Maelstrom Rules - Downtime: Recent Updates

Creating items in downtime
We have halved the length of time required to fashion an item, enchant an item or refine a preparation in downtime. In addition it is now possible to choose the number of days you wish to spend on these actions, allowing you to stop half way through and then resume the action in the same downtime.

Ship construction on rivers
It is now possible to construct shallow bottom boats such as a dhow or a battle barge on rivers as well as on coastal areas.

Learning times now correctly calculated
We have updated the downtime system so that it now correctly calculates the amount of time required to learn a skill, given other actions already submitted this downtime. The system will no longer allow you to accept an offer of teaching or enlightenment in a skill unless you have submitted sufficient actions to allow you to learn the pre-requisite skills.

If you study with an item or at a location then the list of options you see will be based on the skills your character currently knows. E.g. if you study with a sorcerous scroll of The pugilists mighty blow then your only option will be to learn distil mana. Once you have this skill or you have submitted sufficient actions to allow you to learn it in that downtime then you will gain the option to learn sorcerous lore by studying with the scroll.

For future submissions, the new system will avoid the problems with rounding errors that have occurred in the past, where players have fallen one day short of learning a skill despite submitting the time suggested in their downtime response. Unfortunately, the result of the improved accuracy of the whole system is that a number of skills have increased by one day in the amount of time taken to teach them or to learn them from an item. This is an unfortunate and largely unavoidable consequence of the way the new code works and we apologise for the issues that it cuases.

If you have been previously studying a skill and have a downtime entry saying that you have X days left to learn that skill and the downtime system is now requiring you to spend one extra day then email us and we will update that for you. In you haven't yet started studying a skill then we are not able to change this for you and you will have to spend the new time shown.

Retainers wages
Following significant feedback over the issue of retainer wages, we have temporarily removed the recent wage rise. We are going to consider the issues caused by retainers and look at the possibility of implementing a different solution to the problems they cause. We plan to make a full announcement of our intentions before Event 4 this year to become active in the downtime that follows that event.

Enlightenment
We have modified the system of offering and granting enlightenment so that the eidolon who is offering the enlightenment is the player who submits the action initially on the system. We needed to do this to bring the action in line with the new studying system that calculates automatically how much time has been spent studying an action as the actions are submitted (described above). It also brings the action in line with all other actions in the downtime system where the active character is the one who submits the action. We apologise to all eidolon players for the frequent changes to this action in recent downtimes.

Writing Scrolls
We have significantly expanded the range of skills that characters can create teaching scrolls for. The majority of the skills in the game can now be written as teaching scrolls, if your character can teach that skill to another character then you can write a scroll of it.

Paying Taxes and Tithes
You can now use the give money action to pay taxes, tithes or gifts directly to a Known World allegiance. You cannot use this action to pay debts, you must use the pay debt action to pay an outstanding debt. But you can use this action to transfer money to a Known World allegiance to represent payments for taxes, tithes, bribes, gifts or similar.

Building in native areas
We have updated the number of workers required to oversee the construction of ships and colonial buildings in native lands. Since it is not possible to pay the natives to produce the building materials required to construct new buildings and ships there are no construction costs for building in native lands. However the number of workers that must be employed has been significantly increased to play balance the advantages and to represent the extra workers that must be employed to collect the neccessary materials.

Players who are building coloinial buildings in native lands should bear in mind that these buildings cannot be maintained automatically (like buildings in normal colonies) and will need a character with the right skills to repair them regularly.

Farm Productivity Updated
We have updated the code that determines how much a farm can grow to take account of the area of land available to a farm. Farms built on the coast and farms with large areas of forest now produce less. We have had to overhaul the code to correct for these factors so all players with farms will notice a small change in the production rates for farms, but these will be small in most cases. If you use a lumber shed to remove forest from an area then farm production in that area will now increase automatically. Farms that are built in coastal areas where there is little land now also have the number of workers required to operate the farm reduced accordingly.

Known World purchases
We have implemented a new system to allow characters with status to requisition supplies from the Known World. The range of supplies you can obtain is dependent on your status, the higher your status the more options are available to you. The supplies must be paid for by the character with status. This has been implemented to improve support for status within the downtime system and formalize a system that allows characters with status to request aid from their backers in the Known World.

Ship construction simplified
We have updated the rules regarding ship construction. Previously some ships could only be constructed at shipyards and some ships merely gained a bonus by being constructed at shipyards. This caused significant problems for new shipwrights who often lacked access to a shipyard and were unable to tell how long any of their ships took to make. Any ship can now be constructed with or without a shipyard and it is now possible to repair or modify ships that are not in shipyards. All ship construction, modification and repair times are halved if a shipyard is used.

Writing and sending letters
If you write a letter, the item will be added to your inventory. You can give a letter to another character like a normal item using the give item action. The character that you give the letter to will be able to read the message by examining the item in their inventory if they choose.

Any character that travels to a port in the Known World has the option to give an item to a character in the Known World. They can use this action to attempt to deliver a letter to its intended target. Please see the guidelines for more information on writing letters to the Known World.

Teaching speeds
We have altered some of the teaching rates for skills. This has been done to streamline and simplify the skills to make it easier for us to maintain and update them. This is in preparation for making the required alterations to the system when the Version 3.0 rules are released.

Mana Sites
We have overhauled the code that calculates how much mana you can obtain from a mana site. We have increased the rate at which all mana sites produce mana to provide better game balance. We have also removed the random aspect of the rate of production since this added nothing to the game and made finding the best way to use a mana site tortuously difficult. We are looking to remove random factors from other areas of the game for similar reasons.

New options for churches
We have introduced some new options for priests and similar characters who have access to shrines, churches or similar buildings. You can now use these buildings to immediately find out information about the level of devotion in the area immediately around the church by viewing the information for the building. Local inhabitants that are soul tainted or soul pacted will claim to be of no devotion in this report, but everyone else's devotion will appear normally.

If you a devoted character chooses to act at the church then there are two new options you can take to oppose the spread of faiths that you do not tolerate. You can denounce a faith which is an attempt to get the followers of a specific faith to abandon their devotion. Soul pacted characters cannot renounce their faith.

The more "effective" option is to persecute followers of the proscribed faith. By threatening followers of a faith you can force them to abandon their devotion. Persecution is effective against soul pacted and soul tainted inhabitants and is more effective than denunciation against other faiths. If you persecute a faith then some followers of the faith will give up their devotion while others will be executed.

Changes to fishing
We have changed the way fishing works so that the food produced appears after the downtime results are processed and not before. This food will be available for use in the next downtime, but not in the current downtime. As a result food produced by fishing will now work the same way as food produced by farming. We have made this change as it vastly simplifies downtime processing but also because it removes a major source of player confusion and frustration when men-at-arms and slaves starve because anticipated fishing returns failed to materialize.

New options for priests and eidolons
We have overhauled the preaching action that was previously available to priests to create four new options for such characters, to raise the people in an area to fight or to work, to convert people to their faith or to gather alms. We have also created new options to allow people with access to shrines, churches and similar buildings to use them to persecute faiths they don't like.

We have streamlined some of the eidolon options to make the abilities of loyal and fallen eidolons more similar in appearance. So all eidolons can now attempt to raise soul-pacted cults as well as to inspire the faithful or bring enlightenment if they choose to do so. We have made some initial improvements so that an eidolon can see the size of their cult and can form cult members up and start to use them.

Enlightenment has been overhauled to give eidolon players more involvement in the process and more control over what skill is delivered. All eidolons now begin play with a list of skills they can choose to enlighten a mortal character with. This list can be expanded or reduced at the whim of the gods. From here on, the only way to gain the benefit of having an eidolon enlighten you is if the eidolon selects one of the skills they have in their list of options to enlighten you with.

These changes are part of a planned upgrade of options for downtime for "faith" based characters and we hope to continue to build on them in the future.

Cashing letters of credit
We have simplified the way letters of credit are dealt with in downtime. If you have a letter of credit in your character's inventory that you wish to make use of in downtime then you should select the deposit funds with Rimici Capell option. This will allow you to take the letter of credit to the NPCs who work for Rimici Capell in the New World. You will receive coin to the face value of the letter of credit which will then be passed back to the character within Rimici Capell who wrote the letter for validation. If the letter of credit is later discovered to be invalid for any reason then your account with Rimici Capell will be debited accordingly and you will be blacklisted by them until the money is repaid.

We hope this simplification will make letters of credit easier for players to use at events and in downtime. It also makes it easier for us to track the letters and process them properly.

Changes to Permissions
We have overhauled the permission system for buildings. You can now only make use of a building if you have been given permission to use that building by the owner. However if you have been given permission to use the building then no further input is needed by the owner when you use the building. Previously the owner needed to approve every use of the building, this is no longer necessary for any building.

Changes to your Inventory
As requested we have updated the system so that if you hand an item from your inventory to another character then the name you have given the item in your inventory will be preserved. This means, for example, that if you have named a map "Invasion Plans" then it will appear with this name when it is received by the character you have handed it to. Please bear this in mind when exchanging items.

Changes to Letters of Credit
Under the new system if you hand a letter of credit in to GOD at the end of the event we will automatically cash this letter of credit and made the funds available to you. In effect, by handing the letter in you are assumed to be taking the letter of credit to Rimici Capell NPCs and asking them to cash it for you.

Previously If you sold items in the Known World then you would automatically receive the proceeds as a letter of credit. You can now choose to receive the proceeds as a letter of credit, or as coins in your baggy or you can leave the money with your creditors to be used in a subsequent downtime.

New Deposit and Withdrawal Option
We have implemented a new feature to allow you to deposit funds with Rimici Capell in downtime. Any money you bank with Rimici Capell in a downtime will not be put in your event pack at the following event. You cannot withdraw this money at the event, either from GOD or from the Rimici Capell players at the event.

As part of the new feature you can also withdraw funds from Rimici Capell or any creditor who you are currently in credit with. This will give you access to any funds you have deposited with Rimici Capell in downtime. It can also be used by anyone who has overpaid a creditor in the past for any reason.

Changes to Debt Payments
It is now possible to pay any of your existing debts through the downtime system. The new improvements will allow you to pay debts that you have accrued through previous downtime actions as well as starting debts on chartered buildings and ships. At present many existing ships and buildings have the wrong debts recorded for them. We are going to audit every ship and building in the system over the next six months and correct any data that is wrong.

We have removed the old option to ask another player to pay your debts for you. Since any character can now turn any "credit" into cash, it should now be easy to move funds easily between characters to pay debts. If you want another character to pay your debts you will have to ask them to give you the money and then pay the debts yourself once you have received it.

Changes to Financial Results
We have overhauled the way that new actions are submitted to the downtime system so that any expenditure that you submit for this downtime is show in your financial results immediately. This should make it easier for players to see where their money is going.

Setting Gems Implemented
The work precious metals skill has been updated to allow characters to set gems into any item they can make. Items that required gems as part of their construction no longer require gems to make but any item can have one or more gems set into it by a skilled jeweller.

Ship Construction Updated
We have updated the system for constructing ships to make it easier for shipwrights to move half-completed projects between them. Incomplete ships now appear in the list of downtime options for the owner and their status can be viewed. This makes it possible for players to use the management option to move the ship to another character to allow another character to work on the ship.

IC Information Correction
Please note that the Almanac of the Known World incorrectly states the ration of drachms to ounces. Regardless of the real world ratios, in Maelstrom there 15 drachms to one ounce. A traditional ingot of silver is 240 drachms which is 1 pound in weight.

Manage Affairs Removed
We have removed the manage affairs option from the downtime system. It is no longer possible to increase your status by managing your affairs and your status will not decline with time. This has been done to improve the play balance of status, streamline the processing of status changes which was previously complex and bring status into line with the definitions provided in version 3.0 of the character creation rules. There are changes planned for further improvements for characters with status.

Updates to Slaves and MAA
It is now possible to remove men-at-arms from a unit and then to put them back in another unit. This allows players to merge small units, split large ones and reinforce units that have suffered casualties.

All slaves and men-at-arms now need to be fed regardless of whether they are in a unit or workforce or not. Formerly slaves did not need to be fed if they were not in a workforce.

For ease of code maintenance we have removed the "Transfer Slave" action. If you want to transfer slaves between characters then please form them into a workforce and give the workforce to the other character.

Land Permissions Added
We have introduced permissions for land. If you own a piece of land you can now give permission to use the land to another character. This adds the settlement to the list of locations known when the character takes an action and allows them to build on the land.

If a character has permission to use a piece of land and they submit a building action then the action is automatically accepted by the land owner. If you give permission to use your land you will not need to also accept every construction request submitted. At present, if you do not give permission to use your land then you will still need to accept every construction request. This second option will be phased out in the future as it makes the system difficult for us to administer.

Coordination and Act At Location Overhauled
We have overhauled the "Act at location" action in line with the new map system. You can now select a location or a feature from your list of known locations or features to act at. You can then select from a wide range of actions that you can perform at that location or feature. For instance you can now spy on a specific building by choosing to act at that building.

To simplify some of our code and ease maintenance and further improvements we have removed some old actions such as "Study at building". These actions which are no longer present can now be achieved by selecting "act at location".

Coordinating another character has now been simplified. There is now just one coordinate action which can be used to allow another character to do take any action on your land. There is no longer any need to submit multiple coordinate actions, one action will allow another character to take any number of actions on your land.

Native Economics Overhauled
Native hives and tribes use a different economic system to the colonists (since they have no money). This system has been overhauled, streamlined and simplified. Some changes have been made to make things easier to use and more effective. We are not releasing the details of the change here but if you are playing a leader of a native tribe or hive then please contact us with any questions you have about the changes.

Fishing Simplified
The fishing system was hideously over-complicated to achieve a very simple result. We have completely rewritten this action to make it quick and easy for players to submit what they want with a minimum of hassle. Previously you had to sail your vessel to the waters you wished to fish, fill your hold with fish, sail back, unload the fish and then repeat ad nauseum.

Under the new system any ship that is docked in a port can fish. Pick the waters you want to fish and how long you want to spend fishing. The system will calculate how much fish is produced in that time and put the food in the port automatically for you.

Scrolls Updated
We have implemented the ability for characters to write scrolls in downtime. This long overdue feature has been on the list to do since Maelstrom began and was always put off each downtime due to technical problems. It is now possible for any character with a magical skill to write a scroll as well as for some other skills. There are no plans to allow characters to buy scrolls for skills other than magical skills.

To prevent overcomplication of the scroll system and to adjust the play balance of scrolls purchased at character creation, the effects of existing magical scrolls have been adjusted. These scrolls now only teach the stated magical spell, talisman or preparation at the enhanced speed. The prerequisite skills that must be learned before you can learn this spell, talisman or preparation now take the full time to learn.

Map Changes Completed
We have now completed the overhaul of the mapping system. Under the old system characters would slowly find out what the local terrain in a location was first before they found out what if any settlement existed there. This made no sense of any kind and caused all manner of headaches for players trying to work out where their character was.

Under the new system, any character will automatically learn the name and location of any settlement that they act in. Over time characters will gradually accumulate more knowledge of the surrounding area until they can see the terrain for that location. Explorers can gain this knowledge much more quickly by exploring an area.

Many features that were obvious before are now hidden from the map and can only be found by explorers. Features like mines, mana sites and ritual sites can now only be found by explorers. To find a hidden feature an explorer will have to spend additional time exploring an area after they have learned the surrounding terrain.

Previously there was the concept that your character could know an area to "surveyed" level or "explored" level. Now your character can have multiple levels of knowledge of an area. After a day you know the name and location of any settlement present and any major buildings. After years working there (or 50 days exploring) you will know all the terrain in the area. Explorers can then learn to find hidden buildings in the area.

We have introduced a new Known Features list for each character. Every time you act at a location you will automatically become aware of any features that are readily obvious in the area (anything that isn't hidden, such as a farm or other major building) and the features will be added to your list of known features. Every time you act at any hidden feature such as a ritual site then it will also be added to your list of known features allowing you to easily return there in the future.

Most lists of Known Features have now been created but there is still some work to do to bring existing characters up to date with the new system in a fair way. If you believe there are features that should be in your list and are not currently accessible please contact us to discuss it, but bear in mind that some old knowledge (for example the free knowledge of the location of mana and ritual sites and the free knowledge of every port location) has been deliberately removed.

Steal Action Removed
The steal action has caused a unusually large number of problems in processing with players finding it difficult to understand or justify the outcome when robbed. Attempts to rectify the problems were not successful and as the action was causing significantly more OOC administrative problems than it was IC trouble at events we have removed it from the system. At present there are no plans of any kind to reinstate this action.

And so it began......

Dawn breaks, war looms, the evil Lord is gathering his armies to wage a campaign of destruction upon the free peoples of the world. It is up to I, Sir Maximilan Pegasus to stop him, with my trusted band of adventurers we must gather the enchanted sword of Tek, the Shield of Way-Lem and the amulet of Subsidence and together we shall slay this abomination! “TIME FREEZE” And bam, the fantasy world fades away, the enchanted sword of Tek in my hand is a rubber sword smothered in coloured ribbons with a laminated card cable tied to the hilt, I look down and I’m wearing plastic armour and unflattering heropants, and the magical world of my imagination washes away to reveal a field in Wigan, but you know what? It’s larp and I’m a larper, it’s what I do.
I started larping when I was 17, I’d never role-played before, I’d never played D&D or Warhammer, never played WoW or any form of online game, I’d never even read Lord of the Rings, I feel somewhat privileged that I hadn’t done any of those things, I think it gave me an untainted attitude towards what larp could be, I had no preconceptions about saving the maiden fair, slaying the dragon or smiting the liche, to me it was just a new thing to try.
It was cold, really cold, 10am on a September morning, the rain was battering down and I’d been given a faux fur tunic, a mouldy old sword and been pointed towards a man and told, “You’re monstering, there’s the ref he’ll tell you what to do.” I obeyed, I played wave after wave of zombies, orcs and various line monsters and to be honest, was cold, bored and hungry. That is, until lunchtime, the teams switched sides, I got into the kit I’d scrounged up, as with most first timers, a black trenchcoat. I took the mouldy old sword, stood with my fellow adventurers and it hit me, I’m a god damn hero!
Pow, there it was, a new larper was born.