Why Keep a Calendar?

Back in our post Importance of Calendar (probably needed an extra “a” in there), we kind of went on generically about how a calendar allows you to figure out what season you’re in, what holidays and events are coming up, and how much to charge your PCs for stabling horses, etc.  That’s all important stuff, but when there’s a war going on, the calendar becomes a lot more important!

Let’s just use the Holy War of Fletnern for an example.  On 10/20/658P, a “space golem” crashed into a 30’d metal disc (“shield”) suspended in the sky over the town of Zembmior and the Holy War was on.

No matter what the PCs are doing in the campaign, there is a matter of time before they will be able to take certain advantages.  For example, there was a smelter nearby, but he couldn’t handle the bulk of the ore in his little portable smelter.  Plus, after the pieces of the space golem were smelted for their metal, that metal has to be worked.  So there is a time frame when the players can start to get a hold of adamant steel gauntlets, and later other adamant steel items, but not before.

An angel of death bled into some bandages.  Those bandages were rushed to the city of Helatia where the angel blood was added to healing potions.  But the players can only get the super powered healing potions if they go to Helatia after the alchemists have had a chance to work on the potions.

The Senate of Helatia banished the Warriors of the Faith from the city after their soldiers attacked several local villages.  So up to a certain date the WotF were based in the cathedral they had built in Helatia, but after that they needed to go elsewhere.  This will be a major impact to any allies of the WotF trying to find them in Helatia.

It’s a war.  There are battles going on in different areas.  Often, there are patrols from the competing sides out in the countryside.  That means allies could have help, and enemies will be attacked.  Knowing what day it is so you (as GM) know where the enemy patrols are is vitally important for running the campaign.

We glossed over the Miracle at Zembmior earlier, but the day of the collision, there were ore and shield shards scattered all over the area.  But it was less than a couple of days later that armed bands tried to snatch up as much of the metal and ore as they could.  A week later, there was even less.  As GM, you need your calendar or you don’t know what day it is and you don’t know what the debris field looks like right now.

Being able to track where important people or units are is important to the game.  If reinforcements are coming, then as GM, you need to know when they arrive.  Can the PCs attack before the reinforcements get there?  Can the reinforcements get to a village before the enemy does?  If the PCs are defending, how long must they hold out?  Do they have food and water in order to do that?  You can’t really run a siege if you don’t know how much food they have or how long it will last them.

Calendars are vital in any campaign in hopes of keeping some manner of order.  They are so much more important in a complicated story line like a war where distances between places and the number of hours or days it takes to travel really count.  Maybe not everything needs to be recorded on the calendar, but knowing the order of things and the time passing is incredibly important to your sanity.

This post was written as part of the soon to be released Paladin vs. Paladin aka All About Holy Wars, the latest in our Small Bites editions.  Each Small Bites book looks deeply at one subject, a character archetype, a race/monster, a style of questing, or some other role-playing/world building subject.  This one details everything having to do with paladins aka holy knights as well as the holy wars they fight in, even if those wars are against other paladins (which is when they are the most fun!).

To get the full Game Masters’ edition when it is published, you will need to be a part of our Patreon project.  There will be no free version of this edition.  Seeing as this is a double sized edition (at least over 80 pages) and the culmination of most of the last year (plus) of Small Bites editions, anyone who has been getting involved in our Small Bites project is going to want to have this edition.  Interested?  Click the link here.