How fast would a Caravan travel from Waterdeep to Silverymoon [Archive] - Wizards Community

How fast would a Caravan travel from Waterdeep to Silverymoon [Archive] - Wizards Community

Post/Author/DateTime Post
Chronomage
05-25-04, 11:07 PM In my campaign, the PCs will be hired to attack a caravan traveling from Waterdeep to Silverymoon. As I begin planning the Adventure I came to realize that Time in game will be a constraint and a reason for the players to hurry. I haven't yet determined the exact route they will travel so suggestions would be happily recieved. Also, I'm curious about a couple of things:

How big is your average Faerunian caravan in the north? The only caravans I'm familiar with came from Zakhara and usually numbered hundreds of merchants, retainers, guards and the like, and double that in camels. In Faerun I was thinking much smaller numbers and fewer horses but I don't know the real world numbers on that.

How fast do the caravans travel, on average, on average terrain before modifiers?

Can you think of any likely routes where it's easy to derail the track with some disaster (like an avalanche) to force the caravan to take a more dangerous yet quicker route? A LIKELY quicker route, as I don't see ANY caravan heading through the Evermoors.

I saw somewhere that a specific trade route was 600 miles in the journey, but now I can't find where I saw that (maybe Silver Marches or the FRCS?), and it didn't say what the route was anyway.
Autosponge
05-25-04, 11:27 PM Here's what I did.

Used the speed of a wagon/cart. Charted the route from Waterdeep to Silverymoon going through Triboar then on the South side of the Trollmoors to Everlund then up the riverbank to Silverymoon. This was 117 hexes of 6-miles each (~702 miles). I crossed 14 hexes that were hills and 103 that were open grasslands with road in every hex. With good weather, you could expect that trip to take 351 hours (43 days 7 hours), about 16 miles a day (traveling 8 hours a day).

If the caravan can somehow change horses along the way, or continually heal them, they could force march the critters and make the journey shorter (just 1 force marched hour each day shortens the trip to 39 days).

If they had constructs or undead pulling the carts/wagons then you wouldn't have to stop really at all (14 days, 15 hours).

Other than the charting of the course, my spreadsheet does all these calculations.
Kuje31
05-25-04, 11:54 PM The old sourcebooks listed the route.... It should be in Waterdeep & The North......
Chronomage
05-26-04, 02:38 AM That might be where I saw it. Thanks, Autosponge, that was a lot of computing you handled there. I imagine that the caravan will add perhaps two tendays or more to that, as they intend to stop and trade in some towns.
Chronomage
05-26-04, 03:38 AM Originally posted by Autosponge
Here's what I did.

Used the speed of a wagon/cart. Charted the route from Waterdeep to Silverymoon going through Triboar then on the South side of the Trollmoors to Everlund then up the riverbank to Silverymoon. This was 117 hexes of 6-miles each (~702 miles). I crossed 14 hexes that were hills and 103 that were open grasslands with road in every hex. With good weather, you could expect that trip to take 351 hours (43 days 7 hours), about 16 miles a day (traveling 8 hours a day).

If the caravan can somehow change horses along the way, or continually heal them, they could force march the critters and make the journey shorter (just 1 force marched hour each day shortens the trip to 39 days).

If they had constructs or undead pulling the carts/wagons then you wouldn't have to stop really at all (14 days, 15 hours).

Other than the charting of the course, my spreadsheet does all these calculations.

BTW, Autosponge, where did you get your map? The only ones I have come from my 3rd edition and 3.5 stuff, and I didn't see any hexes. Are you using 2nd eds and if so, where from (boxed set, book, whatever)?
Nightchill
05-26-04, 03:42 AM The maps in the 2nd ed boxed set came with a transparent hex grid overlay iirc.
Kuje31
05-26-04, 03:46 AM Originally posted by Nightchill
The maps in the 2nd ed boxed set came with a transparent hex grid overlay iirc.

Aye, many of the 2e box sets had those. :)
Chronomage
05-26-04, 07:42 AM Hmm, for me I have to use string to chart out a course, and than compare it's length to the miles per inch thingy. Ah well.
Faraer
05-26-04, 09:02 AM City of Splendors: Campaign Guide p. 103 (but read the whole Trade & Travel appendix), cumulative times: up the Long Road: 7 days to Red Larch, +6 days to Triboar; along the Evermoor Way +2 days to Yartar, +13 days to Everlund, +5 days to Silverymoon. This allows for normal caravan stops.

The main source on the composition, organization, procedures, and culture of trade caravans is Ed's novel Hand of Fire.
Chronomage
05-27-04, 12:55 AM Those numbers, are they including time spent trading at each of the towns that matter?
Monsoon28
05-27-04, 06:56 AM You might also want to factor in time for possible problems like a horse braking a leg or getting a spur, Broken wagon wheels (caravans usually carry spares), sicknesses that spread (a good influzena), or other unforseen problems (like other raiders/bandits).

Your party can arrive at a point on time and still end up waiting a week extra for a caravan to arrive.

Just some ideas.
Chronomage
05-27-04, 07:47 AM Wouldn't that be funny if some random encounter bandits showed up just as the PCs were mulling the problem over? :rofl:
Faraer
05-27-04, 09:24 AM My guess is the numbers include ordinary waystops for resupply and a small amount of trading, but not major negotiations or unloading of most of the goods.
Autosponge
05-27-04, 09:41 PM The calculations I made were based on 2nd ed maps. But based on those maps, those are probably the most accurate calculations you're likely to find. The base calc takes in 8 hours of travel a day, there is plenty of time for stopping and such and still get 8 hours a night of shut-eye.

Obviously, you can see where some pragmatic spellcasters can cut tendays off a long journey and thus make more trips, sell more goods, respond to orders quicker, etc. The pressure to keep up with those merchants is what makes mundane merchants take great risks (at the time they didn't seem so great). "Cutting corners" the old fashion way can lead to problems (read adventure).

So just from reasoning out some travel calculations you can come up with a dozen small adventures.
dragonheart
05-30-04, 10:41 AM Probably the best way to figure the travel times is to compare to real trips - in the old west in the US a wagontrain (caravan) made at best 15 miles/day. in bad weather and other interuptions that could drop to 0 and in mountain terrain it was more like 5 miles/day at best. wagontrains left Moussouri during march april and may to make it to the west coast about 1500 miles away by september or october.
Chronomage
05-30-04, 02:37 PM Just found where I saw the list of trade routes, it's on pg. 85 of the Silver Marches, under Trade and Travel. Lists the distance as 600 miles by the Evermoor Way and the Long Road.

600 miles, hrmm...

600/20 miles per day in optimum conditions = 30 days.

Now, assume that 20 miles is the best and there will be variances in terrain, inclement weather, wagon and horse problems, stopping in towns to do major trading, say at 3-5 stops, and we could be looking at a 5 tenday trip, give or take a d4 of days. Excellent, excellent. MOST excellent.
Monsoon28
05-30-04, 06:40 PM You might want to recalculate...Dragonheart was pretty much correct on the 15 miles/day. PHB p.164 lists carts and wagons at 16 miles/day. This changes the BEST possible time to 37 and a half days.
Secondly is 600 miles total travel distance or distance from WD to SM? Since roads/trails may practically double-back on hills and inhospitable regions.
Gimric
06-06-04, 01:47 AM Originally posted by Monsoon28
You might want to recalculate...Dragonheart was pretty much correct on the 15 miles/day. PHB p.164 lists carts and wagons at 16 miles/day. This changes the BEST possible time to 37 and a half days.
Secondly is 600 miles total travel distance or distance from WD to SM? Since roads/trails may practically double-back on hills and inhospitable regions.

Yep that 600 miles sounds like an straight direction, not how the trails would actually go... actual travel distance is much more! I can't find my FR Atlas to check it but I suspect they used the straitline distances between the two. (I know, I am relying on an evil out-of-date product. ;) Doesn't mean it is not the best thing out there though, IMNSHO.)
Evandar_TAybara
06-06-04, 07:08 AM Using my electronic map distance measuring tool on the fold out map from the 3.0 FRCS, gives the road distance for Waterdeep to Silverymoon as 530 miles. As this is much less than the numbers quoted above, am I to assume that the scale of Faerūn has changed from 2nd to 3rd edition?

Evan.

EDIT: I double checked by taking the same readings on the map on page 174 (taking into account the errata changing of the scale on that map) and came up with pretty much the same result (535 miles).
Monsoon28
06-06-04, 08:34 AM Yup, 2nd edition Faerun was notably larger than it is today.

And of coarse many prefer to use the original maps, as the new ones leave some people feeling a 'little crowded'.
Gimric
06-06-04, 10:14 PM Originally posted by Monsoon28
Yup, 2nd edition Faerun was notably larger than it is today.

And of coarse many prefer to use the original maps, as the new ones leave some people feeling a 'little crowded'.

Yeah I just got mine out and double checked... I agree with that distace straitline it is around 530 miles.

Taking "The Long Road" to Triboar is about 340 miles then another 57 to Yartar on a side road. Another 225 miles through plains, skirting the Evermoors, to Everlund. Then from Everlund to Silverymoon about another 80 miles. Which makes it a total about 645... So the Silver Marches book is off by 7.5% to the minus by the FR Interactive Atlas... (And I did not do all straight line distances, following roads and such...) But there is some non-trail travel which would extend the number of travel days.

Post/Author/DateTime	Post
Chronomage 05-25-04, 11:07 PM	In my campaign, the PCs will be hired to attack a caravan traveling from Waterdeep to Silverymoon. As I begin planning the Adventure I came to realize that Time in game will be a constraint and a reason for the players to hurry. I haven't yet determined the exact route they will travel so suggestions would be happily recieved. Also, I'm curious about a couple of things: How big is your average Faerunian caravan in the north? The only caravans I'm familiar with came from Zakhara and usually numbered hundreds of merchants, retainers, guards and the like, and double that in camels. In Faerun I was thinking much smaller numbers and fewer horses but I don't know the real world numbers on that. How fast do the caravans travel, on average, on average terrain before modifiers? Can you think of any likely routes where it's easy to derail the track with some disaster (like an avalanche) to force the caravan to take a more dangerous yet quicker route? A LIKELY quicker route, as I don't see ANY caravan heading through the Evermoors. I saw somewhere that a specific trade route was 600 miles in the journey, but now I can't find where I saw that (maybe Silver Marches or the FRCS?), and it didn't say what the route was anyway.
Autosponge 05-25-04, 11:27 PM	Here's what I did. Used the speed of a wagon/cart. Charted the route from Waterdeep to Silverymoon going through Triboar then on the South side of the Trollmoors to Everlund then up the riverbank to Silverymoon. This was 117 hexes of 6-miles each (~702 miles). I crossed 14 hexes that were hills and 103 that were open grasslands with road in every hex. With good weather, you could expect that trip to take 351 hours (43 days 7 hours), about 16 miles a day (traveling 8 hours a day). If the caravan can somehow change horses along the way, or continually heal them, they could force march the critters and make the journey shorter (just 1 force marched hour each day shortens the trip to 39 days). If they had constructs or undead pulling the carts/wagons then you wouldn't have to stop really at all (14 days, 15 hours). Other than the charting of the course, my spreadsheet does all these calculations.
Kuje31 05-25-04, 11:54 PM	The old sourcebooks listed the route.... It should be in Waterdeep & The North......
Chronomage 05-26-04, 02:38 AM	That might be where I saw it. Thanks, Autosponge, that was a lot of computing you handled there. I imagine that the caravan will add perhaps two tendays or more to that, as they intend to stop and trade in some towns.
Chronomage 05-26-04, 03:38 AM	Originally posted by Autosponge Here's what I did. Used the speed of a wagon/cart. Charted the route from Waterdeep to Silverymoon going through Triboar then on the South side of the Trollmoors to Everlund then up the riverbank to Silverymoon. This was 117 hexes of 6-miles each (~702 miles). I crossed 14 hexes that were hills and 103 that were open grasslands with road in every hex. With good weather, you could expect that trip to take 351 hours (43 days 7 hours), about 16 miles a day (traveling 8 hours a day). If the caravan can somehow change horses along the way, or continually heal them, they could force march the critters and make the journey shorter (just 1 force marched hour each day shortens the trip to 39 days). If they had constructs or undead pulling the carts/wagons then you wouldn't have to stop really at all (14 days, 15 hours). Other than the charting of the course, my spreadsheet does all these calculations. BTW, Autosponge, where did you get your map? The only ones I have come from my 3rd edition and 3.5 stuff, and I didn't see any hexes. Are you using 2nd eds and if so, where from (boxed set, book, whatever)?
Nightchill 05-26-04, 03:42 AM	The maps in the 2nd ed boxed set came with a transparent hex grid overlay iirc.
Kuje31 05-26-04, 03:46 AM	Originally posted by Nightchill The maps in the 2nd ed boxed set came with a transparent hex grid overlay iirc. Aye, many of the 2e box sets had those. :)
Chronomage 05-26-04, 07:42 AM	Hmm, for me I have to use string to chart out a course, and than compare it's length to the miles per inch thingy. Ah well.
Faraer 05-26-04, 09:02 AM	City of Splendors: Campaign Guide p. 103 (but read the whole Trade & Travel appendix), cumulative times: up the Long Road: 7 days to Red Larch, +6 days to Triboar; along the Evermoor Way +2 days to Yartar, +13 days to Everlund, +5 days to Silverymoon. This allows for normal caravan stops. The main source on the composition, organization, procedures, and culture of trade caravans is Ed's novel Hand of Fire.
Chronomage 05-27-04, 12:55 AM	Those numbers, are they including time spent trading at each of the towns that matter?
Monsoon28 05-27-04, 06:56 AM	You might also want to factor in time for possible problems like a horse braking a leg or getting a spur, Broken wagon wheels (caravans usually carry spares), sicknesses that spread (a good influzena), or other unforseen problems (like other raiders/bandits). Your party can arrive at a point on time and still end up waiting a week extra for a caravan to arrive. Just some ideas.
Chronomage 05-27-04, 07:47 AM	Wouldn't that be funny if some random encounter bandits showed up just as the PCs were mulling the problem over? :rofl:
Faraer 05-27-04, 09:24 AM	My guess is the numbers include ordinary waystops for resupply and a small amount of trading, but not major negotiations or unloading of most of the goods.
Autosponge 05-27-04, 09:41 PM	The calculations I made were based on 2nd ed maps. But based on those maps, those are probably the most accurate calculations you're likely to find. The base calc takes in 8 hours of travel a day, there is plenty of time for stopping and such and still get 8 hours a night of shut-eye. Obviously, you can see where some pragmatic spellcasters can cut tendays off a long journey and thus make more trips, sell more goods, respond to orders quicker, etc. The pressure to keep up with those merchants is what makes mundane merchants take great risks (at the time they didn't seem so great). "Cutting corners" the old fashion way can lead to problems (read adventure). So just from reasoning out some travel calculations you can come up with a dozen small adventures.
dragonheart 05-30-04, 10:41 AM	Probably the best way to figure the travel times is to compare to real trips - in the old west in the US a wagontrain (caravan) made at best 15 miles/day. in bad weather and other interuptions that could drop to 0 and in mountain terrain it was more like 5 miles/day at best. wagontrains left Moussouri during march april and may to make it to the west coast about 1500 miles away by september or october.
Chronomage 05-30-04, 02:37 PM	Just found where I saw the list of trade routes, it's on pg. 85 of the Silver Marches, under Trade and Travel. Lists the distance as 600 miles by the Evermoor Way and the Long Road. 600 miles, hrmm... 600/20 miles per day in optimum conditions = 30 days. Now, assume that 20 miles is the best and there will be variances in terrain, inclement weather, wagon and horse problems, stopping in towns to do major trading, say at 3-5 stops, and we could be looking at a 5 tenday trip, give or take a d4 of days. Excellent, excellent. MOST excellent.
Monsoon28 05-30-04, 06:40 PM	You might want to recalculate...Dragonheart was pretty much correct on the 15 miles/day. PHB p.164 lists carts and wagons at 16 miles/day. This changes the BEST possible time to 37 and a half days. Secondly is 600 miles total travel distance or distance from WD to SM? Since roads/trails may practically double-back on hills and inhospitable regions.
Gimric 06-06-04, 01:47 AM	Originally posted by Monsoon28 You might want to recalculate...Dragonheart was pretty much correct on the 15 miles/day. PHB p.164 lists carts and wagons at 16 miles/day. This changes the BEST possible time to 37 and a half days. Secondly is 600 miles total travel distance or distance from WD to SM? Since roads/trails may practically double-back on hills and inhospitable regions. Yep that 600 miles sounds like an straight direction, not how the trails would actually go... actual travel distance is much more! I can't find my FR Atlas to check it but I suspect they used the straitline distances between the two. (I know, I am relying on an evil out-of-date product. ;) Doesn't mean it is not the best thing out there though, IMNSHO.)
Evandar_TAybara 06-06-04, 07:08 AM	Using my electronic map distance measuring tool on the fold out map from the 3.0 FRCS, gives the road distance for Waterdeep to Silverymoon as 530 miles. As this is much less than the numbers quoted above, am I to assume that the scale of Faerūn has changed from 2nd to 3rd edition? Evan. EDIT: I double checked by taking the same readings on the map on page 174 (taking into account the errata changing of the scale on that map) and came up with pretty much the same result (535 miles).
Monsoon28 06-06-04, 08:34 AM	Yup, 2nd edition Faerun was notably larger than it is today. And of coarse many prefer to use the original maps, as the new ones leave some people feeling a 'little crowded'.
Gimric 06-06-04, 10:14 PM	Originally posted by Monsoon28 Yup, 2nd edition Faerun was notably larger than it is today. And of coarse many prefer to use the original maps, as the new ones leave some people feeling a 'little crowded'. Yeah I just got mine out and double checked... I agree with that distace straitline it is around 530 miles. Taking "The Long Road" to Triboar is about 340 miles then another 57 to Yartar on a side road. Another 225 miles through plains, skirting the Evermoors, to Everlund. Then from Everlund to Silverymoon about another 80 miles. Which makes it a total about 645... So the Silver Marches book is off by 7.5% to the minus by the FR Interactive Atlas... (And I did not do all straight line distances, following roads and such...) But there is some non-trail travel which would extend the number of travel days.