Yesterday I posted on Reddit an Athas Journey Planner spreadsheet I made. I thought that maybe some of you aren’t there, so I’m also posting it here.
It’s based on the Athas Distance Calculator, but with a focus on tracking supplies, mounts and vehicles, using 5e rules. It includes a lot of automatisms to calculate who carries what and where and how loaded it is. As well as how affect the different terrains crossed the march speed.
I would like to improve it, so any feedback is more than welcomed.
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Wow, this is quite amazing. Maybe having a starting page that explains a bit about it might be helpful. I made a copy and started playing with the the number, but not everyone may know to do that.
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In Cells E26:F26 I could only add a supplies wagon, couldn’t add an armored wagon as seen on Bearucracy K61.
What’s the SsDefiling tab for?
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I could also use some instructions! Though it looks fabulous, I’m struggling with the sequencing. I will keep working at it though…
10 minutes later:
OK, I was being silly. Amazing bit of work.
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There’s a bunch of notest on the Reddit Thread https://www.reddit.com/r/DarkSun/comments/1b8212s/athas_journey_planner_spreadsheet_help_welcomed/
Tl;DR: I made an Athas Journey Planner to track distances, mounts, vehicles and supplies.
Like many of those who still play in the Dark Sun campaign setting, some of the components I consider necessary in a good adventure are travel and exploration. And like many, managing resources starts to bore me after a couple of travels…
That’s why some time ago, inspired by the Athas.org Distance Calculator for Dark Sun, I prepared my own version in Google Sheets. Although it was much less practical because it didn’t perform optimal route calculations automatically.
A few weeks ago I started updating it. And since I don’t have enough knowledge to replicate the functioning of the web application in a spreadsheet, I decided to include instead the journey’s supply management.
Things got a little out of hand, and I’ve reached a point where, although I still want to add things, it will be good for me to pause and see if it helps people’s campaigns and what they need.
So, I’m here to offer you this tool and to ask you that if you use it, please give me feedback on any bugs you may find. Once fixed, I’ll work on new features.
And please, as English is not my native language, any suggestion on the chosen terms will also be welcomed.
The spreadsheet uses the 5e rules, with some modifications:
- I use a modified version of Scott Tidwell’s (aka Polyomnocles) rules for 5e (thanks!), so some small things come from there.
- The travel pace calculation is based on the mph of the traveler/mount/vehicle and its conditions, multiplied by 8 hours, instead of the fixed values of the PHB.
- I added a Terrain Speed Modifier for more variety than just normal/difficult terrain.
- The carrying capacities of some beasts (cough, mekillot, cough!) have been increased compared to what they should have based on their STR. For the rest, I use the values from DMDave’s conversions (thanks!).
At the moment, the spreadsheet takes into account:
Ancestry
- Speed per race or adjusted per individual (class, feats, etc.).
- Water and food needs.
- Carrying capacity according to the character’s Strength stat.
- A base weight of 250 pounds is assumed (character weight + normal load).
- Size’s adjustments.
Journey
- Journey stages.
- Predefined list of known routes between points of interest, with distances, terrains crossed, and the existence of roads between them. It’s based on the 4e map.
- Possibility to add journey stages outside the known routes.
- Indication of completed stages, to set the focus on the following stages.
- Distances in miles, kilometers, and days.
- Terrains crossed.
- Speed automatically adjusted by terrain type (roads allow maximum speed, but this can be adjusted).
- Travel pace: Fast, Normal, or Slow, with the associated effects.
- Forced march or extra hours of travel per day. Includes the maximum Constitution-based TS.
- Full day travel.
- Supplies needed: food, fodder and water. And their cost in ceramic coins.
- Journey text summary.
Terrains
- Terrain types with speed modifier.
Mounts
- Speed and carrying/dragging capacity per species.
- Indication of whether they act as mounts or draft beasts.
- Automatic foraging of beasts according to the type of terrain crossed (kanks are the best option!).
- Howdas
- Adjusted passenger’s capacity.
- Adjusted passengers’ water consumption for being in the shade.
- Passenger’s cover.
Vehicles
- Cargo capacity: people, payload, and total weight.
- Passenger’s cover.
- Indication of whether it provides shade and adjustment to water consumption.
Containers
- Capacity by resource type.
- Container weight.
Resources
- Rations, fodder, and water.
- Individualized weight and cost.
General
- Lists of editable variables to adjust them to the gaming group’s liking.
- Error control:
- Excess cargo: travelers, mounts, and vehicles.
- Insufficient supplies for the journey.
- Unassociated/unequipped mounts, vehicles, and containers.
More notes
- Automatic foraging of beasts is carried out based on the total terrain types between two points. So, if there’s only one foraging terrain out of three between two points, the beast forages in all of them. This is relevant for stages longer than one day, in which the beast is considered to forage even if it does not set foot on suitable terrain.
- Due to the previous point, the verdant belts surrounding the city-states have been removed from the terrain types crossed between two points, since they distorted the calculations. Furthermore, it can be considered that although they exist, they are not free grazing areas for travelers as they are under the control of the city-states.
Future improvements
- Expansion of points of interest.
- If someone wants to help with this, I’ve included a sheet ‘WantToHelp?’ in the document with a list of points of interest that require retrieving the distances between points and the terrains crossed.
- Getting Lost: include DC of getting lost due to terrain.
- Terrain control of mounts/vehicles: prevent ground vehicles from being used for the Silt Sea and viceversa.
- Terrain distances between two points: redesign the points of interest table to include distances for each terrain crossed.
- Marching order: being able to establish the marching order and position of the different team members, automating travelers on mounts/vehicles and pullying beasts.
- Traveler Foraging:
- Include automatic foraging abilities by Ranger class (favored terrains) and backgrounds
- Include foraging DCs per terrain
- Allow to choose whether the containers are filled automatically or by dividing the quantities among those available.
- Half-rations: include half-rations option. Ideally by stage and traveler.
- Summary of actions per day and traveler: a summary of the rolls to be made each day based on previous selections: traveler foraging, forced march, half-rations, getting lost, etc.
- Organize and improve the formulas (currently they are a mess).
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First, apologies for the late response: I’ve been sick in bed for almost a week and could’nt answer your questions.
You are right, the sheet probably needs some instructions. As I’m used to it I didn’t thought that other people could find it confusing. I’ll try to add it soon and maybe I can rearrange some things to make it’s use more clear.
Regarding your problem with cells E26:F26, it’s working as expected: the idea is that you can only select a vehicle that you have already configured. So the filter only shows the existing vehicles.
You can add a new vehicle to the party in cells B41:C41 (name and type) and it will appear then on the available options for the Travellers and Mount sections.
I think what happened to @Zepa77 should be something similar, but if you have any other questions before I upload a new version, please feel free to ask, as it helps me to find ways to improve it.
I added a new page with some notes and instructions. Hope it helps making it easier to understand!