Re: Ruins and Quests

Rob McNeur (ROB@ccc.govt.nz)
Fri, 14 Aug 92 10:24:35 GMT+12:00

I like the idea of Ruins and Quests, but think that it should be extended.

Ruins should be formable from any type of structure, and with suitable
building skills should be able to be repaired back to use.
e.g. Biff the roving mercenary finds the crumbled Tower of the Basilisk [1234]
now in ruins since the basilisk killed the original owner.
being a normal greedy adventurer, he enters, explores, tracks the beast to
it's lair, kills it and takes it's treasure (512 stone statues !).
He goes back to civilization, hires a mason and some labourers and comes
back to the Tower and repairs it back to it's former glory and then moves
in (carefully killing the mason and labourers first so they can't carry the
news back to anyone else).
He now has a decent fortification costing significantly less than if he had
built it from scratch. During his adventuring, he gets killed and, as no-one
else finds the tower, it slowly reverts back to ruins and, if abandoned
long enough, finally disappears totally.

Suggested rules
---------------
o Any occupied building has a 15% chance to collapse at 1% per month.
This represents normal wear and tear. The inhabitants are assumed to
perform normal minor repairs.
o Any unoccupied building has a chance of (100-current damage level)% to
collapse at 1% per week. Hence, when the building is totally safe,
but is unoccupied, current damage level = 0. This has a 100% chance
of taking 1% loss per week.
After taking 20% damage, this has an 80% chance per week of taking an
extra 1% damage. When it reaches 90% damaged, there is only a 10%
chance of taking damage that week.
Hence initial damage occurs quite easily, but as the building
collapses, the rate at which it takes further damage slows down so
that the pile of overgrown rubble it finally becomes at 75%+ will
remain for quite some time before totally disappearing.
This damage can also be used for roads, allowing them to also degrade
with time.
o When the building reaches 60% damage it is unstable and dangerous to
be near. Portions of it MAY fall off, hitting nearby people. (this is
the normal damage which occurs each week/month). It is partially
rubble and fallen down.
o When the building reaches 85% damage, it is primarily a pile of
rubble and is rapidly becoming overgrown and is now a total ruin.
o At the stage the building reaches 100% damage, it has totally
disappeared from view and no longer exists. Until this stage, it is
still repairable, after this stage it is too late to do anything
except start again from scratch.
o For any building that is NOT part of a town or city, at any stage that
the building is unoccupied, there is a 1% chance per day that it will
be taken over as a lair by an appropriate but random monster. If this
occurs, it is immediately supplied with appropriate treasure, captives,
equipment etc.
This can also be variable based on the amount the building has been
damaged. Orcs will live in a building until it reaches 85% destroyed
and then leave for somewhere safer, snakes live anywhere anytime.
o It would also be possible for unoccupied buildings in towns and cities
to be taken over by other monsters (vagrants, thieves, were-rats etc)
with their own appropriate treasures.
o This requires a table of monsters, their normal location (town,
forest, desert etc) and for each one, their chance of each type of
treasure e.g.
Were-rat, chance of occurring-20%,
town/city-90%, forest-10%, captive-20%, artifact-2%,
gold-60% chance of 1-30 gold, equipment-25%
Dragon, Chance of occurring-1%,
town/city-0%, forest-10%, Desert-30%, Mountain-60%,
captive-5%, artifact-12%, gold-1000->30,000 gold, equipment-20%
etc
Or else a seaparate table can be held for each terrain type, and a
check just made on the appropriate table depending on the surrounding
terrain e.g. Town/City, Forest, Desert, Mountain, Plain etc.
o Every time a ruin becomes the lair of a monster, a check is made on
the appropriate table and a monster chosen. If it is overcome, the
treasure lists etc are checked.

Using this method, Quests can be made in civilized areas as well as in
deserted regions. Monsters can occur anywhere that a deserted building
exists.
If necessary, a sign can be hung out the front saying
"Caution - small Monster", "Be Careful - medium Monster", "Danger - Big
Monster" or "Please complete your will before entering". This allows
adventurers to have an idea of what scale of challenge to expect.

Any violent likes/dislikes, or general thoughts ?

Kaspar [581]
Aka Rob McNeur
rob@ccc.govt.nz


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