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Beginning in my campaigns earliest planning stages I wanted to create an atmosphere of isolation and privation that I imagined an exploration of this magnitude would impose upon its participants. Especially, the ability of the exploration to sustain themselves so far from civilization.
To accomplish this, I modified the Kingdom Building and Downtime rule sets into a Base Camp rule set. It is not a highly detailed system, it is intentionally simple, so it emotes what I want the players to feel without becoming a game unto itself.
First, I developed a list of Camp Improvements along with the cost and construction time for each. When the party first established their base camp they were given 5 build points to begin construction of their base camp. The only mandatory improvement was a faction HQ. Each week the faction resupply arrives and the players receive an additional build point to further enhance their base camp. Improvements bring specialists, and open resources the PC’s can use, spending either gold or earned PA. All of the improvements are tied to downtime activities, as well as the exploration, supply and defense abilities given in the AP. So far this has worked really well and has been well received by the players.
After the HQ and a palisade, the first improvement my players built was a trading post. Not surprising this is the outlet through which the PC’s can buy/sell their treasure. I gave the trading post the exact same statistics you would a settlement (base limit, purchase limit, spellcasting). As the players gain prestige these improve, reflecting their faction’s willingness to fund success.
I also wanted to keep as many of the NPC’s the party met along the Race to Ruin in the story as possible, so all NPC's who still live are available using PA to support the PC’s exploration. Cheiton was one of my favorite NPC's, so I gave him ties to the Kalabuto area as a merchant/black Marcketeer and had the PFS hire him as their trading post manager.
The trading post has Available Magic Items for PC’s to buy and Cheiton uses his contacts to procure other items. If the PC’s want something that isn’t available then they have to let Chiton know, roll to see if it’s available (I reduced the roll to 70%), and if successful they pay in full and a week later the item arrives.
I also wanted to make the Treasures of Saventh-yhi more meaningful, so once the PC’s recover half the Treasures the Availability Roll goes up to 75% and when they find them all it increases the value even further.
This system, in conjunction with my decisions to use the slow advancement track and nerf the mass transit spells has worked great both in meeting my intention to emote the feelings of isolation and privation and increasing the challenge(s) for my more experienced players.
Has anyone else done anything similar?