OOC Discussion

[Blaeringr]

Continued from OOC New Beginnings

[Blaeringr]

Question for @Dr Jackal: how tall is Kek? Just curious...

[daltar]

I'm up for going walking, though I'm good with any of the options. We would need to deal with our elf's monetary issues for the other options but...

 

As I see it, we have 2 votes to walk, 1 for a faster method. For the rest of the party, any votes or alternatives?

[Blaeringr]

21 hours ago, Dr Jackal said:

Is there any chance of working for our passage upriver? Or working on a caravan going that direction, at least part way?

Yes, that's very possible.

Edit: There are no specific rules citing how much you should make doing caravan guard work. I think it would go by the regular earn income rules.

So we'll use the online calculator here: https://2e.aonprd.com/EarnIncomeCalc.aspx

You guys roll 3 times for the three days of travel, and you roll using your class bonus, which should be a +7 for each of you. You get paid a bonus for actual combat equal to your total base pay. You're aiming for a DC of 15. If you roll exactly 15, you manage to do the bare minimum of the caravan captain's expectations, and earn 6 sp for the trip. If you beat the DC by 10, you earn 9 sp. Double that if you see combat.

Does that seem off to you? Hired guards risking their lives for 2-3 sp a day. But to hire a skilled hireling to do basic labor with a +4 modifier to their checks, they earn 5 sp per day. That seems off to me.

Unskilled hirelings make 1 sp per day, with a mod of +0, whether they fail or succeed. Skilled have a mod of +4 and get 5 sp whether they fail or succeed, although I think the rules just wave that and assume they succeed at their tasks. Anyways, I don't want to downplay the danger of caravan duty, but danger pay is included if you see combat. So caravan duty within settled lands I wanna say should start at 5 sp. Roll three checks vs DC 15 with your class modifier (+7); failure = 3 sp per check, success = 5 sp per check, crit = 8 sp per check. Double those if you see combat. So instead of the basic earn income roll linked above which might earn you a max of 18 sp for three days if you see combat, this would be a max of 48 sp for three days if you see combat.

Not huge money, but I think it makes sense for mundane work outside of a proper adventure. What do you guys think?

Edited October 22, 2023 by Blaeringr (see edit history)

[Dr Jackal]

1 hour ago, Blaeringr said:

Question for @Dr Jackal: how tall is Kek? Just curious...

I feel like Kek is dead-on average for an orc or just a bit under. According to this table, orcs are 6'4" on average, so let's say Kek is 6'3" and 244 lb.

[daltar]

1 hour ago, Blaeringr said:

Yes, that's very possible.

Edit: There are no specific rules citing how much you should make doing caravan guard work. I think it would go by the regular earn income rules.

So we'll use the online calculator here: https://2e.aonprd.com/EarnIncomeCalc.aspx

You guys roll 3 times for the three days of travel, and you roll using your class bonus, which should be a +7 for each of you. You get paid a bonus for actual combat equal to your total base pay. You're aiming for a DC of 15. If you roll exactly 15, you manage to do the bare minimum of the caravan captain's expectations, and earn 6 sp for the trip. If you beat the DC by 10, you earn 9 sp. Double that if you see combat.

Does that seem off to you? Hired guards risking their lives for 2-3 sp a day. But to hire a skilled hireling to do basic labor with a +4 modifier to their checks, they earn 5 sp per day. That seems off to me.

Unskilled hirelings make 1 sp per day, with a mod of +0, whether they fail or succeed. Skilled have a mod of +4 and get 5 sp whether they fail or succeed, although I think the rules just wave that and assume they succeed at their tasks. Anyways, I don't want to downplay the danger of caravan duty, but danger pay is included if you see combat. So caravan duty within settled lands I wanna say should start at 5 sp. Roll three checks vs DC 15 with your class modifier (+7); failure = 3 sp per check, success = 5 sp per check, crit = 8 sp per check. Double those if you see combat. So instead of the basic earn income roll linked above which might earn you a max of 18 sp for three days if you see combat, this would be a max of 48 sp for three days if you see combat.

Not huge money, but I think it makes sense for mundane work outside of a proper adventure. What do you guys think?

Sounds pretty good to me! Thank you for calculating it Blaeringr. Want to do the caravan work for extra cash and responsibility then, everyone?

[Dr Jackal]

Regarding caravan pay, I don't know if you want to go for "realism," or what realism means in this place.

That said, if I were setting up a caravan, I would be looking for a bunch of skilled drovers/groomsmen, at least one engineer/repairman/wheelwright (you absolutely need one because if you don't, you are absolutely boned if a wagon throws a wheel), and a handful of designated guardsmen. Those are all skilled workers, at least.

There are secondary skills that I would like to have but aren't full-time, necessarily (unless it's a really big caravan). I would offer a bonus to people who could take on roles as doctor/vet, cook, quartermaster, and bard/entertainment. If you're rich, you might want to spring for a weather-mage or something as well.

I would also offer premiums based on the difficulty of the road, as well as the price of the cargo you're hauling. If it's basic goods on a well patrolled road, you get 1x. Once you start hauling expensive stuff on dangerous roads, you'd start looking at 1.5x, 2x, 3x, 5x.

I'm not sure I'd roll daily. Since you're signing on for a period, I'd allow each PC one roll to haggle for higher pay for the duration.

 

EDIT: I'm completely fine with how you're doing it. I only posted because you put some thought into it and figured you might want a discussion.

 

Edited October 23, 2023 by Dr Jackal (see edit history)

[Blaeringr]

The main issue as I see it is that Paizo really streamlined and "balanced" how downtime income works because they want the game to focus on adventuring, so yeah, you can make a little money at this stuff, but not too much as this isn't your characters' fate.

I think the game could use a little more downtime, slice of life, whatever you call it, and the whole PBP format gives you the chance to cover both without taking away too much from the time you focus on adventuring stuff.

So I'm all for a conversation of taking things a little further than the official rules, because dragons didn't just land in your back yard forcing you all to confront your destiny and drop everything else to save the world.

[omegoku]

Khaine is happy for us to just head straight there, but if we can pick up caravan work on the way, we might as well.

Extra coin, more protection from numbers and about the same speed we can manage without the wagon.

[farothel]

I think the downtime income was more of a 'what you do between adventures' thing, to make some extra money to keep alive or to buy non-essential stuff, rather than the big scores. That's what adventuring does.

And the table in the core book is just a guideline, as jobs can be different depending on where you are. For instance if Chelia is the only person with crafting who can repair a wagon wheel to join a caravan, she can probably get a bit more money. If half a city is there to be caravan guards, it's going to be less money as guard. Simple supply and demand really.

It normally is only 1 roll per job, if I understood the rules correctly.

[Orgoth8]

agreed, especially at the start of our campaign, and given this would be our first time in the wilds, getting hired by a caravan that's at least going most of the way towards our goal would be helpful, given many of us don't know the land, AND the extra gold would come in handy. If it's possible of course.

[daltar]

I think we are mostly in accord then.

 

Lets go through the caravan and Kek can buy his supplies as we do, perhaps as we transition scenes.

 

I was looking through consumables but I didn't find anything of our level that may help with saves against disease or to heal it beyond the good old medical supplies and medicine skill. I was also looking for something that may give us resistance to Acid damage or help with it since our employer mention that the infected goblins spit acid, but no luck there either in consumables. I guess those may be a tad too specialized and there's only so much preparation we can do at level 1 resources.

 

Maybe Kek can do a check of some sort to find something helpful to possibly prepare against diseases, but that may have to be homebrewed by our GM if it exists and is within our means.

 

But for the sake of keeping things moving, I'd say lets do the check for the caravan.

[farothel]

good idea. Does everybody have rations for a week or so? We'll be out in the wild for at least part of the trip, so rations is also a good idea.

 

And yes, just making sure we have a medicine kit (or whatever it's called in here) should be enough in the way of lvl1 supplies. I'm not sure if Kek (the most logical one to take one) did take one, otherwise we can put our money together to get one.

[Orgoth8]

OPE, I think I may have neglected to put in equipment/buy equipment. So I'd need to do that, lol

[Blaeringr]

11 hours ago, farothel said:

It normally is only 1 roll per job, if I understood the rules correctly.

The online calculator (https://2e.aonprd.com/EarnIncomeCalc.aspx) assumes you roll once each day.

Sounds like going with a caravan to Aldpine, making some money on the way, and on foot from there. I'll get that thread moving there tomorrow, this evening I'm gonna start Kahine's show-combat thread with the town watch's student.

Edited October 24, 2023 by Blaeringr (see edit history)