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ShortQuests -- individual adventure modules! An all-new collection of digest-sized D&D adventures designed to plug in to your game.

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="JohnSnow" data-source="post: 3896168" data-attributes="member: 32164">Gladly. Actually, I'll go one better and quote some of the relevant descriptive text first, and then summarize.Put simply, Zones are parts of the battlefield that the characters can interact with. There are basically three kinds of zones: condition, event, and action zones. Condition zones describe an effect that continuously functions on the battlefield, such as the storm-tossed decks of a ship, or the icy surface of a mountain pass. Event zones come into play when they activate, and influence the battlefield in some way. They're either timed or triggered. Under this theory, traps are just a particular form of timed event zone. Finally, action zones are parts of the battlefield that the character can activate by direct action, such as a boulder that you make fall over, or a barstool you can pick up and use as an impromptu weapon.Zones are usually either continuous, reusable, or single-use. A trap that resets in 3 rounds is a reusable triggered event zone. By contrast, a barrel of beer you can overturn to make the footing slippery is a nonreusable action zone.Sometimes the distinction between different types of zones is a little vague, as is the case with the doomspores mentioned in the Design & Development article. That sounds to me like a triggered event zone (like a trap) but can also be thought of as a non-reusable action zone, since it can be deliberately triggered. Because it does trigger if you enter the square, it's probably better as a triggered event zone.Zones are awesome, and tend to make battles MUCH more dynamic and exciting. Obviously, any DM has always been able to do this, but for the most part, adjudicating them was left up to the DM. Zones provide much-needed guidance for how to do this.Does that explain the concept sufficiently? Or do you need a more complete explanation?</blockquote>

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