Ok, did setup. Here is the Game Turn placard:
Here is the current game setup:
You are starting lost in the Wastes directly below the “HOTTile” in the center bottom, which in this case (it’s random) contains a Caravansary and an Oasis. There is also an ancient ruined village to your immediate right (this has no inherent game effect, unlike the Caravansary and Oasis). While you are in the Wastes you move more slowly and have to eat food equal to your Food rating even if you make your survival check. Taking a Caravan from the Caravansary (or finding another one) is the only way to make it back to civilization in the form of the City-States in the quadrants to either side (or on the other side, pictured shortly). However, the Ravager of Shurax will spawn in the next few turns and start moving around the Wastes. He’ll only visit each explored HOTtile once and only the players can add new ones by exploring. Once he’s visited and departed from over half the explored HOTtiles in play, Act II starts, and he’ll start moving faster and leaving the wastes at times. This is bad. (And Act III is even worse.) So you probably want to balance between time in more civilized regions (which are more forgiving and offer opportunities to get food more regularly) and time in the Wastes (which get you more time on your clock and Ravager crystals and such). This is the Ravager, btw:
Here is the other half of the board. Notice the Circumstance cards in play. Many turns will involve encountering a Circumstance on this board - you’ll roll a d6 and 1, 2, 3 or 4 hit the card in that slot. 5 or 6 is the top of the Circumstance deck. If you roll a 6 and so choose, you can draw a Peril card instead. Probably don’t do that yet, they’re very dangerous (but have additional rewards).
Here are zoomed in versions of the cards up currently:
Here are the current missions the four City-States are offering, from Dria, Nemsynet, Phorora and Tarri left to right:
(The one for Phorora is the start of a Living Card story arc.)
If you can find a Mission location (with the arrow-in-target icon of the appropriate terrain type, you can initiate any of the three missions that involve skill checks. Get the appropriate amount of successes on the appropriate skill in one attempt, and you will have succeeded the mission and will get moved one step toward that city on the reputation track (either horizontally or vertically depending) and get the listed reward as a group (a gold hex with a + means you get 2 gold each if you’re in that city’s part of the reputation track after the mission adjustment and none if not, and the + cards are Power Ups which are how you advance). A couple have “opposite reputation” options, which mean you can choose to have done the mission for the opposing city instead, and get that reputation. Generally the only difference otherwise is they have a different reward for getting a critical success.
Finally, here’s the starting Battle Mat, which tracks some miscellaneous things like Reputation, Arena Reputation, group permanent items, how many times you’ve gotten food from Oases, and difficulty (starter, to start with):
Things I need from y’all:
- take a look at your finalized character stats in the spreadsheet a couple posts back and see if you’d like to buy any gear upgrades, then let me know what.
- name your character.
- Pick a starting reputation as a group - you can move one step towards any of the four City-States at the start of the game. It’s optional, but possibly beneficial. Being aligned with a City-State gets you discounts for some of their stuff when you’re there, and more money for using the Employment option, better pay from their missions sometimes, and so on. Getting maxed out rep with a City State (or a faction, in the extreme corners) has other benefits if you have the expansion. But also, the opposing City-States might mess with you.
- As a group, let me know which movement mode you’d like to use (the Game Turn placard has the list and the effects) and where you’d like to go. If you move to or through the Caravansary you’ll reveal a Caravan Master and their destination. If you stop there, you can buy Bazaar items cheaper than 3 gold base price, with a Master-based markup. (I’ll provide the Bazaar placard, but importantly, you can buy food at 2 gold for 5 food at a time. You can share gold and food whenever outside of combat.) And optionally travel with the Master to their destination, which will trigger the Caravan Journey mechanics (they can be pretty rough, and cost food, so be careful). The Oasis heals you and can refill your food (see the Game Turn placard). Going up to the edge of a HOTtile will allow you to place a new random HOTtile which might have things like mission locations or bosses and you can keep going if you still have movement. Once I have your intended destination, I’ll pull up any new stuff that’s triggered along the way and then…
- I will roll your skill checks for you. If you crit anything I’ll ask which critical benefit you want unless it’s obvious (e.g. healing is pointless right now because you’re at full.) In the unlikely event a character with a positive Food Rating succeeds their Survival check (seriously y’all suck at survival), I’ll ask if you want to eat food anyway if you’re in the Wastes - it’s optional at that point, but if you don’t you’ll gain the Heat Exhaustion Condition and take 2 Energy Drain (which removes energy but rolls over into health if you’re out of energy) every turn until you clear it. If no decisions need to be made at this point, it’s either Circumstances or the Event phase depending on where you end up.