A labyrinthian temple, a hostile dreadnought, or an abandoned space station; your adventures might lead you to locales too big to map out in traditional battle maps.
These environments will have an Alert level - an abstract measure that notes the degree to which the opposing creatures in this location are aware of the party's presence.
The general idea of these locations is that the opposing force is overwhelming and stealth is key, because actually alerting all enemies would provide overwhelming odds.
Raising The Alert Level
Certain actions raise the Alert level. This increase can be by 1, 1d6, 10 - whatever the action itself entails. The DM will generally let players know if an action can result in an increase in Alert increase. Some examples are:
- Searching a room for loot in situations where stealth is of the essence.
- The DM might offer a choice: "Make a WIS Test if you want to search the room. If you fail, you might still find some loot, but will generate noise in the process.". The player accepts and fails, and rolls 1d6 - a 6. "As you search the cupboards, you accidentally bump against a collection of glass beakers on the nearby countertop. The sound of shattering glass echoes across the halls."
- Knocking out guards or leaving other signs of entry such as forced doors or broken glass.
- Firing a blaster and destroying the environment.
- Making a slicing attempt on a secure terminal.
Raising the Alert Level isn't a problem in and of itself - it signifies the cumulative noise and traces the party has left. The real problems start when an Alert Test is triggered.
Alert Tests
Alert Tests are generally triggered by big, loud actions, such as:
- Tripping a security alarm
- Failing to slice a secure terminal
- Blowing something up
- Ending up in a loud fight
This generally means facing an enemy response, based on the location and type of enemy that inhabits it. The DM rolls on the appropriate response table, which takes the current Alert Level into account. Tripping an alarm without previous incidents might cause a patrol to be sent to check the party out; blowing up a fuel supply after having left a trail of destruction already makes a larger response far more likely.
Really big actions, such as destroying a vital fuel depot, will have a proportionate increase in Alert Level before the Alert Test is made.