I have returned to try to understand SUPPLIES! I read online about a SUPPLIES PACK but can’t find it in ICRPG:ME. I did find SUPPLIES in Ghost Mountain but am curious if there’s more I’m missing. As always, thanks! Edit: What do you all recommend SUPPLIES cost in LOOT slots, if any? I was thinking one per SUPPLIES.
Oh, we did the teaser one-page and the PCs died. But, their actual for-reals characters have just arrived at the prison! Good times!
There’s as far as I could see (and as far as I could Strg+F) no SUPPLIES PACK as loot. There’s different loot in the Ghost Mountain section (p.236-237) that lets you preserve SUPPLIES like the COFFEE OUTFIT.
The only “rule” I could find was the one on page 239 of ICME in the Ghost Mountain section, where it says what a SUPPLY consists of and how many people can be fed by one in a day.
There’s the NOMAD BUNDLE in the MAGIC section on p. 325 that contains TRAVEL SUPPLIES.
I personally don’t track SUPPLIES because I’m playing WARP SHELL.
If I’d track them I would probably just steal the resource die from Forbidden Lands (because it reduces all the bookkeeping to a dice roll, which is just so nice) and have them separate from the LOOT slots.
Thank you for the advice! How does that work in Forbidden lands? I like the idea of tracking SUPPLIES overall and any slick way of doing it is welcome.
As an aside, I really like how ICRPG’s pushing us back into a tight, uncomplicated system of ruling over rules. So far, Savage Worlds has become our system of choice but ICRPG has really made me think of how I run other RPGs, enhancing my GMing.
In Forbidden Lands you have resource dice (d12, d10, d8, d6) for consumables like food, water, torches, arrows that you roll every time you use the consumable. When you roll a 1 or 2 you decrease the resource die by one step. If it reaches d6 and you roll a 1 or 2 the consumable is gone. Stocking up on resources is easy, as well. You increase the specific consumable by one step on the dice chain rather than tracking numerically exact amounts of food, water, torches, arrows etc.
Example:
You enter the dark caverns of Kath-Adun. It is pitch black. You cannot see the hand in front of your face.
You: Right, I’ll light a torch.
GM: Okay, what’s your resource die on torches?
You: Uh, it’s a d8.
GM: Okay, roll a d8.
You: Damn, I got a 2.
GM: That’s alright. It’s very dark here so your torch will be used up by wandering the caverns. Decrease your resource die by one step.
You: Alright, I have d6 torches now. Better be careful!
I’m answering based on gameplay experience and second edition rules, ok? Unfortunately Modiphius doesn’t ship to my country so I have only the ME free update, not the book itself.
So, Supplies. Love me some Supplies. According to 2E (Core/Worlds), one Supplies contains enough for 4 people to travel for 1 day and costs 10 Coin. Also, one day of travel covers 10 miles as the standard.
In Worlds, depending on how easy or hard the lay of the land you’re travelling in is, the amount of Supplies you need changes. For example, traveling in Iradrum is pleasant, so you spend only 1 Supplies per day and you cover 25 miles instead of 10; but crossing the desert of Khett is deadly and costs 3 Supplies per day for the 10 miles of standard travel.
As any item, 1 Supplies should take 1 carry slot of space. So, yeah, travelling far requires a lot of Supplies… That’s why people need villages on the way to reSUPPLY or wagons, mules, etc.
As always, some tinkering is needed. Since 1 Supplies is enough for 4 people per day, if you’re travelling alone or with one single person I allow 1 Supplies to last a day in Khett, for example. This math however is not fun and should only be used if you and your group enjoy this aspect of the game.
Edit. Also, as you noticed based on Ghost Mountain rules, the use of Supplies and the rules can change based on setting, usually to enhance or highlight some aspect of the world. Supplies in the fantasy setting of Alfheim are used differently from the prehistoric setting of Blood & Snow because in the latter they are part of the drama and your survival is tightly connected to your resources. But in the superhero world of Vigilante City and the sci fi setting Warp Shell, Supplies are mostly ignored because they’re usually not part of the tropes of that genre… But they can be in your game, depending on the tone you want and how much bookkeeping you and your players are comfortable with.
Happy gaming!
Oh, before I forget:
Hank also has this video where he talks about how the simple Supplies system can be used in journeys on boats (or spaceships or anything really).
