Time in game

[Erik-Stoney]

I am putting together a world that when night falls bad things come out and try to kill people.

How do I keep track of the time? I want to give them a warning siren a couple minutes before sundown. I dont need to track time that closely but come up with some standardized was of tracking it instead of: : "I DECLARE THE NIGHT FALLS!"

I thought about getting a chess clock and tracking time while they take actions and such. That seems a little overboard though.

Help is appreciated! First time back to GURPS in 10 years (because everyone I know plays D&D). I finally talked them into trying. Very excited!!

Thanks for your time!!

Erik

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Erik-Stoney

I am putting together a world that when night falls bad things come out and try to kill people.

How do I keep track of the time?

The key thing to realize is that out of game time and in game time are not linked; a combat that takes an hour to play out probably lasts under a minute in-game, while an hour of uneventful travel might be resolved in a minute or less. Given that, mostly what you should do is remind people of what time it is, and how long long tasks will take.

[whswhs]

If they know that night is a risk, and are keeping watch for it, just tell them "the sun is getting low." If they aren't keeping watch, roll Per for each of them, and hand notes to the ones who succeed: "It's starting to get dark" or "the sun is about to set."

[arnej]

Because remember...

“Game time is of utmost importance. Failure to keep careful track of time expenditure by player characters will result in many anomalies in the game. The stricture of time is what makes recovery of hit points meaningful. Likewise, the time spent adventuring in wilderness areas removes concerned characters from their bases of operations – be they rented chambers or battlemented strongholds. Certainly the most important time strictures pertains to the manufacturing of magic items, for during the period of such activity no adventuring can be done. Time is also considered in gaining levels and learning new languages and more. All of these demands upon game time force choices upon player characters and likewise number their days of game life…YOU CAN NOT HAVE A MEANINGFUL CAMPAIGN IF STRICT TIME RECORDS ARE NOT KEPT.”

Dungeon Master’s Guide (page 37), Gary Gygax

[arnej]

(Hopefully that is read in the proper humor)

I like Mr. Stoddard's suggestion better anyway.

[Michele]

I'm assuming the setting is Low-TL and therefore there aren't clocks.

When you are outside, in the field, it is second nature to be aware of how low the sun is on the horizon, unless a PC really is a hopeless city-dweller. There might be distracting factors (a fight going on at the end of the day) or confusing factors (very bad weather), of course.
But generally, the minutes or moments when the sun is about to disappear don't go unnoticed. The change in lighting is rather evident.

You should also decide whether bad things start to happen as soon as the sun is no longer visible from the point where you are (in which case one wonders whether rainy days = night), or only when it is totally dark. In the latter case, you have twilight for a while. This grace (and warning) period can be shorter or longer depending on how close to the Equator you are (closer = shorter), how cloudy it is, at what altitude you are, and other factors.

[Culture20]

If I lived in such a world, mid-afternoon could very well be the point at which you really start to fear; "am I close to a city? can I dig a shelter here? Does this location have long shadows until late in the morning?" Unless the PCs are underground, they will be watching the sun/daytime-clouds religiously. For outdoor travel, asking the players their standard operating procedure would make sense. If they break camp at sunrise and stop every day at noon to make a new defensible shelter through the afternoon, then you work that into your story.

[Erik-Stoney]

Thanks so much. Thanks for the blurb on time.

I'm thinking I may get a little paper clock and hang it on the front of my GM screen and change it when needed. Then blow the horn. I want to make time moving subtle and something they have to keep track of. So the clock will do that.

You all helped a lot!

It's a modern setting. The creatures are in all shadows so people will have to have so many lights in their houses that there are few to no shadows.

[Anaraxes]

The clock is a great idea. Wonder if you could get one with hands or a knob on back, so you could just reach up and adjust it as needed without drawing a lot of attention to it (as with picking it up to fiddle with it).

Oh... and Gygax's point isn't really far off. Time is a game resource, and games are about allocating resources. If a resource is infinite / untracked, then there are no interesting choices to be made about it. And of course D&D and dungeon crawling in particular has a large component of resource tracking -- time, ammunition, food, spell slots... it's all about pacing and endurance in that dungeon. A game where the wizard shows up for every fight with all spell slots full is different from one where the wizard has to ration out those trump cards across an unknown number of fights in a series.

I'd certainly agree that it's not something you generally need to obsess over to the the point of having Time Use Sheets (ahem) and a chapter of rules detailing calculations for many seconds every activity takes. Most of the game time is going to pass with the GM just declaring how long things take, which is tantamount to declaring when night falls. Just make sure the players know that winter^H^H^H^H^H^H night is coming, and give them some choices that means they get to risk carrying on past dusk if they like for matters of some importance, or instead choose to play it safe.

[Dalin]

Originally Posted by Erik-Stoney

It's a modern setting. The creatures are in all shadows so people will have to have so many lights in their houses that there are few to no shadows.

This sounds deliciously creepy! I can imagine this would change the way houses are furnished, too. No shadowy places under beds or there really will be monsters there.

As others have said, I wouldn't obsess over exactly how long things take. The players just need to know that daylight is limited and you can give them rough estimates of time required for various activities. As sundown approaches, they will get nervous, I'm sure.

Originally Posted by Anaraxes

The clock is a great idea. Wonder if you could get one with hands or a knob on back, so you could just reach up and adjust it as needed without drawing a lot of attention to it (as with picking it up to fiddle with it).

I bet they make clocks like this for elementary school teachers who need to teach kids how to read clocks.