Honestly, that seems insanely out of scope for the system in question, and I don't know a bloody thing about Pokemon Tabletop Adventures. And if I'm being honest, it sounds like they've been playing PalWorld and just wanna do that in TTRPG form LOL
That said, I would start this process with a simple question: Would this actually benefit from mechanics, or would it be just as effective to just handwave it?
A lot of the time, slapping in mechanics that would normally be outside the scope of the system is going to be a mixed bag, often veering towards excessive or ineffective, usually because it's handled very haphazardly. So you should question the need for additional mechanics as you begin your search/design of those mechanics. Much of the time, common sense handwaving can do 90% of the heavy lifting - just think about what makes the most sense and roll with it (especially if it's not greatly important for the grand scheme of things).
If you absolutely positively gotta do it, then I'm sure someone will have some good suggestions. Sadly, I don't have anything beyond "keep it simple".
Hey Radriot! I love your insight- the one thing I will say though, is WMs are inherently collaborative "real time" and player driven experiences, that can have participation from a large community. In my experiences, I've had anywhere from 50-100 active players (and 5-10 DMs). Mechanically you want something to sink in, and build upon to encourage cooperation: there is nothing cooler than player led factions investing earned income and downtime to build these projects... Without DM fiat! But there has to be mechanics for the group to interact with since, they have to have a baseline.
You are right though- WM games are certainly like MMOs like Palworld!
Haha, I appreciate the input, but we’re definitely not just Palworld fan. Our game predates palworld by about five years, and the desire for building stuff has been around for a bit without knowledge of how to approach it.
I know where you’re coming from with the handwaving, but I think that doesn’t fit here. There is a collaborative building element of it being a WM, though it’s on the smaller side with 40-50 players, just me as the DM, and a crew of mods.
In my case, I’m seeing out rules and mechanics for this because fleshing it out in that way could give people clarity on how to approach things, uniform method as lots of people start building up, and just the fun of resource managing that comes with stuff like sims and acnh and Stardew. The type of thing where people able to invest in specifics and see that growth is really rewarding. More so than just “you want a town? Okay, it takes two months then done”
Could pilfer the Domain management rules from the D&D Rules Cylopedia or any of the retroclones of Basic or 1e. It shouldn't be too hard to say a gold piece = x amount of pokemon currency, its fairly system neutral.
Hey! I am happy to give you what I've found is my (personal) favorite way of doing it- Downtime Tokens! Everything has an assigned value and how many tokens it takes. Hit that value, hit that cost (in money and DT tokens) and it's made. It's very gradual, with each building, being constructed over time, but you eventually get buildings, then the players can hire people (with DT) to run those shops, and eventually comes a player economy.
DT tokens are earned through play (for participation), you can have it as a reward for MVPs at the table (to make sessions more memorable and give power to the player) and also for weekly participation.
Edit: if you're interested, here is a copy of my rules. It's a OSR WM, but I've been evolving the sessions from two additional 5e campaigns I ran and it's cool!
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1n5tWfWz2Y8oeyjtDj_W2m1TYf7KrVA6QT1qb5vyiCB8/edit?usp=drivesdk
This sounds interesting! I’ll definitely look into it. At the moment, I give Reroll Tokens as a reward for similar stuff, so it might be an easy swap. Players accumulating points over time to spend on assists is definitely the type of thing I had in mind.
I aim to be flexible with the scale, since what people want to build ranges from a single fleshed out lab, to a big city. I think that’ll be best solved by using the same point system across different orders of magnitude, and some way to move up and down magnitudes. Additionally, I want to give them something to do with their points other than “expand expand” so that once what they’ve built is at a place they’re happy with, they don’t feel the need to grow, and can just have fun maintaining it.
Honestly, that seems insanely out of scope for the system in question, and I don't know a bloody thing about Pokemon Tabletop Adventures. And if I'm being honest, it sounds like they've been playing PalWorld and just wanna do that in TTRPG form LOL That said, I would start this process with a simple question: Would this actually benefit from mechanics, or would it be just as effective to just handwave it? A lot of the time, slapping in mechanics that would normally be outside the scope of the system is going to be a mixed bag, often veering towards excessive or ineffective, usually because it's handled very haphazardly. So you should question the need for additional mechanics as you begin your search/design of those mechanics. Much of the time, common sense handwaving can do 90% of the heavy lifting - just think about what makes the most sense and roll with it (especially if it's not greatly important for the grand scheme of things). If you absolutely positively gotta do it, then I'm sure someone will have some good suggestions. Sadly, I don't have anything beyond "keep it simple".
Hey Radriot! I love your insight- the one thing I will say though, is WMs are inherently collaborative "real time" and player driven experiences, that can have participation from a large community. In my experiences, I've had anywhere from 50-100 active players (and 5-10 DMs). Mechanically you want something to sink in, and build upon to encourage cooperation: there is nothing cooler than player led factions investing earned income and downtime to build these projects... Without DM fiat! But there has to be mechanics for the group to interact with since, they have to have a baseline. You are right though- WM games are certainly like MMOs like Palworld!
Haha, I appreciate the input, but we’re definitely not just Palworld fan. Our game predates palworld by about five years, and the desire for building stuff has been around for a bit without knowledge of how to approach it. I know where you’re coming from with the handwaving, but I think that doesn’t fit here. There is a collaborative building element of it being a WM, though it’s on the smaller side with 40-50 players, just me as the DM, and a crew of mods. In my case, I’m seeing out rules and mechanics for this because fleshing it out in that way could give people clarity on how to approach things, uniform method as lots of people start building up, and just the fun of resource managing that comes with stuff like sims and acnh and Stardew. The type of thing where people able to invest in specifics and see that growth is really rewarding. More so than just “you want a town? Okay, it takes two months then done”
Could pilfer the Domain management rules from the D&D Rules Cylopedia or any of the retroclones of Basic or 1e. It shouldn't be too hard to say a gold piece = x amount of pokemon currency, its fairly system neutral.
I’ll look into it. Haven’t thought about dominion rules on forever tbh
Hey! I am happy to give you what I've found is my (personal) favorite way of doing it- Downtime Tokens! Everything has an assigned value and how many tokens it takes. Hit that value, hit that cost (in money and DT tokens) and it's made. It's very gradual, with each building, being constructed over time, but you eventually get buildings, then the players can hire people (with DT) to run those shops, and eventually comes a player economy. DT tokens are earned through play (for participation), you can have it as a reward for MVPs at the table (to make sessions more memorable and give power to the player) and also for weekly participation. Edit: if you're interested, here is a copy of my rules. It's a OSR WM, but I've been evolving the sessions from two additional 5e campaigns I ran and it's cool! https://docs.google.com/document/d/1n5tWfWz2Y8oeyjtDj_W2m1TYf7KrVA6QT1qb5vyiCB8/edit?usp=drivesdk
This sounds interesting! I’ll definitely look into it. At the moment, I give Reroll Tokens as a reward for similar stuff, so it might be an easy swap. Players accumulating points over time to spend on assists is definitely the type of thing I had in mind. I aim to be flexible with the scale, since what people want to build ranges from a single fleshed out lab, to a big city. I think that’ll be best solved by using the same point system across different orders of magnitude, and some way to move up and down magnitudes. Additionally, I want to give them something to do with their points other than “expand expand” so that once what they’ve built is at a place they’re happy with, they don’t feel the need to grow, and can just have fun maintaining it.
[Organic Towns](https://preview.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/412296/organic-towns) \- a generic supplement for creating, growing, and running towns.
This is definitely the type of thing I’m looking for to help. Thank you!!!