It's time for another hex crawl thread!

I have questions for those of you with experience on it.

1) How do you decide what to put in the hexes? Not just environments, but points of interest. When I look at the map I just have no idea where to start, outside of just plunking down random stuff "just because" as a starting point. But surely people have some order to the process?

2) I noticed some 6-mile hexes are broken down into smaller subhexes. How exactly do players interact with these smaller hexes when traveling? It's not like the GM shows them the smaller hexes or has them deliberately navigate through each one, right? So how do those sub-hexes work with the game? How are you supposed to use them?

That's all for now.

just a few quick tips... Terrain is important.

I start with Coastlines, then the mountains. Then the rivers that flow off the mountains and random low spots or lakes, then forests and jungles, and last desert. The rivers always flow from the mountains to the seas (unless there is some unusual magics of course).

Then I start placing settlements.

Largest Cities first, working my way down to the smaller ones.

Roads to connect some (but not all) of the cities. Then trails. Then Mines.

Finally seaports, and ancient ruins / places of high adventure.

The richest ruins are located in the most remote and inaccessible places, and are guarded by fearsome beasts, but once in awhile, I'll place a random ruin fairly close to a settlement or town, and have the monsters venture forth to cause mayhem from time-to-time.

Castles, towers, and fortifications can be placed at any time cities and settlements are placed, close, or distant from the settlements, as it suits you.

I find Hexographer to be a useful program. It can randomly generate a hex map. That map will rarely be what I want, but it is really easy to edit a map, and having a bad map in obvious need of fixing is a lot better than staring at a blank white sheet of hexes.

I don't have a set process for adding sites. Some suggest themselves based on the map using thinking similar to GameDaddy's.

On the other hand. I simply collect ideas for things that can be in hexes all the time. They might be my own ideas, or ones I took from other people. Once I have a map, I can look for places to put my stray ideas. If you run ideas and your map still feels too empty, don't just keep staring at the map. Look at your books gaming or otherwise for ideas. Watch some TV. Go to a gaming forum. Just keep part of your brain looking for ideas and jot them down as you have them. The key them to the map.

I'm not particularly organized about these things though. Estar has a much more professional approach to filling out a hexcrawl that he can link you to. Maybe that is why he has published books of his hexcrawls, and I just have my personal notes.

As for hexes, I never use hexes smaller then 6 miles in a hexcrawl. I do use 30 mile hexes for larger scale though.

How densely do you guys put down points of interest though? Is it like every other hex? Or are there just vast expanses without any? It seems boring if it's the latter. But maybe it would be too crowded if every hex had something.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;984475How densely do you guys put down points of interest though? Is it like every other hex? Or are there just vast expanses without any? It seems boring if it's the latter. But maybe it would be too crowded if every hex had something.

It varies a lot. My main Wilderlands sandbox is at 15 miles/hex, you can see most of the detailed points of interest on this map:



But I also do nested smaller sandboxes, usually at 1 mile/hex:



This is particularly suitable for allowing a variety of PC groups of different levels to adventure in the same overall area. Normally low level group uses the 1 mile/hex scale map, high level group uses the 15 mile/hex scale.

I currently have a 3rd level group based in Bratanis who have been adventuring in the nearby low level dungeons - Goblin Gulley, Sunken Citadel, and the Skygod Idol dungeon 10 miles away. Currently they're back at the Skygod Idol dungeon, they were travelling to the Temple-Tomb of Belaras to deliver a staff, but they've just been asked to rescue a kidnapped noblewoman pilgrim from brigands. Previous groups started at 1st level in Selatine and mostly adventured in Thracia & Dyson's Delve until they were levelled up.

The high level PCs tend to move around more, currently for active PCs there's a 9th & 10th in the amazon village of Highhaven defending it from orcs, a 16th about to attack Ahyf with his lizardman army (& pirates - planning to install Sarene the Pirate as Baroness of Ahyf), and a 19th & 9th at the Altanian Clan Moot at Nera organising the birth of the Altani-Nerath Empire while readying for the 19th's oncoming duel with Kainos the Warbringer, son of Ares-Bane. They are mostly at slightly different points on the timeline too.

Everything is random.  I roll randomly to determine hex type (with a system that keeps results from being too wacky by giving a fair chance of each terrain showing up adjacent to similar terrain), roll randomly to determine if there is anything noteworthy in a hex when the PCs enter it, roll randomly to determine what that is (broad category), then either fill in the details myself or use a random generator like Donjon to decide the specifics.  Sometimes the results are unconventional (or downright gonzo), but it usually works pretty well.

EDIT-And agree that Hexographer is good too.  Generates terrain randomly, then can generate features/points of interest/encounters randomly as well, with the ability to determine how frequently such encounters show up.  Very handy, although as mentioned will probably need to be adjusted (it occasionally places two cities in adjacent hexes, for example)

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;9844331) How do you decide what to put in the hexes? Not just environments, but points of interest. When I look at the map I just have no idea where to start, outside of just plunking down random stuff "just because" as a starting point. But surely people have some order to the process?

In a nutshell, come with two paragraph, one describing the region in the present and one briefly describing the history of the region.

For example.

QuoteSylvania is a land of heavily forested hills. While not rugged the numerous tree, hills, and valleys has allowed a number of small realms to keep their independence. The western area is dotted with manors and small keeps who owe nominal fealty to the Grand Kingdom. The central region is dominated by Wyvern Tor and the dense forest that surrounded. It is inhabited by at least one orc tribe and monsters are known to hunt underneath it's eaves. The wood thin out eastward of Wyvern Tor and the hills are dotted with wight haunted barrows of a forgotten kingdom.

Draw a map of the above and overlay a hex grid. Then on the basis come up with items that fit what what was written above. It helps to think of Sylvania as if it was a real place. Based on your knowledge of history, fantasy, and forested hills regions, what would you think would be found in such a location. Then mark down the locations of your ideas.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;9844332) I noticed some 6-mile hexes are broken down into smaller subhexes. How exactly do players interact with these smaller hexes when traveling? It's not like the GM shows them the smaller hexes or has them deliberately navigate through each one, right? So how do those sub-hexes work with the game? How are you supposed to use them?

Hexes are used a reference grid and as a easy way of counting distance. Subhexes are used on maps that detail a larger area. The larger hex is what is found in the original large scale maps. The subhexes is what you actually use for location reference and counting distance on the smaller scale map.

I don't have an example of all this working with numbered hexes. But I can show you what a large scale-small scale map looks like.

Large Scale Map
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1299[/ATTACH]

Small Scale Map
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1300[/ATTACH]

Link to the blog spots with the full resolution maps.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;9844331) How do you decide what to put in the hexes? Not just environments, but points of interest. When I look at the map I just have no idea where to start, outside of just plunking down random stuff "just because" as a starting point. But surely people have some order to the process?

2) I noticed some 6-mile hexes are broken down into smaller subhexes. How exactly do players interact with these smaller hexes when traveling? It's not like the GM shows them the smaller hexes or has them deliberately navigate through each one, right? So how do those sub-hexes work with the game? How are you supposed to use them.

Quote from: GameDaddy;984437just a few quick tips... Terrain is important.
I start with Coastlines, then the mountains.

I agree Terrain is important. I always start with the map. On a piece of scratch paper I sketch a few (3-10) blobs roughly like Australia(my basic unit of land mass), and I spread them around on the sheet. Then I visualize where mountains would form from two or more of them colliding for mountains more inland. I decide if there are coastal mountains as exist along the west coast of N and S America. The I play with the coastline shape and I decide if I have any active or inactive volcano's. Now I have one or more continents and I decide how far apart I want them to be and how they are arranged with respect to each other.

At this point on focus on only one continent and I do most of the things that GameDaddy noted. I usually decide where the major rivers are and the most major points of interest are. Then I zoom down to a much smaller area, say about one-third the size of Australia and flesh that out in more detail and get it ready for play, the closer to the starting point the more detailed I get with roads, trails and such. I refer to my notebook for names and I expand notes so that if the players go to areas I did not expect, then I am ready to roll with the punch.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;984475How densely do you guys put down points of interest though? Is it like every other hex? Or are there just vast expanses without any? It seems boring if it's the latter. But maybe it would be too crowded if every hex had something.

Quote from: S'mon;984477It varies a lot. My main Wilderlands sandbox is at 15 miles/hex, you can see most of the detailed points of interest on this map:
This is particularly suitable for allowing a variety of PC groups of different levels to adventure in the same overall area. Normally low level group uses the 1 mile/hex scale map, high level group uses the 15 mile/hex scale.

I decide first for the larger hex size what the major feature is whether it is villages or a town or a city or a small ruin or a large ruin and then I fill out the rest of the hex based on my view of what makes since. Some hexes with have more than one major feature. In some hexes the major feature is the landscape itself.

If they are just traveling through an area and the only real thing to encounter is wildlife or a random encounter then I roll those and we play that out. Bitd we played out every 24 hour period, setting watches and the whole deal. Now we do that part quickly and get one with what we find to be the more interesting parts. You can play out doing sometimes in detail a few times and after that if becomes standard and assumed. Like taking care of your horse, building a fire, getting water. Now if you are in a desert getting water becomes interesting, where other places it would not be.

Quote from: Technomancer;984573Everything is random.  I roll randomly to determine hex type (with a system that keeps results from being too wacky by giving a fair chance of each terrain showing up adjacent to similar terrain), roll randomly to determine if there is anything noteworthy in a hex when the PCs enter it, roll randomly to determine what that is (broad category), then either fill in the details myself ...

I used to do a quite a bit of things randomly, but over time it has become less and less until these days not so much anymore.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;984433It's time for another hex crawl thread!

I have questions for those of you with experience on it.

1) How do you decide what to put in the hexes? Not just environments, but points of interest. When I look at the map I just have no idea where to start, outside of just plunking down random stuff "just because" as a starting point. But surely people have some order to the process?

2) I noticed some 6-mile hexes are broken down into smaller subhexes. How exactly do players interact with these smaller hexes when traveling? It's not like the GM shows them the smaller hexes or has them deliberately navigate through each one, right? So how do those sub-hexes work with the game? How are you supposed to use them?

That's all for now.

1) I have years (now decades) of practice, and started with an example I liked, the published sample map in TFT's campaign book In The Labyrinth, which I and my friends used as models for how to map a campaign world. 80 x 50 hex map to start with, 12.5km hexes, showing terrain type, rivers and typed roads, towns, villages, forts and special locations, place names, and a list of brief map notes for most of the places. Most of the hexes have only terrain type.

Having used that map in play for a bit, I started adding my own maps extending it in similar style. It helped that it already established larger nations and geographic patterns. My first maps were pretty crude and had things I'd later consider mistakes and revise or have to make up annoying rationalizations for. Eventually I re-worked those.

I got better and better at it with practice, and the maps got more and more elaborate because I got better at it and more interested in various types of detail. However I still usually have large areas and towns where I only know the terrain type and have a rough idea of what it's like there, until I or the players get interested in detailing more.

The main pattern that developed for me was that my first maps suffered from lack of overall large-scale vision (in time and space) of large-scale stuff, to give context that gives me an idea of what the details should be. Going hex by hex and detailing stuff seems backwards to me. Now I try to start as large as I can with cosmology, geographic history, population history, continental sketches, regional sketches, different drafts of those, then regional maps tending to start with the broad strokes and filling in details after that, usually. History and locations of nations and geography give context that make inventing (and remembering) details that make sense much easier for me. A lot of places, especially those distant from PCs, just have vague ideas in my head for what sorts of details to put there if/when I or the PCs get around to them. For me, making a map that shows all the terrain, road/settlement networks, and place names with a few spare map notes is enough for me to have a good high-level idea of what's there. I can look at maps no one ever got to, that I never detailed, and remember basically what I had in mind to be there if play ever got over there. Knowing what was generally over there however allowed me to make other decisions about what made sense for where the players were. I could make NPCs and trade goods that came from there, political decisions based on their being that sort of nation there, etc. And, I find it fun. I have made maps of places without ever making campaigns for them, for fun and to experiment with ideas.

I would recommend practicing, particularly with some throw-away maps, and also checking out other people's maps and looking for styles you like to figure out what style you want to try, experimenting, etc. Maybe even start with a short-term game based on someone else's map, to see how it plays out.

2) For my first several years of GM'ing, I didn't do sub-hex details except for fixed locations inside a hex (e.g. a town or an adventure location). Eventually I did start doing that, but only for locations of interest and detailed maneuvering/adventuring. I just divide the movement scale proportionally, and outline the detailed terrain at whatever level is needed. I also never show the players the actual hex maps anyway, and now even do maps where the terrain doesn't follow the hexes, particularly for detailed areas. So I describe what the players see and make very rough sketches on paper for them of what they can see and make out about the terrain around them, based on more detailed maps that I keep to myself. Usually the small-scale details don't matter except in specific situations. That is, the players are following a road from Booferville to Hidden Valley, so only the road & terrain types and landmarks/crossings and length of each along the way matter. It's only when specific places within a hex are significant that smaller-scale maps are wanted. It could be that there's just a complex location, such as multiple settlements or a terrain situation or fortification, or a situation such as needing to find a specific place, or a pursuit or tracking situation, or a situation with multiple groups / monsters / units / patrols / scouts moving around, that it might be fun/interesting to track that and the details of the lower-scale terrain become significant and interesting. Again, I usually play it out with verbal description, Q&A, and/or rough diagrams. If I have players who aren't so interested or capable to play at that level, and/or their characters have significantly different skill sets from the players, I also involve die rolls against skills which I interpret and sometimes have rule systems for (e.g. tactics, area knowledge, survival skills, tracking, navigation).

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;984475How densely do you guys put down points of interest though? Is it like every other hex? Or are there just vast expanses without any? It seems boring if it's the latter. But maybe it would be too crowded if every hex had something.

I still have vast expanses without any, until/unless someone takes interest in an area and/or spends time doing stuff there. It's not boring, and it wouldn't be practical for me to map an entire continent with details for every spot in advance, and the details would have no context unless I started with the broad strokes anyway. Also there would be an intense level of unused details, especially if/when players want to travel and explore a significant distance. Details generated during (and in prep for) play around where the PCs are active can of course be stored and hoarded and get quite dense, but at least they're connected in the GM & players' memory by having them be relevant to play. After a few years I had developed the ability to fill in details between known things fairly easily, so it's not really needed even if players do suddenly take an interest in the 4th farmland hex between Kel and Winterhome. I can brew up reasonable details, and have some generic appropriate NPCs, names and farmhouses I can use as needed. Then that hex does have details. But I assume most hexes don't have a very high density of adventuring stuff, at least not obvious ones, so it's not like you can randomly wander from wilderness hex to hex and expect dungeons and magic treasures all over the place. You may well meet beasts and brigands and other lost adventurers, though, but days are liable to pass between significant encounters. If it was constant adventure everywhere, it'd be a bit silly/inconsistent and it'd take forever to game out traveling around exploring (though that can be pretty fun too).

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;984433It's time for another hex crawl thread!

I have questions for those of you with experience on it.

1) How do you decide what to put in the hexes? Not just environments, but points of interest. When I look at the map I just have no idea where to start, outside of just plunking down random stuff "just because" as a starting point. But surely people have some order to the process?

2) I noticed some 6-mile hexes are broken down into smaller subhexes. How exactly do players interact with these smaller hexes when traveling? It's not like the GM shows them the smaller hexes or has them deliberately navigate through each one, right? So how do those sub-hexes work with the game? How are you supposed to use them?

That's all for now.

1: I either use random gen like the system in AD&D, or my own slightly less random, but still random, system. If it is a mostly subterrene wilderness then I use How To Host A Dungeon. I really miss an old online program called WildGen which made very organic feeling maps and have not yet found anything that compares to it.

This map was created using the AD&D system. This was before checking for habitation/ruins. The yellow hexes were valleys and other dips in the terrain.


Other times I just draw a map.

Think about layout or look at the terrain around where you live. You'll find that often features will show up in clusters or lines and that can give you ideas for map layout. Personally I tend to keep the starting area somewhat small. And then add on as needed. The AD&D method actually tends to create clusters of features which makes it less random. Note though that the system really wasnt meant to be used to make a hole map.

2: I tend to base my hexes either on 6 miles. Which is about as far as you can normally see on foot. Or I base it on 24. Which is about as far as you can reasonably travel in a day on foot. The map above is based on 6 miles and covers what could be reached in about 2 days walk.

Personally It feels like going any smaller is overdetail. Whats the point? I can see it maybee being useful for moving armies around or a really compressed area. For example. Keep on the borderlands has 1 square = 100 yards. You could convert that map into hexes of the same size.

In this case you use the smaller hexes to pinpoint where things are in a larger hex. Effectively a zoom feature. But I wouldnt use it for every single larger hex on the map.

Iron Crown Enterprises had a product "Campaign Law" that walked you step by step through the creation of a map according to accepted geographical, meteorological, and sociological laws. "prevailing winds bring rain on the side of the mountains facing it while the other side is more drier, rivers converge here for a lake" etc. You got the feeling your world was logical and made sense, not simply a bunch of random ideas thrown down. It was fun too, even if you never used the world you made!

Quote from: rgrove0172;984773Iron Crown Enterprises had a product "Campaign Law" that walked you step by step through the creation of a map according to accepted geographical, meteorological, and sociological laws. "prevailing winds bring rain on the side of the mountains facing it while the other side is more drier, rivers converge here for a lake" etc. You got the feeling your world was logical and made sense, not simply a bunch of random ideas thrown down. It was fun too, even if you never used the world you made!

Was that part of the main set? I have Rolemaster somewhere, just the books without the box.

Hey, I just had an idea. What if you took a real life place off a map and converted it into a hexcrawl format.

That would handle making "realistic" terrain.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;984793Hey, I just had an idea. What if you took a real life place off a map and converted it into a hexcrawl format.

That would handle making "realistic" terrain.

You'd have Greyhawk