What happens while the characters are plodding along the king’s roads connecting towns and cities in fairly populated lands? These encounters are intended for roads where the heroes are more likely to meet other travellers than wildlife or monsters.
This table is designed for a European inspired fantasy set in a technological and cultural age equivalent to the Middle Ages up to the Early Modern Period (ca. 1100-1750 AD.).
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The road winds its way past an ancient oak or yew with heavy branches decorated with scraps of cloth in all colours as well as small figures of injured or sick people—there may even be a couple of crutches abandoned by its roots. Local legend holds that if one crawls through the hole in the tree at midnight, one is cured of all ailments. True? Who knows?A well armed, grizzled mercenary travels in the same direction as the characters. He appears to be quite chatty and asks a lot of questions; he is actually a bounty hunter, trying to establish whether any of the characters are the mark he’s been sent to bring back dead or alive. If they're notorious enough one of them likely are, and the bounty hunter will bide his time until he can call down friends or authorities upon the heroes, rather than fight them one against three or more.
Alert heroes may notice tracks along the side of the road and in turn discover the naked bodies of a small group of men. A while further down the road they are approached by what appears to be armed soldiers or guards, demanding to search their goods. These are highway robbers who stole the soldiers’ uniforms to be able to exact tolls ‘legally’.
A wandering preacher may swap a bit of healing or knowledge for a warm meal at the characters’ campfire.
A horse grazes by the side of the road, its rider having fainted and fallen out of the saddle. Sick or injured, the rider now lies unconscious in the grass.
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