foyrkopp

Thanks for writing that down, that could indeed work out fairly well quite reliably.

I'd argue that, as far as those terms are being generally understood in the community, this isn't railroading - it's a linear adventure.

Railroading ignores player choice and agency ("You want to liberate the princess before attempting to destroy the Death Star? No, you find out security is too tight and return to the rebel base to prep the final assault, no discussion allowed.")

A linear adventure is just a scenario where the order of encounters is fixed - a race, a linear dungeon or a scenario where the party are employees of the king and get just assigned to missions are good examples of this. It's the opposite of a sandbox, but it works perfectly well and is an excellent choice for newer DMs or more time-constrained tables.

As long as everyone is fine with this and player choice within those encounters still matters, it's not railroading (in the sense the term is usually used.)

I've just made the plunge myself, and so far, it's been going well (got matches, crowbar & maglens, am no longer freezing to death, on my way to the Mysterious Signal Fire right now).

Here's what helped me

• Seconding @[email protected] 's advice, Zak's videos are a godsend to get a grip on the Loper mindset (and general efficiency in TLD).
• You need to be able to handle wolves without fighting - Walk the Dog and the Torch+Aim-Scare being most crucial here. Zak has a great video on the latter, I've written about the former here
• Personally, I avoid looking up loot tables, but I did read up where the guaranteed match spawns are. To my mind, there is little point (nor fun) in repeatedly freezing to death until you've stumbled on your first pack, so I decided to skip that part.
• Depending on where you start, formulate a plan quickly. What do you want to do first, where do you need to go? Be ready to adapt that plan if circumstances change, though - if you're on your way to a known bedroll & hammer spawn, but find the hammer on the way, it might be worth it to just skip straight to smithing and then go bear hunting.
• Map knowledge is key - it might be a tad frustrating if you're not there yet, but having explored all non-timberwolf maps on lower difficulties made a ton of difference in both formulating and executing said plan for me. Hushed River Valley was the worst pain to explore (I did it on Voyageur, decked myself out in satchel + backpack + full fur clothing for easier repairing and then spent quite a lot of time there before getting a grip on the map), but it was well worth it.

Here's my "general" game plan for Interloper:

Things to keep in mind "on the way":

• You don't want to start by thoroughly cleaning out map by map - at the beginning of interloper, you're pressed for time and want to focus on high-return-of-invest activities until you're sufficiently kitted out. It's absolutely worth it to make a quick detour for a loot hot spot, but leave the small stuff for later and keep moving.
• As long as you don't have a bedroll (or are en route to a guaranteed spawn), plan your routes around known beds. Theoretically, you can sleep in cars / snow shelters if you can keep a fire going, but wind is always a fickle mistress.
• Grab some cloth and craft some bandages early for emergencies.
• If you're not insanely lucky and find gloves & hat early, grab some more cloth to craft improvised wraps if your frostbite risk goes too high (and you've found a suitable tool)
• If you don't have enough food, it's usually worth it to make a quick detour to a cat tail field
• Getting some rabbit hide & guts curing early will speed up crafting later - the same goes for deer hides from carcasses (although those usually require a fire), and saplings (as soon as you find a hacksaw)

Ordered ToDo list:

• head to the nearest match spawn
• go hunting for a hammer ^1^
• go smithing & craft two bows + sufficient arrows, hatchet & knife
• get enough guts & hides curing for a crafting binge later (don't spend too long looking for a moose, you'll stumble upon one naturally eventually)
• head to Ash Canyon for the Technical Backpack and maybe swing by the Summit, although the latter doesn't have that much great loper loot
• crafting binge
• go hunting for a maglens and a moose if you haven't found them yet

^1^ There's a guaranteed hammer and bedroll in:

This is the way.

On the other hand, though, there’s a huge gap in the power level between feats, and I’m not sure I’d necessarily feel the same way if the feat chosen was Shield Master, which is one of the weaker of the full feats. I might also be more inclined to set aside a list of the more flavourful feats like Chef that the players could just get for free without the associated ability boost and let the players just pick one for free as character building.

On that, I agree and I've explicitly done exactly that. In hindsight, the option to boost a main stat with a "Ribbon" half feat to 18 was still a tad too strong, but that can be easily house ruled along the lines of

At character creation, every PC can choose a feat from (list). If a half feat is chosen, it's Ability Score Increase can't be used to achieve a total character creation Ability Score Increase of more than +2.

When pre-generating, I mostly focus on the mechanical build - I tend to come up with the actual person once I know about the setting and campaign theme.

That being said:

Scout Ranger (utility archer)

Half-Elf Fey Wanderer 5 / Scout Rogue X (Sharpshooter)

Idea: Sacrifice 5 Rogue levels for Archery FS, Extra Attack, additional skills/expertise, WIS-to-CHA checks and a smattering of really useful spells like Goodberry, Pass Without Trace, Speak with Animals and Misty Step.

What's Cool:

• eventual proficiency in 12 out of 18 skills and Expertise in 5 (later: 7) of those.
• between Cunning Action (Hide), Steady Aim + Skirmisher and Zephyr Strike, the build can reliably achieve advantage and/or mobility
• avoids the hand crossbow meta

What Sucks:

• Several core skills are locked behind both subclasses, so one would either have to go without those for long stretches or negotiate with the DM about "retraining" skills.
• Rogues wonky multiclassing rules (starts with 4 skills, but only gets 1 when MCing in) means we either start with Rogue 1, delaying Extra Attack to lvl 6, or loose out on one skill
• The build plays mostly like a standard Ranger (or slightly worse at lvl 5, if we started with Rogue) until lvl 8.

Halfling "Blademaster" Barbarian

This is a Halfling mostly because it won't work with VHuman/CLineage (stats would be too lousy), I love the race/class combination and this is a rare Barbarian build that doesn't run on heavy weapons. However, it needs the (fairly common) house rule that either flat-out removes the exhaustion cost from Frenzy or at least mitigates it with a (progressively harder) CON save.

Halfling Berserker Barbarian 8 / Fighter 4 / War Mage 2 (Stats: 14+2/14/13+1/13/11/8)

Idea: Stack Rage's and Dueling FS' damage bonus on a build with a BA attack for high & reliable damage with solid defense (GWM can't wear a shield and is either more swingy or more vulnerable), then throw War Mage's Arcane Deflection on top for save protection / even more defense.

What's Cool:

• a Barbarian that doesn't need to rely on Reckless Attack and can wear a shield will be very durable
• combining a BA attack and a flat +4 damage bonus will add up very quickly, and we don't need to stomach a -5 to attack to do it
• we can pick up virtually any magical one handed melee weapon we find
• on-demand +4 to saves / +2 to AC is huge
• we haven't even decided upon a Fighter Subclass yet, so there's room for some additional goodies

What Sucks

• a limited amount of Rages that need a BA to start and will run out whenever we spend a turn not actively fighting
• our second & third ASI will be delayed by quite a bit (recommended order would be Barb 1 > Fighter 1 > Barb 5 > War Mage 2 > Barb 8 > Fighter 4)
• can't be run without the aformentioned house rule - with how thin the stats are stretched, a PAM VHuman/CLineage just can't afford 13 INT
• arguably, a Hoplite Hexadin would be flat-out better, with fewer downsides, smoother progression and decent spellcasting

No-House-Rule-Versions:

• Can be run with a Path of the Beast Barb if your DM agrees that you're not "wielding" an off-hand Form of the Beast claw as long as said hand is wielding a shield, but loses out on the weapon flexibility for a fixed d6 weapon.
• Otherwise: CLineage (14+2/14/14/8/13/9 + PAM) would be relegated to a spear and be forced to replace the War Mage dip with Resilient (WIS). (Yes, technically, one could run INT 13 / WIS 9, but running with a -1 modifier to WIS saves for most of one's career seems... unwise.)

Most people have (including me), it's designed that way.

Unpopular opinion: This is a good thing. Having to make meaningful choices with a cost (even if it's just an opportunity cost) is a core part of what makes this an actual game.

19 STR and 15 CHA.

Take +1 to both.

As a DM, I decide when an action warrants a roll.

Actions that don't actually carry a risk when failing don't fall into this category.

So no, trying to pick your training padlock won't net you a roll. Trying to pickpocket in the marketplace will, but there's some definitive consequences attached to failure.

Fortunately, I've got a table of rather mature players, so this isn't a problem to begin with.

I've adopted the "you get Inspiration whenever you roll a nat 1" idea that the playtest floated for a while and it's turned out well.

I think that the "official" way of granting inspiration (grant when players play well into their PC's character traits) is a horrible design that both fails to achieve what it sets out to do and is both highly subjective & continuously forgotten.

The nat 1 approach doesn't break any other system, reliably hands out a small trickle of Inspiration just the way the original was supposed to do and requires little to no work.

I'm somewhat tempted to introduce QoL features like "you can hold two" or "you can use them to reroll", but part of me likes how it's a limited tactical resource rather than a safety net.