Journeys

Traveling can be every bit as dangerous as facing monsters or delving into dungeons. Long roads cut across plains, forests, deserts, and mountains, where the party must contend with hunger, fatigue, unexpected encounters, and setbacks of every kind.

Shifts

In Gloomtrail, the day is divided abstractly into 4 shifts: Morning, Afternoon, Evening, and Night.

A party of adventurers can travel for 2 shift in a row without suffering any penalty. For each additional shift spent traveling, a character takes 6 fatigue damage.

Most commonly, the party travels during the Morning and Afternoon shifts, uses the Evening shift to make camp, and sleeps through the Night shift.

Travel Time

The first thing the GM should do is establish how many travel days the party needs to reach its destination. To do this, consider the means of transport the characters are using and the type of terrain they must cross.

Use the following modifiers to calculate the number of travel days based on the predominant type of terrain:

Danger Level

After establishing the expected number of travel days for the journey, the GM must set its danger level. The danger level determines the number of encounters the party must go through to reach its goal.

Use the table below to calculate the number of encounters based on the number of travel days and the journey's danger level.

The number of encounters the characters must face during a journey equals the travel days divided by the encounter frequency that corresponds to the journey's danger level.

Journey Encounters

A journey's encounters can be drawn from a table, like the following one, or prepared in sequence by the GM. The final encounter is always the party's arrival at its goal, which may or may not include a challenge of its own, at the GM's discretion. Besides that, the GM can roll 1d12 + 8 to determine the time of day at which a encounter takes place.

AMBUSH ON THE ROAD: Thieves, mercenaries, or intelligent creatures strike by surprise, demanding supplies, a toll, or blood. If the party suffered a setback before this encounter, they are caught off guard.

BLOCKED CROSSING: The road ceases to exist: a bridge has collapsed, a ravine has opened, or the road has been swallowed by landslides. There is no direct passage. The party must decide whether to improvise a new crossing or go around the obstacle, losing time and resources. If the party chooses to look for another way, this encounter does not count toward journey progress.

DANGEROUS CROSSING: The road is broken by an unstable bridge, a log over a chasm, or a river in flood. The party must decide whether to try to cross or to go around, which will add several days to the journey. If the party chooses to look for another way, this encounter does not count toward journey progress.

DUBIOUS COMPANY: A group of travelers offers help or shelter. There may, however, be ulterior motives: they could be thieves, spies, cultists, or just ordinary folk. Either way, trusting them is a risk.

HIDDEN RUIN: The ground gives way or a landslide swallows part of the party, who plunge into an ancient structure of tunnels, catacombs, or forgotten ruins. Making their way through the interior and finding a way out is the only path forward.

HOSTILE TERRITORY: The party crosses territory held by hostile creatures. Spirits, sentinels, or guards watch over the passage. They must negotiate, slip past, or face the consequences of trespassing.

LANDMARK: The party comes upon a landmark. A structure that catches their eye. An abandoned mine, a dark cave, or even a roadside inn. It is up to the party to decide whether to explore or ignore the opportunity.

LOST PATH: The party loses its bearings: the trail forks, the markers vanish, or the sun disappears behind clouds or trees. They must find the right way before their supplies run out. If the party chooses to press on without having found the correct path, this encounter does not count toward journey progress.

MERCILESS STORM: A torrential downpour, blizzard, or sandstorm forces the party to seek shelter or endure the weather. The characters take 1d6 fatigue damage before the next encounter if they decide to push on.

SIGN OF HOPE: A spring, a shrine, or some other promising place appears ahead, but reaching it takes effort: perhaps the way there is dangerous, or perhaps something guards the place and bars any approach.

TERRITORIAL PREDATOR: The party realizes that a wild or monstrous creature is stalking them. With every lapse in caution, it draws closer. They must throw it off, drive it away, or face it.

Encounter Setting

If they wish, the GM can roll one of the setting options below to help them craft a encounter.

ANCIENT/OVERGROWN: Buildings completely reclaimed by nature and forgotten by time. Thick, impenetrable vines, heavily moss-covered monoliths, petrified trees, or crumbling stone roads buried under centuries of dirt.

BIZARRE/WEIRD: A surreal, alien environment that breaks the natural rules of reality. Forests of giant glowing mushrooms, floating earth motes, rivers that flow uphill, or crystalline geological formations.

CORRUPTED/BLIGHTED: A sickened, unnatural environment tainted by dark magic or toxins. Dead and twisted flora, unnaturally dark shadows, foul-smelling sludge, toxic spores in the air, or earth that feels rotten or defiled.

RUINED/ABANDONED: The environment is marked by the crumbling, relatively recent remains of civilization. Collapsed walls, rotting wooden fences, rusted tools, or pillaged campsites.

SACRED/DIVINE: An environment that radiates a palpable divine presence, deep peace, or ancient reverence. Unnaturally still air, rock formations that look like praying figures, a pristine spring, or ground marked by holy signs.

TREACHEROUS/HAZARDOUS: A highly unstable and inherently dangerous natural landscape. Precarious cliff edges, thin ice over rushing water, paths prone to sudden rockslides, or deep, sinking bogs.

WHIMSICAL/FAIRY-TALE: An enchantingly beautiful, playfully magical setting. Unnaturally vibrant colors, shimmering ethereal mist, motes of floating light, perfectly symmetrical trees, or wind that sounds like music.

WONDROUS/MARVELOUS: A breathtaking, large-scale natural phenomenon that is astonishing but not inherently magical. A massive echoing canyon, a crater from a recent meteor strike, a colossal waterfall, or an awe-inspiring cavern system.

Landmarks

Beyond encounters, in some situations the GM may need to prepare or improvise points of interest along a journey. Places where the characters can rest, find supplies, or uncover information about the world.

Below are a few ideas to help the GM with that task:

Brewery or Winery

What kind of drink is made here?

1. A dwarven ale that invigorates, but fells the weak.
2. A fae wine that grants visions, but is addictive.
3. A mead that wards off fear, but poisons.
4. A brandy that relaxes, but catches fire easily.

Campsite

Who is here?

1. A company of mercenaries.
2. A merchant caravan.
3. A troupe of traveling performers.
4. Recently abandoned by [roll again].

Cave

What lives here?

1. A tribe of goblinoids.
2. A band of bandits or cultists.
3. A territorial animal such as a bear or mountain lion.
4. A territorial monster such as an owlbear or giant.

Chapel or Monastery

What kind of deity is this place dedicated to?

1. A patriarchal or matriarchal deity.
2. A deity of order and justice.
3. A deity of martyrdom and pain.
4. A deity of magic and knowledge.

Farm, Ranch, or Mill

What trouble has this place been facing?

1. A curse is killing the livestock and the crops.
2. Bandits demand tribute to keep from burning it all down.
3. Evil tribes threaten to raid the place.
4. The owners lure travelers to their deaths.

Graveyard

Who is buried here?

1. A saint whose grave still works miracles.
2. An ancient king with his guard and his treasures.
3. A forgotten hero and their ancestral weapon.
4. An evil sorcerer who defiled the surrounding land.

Hovel or Lighthouse

Who lives here?

1. A cursed spirit.
2. An ill-meaning witch.
3. A wise but paranoid hermit.
4. An enigmatic hunter or lighthouse keeper.

Inn

What is this inn's reputation?

1. A den of crime.
2. Quiet, but without much luxury.
3. Cozy and safe for spending the night.
4. Almost always bustling and festive.

Mine or Quarry

What state is this place in?

1. Overrun by a tribe of goblinoids.
2. Abandoned after being dug too deep.
3. Partially collapsed, but still rich in resources.
4. Flooded by groundwater and overrun by abyssal creatures.

Shrine

What kind of deity is this place dedicated to?

1. A benevolent deity tied to life.
2. A neutral deity tied to fate.
3. A neutral deity tied to nature.
4. A malevolent deity tied to corruption.

Tower

Who lives here?

1. An eccentric mage with their experiments.
2. A band of bandits that uses it as a hideout.
3. A spirit that stubbornly refuses to leave.
4. A flying creature that has nested at the top.

Wreck or Shipwreck

Where are the survivors?

1. No one seems to have survived.
2. Under attack amid the wreckage.
3. They were dragged off to a nearby cave.
4. They fled from something, looking for somewhere safe.

Advancing the Journey

The first step in determining how far the journey advances toward the next encounter is figuring out how many days actually pass before reaching it. The number of days until the next encounter is set by the table below, according to the danger level of that stretch of the journey:

Journey Challenge

To determine whether the party suffers a setback before the next encounter, the characters make a journey challenge. A journey challenge is a skill challenge with a difficulty based on the type of terrain, in which each participant must describe how they contributed to the journey's advance and use a relevant skill:

If the party succeeds, the adventurers reach the next encounter without any setbacks. Otherwise, the GM chooses or rolls a setback from the list below:

Supplies

Each character consumes one travel ration for every day traveled on a journey.

Conserving Supplies

To conserve supplies, the party can hunt and forage while traveling. Doing so increases the difficulty of the journey challenge by +2 for each character in the party.

On a success, the party consumes only half the supplies needed for the number of days traveled, rounded up. Otherwise, the party consumes its supplies as normal.

Traveling Without Supplies

Traveling without supplies increases the difficulty of the journey challenge by +3 for each character in the party.

On a success, the party manages to reach the next encounter without any setbacks; on a failure, however, it suffers an additional setback, and every long rest during that stretch counts only as a short rest.

Wounds on Journeys

A wounded character undertaking a journey may make one attempt to recover a wound per long rest taken on that stretch of the journey, but failing those attempts does not grant the party any Boons.