D&D General Hexploration Design

[Myrhdraak]

You can combat EL fluctuations by having areas of differing levels of danger. If your PCs are starting in the central Hex, have the surrounding 3-4 hexes in all directions contain EL 1-4 threats, then as they get further out have different zones (or fixed areas) that contain higher level threats.

You could have 'zones' with each zone a cluster of Hexes with threats grouped by tier (heroic, etc).

5E is pretty forgiving. PCs can hit and defeat a higher CR threat presuming they're fully rested. They may take that high level threat as an indicator they're in a dangerous area and are in over their heads.

As for upgunning low level threats, thats also pretty easy. If PCs hit an area where they're of a higher tier than the the area, give monsters in that area a slight up gunning (+2 to Saves, Attacks, Skills, +50 percent to HP, and all damage dice increase by 1 step (d4>d6>d8>d10>d12>2d8)) for each tier the PCs are higher than that of the area.

Have not run a hexcrawl, but might want to try it out. I think the modified resting rules in "Adventures in Middle-Earth - 5th Edition version" would add to the danger and resource management. The PC would have to find "safe zones" where they can recover.

 

[J-H]

For high levels (13-20) I am assuming scaling is generally less necessary.

 

[SavageCole]

Gearing up for an exploration campaign right now, so very timely topic for me. The last real hexcrawl I played was Isle of Dread with my little brother 35 years ago. We’re doing classical premise of a party that finds themselves shipwrecked on a mysterious, tropical island. OK, they all wake to find themselves in crashed starship escape pods on this island — and they have amnesia, so the exploration is of both the island and trying to discover more about their own identities.

Great callout Myrhdraak on AIME for travel rules. Having a set of mechanics for not only the navigation of unknown hexes, but jobs for everyone works so well. I hadn’t made that connection until seeing you share it.

Obviously, having random encounter tables broken out by biome makes sense. It’s more than a ”wandering monsters” table , though. And I feel like I need 4-5 good set piece encounter concepts at the ready for what the group mI got encounter in the jungle, along the coastal cliff side, atop the volcanic mountains. If anyone can point me to any sources for those sorts of encounters (more than just fights please), I’d be grateful. I can mine seeds, all the stuffs on my shelves, etc. for inspiration, but does anyone knows a site or published supplement they’d recommend?

Is the old AD&D Wilderness Survival Guide worth checking out again? Not to use as is, but to mine? I haven’t seen that thing since the late 80s, but I imagine it’s available on DMsGuild.

 

[Doug McCrae]

* I divide my hexes into 7. There is a central hexagon, and then 6 trapezoids (one for each side of the hexagon).

If you're finding you need to divide up your 6 mile hexes because you need a finer scale then why not use 2 mile hexes?

 

[jasper]

I didn't like the hexcrawl in Tomb of Annihilation. The random encounters were boring. They took a lot of time for our DM to set up and then they were always too easy. Our DM had problems with pacing the game and the hexcrawl made it worse.

I'd rather have the DM pre-plan the encounters. Let the players pick a route to a location and the DM choose the encounters along the way that build up the story rather than distracting from it.

I thought the daily survival rolls were repetitive and boring. A good roll shouldn't allow you to avoid random encounters. It should unlock great encounters.

What I did in my Adventure League game, was two weeks before the start; everyone gave me I think 5 % rolls. I then used those rolls as the wandering monster rolls for each chart. I typed up the encounter per terrain and put those in an bag. Tonight's encounter will be. Let Tommy pull from the No Undead bag. 29 T-rex. Submitter was Tommy. Everyone thank tommy.
I agree with on the unlock great encounters. But half the point of the book was It was a CLASSIC HEX crawl for those who never encounter one.

 

[jgsugden]

If you're finding you need to divide up your 6 mile hexes because you need a finer scale then why not use 2 mile hexes?

Map size. I don't want to increase the size of my map by 300% in each direction. Part of the fun, for me, is to put the map together with the PCs so that they can see it being discovered and completed. If the map is too big, tht becomes unruly.

And, this is mostly so that I can provide and be consistent on where, within a hex, a feature is located. For example: Hex AA37 is a swamp. In Zone 0 (center) is the hag's hut, and in zone 3 (SE) is the troll cave entrance. I have an excel spreadsheet that covers all of the hexes and the 7 subzones within them. The main terrain type for each hex is populated, as are a small number of subzones for features of note.