Pirates of the Visutula

[Raellus]

Is wrecking the tug worth getting to Warsaw quicker? That's the decision that you'll have to make as Adam.

Travelling at night is going to be more dangerous. It'll be harder to spot obstacles. Using the tug's lights to mitigate this danger is going to make her a conspicuous target in the dark, another risk to consider. NVGs are a compromise, but if you've ever used them, you'll know depth and peripheral vision are somewhat compromised making it difficult to pick out obstacles. The monochrome sight picture presented by most military NVGs also makes it difficult to pick out subtle differences in terrain. I would think that this would be even more pronounced for moving water. And then there's the issue of eye strain from prolonged usage of NVGs. As a GM, I would increase the frequency of observation checks and random obstacle rolls if/when the party travelled at night. My players made the decision fairly early on not to travel far or fast at night.

The next major decision you need to make is what the local conditions are in the regions that the tug will be passing through. I tried to mix it up. A few areas were relatively safe, others were empty, many were controlled by enemy forces or bandits, some were home to x factor groups- neither obviously friendly nor openly hostile to the PCs. This created a lot of variety and kept things unpredictable which, to my mind is a good thing. I think that my players mostly enjoyed it as well. This will take some work on your part. The module provides some decent details on the game world between Krakow and Warsaw, but since I knew that a lot of my players had already played P.o.t.V., I made some minor but significant changes to the module materials in order to keep my campaign fresh and suspenseful.

To do determine how much Adam knows about local conditions, you'll have to decide how often Adam has travelled the Vistula in the months leading up to the adventure. If it's been a few weeks or months since his last trip, local conditions could have changed. A town that used to be safe & friendly might not be overrun by vicious marauders. When I played Adam, he hadn't travelled the river since he'd lost his last tug, a period of (IIRC) a few months. He could give the PCs intel, but it was by no means fresh. This gave the players some leads, but they still had to proceed with caution lest circumstances had changed. I played Adam as cautious and tried not to pull any blatant bait and switch moves on my group.

Good luck and have fun.