Timekeeping for DMs

It is pitch dark. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.

Turn mode

Every sixth turn, tell them “scratch light”.

What they can do in a turn:

• If they are fighting, go to round mode
• A spell with 11 minutes or shorter casting time (Tip for DMs: A turn is ten minutes but let them have their rituals)
• Interact with or search through a 10′×10′×10′ cubic area (moving up to three times their speed to do so, so 60′ when encumbered, 90′ otherwise).
• Move 100 times their speed between known, familiar, and clear rooms. Or outdoors. (That’s 2000′ even when slow or encumbered, still more than ⅓ mile.)
• Schlep ultra heavy things (up to their push/pull limit) 500′ between known, familiar, and clear rooms.
• Carefully measure walls or floors up to three times their speed.

Most of the time you don’t have to measure movement. In known space or outdoors you can move quickly (or you’re in hour mode), and in unknown dungeon space, interactions are going to most likely be within 60′ of each other. They’re not gonna say “we stumble unseeingly through the dungeon and don’t do anything or interact with anything for three rooms but in that fourth room we’re gonna examine the furniture if there is any.” More likely, they are going to be cautious, ask you questions… in other words: interact with things!

In the rare case that you do find them doing a lot of movement in the unknown&dangerous dungeon space, but nothing you think qualifies as interactions, you can divide the map into 60′×60′ zones. Speed 20′ is one zone, speed 30 is one-and-a-half, and speed 40 is two.

That’s also a good zone size if a chase breaks out. In that timescale, with speed 20′ it takes three “moves” (a dash gives you an extra move) to get to the next zone, with speed 30′ it takes two. Speed 40′ you can think of as two 20′ “moves”.

Writing that makes me reconsider how I describe rooms sizes. I’ve been doing the “five-foot wide corridor, thirty by twenty room” etc. Maybe I shouldn’t. That can also cut down on my counting. I will still say if a room is bigger, or corridor is longer than the edge of their light source, or in dim light. Even walking to the edge of dim light (on a 20′/20′ source like the Light spell) and asking me again what they see is something that comfortably fits without me having to charge a turn.

Six turns make an hour.

Hour mode

Every hour, tell them “scratch light”.

What they can do in an hour:

• If they’re interacting with things or casting spells, go to turn mode
• Overland, easy terrain: travel 3 miles (4 if fast, 2 if slow. Speed 20 forces slow pace)
• Overland, difficult terrain: travel 1½ miles (2 if fast, 1 if slow. Speed 20 forces slow pace)
• In Veins main routes: ⅓ mile
• On a sailing ship: 5 miles

Hex point of view

(Double the times for difficult terrain.)

Many hex crawl or point crawl modules come with their own time-to-hex or time-to-point abstractions. Those systems are often worth using for those particular areas.

8h mode

What they can do in 8h:

• If they are interacting with things or casting spells, go to turn mode
• Overland easy, travel 24 miles (30 if fast, 18 if slow. Speed 20 necessitates slow pace.)
• Overland difficult, travel 12 miles (15 if fast, 9 if slow. Speed 20 necessitates slow pace.)
• In Veins main routes, 3 miles. (That’s my house rule. Veins RAW: 2⅔ miles.)
• On a sailing ship: 40 miles. (Unlike overland, can sail through all three 3×8h which is 120 miles.)

7×3×8h makes one week.

Week mode

What they can do in one week:

• A downtime activity
• Check for rumors at the barbershop
• New offers at the market

Four weeks make a month.

Month mode

What they can do in one month:

• Domain level events happen
• Equipment and gear becomes available in the souk