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Waypoints

Overview

Waypoints presents a reusable adventure structure: hidden or ruined installations scattered across the landscape that, once repaired or linked, become campaign infrastructure rather than one-off treasure sites.

Core Modules

  • Mapping: long-range geography and nearby point-of-interest display.
  • Environmental: clean food, air, and water support.
  • Medical: accelerated healing and severe injury recovery.
  • Linking: register characters and establish network access.
  • Cache: shared extradimensional storage.
  • Transport: travel between linked waypoints.

Structural Model

The source implies a repeatable six-floor installation layout that can be dropped into many biomes:

  1. Ground floor: Environmental controls and power-source access.
  2. Second floor: Medical alcoves and diagnostics.
  3. Third floor: Habitation and staging space.
  4. Fourth floor: Mapping and linking consoles.
  5. Fifth floor: Field projector and cache/transport access.
  6. Core systems: power source and module condition determine what is online.

This creates a useful prep pattern: each waypoint is both a location to explore and a strategic node that changes the travel map after activation.

Activation and Degradation Procedure

The source includes a condition generator suitable for campaign setup or mid-campaign discovery:

  • Roll 6d6 and assign dice (highest to lowest) across Mapping -> Transport to set module condition.
  • Condition bands run from 1 (near-destroyed) to 6 (fully intact).
  • If doubles appear, roll an event (squatters, predator lair, repurposed module, missing module, etc.).
  • If triples appear, roll replacement power source (water wheel, magical crystal, crank, bio-engine, bottled ghost, etc.).
  • If no triples appear, original power source has failed and modules start offline.

Table-Facing Uses

  • Exploration reward conversion: discovering a waypoint grants infrastructure, not just treasure.
  • Route planning game: players prioritize which nodes to repair first based on module benefits.
  • Faction pressure: active waypoints become magnets for settlement, raiders, and political claims.
  • Risk pacing: damaged modules preserve uncertainty even after a waypoint is found.

Integration Notes

  • For B/X-like travel: pair mapping + transport unlocks with encounter checks so mobility gains do not erase wilderness risk.
  • For post-collapse campaigns: make spare parts and power media primary expedition objectives.
  • For science-fantasy tone: treat module failures as both technical and mythic (ritual controls, strange AI behavior, haunted systems).

Design Value

Waypoints are compelling because they turn exploration rewards into infrastructure rewards. They can seed travel networks, safehouses, and strategic objectives in science-fantasy or post-collapse campaigns.

See Also