I am new to Conan, books arriving today and have a little knowledge of the 2D20 system from watching games on Star Trek on Twitch.
I assume the Momentum and Threat (Doom?) mechanic are the same across multiple Modiphius systems?
If so, what would a good number of tokens be to represent each?
What do people use in Conan or other tittles to keep track?
I am looking at making some from wood instead of simple poker chips or dice with appropriate symbols burned in.
All suggestions are welcome as they may fuel better ideas.
Thanks
My group plays online so we just use images in Roll20 (what roll20 calls cards). I think there have been times were there were up to 7 momentum in the pool but it tends to get used up quickly, so 10 momentum tokens would likely suffice. Doom has gone as high as 24. That was an unusual spike on account of a player using sorcery and ‘casting for consequence’. If you are making your own, make some tokens worth 2-5 doom to allow yourself some headroom.
We use go stones, slate for Doom and sea shell for Momentum. About number, last time with one player, I peaked as 15, while some weeks ago I only went to about 6 with two players. Ultimately it is up to you to decide if you spend some with regularity or if you bank most of it for the final encounter (encouraging overconfidence in your players, which they soon discover to be a slow and insidious killer).
No more than six points of Momentum may be saved in this pool at any time. Any points of excess Momentum in the group pool are discarded.
I said my group may have had 7, but that was just going by memory. Or I may have forgotten this rule during game play. That said, there could be situations where the group pool has 6 momentum and a player makes a great roll generating 4-5 more points of momentum. The important thing is, the player should use that momentum to improve the outcome of the test as it can’t be saved in the pool when their turn ends.
Do many groups bank much Momentum? Here 7 or 24 points are mentioned and I remember a post about reducing a group’s pool, meanwhile I feel my players very often spend everything to improve the scope of their successes and should keep more of it, since it often leads them to have to add to Doom in order to buy extra dice.
I know what you said and appreciate the explanation. On the Conan Facebook group many have mentioned since yesterday that I would need up to a max of 24 Momentum which still confuses me as i was certain the pool was 6.
here is an example that you may understand better than I do.
_"Momentum, you don’t really need that many. Players will gain and spend it, but they can only store 6. _ To be 100% safe. You could possibly have players roll up to 9d20 (ie 5d20 + assistance from a squad) with a total possibility of 18 successes, if they rolled that against a D0 they would have 18 momentum. If they had 6 stored when they rolled it, you would need to have 24. 25 is a nice round number."
My group seldom has more than 3 momentum in the pool. 7 was the highest I could remember, and that may have only been 6. Momentum is most often spent in the moment. My players are wary of giving me doom to increase their die rolling, but it does happen.
Since that was my response I’ll try and explain my reasoning behind the 24 number.
Your party has 6 momentum saved in the pool.
One of your players has an entourage of 4 guys with him. He spends a fortune and pays 2 points of doom to gain 1 die at an auto rolled 1 with the fortune as well as 2 other regular dice.
He now rolls his normal 2d20 + the 2 dice bought with doom + the 4 extra d20 assistance dice.
He is rolling 8d20+1die that is an auto 1 with a fortune.
By some miracle he rolls 8 1s on his roll and has an additional 1, for a total of 9d20 rolled as 1s on his fortune d20 on a D0 skill challenge and so gains 18 successes, and due to the D0 test, 18 points of momentum.
To place that on the table with the 6 in the pool, you require 24 momentum tokens.
This is of course a worst case scenario and you will likely never ever need that many, but that’s not what you asked. You asked how many you will need. I gave you a max number you should ever need.
Even this isn’t really the WORST that could happen. You could have that player hold all that momentum and have another place do the exact same thing and need another 18 tokens. But there is safe and their is ridiculous.
But there is safe and their is ridiculous.