Latest revision as of 21:58, 26 March 2017

This page explains the timekeeping model and action economy that Trinity uses.

If you are familiar with standard d20, some of this page will make sense to you, but a lot of new concepts are presented here to expand the scope of timekeeping beyond combat.

Timekeeping and Action Economy

The notion of proper timekeeping being a necessary component of tabletop RPGs goes all the way back to Gygax. I find this ironic given that the early editions of D&D largely lacked a sensible timekeeping model and action economy, and the idea of tracking literal minutes in an adventuring day is cumbersome at best and absolutely insane at worst. That said, there is certainly merit to the idea, and - indeed - to accommodate more interesting mechanics that cover more territory than just combat, we need more means of tracking time that aren't annoying.

Combat Time

The smallest units of time we track is combat time, which is something of a misnomer because it also covers things like navigating cliffs or other exploration hazards. However, this part of the timekeeping system in Trinity is a legacy holdover from D&D, in which it was used exclusively for combat, so: there it is.

Combat time is tracked in rounds, units of time that cover 6 seconds. Each participant in the encounter (generally) has a turn in each round, in which they can take a number of actions. Some effects allow characters to have more than one turn, while other effects can cause a character to lose their turn.

Initiating Combat Time

When an encounter occurs, all participants roll initiative. This is d20 + your level bonus + the best of your Dexterity, Intelligence, and Bravery modifiers. Some effects may give you a bonus or penalty to this roll.

Once all participants have rolled initiative, play proceeds in order from highest to lowest initiative. Once the participant with the lowest initiative has taken their turn, the round ends and a new one begins, starting with the participant with the highest initiative.

Combat Action Economy

During your turn, there are four primary types of actions you can take: full, standard, move, and free.

On a normal turn, you gain one standard and one move action. You can combine one standard and one move into a full action. You can convert a standard into a move. You can take as many free actions as you like, within reason (typically three or four at most).

Basic Actions in Combat Time

Combat Time at the Table

In general, after each of your actions, the DM will acknowledge it and, if appropriate, let you know what the effects of your action were.

Due to the very small timescales involved, the overall situation will generally not change much, though there are exceptions. Combat is fast and fast-paced; in general, you probably won't find it necessary to talk much or analyze the situation too greatly, beyond what's necessary to use your abilities as you see fit.

Exploration Time

One step above combat time is exploration time. This is an entirely novel concept to Trinity (and is partially imported from Journey, a game system we worked on for several years) and is not in any iteration of D&D, so this is where things start to get weird if you're used to that. This time track is used when exploring a particular location, like a city or a dungeon, but not used for overland travel.

Exploration time is tracked in hands and watches. A hand is a unit of time that covers roughly 12 minutes, while a watch covers 20 hands, or 4 hours. So five hands equal an hour, and six watches equal a day.

The real-world duration of a hand comes from an interest in codifying the amount of time a short rest takes, which in D&D 4e, is "about 10 minutes." "Rounding" that up to 12 minutes lets us fit 5 in an hour, which is a good number for multiplying when we try to figure out how many "exploration turns" a day or a few hours consist of.

During a hand, characters are assumed to be taking their actions more or less simultaneously. Thus, while we use initiative in exploration time, this is primarily for bookkeeping purposes and to ensure that everyone gets to act; during your turn, you only declare actions, you don't get to see their resolution until the end of the hand. Once all characters have declared their actions, those actions are all resolved simultaneously.

Exploration Action Economy

During each hand, there are four primary types of actions you can take: broad, narrow, traversal, and quick.

On a normal turn, you gain one narrow and one traversal action. You can combine one narrow and one traversal into a broad action. You can convert a narrow into a traversal. You can take as many quick actions as you like, within reason (typically three or four at most).

Basic Actions in Exploration Time

Exploration Time at the Table

Exploration time is significantly more "fast and loose" than combat time. After the DM describes the results of actions taken during a given hand, you should feel free to discuss with other players what you discovered, if anything, and decide what your next actions will be.

Remember that a hand represents twelve minutes' worth of actual time. Unless you're being actively stealthy, that gives your characters quite a bit of time to discuss options and what's going on around them.

Adventuring Time

Above exploration time is adventuring time, which is used to track overland travel.

Adventuring time is tracked in compasses and cycles. A compass covers about 60 minutes, while a cycle covers roughly a day, so there are 24 compasses in a cycle. You might ask - why have a separate term for day? Because some settings might have weird days that last 28 hours or something, and we don't want to make assumptions about the setting.