 1000 km wide? What matters is how long it takes to get there or traverse the area.

So rather than the distance/time conversions, I am more interested in the time _rates_ of different travel options.


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## S'mon (Aug 30, 2015)

MoutonRustique said:


> If you're in virgin terrain like the Appalachians you... well, on average, you're not doing more than a mile a day...




I remember it once took my son and I about two hours to go about 100' through a bog, cross a stream and more bog...

If literally trackless woods, 1-3 miles seems reasonable, with chances for getting lost, so could be less or negative. 20-40 miles type rates are for travelling along an existing path.

Edit: I'd think the smart thing would be to hire a local guide?


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## Gilladian (Aug 31, 2015)

I do think I will offer them a chance to meet and hire a guide, yes. But the folk who have BEEN acting as their guides are reaching the edge of the terrain they know anything about, and are turning back. The new guide will be someone who spends his time in this area watching for dangers for the Kingdom the PCs are from. He has been told to expect the PCs and is "waiting for them". The scene where the PCs meet him will entail them getting attacked, and him arriving in time to lend a hand at taking out the attackers; it won't be a huge "I saved your lives and you owe me" scene, but I hope it will make them respect him a bit. The PCs are actually more-or-less on a mission from their home kingdom to investigate something going on out here, and this man knows where they need to be to see what they need to see. Unfortunately, he's already known to the "bad guys" as a member of the kingdom's watchers, so he can't do much investigating, himself.


Not that this plays into the journey the PCs are on, much. It's just context. They're trying to reach a specific, known point, and they do have a potential guide that they don't know about. So that could help explain why they CAN travel 10 miles a day instead of 2-3. If they miss the guide, or refuse his help, I think I'll REALLY play up the rugged, densely wooded terrain and see what they do. One PC does have an owl familiar, which will help.


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## MoutonRustique (Aug 31, 2015)

This all really depends upon what you want the situation to feel like : 
 - roads/trails/paths are a necessity or a simply "friendlier" travel
 - this area is inhabited and traveled by someone/something or completely wild (humanoid-less)
 - guides are an essential resource or just a useful perk to get there a bit faster
 - etc.

As always, the most important thing is to make sure you and your players are on the same page and can accept and enjoy the game. I know it's in there, but "player buy-in" should really be advice numbers 1 through 25 in the "26 things you can do to improve your game!" lists.


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## Celebrim (Aug 31, 2015)

In terms of the 3 miles a day theory, I have a couple of complaints/observations.

First, that's straight line distance, not the total distance travelled - what someone called the 'useful distance'.  Yes, I grant you that sometimes it might require 6 miles of travel to go 3 miles because you have to deflect out your line of travel or you find yourself at a dead end or simply because you get a little bit lost and wander out of your way.  But these are to my mind all problems of navigation and not problems related to physical endurance, and as such D&D has no good rules available for dealing with not going along the best route or not going where you intend.  If you agree that some of these problems will be alleviated by having a guide familiar with the terrain, then I think you are also implicitly agreeing that there is some skill that you can have that lets you effectively travel farther for the same effort.  I also think that in terms of long distance travel, useful distance might be defined differently than it would be when the goal is to see something specific and return from the trip.  As long as it is vaguely in the right direction, it's all useful, and the added travel time is mostly measured in the extra hexes I add to the path.

I have such a skill, called 'navigation', that helps you travel in a straight line and not get lost.  In general, it's impact on the campaign is only observed if the PC party neglects it.   If a PC is skilled in navigation, by the time they are expected to travel in the trackless wilderness they are usually pretty good at it.  For example, right now 7th level, 10 ranks + 1 wisdom + 3 enhancement bonus from a magic item + 2 circumstance from a PC that can assist = +16 bonus.   They can navigate trackless wilderness with unfamiliar geography on a 2+ (18 DC) most of the time.   Soon, it will be trivial.  They can just do it.  Yes, if they can't do this, they better hire a guide.

Secondly, I have hiked in the wilderness off trail and I'm familiar with some of the worst terrain in North America - swamps, pine tickets, blackberry brambles - where even walking can be next to impossible and if you had to force your way though it you'd be a very tough person to make even 4 miles in a day.  But its actually rare for such terrain to be even 4 miles thick or to require a large deflection to avoid it.  It's also rare for such terrain to be completely trackless.  Deer for example use pine tickets as shelter, and blackberry brambles as feeding habitat.  If you have large game animals in an area, you are going to have game trails.   In the case of most D&D settings, you are also going to have trails used by aboriginal populations of some sort, even if these don't rise to the level of an improved trail or primitive road.  If the goal was simply to be vaguely 8 miles away from where I started in a certain direction (NW) I can think of few places where I couldn't manage it if I were fit.

Which brings up what I think is a major problem in compare our own personal experience with that of the PC's.  The PC's are supposed to be heroic persons.  They don't have a desk job.   They aren't generally out of shape or obese, and there are generally no rules for becoming either.  D&D has very few rules for really dealing with fitness and endurance, and they mostly only come up when the PC's try do something above and beyond norms which are set by examples of very fit and very healthy persons to be begin with.   I know what I'm capable of doing now, and what I was capable of doing when I was younger and even though when younger I was never super fit, what I could do then was vastly greater than what I can do now.   D&D doesn't in general make the act of struggling on a journey have drama or granularity.   You don't expend 'endurance' points for each mile you travel or each hill you climb, and track how much endurance you return by resting.  It doesn't make the party take a 1 hour break to recover enough endurance that they'll be able to finish the days journey, it doesn't make them stop and take a full days rest because they haven't recovered from the exertions of the previous day or days.  Personally, I'd be hard pressed to keep up 20 miles a day or 10 miles a day in rugged terrain over a long period as things are.  A mere two miles up a hill at 1500' elevation change a mile and I'm heaving and collapsing these days, light pack or not.  But D&D has no way of simulating this in detail, and I think that is by design.   

If you look back historically, someone like Daniel Boone is not making just 3 miles a day headway exploring the frontier, and if he is, it's because he's mostly doing something else ('cilled a bar').  I'm not sure that I'm convinced by testimonies of what average persons can do when trail breaking, even those that are fairly fit.  Perhaps if you told me that you compete in long distance wilderness travel and ultra-marathons and then told me that after 3 miles of trail breaking you were exhausted, I'd take that seriously and reconsider.  But I've hiked a lot in the hills of the south-eastern United States, on and off trail because mostly I wasn't in park land, and I'm not sure 1-3 kilometers represents the output of a fit person doing anything except maybe attempting to summit a peak or pushing cave passage, much less superheroes like the PC.  What the anecdote is useful for is countering claims that it's unrealistic that the PC's only managed 6-8 miles of travel in a days time while carrying gear in rugged terrain.  If I tried to force one my players though 1-3 miles travel in a day, I'd expect sufficient revolt that I would have to create detailed endurance rules to justify it.

Much like the example with navigation, my expectation is that if you rigorously implemented endurance in your game, the PC's would simply have invested in the resource and it would only matter much in the game if they neglected it.  And to the extent that they did neglect it, they'd remedy the situation by employing porters, mules, and even litters to carry that wizard in ill-health at low levels and at higher levels flying carpets and other extraordinary 'mounts' or just circumvent the difficult travel entirely with teleport  (if they don't already).  If that is what you are going for, then by all means implement that but it's not really going to arise out of the current rules regardless of how you set long distance travel per day.


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## Greenfield (Aug 31, 2015)

When I was in the Boy Scouts, many many years ago, we did a week-long, 50 mile hike through a "wilderness" area, meaning no marked or maintained trails, no man made artifacts like prepared campsites etc.  This was in the mountains near Lake Tahoe, on the California side.

The first day was 5 miles, and it was the longest five miles I'd ever walked.  Uphill, broken terrain, no trails.

The last day we were looking at the map and laughed when we saw that the day was 10 miles, total.  We were taking bets on who would get there first, and expected to get some fishing in before lunch, at our final destination.

Being "city kids", we weren't in anything like good shape when we started.  By the end we'd each walked off 10 pounds of water weight (mostly) and could have handled a 25 mile day, in the kind of terrain you were describing, while carrying packs, and done it without a "forced march".  

Don't know if that helps.


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## Gilladian (Sep 1, 2015)

I love discussions like this! So what I'm distilling from this, is that with game trails and the occasional "orc hiking trail" (they'd better have to fight some orcs!), then with a guide and a reasonable chance of spotting and avoiding the worst geographic mistakes (the owl familiar), a ten-mile-per-day progress is at least feasible, if not likely.


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## Man in the Funny Hat (Sep 1, 2015)

I'd say the take-away is that you can make it as easy/fast or as difficult/slow as you want it and nobody can tell you you're wrong.  Only the DM can really say for sure what the terrain is.  Forest can have underbrush or be a flat, dry, easily traversed floor.  Scrub can be brambles with steel-hard spike thorns or razor-sharp grasses.  Or both.  Or it could just be greenery that's an impossibly dense and impenetrable mess that's even worse if it's wet.  Terrain can have rocks the size of golf-balls or the size of two-car garages.  If it's the latter, can you just walk pleasantly between them, or do you have to climb over top of them for 5 miles? There might be tracks and trails - or there might not.  In the real world we don't have intelligent plants that want to herd you into valleys you get lost in and can't climb out of by opening trails and then closing them behind you - that can happen in D&D.  Maybe there's no large game trails because the stirges kill all the large game.  Maybe the local tribal shaman or druids go around casting Plant Growth to remove traces of humanoid activity.  And maybe the DM is just tired of rolling random encounters and announces that you simply get where you're going without any more fuss.  And of course, if a merchant caravan of 10 wagons leaves city A to go sell wares in city B then it can't be THAT hard to get through, can it?


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## S'mon (Sep 1, 2015)

Man in the Funny Hat said:


> I'd say the take-away is that you can make it as easy/fast or as difficult/slow as you want it and nobody can tell you you're wrong.




Yup. BTW I see the 5e DMG pg 112 has DCs for wilderness navigation, forest is DC 15 Wilderness (Survival). It doesn't say when to check but I'd think daily was reasonable. The rules are a bit vague compared to pre-3e exploration rules though. Looking at the PHB pg 181-2 it looks as if PCs are normally moving 24 miles/day in clear terrain, 12 miles/day in difficult terrain, with mounts making no difference - this is probably more realistic than prior editions. If the PCs have a guide let them move 12 miles/day through the woods. If they have a PC skilled in Wilderness (Survival) then either let them move full rate, or maybe 3/4 rate assuming some backtracking and reorienting is needed. If not then I'd suggest half rate 6 miles/day for straight-line distance achieved.


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## Bluenose (Sep 1, 2015)

S'mon said:


> Yup. BTW I see the 5e DMG pg 112 has DCs for wilderness navigation, forest is DC 15 Wilderness (Survival). It doesn't say when to check but I'd think daily was reasonable.




I think it depends how often you want people failing. How skilled should you have to be before getting lost every week isn't likely? A +12 bonus against DC15 means you're probably failing at least once in the first week.

To make one comment to the more general question, the mounts and pack animals probably are going to slow you down and/or to need healing fairly quickly in this sort of exercise. They also massively increase the logistic problems, and attract predators where humans are perhaps less likely to. Plains are a different matter, but horses are not suitable for woodland/forest travel.


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## S'mon (Sep 1, 2015)

Bluenose said:


> I think it depends how often you want people failing. How skilled should you have to be before getting lost every week isn't likely? A +12 bonus against DC15 means you're probably failing at least once in the first week.




Lost here just means going off course and losing some time, so +14 to never fail seems ok to me, with a typical skilled character in 5e being +5 or so.


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## (Psi)SeveredHead (Sep 2, 2015)

I don't think any version of D&D covers this rule well. In part because rules for horses are even more unrealistic than rules for people. This is to address the opening post, where using horses and mules were part of the scenario.

I recall reading about a battle in Ancient China, about 1800 years ago. The enemy stood between Cao Cao's forces and a grove. Cao Cao's troops were thirsty, too. Cao Cao told his troops that the grove contained peaches, and his guys got fired up and beat the enemy. I don't know if they actually found any peaches. Since Cao Cao survived for several more decades, probably! People can be motivated more easily than horses, as they can picture the future.

Horses can run far faster than humans, but their walking speed isn't that much faster. Horses in the versions of D&D I'm familiar with (2e to 4e) always have a much higher walking speed than a human. In 4e, a horse moves at speed 10, compared to an unarmored human's 6. Traveling by horseback, overland, is more than 1.5 times faster in that edition. I don't think this is realistic.* In 3e, not only does the horse have a similar speed ratio, but it has a high Con score and the Endurance feat by default, so it'll take longer than a human to get tired, which I don't think is realistic either. The horse will only _walk_ a bit faster than a human and actually has less walking endurance. The human needs to get off (and possibly onto another horse) at certain times. A person might starve himself or herself for a bit if they need to push fast for a time, but the horse will balk at such treatment. I've read that you could move really fast if you took a lot of horses per person, but modern-day unfamiliarity with horses, but horrible rules complexity, means no version of D&D could model that effectively.

*In my game, I've set horses to speed 7... but gave them a special trait that lets them run and charge at horse speed. It doesn't really deal with the endurance issue, though.


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## bgbarcus (Sep 2, 2015)

I got curious about the difference between horse and human travel pace and did some research.  Horses have short bursts of speed but more rest and more long food/water breaks than humans. Horses also have far more restricted terrain options. Over a long journey humans are more resilient and make better time than horses and humans are able to move through terrain that will block of kill a horse. Riding does leave humans less tired for those battles but the horses need to take at least one day a week to rest.


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## N'raac (Sep 2, 2015)

First question to ask is whether we want realism or genre emulation.  Everyone wants horses to travel in fantasy games.  If we want the players to gravitate to horses in game, there must be an advantage to travel using horses.

To me, the advantage isn't speed of travel, but carrying capacity.  The horses can haul a lot of baggage without slowing down the pace of travel.  I'm pretty sure that was stated to be the case in at least one older edition, but probably got removed for the easier/more intuitive "movement speed dictates speed of overland travel" model in later editions.

Man in the Funny Hat nails it, though.  "And maybe the DM is just tired of rolling random encounters and announces that you simply get where you're going without any more fuss. And of course, if a merchant caravan of 10 wagons leaves city A to go sell wares in city B then it can't be THAT hard to get through, can it?"



Man in the Funny Hat said:


> I'd say the take-away is that you can make it as easy/fast or as difficult/slow as you want it and nobody can tell you you're wrong.  Only the DM can really say for sure what the terrain is.
> *****************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
> And maybe the DM is just tired of rolling random encounters and announces that you simply get where you're going without any more fuss.  And of course, if a merchant caravan of 10 wagons leaves city A to go sell wares in city B then it can't be THAT hard to get through, can it?




Is it adding anything to the game to meticulously work out overland travel speeds, or to play through an endless series of navigation rolls, cam setup and breakdown descriptions, animal handling and veterinary horse rolls. random wandering monster checks, etc. etc. etc., or should we just assess some travel speed we can live with, announce that "it takes three weeks of difficult, dangerous travel through the orc-infested broken terrain so you are tired, dusty and sweaty when, at long last, you crest a hill and see your destination in the distance."

I haven't played in many games where the GM follows that with "Unfortunately, another band of adventurers beat you hear and cleaned out the dungeon before you arrived.  Where do you want to look for new adventure hooks?"  Somehow, no matter how long and arduous, or short and convenient, the journey, the PCs seem to arrive right around the time that would best suit the adventure.


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## bgbarcus (Sep 2, 2015)

N'raac said:


> First question to ask is whether we want realism or genre emulation.  Everyone wants horses to travel in fantasy games.  If we want the players to gravitate to horses in game, there must be an advantage to travel using horses.
> 
> To me, the advantage isn't speed of travel, but carrying capacity.  The horses can haul a lot of baggage without slowing down the pace of travel.  I'm pretty sure that was stated to be the case in at least one older edition, but probably got removed for the easier/more intuitive "movement speed dictates speed of overland travel" model in later editions.
> 
> ...



My game covers multiple parties (same players) across a large portion of the world. Several are setting up dominions.  Travel times are important although I don't spend time in travel encounters unless they add to the story or do something entertaining.  I keep a world timeline so everyone can know who is where and when.


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## Greenfield (Sep 2, 2015)

bgbarcus said:


> I got curious about the difference between horse and human travel pace and did some research.  Horses have short bursts of speed but more rest and more long food/water breaks than humans. Horses also have far more restricted terrain options. Over a long journey humans are more resilient and make better time than horses and humans are able to move through terrain that will block of kill a horse. Riding does leave humans less tired for those battles but the horses need to take at least one day a week to rest.




Care and feeding can also be an issue.

Horses are adapted to eating grass and other greenery, and like most large herbivores, they normally feed through most of the day.  Just not that many calories in grass, after all.

We bypass that by feeding them seed grains, like oats, which are like candy to them.  Lots of energy.

But if they live on candy all the time, they get sick.  They get digestive problems unless they can consume their normal food at least some of the time.  Even hay can be a problem, since it's much drier than fresh grass.  

And if they get sick... 
http://cameron.kangaweb.com/jokes/Farside/vet.jpg


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## MoutonRustique (Sep 2, 2015)

A thing which is rarely brought up (at least, as far as I've seen) and that could be very interesting is using HP as a travel resource.

For those where HP is meat - this won't make sense. So... yeah, stop reading I guess?

For those who espouse the idea that HP are a wide combination of factors - including fatigue, moral and such, travel could very well have an HP cost.

Now, in this edition, there are a few ways to approach this and have it still make sense :
 - you can have the "implicit" equivalent to 13thAge's "tier environments"
 - you can accept that higher level characters can travel further
 - you can use % of hp for damage
 - something else, someone smarter will figure out

As to the first option, I believe it is the better idea. You set a certain "difficulty" to different "zones" or "terrains" and then travel through this costs hp - ex: 1d10hp/hour of travel would be a very deadly zone (dangerous volcanic area with roaming mephits and such). Since this isn't "combat damage", you could very easily allow for HD to be spent during the course of travel (w/o requiring a specific short rest)

Travel could incur an automatic hp loss, only a failed check, or both (automatic base, added on failed check).

This really adds the idea that travel is _taxing_.

It's also offers easy means of increased or decreased effort : 
 - more gear, higher dmg die
 - forced speed, penalty on checks
 - mounts, reduce dmg die
 - guide, advantage on check
 - etc

I'm leaving this here for someone else to run with... because I'm lazy


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## pemerton (Sep 3, 2015)

MoutonRustique said:


> A thing which is rarely brought up (at least, as far as I've seen) and that could be very interesting is using HP as a travel resource.



I think this is pretty common in 4e play: overland travel is resolved as a skill challenge, and healing surge loss is an element of skill challenge resolution.


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## Campbell (Sep 3, 2015)

When it comes to travel times and distances I prefer qualitative descriptions than quantitative. It helps to invoke the scale of things in a way that is more readily understood and closer to the way most people understand the world around them spatially. I make sure that I'm addressing a character specifically when I do so.

Here are some examples:

Winter's Ford is about 4 days travel by horse. Jaden, your palamino could make it in 3 days, but you would have to leave the others behind. If you travel through the Green Wood that will probably cut a day off your journey, but you will have to walk your horses through it.
The goblin cracks a crooked smile at you, Rensar. He's a stride or two away from you. Not quite in your face, but you could reach him with your spear.
Gertog, the ogre towers over you. His knees are at eye level.


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## MoutonRustique (Sep 3, 2015)

pemerton said:


> I think this is pretty common in 4e play: overland travel is resolved as a skill challenge, and healing surge loss is an element of skill challenge resolution.



There is that implicit aspect. However, I've always thought that _travel_ should get it's own subsystem - it's such an integral part of many games and many genres, it feels like a waste to always leave it sort of "up to the DM".

But yes, having this in 4e is very easy (actually, _not_ having it is probably harder!) - but I'm not finding it easy to port over to other editions...


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## Gilladian (Sep 5, 2015)

Hmmm... something else I was contemplating was adjusting the lengths of short and long rests during true wilderness travel. Make a short rest occur only after 8 hours of rest/sleep, and a long rest require a full day of camp/rest/no travel. 

I'm SURE I didn't come up with this on my own - I read it somewhere as a recommended option - but WHERE did I read it? Curse getting old and having no memory!


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## (Psi)SeveredHead (Sep 6, 2015)

Gilladian said:


> Hmmm... something else I was contemplating was adjusting the lengths of short and long rests during true wilderness travel. Make a short rest occur only after 8 hours of rest/sleep, and a long rest require a full day of camp/rest/no travel.
> 
> I'm SURE I didn't come up with this on my own - I read it somewhere as a recommended option - but WHERE did I read it? Curse getting old and having no memory!




Wouldn't that make travel more strenuous than combat?


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## Gilladian (Sep 6, 2015)

Not really; for days on which there are no encounters, it will mean nothing. It simply means that if a party travels through wilderness for five days, and has 2 encounters, they will have one or more short rests between the two encounters, not one or more long rests. It means that pacing will be more "dungeonlike"; they won't be able to go nova on every day's travel encounter, fairly confident that they won't have another in the same day. And they won't always be fully healed, either. I'm anything BUT a killer DM, so I'm confident it won't lead to mass slaughter - just slightly more cautious overland travel prep.


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## howandwhy99 (Sep 8, 2015)

Think of it as a game, not a result. Outdoor Survival is perfect for just these situations. 



> if you're traveling through *trackless forest*



Each hex is 3 miles, 1 imperial league. 40 hexes is 120 miles distance on the board. Players stand a chance of getting lost each day as they try and navigate the wilderness. Track their actual direction on your DM map behind the screen, but let them wander about on the outdoor Survival map. Just as in that game's rules, track water and food as well as deprivations from the lack of such. Slow movement as their conditions worsen due to starvation and dehydration. 

Keep rates of movement from D&D. Shorter humanoids are likely moving the slowest, so the group moves at their pace. But perhaps the group puts them on mounts? That is a game action by the players to speed up travel however. So as Ref I'd tell them they are going fast or slow and answer who's setting the pace, but not how to play strategically. 

Forced march rules can be used from D&D as well. same with terrain type adjustments upon movement. I use the base terrain as the overall one experienced while crossing the Outdoor Survival map, so a desert uses the same board, but the features represent different elements. I think of them as smaller variations within a larger, undefined terrain feature on my big DM overland map. 

We can than rate the terrain feature with a difficulty level given things like its size and components within it. Not to mention what monster lair and wander within (which sounds like only a few types in your case). 

Seasons and climate could certainly affect certain game elements. Check your edition for game rules and alter terrain elements as necessary. Stuff like snow covering or or droughts would be big changes, shorter days and fallen leaves in a forest less so.

The benefits of keeping this a game rather than solely spent game clock means wandering off the beaten track is both dangerous and an adventure. Lost castles and dungeons can be placed and found. So can monsters who normally don't come into contact with civilized areas. Treasures from the past may be found too, but so too is lots of common scenery. Ultimately, think of it like a dungeon for all those purposes. Monsters, treasures, traps, and approximate locations for all on a map. But it's only going to be as interesting as its design ultimately.

Anyways - IMHO travel rates matter, but when used alone are best saved for easily followed paths or tracking time taken within a city or dungeon. Trackless areas are a completely different game.


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