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The rules for foraging for water say that the whole party can fill out their water skins up to d12 even if only one person forages. However, the consumable says that a single person can't carry more than d12 of water, so they can't carry the water skins for the whole party. What is the intent here?
1. One person does foraging for water periodically and everyone gets d12 on the water consumable.
2. One person does foraging for water and anyone helping them gets d12 on the water consumable.

One person forage for water and if he finds it, everyone with him can fill up their waterskins. Technically one guy search for water and he takes all the groups waterskins and fill them up (if he finds a stream nearby) and comes back to camp so everyone has a full waterskin.

Some bonus info about weight of food/water units and steps.
Any resource unit has a weight of one item. So a unit of raw Meat will have a weight of one. If a chef converts it to Food steps, it will save space since four steps (d12) have a weight of one. You could of course carry more than d12 Food, it just have a weight of one per unit (in this case Food units since you already have d12 Food steps). The units of food can be converted to steps when the number of steps goes down. The idea is each player only have one die of steps. Any more than that will be carried as units until.

It is the same for water. You can carry one waterskin (four steps). A barrel (heavy item) can hold 10 units of water. This means that a barrel, full of water will have a weight of 12 items (2+10). Each of those water units will increase the steps in a waterskin by one. So one character can carry one waterskin with four steps of water and barrel with 10 units of water (a very strong person with the talent pack rat obviously). That water will on the average last for 37½ days.

> One person forage for water and if he finds it, everyone with him can fill up their waterskins.

I am confused by "everyone with him". I think this is citing the book directly - I have reread the chapters. I am trying to get intended interpretation. Is "everyone with him" - everyone who helps? everyone who spends a quarter? everyone in the party?

> Technically one guy search for water and he takes all the groups waterskins and fill them up (if he finds a stream nearby) and comes back to camp so everyone has a full waterskin.

Taking everyone's water skins and filling them up seems to go against the rules, because they clearly state that D12 of water is as much as a person can carry. Waterskin appears to represent the the D12, so it would mean that a person carries say 4xd12.

The idea with with the resource system is that every character has one die of each consumable. The main reason is that you hardly ever needs more than that. Four steps (d12) of Food/Water will last 11 days on the average.

So if one person is foraging, for a Quarter Day, then, if he finds water, you can just assume that he will fill up as many waterskins as the group has. Either by running back and forth (it is sex hours after all) or carrying it all at once if he is strong enough. He is just doing a favour for his friends.

"Hey, I found a clean stream over here! Any of you need to refill your waterskins?"
"I do! Comming!"

But i mostly feel the rules aren't all that "hard coded" (is in "forceing you to adhere to them"). When setting out for adventure, a single person wont carry more than a D12 of a resource since that is "A crapload of that resource". But that doesn't stop them physically from being able to pick up a fellow adventurers waterskin and hand it to them.

Thanks, I will change the ruling to allow everyone to fill out the waterskins.

>"Hey, I found a clean stream over here! Any of you need to refill your waterskins?"
>"I do! Comming!"

This was not my interpretation of foraging for water. If the stream is within a shouting distance of the camp, what is the point of the roll? This isn't a challenging action. My interpretation is that the character looks within the whole hex for a source of clean water.

Thanks, I will change the ruling to allow everyone to fill out the waterskins.

>"Hey, I found a clean stream over here! Any of you need to refill your waterskins?"
>"I do! Comming!"

This was not my interpretation of foraging for water. If the stream is within a shouting distance of the camp, what is the point of the roll? This isn't a challenging action. My interpretation is that the character looks within the whole hex for a source of clean water.

As you said, if there is a river, stream or lake, then there is no roll and since a waterskin lasts for a very long there are plenty of time for the players to go towards a river or lake if the water starts to run out. We have played for 27 long sessions (+13 long beta sessions) and so far my players have been forced to forage for water exactly ... never, but sure, if they are in a middle of a big forest or mountain area with no rivers or lakes then it will happen. I think the longest they have ever been away from a river is two days or something.

@Fenhorn If the water is almost always present, why track this resource at all? What is the narrative purpose of a game challenge associated with it?

@Fenhorn If the water is almost always present, why track this resource at all? What is the narrative purpose of a game challenge associated with it?

It is not always present, but my players have chosen to travel alongside rivers and lakes as much as they can, even if that means the trip will take longer. So my players are usually never more than two days from a river or a lake. There might be some adventure sites here and there where my players can't do this tactics and then water may becoming an issue.

If the stream is within a shouting distance of the camp, what is the point of the roll? This isn't a challenging action. My interpretation is that the character looks within the whole hex for a source of clean water.

1) it was an example. Substitute with a thrilling short story, where the forager returns to the camp and tells everybody about their discovery, and every one grabs their waterskins and follow if you would prefer.

2) Being within shouting distance of the camp does not mean it is obvious. PCs arent omniscient, and they don't automatically know what is under every rock and behind every bush within 300 meters of their camp. Escpecially not in a forest, for example, where sight might be very limited. Even on an open field it might be obscured by tall grass, a gentle slope, or just very tiny. A stream with servicable drinking water does not need to be large. And streams can run under ground for long streches, only to trickle out in a small spott in a hillside before being swallowed by the ground again.

Searching the entire hex does is not the same thing as the source being located at the furthest possible distance. The time spent might as well be explained by the water trickling out very slowly, so it takes those six hours for everyone to actually fill their waterskins.