Crafting, Encumbrance, and dealing with "Stuff" in game

[OgreBattle]

Having difficult terrain rules that can be bypassed by higher level flight and so on can be fun and shows player progression. So going from manually hauling your loot to getting a donkey to getting an armored caravan of your own will be nice progress.

It can also create a "ha ha, ironic" loop like you started off as a lvl 1 caravan raider, now as a lvl9 rich guy your caravans are getting raided by lvl1 mooks.

Some table time is fine. Downtime is a big part of the game I intend to create. Where combat is going to be it's own tactical minigame, exploration is going to be more hex crawly minigame, downtime is going to be a minigame of its own. I expect characters to spend actual time planning out and pursuing personal goals in it and everything. Developing contacts/connections, maintaining their assets, self care, and crafting stuff are all the kinds of things I expect players to be doing.

Is there interaction between players for your downtime minigame?

[Thaluikhain]

Having difficult terrain rules that can be bypassed by higher level flight and so on can be fun and shows player progression. So going from manually hauling your loot to getting a donkey to getting an armored caravan of your own will be nice progress.

Skip some logistics rules once they stop being novel and start being tedious, with a good in-universe reason? On to a winner there, I think.

[jt]

That's good your logistics sim is a sideshow, but if you want logistics to be a big part of the game, it'd probably be better to make it more nuanced and complicated over time rather than more streamlined.

Like maybe hauling all your loot via airship is more efficient and better, but the fuel is harder to find and you need to care about whether you're up to date on bribing whichever dragon's airspace you're flying through.

(Again, if logistics is a big part of the game. Don't make it complex if it's not.)

[saithorthepyro]

I only use encumbrance if the game is a wilderness game or exploration driven, or both. If it's not a game where encumbrance is likely to have any effect at all, it's pointless minutia to a large extent.

[PhoneLobster]

I thought this had moved on from "why can't we have infinite instant pocket space" to talk about the crafting bit instead.

I thought this was solved with the simple point that, yes, of course, you should have SOME sort of rules managing and limiting inventories. It doesn't have to be much, it probably shouldn't be recognizable as D&Ds pretty messy "encumbrance" rules, but of course you should have something. Because...

A) Weak characters should have a divide with Strong characters on which items they can lift and use. It's cool to find a big axe that one guy can use and another guy can't even lift. This can be done several ways, it does not require tracking a total tally of individual item weights.

B) Characters should not be able to store unlimited items on their persons. Infinite lists are bad. Instant access (in game time) to long time cost (in real time) dumpster diving is bad. Characters with no motivation to keep their inventories relevant to build and character concept is bad. You want some sort of limit however minor or tame. This can be done several ways, it does not require tracking a total tally of individual item weights.

C) Off character storage IS ITSELF AN INVENTORY LIMITATION. It is not the same as infinite instant pocket space and not an excuse for infinite instant pocket space to exist. You should probably have rules for how long it takes to pick up and equip items, how long it takes to go back to storage, and how that interacts with your encounters. Off character storage itself should just be an emergent result of those inventory management/movement/encounter rules already existing, which they should in their own right.

D) Even on character bulk item storage can be an inventory limitation. It is not unreasonable to give characters some limited instant access space and some less limited "storage" space "in their bags or something" that is not instant access. Even a system like this would be some sort of limitation on infinite instant access items, and therefore a desirable improvement on them.

E) Bags of holding and rings of storage could work like D. Even if they did not and were themselves instant infinite pocket space, they aren't an excuse for everything else to be infinite instant pocket space. Because if everything did that then bags of holding and the like no longer functionally exist as an exclusive meaningful difference for some characters to obtain at some point.

[MGuy]

Is there interaction between players for your downtime minigame?

I am really not sure. What I'm definitely trying to stick to is having discreet rules to codify things people might or might not do in games. Just enough to create some set of engaging choices players can make along the way. I do not know if I want to create actual rules for interactions between players.

[Zinegata]

The explanation for that is in the games premise: that there are adventurers. The premise that there are adventurers is the historically anachronistic assumption that there are individual people so badass you hire them instead of 100 dudes with spears.

Take it from the opposite perspective:

If adventurers are so badass you hire them to do Herculean tasks that no one else can do, then why waste them on mundane tasks that can be handled by 100 guys with spears? That's why armies had supply caravans. The best soldiers aren't assigned to the supply caravans. The best soldiers are instead up front with the army.

Yes, the supply train can't fight very well if it encounters raiders (whether magical ones in fantasy, or mundane ones in real life) but that's why the supply train is never too far off from the army. So the army can always protect the supply train from a real threat.

Point is, the caravan's there to be a convenience - a point that adventurers can always return to in between fights to access the rest of their stash. Sure, there may be situations where the caravan is bailed out of trouble, and where the party might march a few days away from the caravan (and therefore be unable to access their stash at this time); but its existence allows the adventurers to focus mainly on their on-person gear instead of tabulating their entire stashes all the time.

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Also - I don't want to leave on a note where I just discuss forum drama, so let me leave with this actual piece of useful design advice:

A designer's job is to ask who the players are, and what do they want.

Yes, it's sounds simple. But most designers actually forget this and start chasing after whatever new "cool" idea that comes into their head. That's indeed why the professional designer I got this advice from shared it as his basically number one rule.

A good design isn't one that is jam-packed with every idea you can think of.

A good design is one where every element adds to fulfilling the core question - "Who is your player, and what do they want"?

And in RPGs, most players will answer that question with "I am an Adventurer, who wants to gain adoration, fame, and fortune by killing some evil monster".

Indeed, the best games and RPGs are the ones that are able to narrow that down to something very specific and yet very appealing. Pendragon for instance basically answer the core question with "I am a knight of the round table, and I want to remain true to my vows no matter the cost", and the majority of its unique mechanics are attuned to furthering this core.

If logistics and accounting doesn't help with furthering that core idea, then maybe don't focus too much on it or even ignore it entirely.

By contrast, if the game is about "I am an explorer and I wish to gain fame, adoration, and glory, by uncovering these unknown lands", then yeah definitely add something like a hex-based mini game exploration thing.

But that's also why asking that simple question - and being very definite about your answer - is so important. It's very easy to fit new things into a generic term like "adventurer" and end up not having a very clear theme or game. It's actually a bit of work to narrow down what you really want out of the game.