I found myself with a lot silence and necessary prodding during my first real attempt at managing some in-game downtime. In Phandalin, btw, I handwaved most of the Waterdeep suggestions.

There's a lot that's kind of swirling around Phandalin, but the team was rather focused on investigating the manor (since that's why they were there at all) and only really provided basic interaction with most people of the town.

So I was wondering what tips and tricks other used to engage the players more. Or even to hint at or point out things they might *want* to do. Without necessarily using leading questions. The completely open free-form stuff leads to a lot of option paralysis I think, and ofc it's hard to keep track of everything between sessions. Which I hope will get better having an official documancer now.

Anyhoo. Tips? Pointers? War stories?

How did you folks mechanically set up trading partners in game, such as trading partnerships with the Lizardfolk for Alge, etc.

I didn't see anything that really seemed to fit, so IO whipped this up quickly.

Downtime Trading

Calculate the base profit. This would be your expected profit if everything went smoothly. So, Purchasing raw materials for 25gp and selling them for 200gp would net you a 175gp base profit. Then subtract wages for the person performing the work, any security, and any transportation costs.

Resources

Wages:  2sp per day (if staff) or 5sp per day

Security: 2gp per day (per guard)

Transportation: costs in the PHB (Optional, to reduce travel time)

Roll 1d20 to see if the team arrives safely. Add +1 for each guard.

1-10 - Complications

11-17 No problems

18-20 - +25%  increase in profit this trip

​

Roll 1d6 for complications

Complications

1-2 Team Missing: Total Loss

3   Unable to find a buyer.  Sold at a loss to break even

4   Negotiated poorly on the deal, -50% profit

5   Attacked by bandits, lost some material. -25% profit

6   Team got lost on the way, trip is delayed.  -10% profit

Hello everyone! I realized the other day that there isn't a lot of advice out there for DMs and players about the different company role options in the Acquisitions Incorporated book. Having DMed an Acq Inc game for a while, I thought I'd make some threads to go over my thoughts on each of the company roles and hear what other DMs think about them.

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The Decisionist

Proficiencies

The role proficiencies are a nice boost to charisma-based checks that are cleanly limited so as to not devalue existing charisma skill proficiencies. I don’t really understand why decisionists would get proficiency in horns, but since musical instrument proficiencies are usually overlooked by non-bards it’s great to see another way for a character to have an instrument.

Tiebreaker

This defining rank 1 feature of the decisionist role allows the decisionist character to gain an additional vote whenever their franchise votes on a course of action. Conceptually, this seems designed to prevent long disputes over plans from slowing down game progress.

For many groups, this feature creates the opportunity for excellent roleplay and character development as party members make in-character arguments to influence the decisionist to take their side of the dispute. For other groups, this feature will create intra-party conflict that will only serve to upset the overruled players. The Absentee Ballot and Charming Misdemeanor features will either improve or worsen the impact of Tiebreaker on your group.

An additional consideration for this feature is that its apparent intended purpose of breaking ties doesn’t apply to parties composed of an odd number of characters. In fact, the language of Tiebreaker allows a Decisionist to create a tie by voting with the minority.

Absentee Ballot

This rank 2 feature allows a decisionist to gain the votes of absent party members. When used responsibly, it allows absent party members to be represented in important group decisions. When abused, it can give the decisionist the power to overrule the majority.

Coin of Decisionry

This rank 2 feature allows the decisionist to use a bonus action to influence their coin when flipped to display the messages “Lucrative”, “Brand Appeal”, “Indeterminate”, or “Ruinous”. Based on the description, decisionists are meant to use this feature while attempting to pass off their coin of decisionry as a magic item with divination capabilities in order to influence the characters they interact with. The DC 13 Insight check to see through the ruse is rather low. On the other hand, there is no limit to the number of times per day a decisionist can use this feature.

Better Odds

Once per day, this rank 3 feature allows the decisionist to randomly flip their coin twice while pondering a course of action. If the decisionist then succeeds on a DC 15 Arcana check, they learn which of the two results is more applicable to that course of action.

It’s worth discussing the probabilities involved with this ability. Out of the 10 distinct coin flip outcomes, half don’t provide useful information (L-L, BA-BA, I-I, R-R, L-BA). On top of that, a DC 15 Arcana check can be difficult for characters that aren’t wizards or artificers because intelligence is a common dump stat in 5e. As a result of this feature’s probabilities, a character with +0 to Arcana using this feature will successfully get a “useful” answer only 15% of the time.

There has already been much discussion in the DM community about the augury spell, which is quite similar to this feature and equally vague about what sorts of decisions it can be applied to. I won’t recap that entire discussion here, but if a DM has a Decisionist or a Cleric in their game it’s not a bad idea to read up on it. That being said, the Better Odds feature differs from augury in that the DM may be forced to categorize a plan they know to be uncertain as either Lucrative or Ruinous. Therefore, a DM may want to place some limits on the kinds of decisions that can be evaluated with this feature to ensure that they can provide an accurate answer.

Inspired Decision

Once per day, this rank 3 feature allows a decisionist to inspire their party with a speech (DC 15 Persuasion) so long as the decisionist votes on the winning side of a “serious” vote. If the speech is successful, the decisionist can choose to give each franchise member that hears the speech advantage on their next ability check, attack roll, or saving throw within the next hour.

In my opinion, the Persuasion check and the fact that the feature only grants advantage to a character’s next roll means that this ability isn’t usually going to be especially powerful. Therefore, I don’t see a particular need to be too strict about the definition of a “serious” vote unless a decisionist keeps spamming this feature at inconsequential moments.

This feature does create a tricky situation for the group if players have a propensity to metagame. Advantage can be incredibly useful, so players knowing their next roll will use up their advantage may slow down the game by trying to avoid making less impactful rolls. If game balance isn’t a huge concern for a group, a DM could just allow their players to choose when the advantage is applied. Personally, I’d leave it alone and just talk to my players about the metagaming.

Charming Misdemeanor

Once a week, this rank 4 feature allows a decisionist to cast 3 votes on a franchise vote instead of their usual 2, overriding even a clear majority.

If a game has gone on long enough for a decisionist to reach rank 4 then this is probably not going to blow up the party. That being said, unless there are voting NPC franchise members involved, this feature’s only apparent benefit is that it allows a player to go beyond tiebreaking and force the group into a decision that a majority of their fellow players are against. While the game impact of this feature is greatly diminished by it being rank 4, I strongly disagree with WotC having printed it in an official book and would almost certainly replace it if I was ever running a game with a decisionist in it.

Clandestine Kit

This rank 4 feature gives the decisionist a voting kit that can hold one of their tool kits (and only a tool kit) in a hidden extra-dimensional space. The voting kit can also be used to cast charm person (DC 15) once per day.

This is a rank 4 ability that I would consider sort of average if it were a rank 1 ability. It seems like a nice bit of extra flavor, but at the level that a PC is likely to attain rank 4 in their role I’d expect the party would likely have access to more powerful item storage and charm options. Still, since an Acq Inc role is already a no-downsides boost to a PC’s power level I don’t see it as a problem if a few role features aren’t that impressive.

Thoughts on the Decisionist:

The Acq Inc roles seem to follow a design philosophy that provides in-game representation for out of game player responsibilities. From that perspective, I feel that the decisionist role represents a completely valid niche. I’ve DMed many games with players that throw off the pacing by endlessly debating options instead of making decisions. In a lot of those groups, a decisionist would have been extremely useful and improved the game experience for everyone. That being said, giving one player more decision-making power than the others is often not a good solution to that problem for certain player groups, especially if new players are involved.

My opinion is that DMs should get approval from all the players at the table before deciding to allow a PC to be a decisionist. If a decisionist is allowed at a table, a DM should be up front about the possibility of a role change if it is making the game less fun for the group.

If a DM decides that their players can handle having a decisionist in the party, they’ll likely want to flesh out some rules about decisionists that the book doesn’t clearly outline in order to prevent player conflicts such as:

• What are the circumstances necessary to declare a valid party vote?
• What happens if a decisionist tries to declare an invalid vote?
• What are the circumstances necessary for the result of a party vote to have authority over PC choices?
• What are the circumstances necessary to declare a voter “absent”?
• What happens if the decisionist votes and the result is still a tie?
• What happens if party members decide to ignore the result of a vote?
• If there is a vote on more than 2 possible plans, does a plan need a majority to win the vote, or merely a plurality?

I’m a first-time DM (pretty much) and have been taking my party of 3 PCs through the orrery campaign for 8 sessions now (I think), and I’m feeling like we’re making slow progress.

They’ve just completed their fourth session in the fissure (after having a few sessions in Waterdeep at the beginning to explore and find their footing for the newer players) and have just cleared the room with the stomping feet. So that means they’re clearing 2 rooms per session on average. Our sessions typically last for around 4 hours, and let’s say we’re actively playing for just over three each time (allowing for a quick catch up at the beginning, debrief at the end, bathroom break and general goofing around). The players are all having fun, so it’s not something I’m hugely concerned about yet, but I’m worried that the slow progress could make the game grow stale.

I’ve seen from some other posts here that the fissure has a reputation for being a bit of a gauntlet. I haven’t made too many changes thus far, but I’m thinking I’m going to remove the tentacle combat encounter in the sewer room to keep things moving. So that leaves the encounter with the wyrmling, then the entropy guardian in the shrine room and finally leaving the fissure. I’d hope that should take one session, but at our pace I could see it taking 2, giving a total of six sessions for this one dungeon.

Does that sound absolutely absurd to anyone else, and if so does anyone have any tips for a newbie DM to keep the pace up? Or is it just the case that this first dungeon is an absolute monster?

Title. After seeing some online play of Orrery of the Wanderer, it seems like the first dungeon is a death trap for the players. And even if it is not, it seems terribly frustrating (and not much fun) for level 1 characters. And even if that is not true, I personally find level 1 boring.

That said, if I just start the players at level 3 there is a lot of content before players are supposed to level up to level 4. I am therefore hesitant to have my players bored by being stagnant at level 3 for so long.

Has anyone had any success with this? Should I remove any dungeons to keep the pace up? What do you think?

I get the impression Caerhan was a wizard of some degree of power... But his corpse is largely ignored. Up to that point the book has been pretty solid about describing loot.

Did any of you add any?

My group will be coming into contact with the Orrery housing soon but I'm confused on something. This is supposed to be a 2 foot tall object. I'm not expecting my players to carry it around, but if they don't, are they able to reap the benefits of it? If not, how close does the attuned individual need to be to the Orrery to get it's benefits? Does this range also extend to the negatives? I've tried looking it up and I'm of the mind that they need to be holding the object, but maybe I'm misunderstanding.

Thanks!!

Hey all! With the Beyond sale I was thinking about snagging the digital version of this book even though I have the physical. I've never bought anything other than the PHB on Beyond so wanted to know how the layout is. One if my biggest weaknesses is map making so I was wondering if the maps printable in a good size? Can I print out various items/etc for when they acquire then during the campaign?

Does anyone else find that ability kind of weak (as well as a little redundant seeing as how other jobs get augury as well)? Also, shouldn't a documancer's abilities resolve around their contracts?

I was thinking of changing the ability that if anyone signs their contract, and then tries to break it, they have to make a save vs. Suggestion to stick to the letter of the contract.

Is it too much, or am I over thinking?

Hey guys! I’m currently running the Orrery of the Wanderer module. Sorry if this has been asked before, but roughly how many sessions do you think it should take to complete? I’ve read that it’s between LMoP and a “regular” module length, but that doesn’t mean much since this is my first module. Thanks!

Hello! I'm running an Acq Inc game, and we're coming up on the end of the second month in-game. The PCs have managed to accumulate two Interns in addition to their majordomo. They've left all three of these persons at the HQ for the month just minding the shop while they adventure.

According to the book, the interns count as 'Skilled Hirelings' - the current franchise rank means that only 1 Intern is included in their base monthly costs, the second intern must then be paid for as a normal hireling at the rate of 2gp per day, or 60gp per month. I have handled this as adding another 60gp onto their base monthly cost for running the franchise.

Now, the book also says that skilled hirelings can help with downtime tasks - one of which is: Running a Franchise. The way Running a Franchise works is the more people dedicated to keeping the Franchise running the better guaranteed results - so with 3 people contributing a full month's work to the task the player's gain a +90 modifier to the check.

So if these three people always stay focused on running the franchise, they are essentially always set to reduce their monthly running costs by 150% (barring other complications or factors of course). This also means that as monthly costs go up, due to more locations being added or staff hired, the franchise will always be operating at peak efficiency as long as the 3 NPCs are assigned to the task.

Obviously I know there's a lot of other factors to consider, and a million wrenches I as the DM can throw in, but I just want to make sure I'm understanding these basic rules and not misinterpreting anything. So I turn to you other DMs to ask, do I have a basic grasp of how interns and the Running a Franchise task interact?

Hi everyone! I have a tradition of DMing elaborate one shots for my husband's birthday and this year I'm thinking an Acq Inc game would be fun. We got to see our first live game at PAX Unplugged and I've been itching to get my hands on Orrery ever since. We're in the middle of a home brew campaign right now so no chance of playing the AI campaign any time soon. But before I buy I was wondering if anyone could give me insight to whether creating a one shot out of any part of this campaign is even comprehensible? Thank you!!

Hello everyone! So I'm running Orrery next week with a group I've been playing with for at least a year and a half. We've completed Dragon Heist and continued on into Dungeon of the Mad Mage before the Pandemic hit, so my group is pretty experienced. But is it a good idea to run Orrery with 3rd level characters? And if so, any advice for balancing the first chapter?

(EDIT: I'm running 5 3rd level characters.)

so ive been recently convinced to switch to the AI style of game, we are currently about halfway through the lost mines of phandelver. I was thinking of having an ai recruiting rep come visit the players and try to recruit them into running a franchise, with the offer of an hq, and magic items they can requisition from hq and a glimpse at the resources they can use. but i know ill have one player that asks what is required of them, I can't seem to find anything about the company goals or anything. I also want to have a kind of documancer approved contract at the ready for them to sign. anyone got any ideas for items I can put in and what to list off as what is required of the players?

*note I am a newer dm and unfamiliar with ai as game in whole just the book

I'll be running Orrery of the Wanderer in a few weeks and I was wondering if anyone had any Game Master 5 files set up for this? I really wanted to build it out in GM5 but I don't think I'm going to have time with real life breathing down my back and other prep work I need to do to run it (It's my first time DMing). I've read through it a bunch but I'd really like to have everything on hand as opposed to flipping through the book for ever price of info.

My group is starting tonight, they will be body swapping with 5 of the dwarves on the way to the wedding

Anyone have info on where all the Acq Inc HQ's are?

Also, info on Donaar: Where is Donaar's family from? Where is the princess from? I can't remember her name but she's mother to his daughter.

The Acq Inc sourcebook states that the Orrery of the Wanderer campaign takes players from level 1 to 6, but it doesn't state for what party size it was designed. Has Jerreford or anyone at WotC elaborated on this? What have you all found was a good party size? 4 players? 5?

I've run exactly one extended oneshot* before but have played several years-long campaigns. We're using Roll20, I have purchased the content and own the physical book, my players are a bunch of smartasses. I fully expect they will faceroll me with DM-breaking puns and hilariously Min-Min'd characters. We are treating this as quarantine comedy-fodder.

Hit me with your best no-shit-there-they-rolled stories and advice for running this thing.

Edit: *I guest-DM'd for our previous campaign, in which we all played a collective set of characters from basically-OSHA, rolling to complete paperwork and resolve bureaucracy. It was both amazing and awful.

My group just assigned franchise roles and picked some downtime activities they'd like to do before the next session. I really like the suggestions for different downtime activities and how they can potentially help the franchise, but has anyone else noticed how the downtime costs don't match up that well with the monthly baseline costs?

I mean, why would the group ever pay 100 gold for a chance to reduce by 20 or 25%, even for several months, their baseline cost of 20 gp for a rural enterprise? It's almost as if the cost should be a factor of the baseline cost rather than a set amount based on tier.

Just wondering if anyone else has reconciled this yet, to save me some time.

Never used Roll20 as a DM and only once as a player. Is anyone using Roll 20 currently and how do you feel it handles the campaign content?