How do you handle a "map the world" campaign?

[dreaded_beast]

I've heard about campaigns/adventures where the PCs are hired to "map" the surrounding area/wilderness.

How is this handled? Give the PCs a blank hex/square grid and have them wander around filling in the blanks? I assume the DM would have a completely filled in world map, which would be kept secret from the players.

Can anyone fill me in how they have run or played in such a campaign and your experiences?

 

[jmucchiello]

Can anyone fill me in how they have run or played in such a campaign and your experiences?

I can't imagine such a campaign being truly interesting. What measuring devices do they have access to? How do you know you got the river in the right location? Does it bug have to speak with dead the critters who attack you so you can ask them the name of your finger?

Seriously, why would you give them hex paper? Give them a piece of vellum and a pot of ink and a quill. Good luck them coming up with anything remotely accurate. Real world mapping involves estimating distances and such, how do you do that when they cannot actually see the world around them.

 

[Coredump]

Yet, amazingly enough, they have been making maps for hundreds, nay, thousands of years...how can they possibly do it?
You do not need an airplane to make a map. Of course it helps, as would having a flying wizard.

And why does the scale have to be accurate? You can have the scale be off, and still be a very helpful map.

I think the reason for doing a campaign like this, is it gets the players to explore unknown areas. It is a plot hook.

.

 

[jmucchiello]

Yet, amazingly enough, they have been making maps for hundreds, nay, thousands of years...how can they possibly do it?
You do not need an airplane to make a map. Of course it helps, as would having a flying wizard.

I mean that people who draw maps can actually see the terrain they are mapping. You don't get that when you are playing RPGs. You know, the DM just describes it. Who said anything about airplanes?

Ultimately, I guess actually making the map should be left as something that just happens in game and not something the players have to worry about.

DM: A few hours into your survey of the bog you come across a cave entrance....

or

DM: As you crest the hill, you can see a large river valley.
P1: We set up a small camp so mapping guy can sketch the valley.
DM: Spot checks.
....
DM: A few miles northeast of your position, high spot roll sees plumes of smoke. Perhaps a thorpe or village.
P2: Once the sketch is finished we head that way to find the village and gets its name.

 

[Turanil]

I've heard about campaigns/adventures where the PCs are hired to "map" the surrounding area/wilderness.

How is this handled? Give the PCs a blank hex/square grid and have them wander around filling in the blanks? I assume the DM would have a completely filled in world map, which would be kept secret from the players.

Can anyone fill me in how they have run or played in such a campaign and your experiences?

I don't know of these specific adventures. However, I think this makes for an interesting plot hook: exploring some area and stumbling upon things of importance, and others of less significance, leading not only to adventures (ex: exploring these ruins), but also finally figure out something terribly important (ex: if map is well done, they find that five buildings/ruins/etc form the vertex of a huge pentagram in the countryside. Then, in each is a special thing of magical property. Of course this is to open a mighty gate to hell, nothing less...).

How to handle the mapping. First the DM describes verbally, and THEN he draws on a sheet of paper the map as the PCs progress. Players actually DON'T DRAW anything. However, the trick is that PCs must make some skill checks related to Craft (Mapmaking) or Profession (Cartographer), or whatever you deem relevant. The accuracy of the map is dependant of their successful or failed checks. Then, if they failed and drew an inaccurate map, this must have dire consequences on the adventures (they are lost, and when having to come back can't...).

 

[Capellan]

Wandering from hex to hex and mapping them would be fairly dull. Not to mention massively time-consuming (in terms of in-game time).

A better approach to a mapping the world campaign is probably to appoint the PCs as envoys (or guards for envoys) whose job it is to go forth, meet the people who live in distant areas, and trade for their maps.

Naturally, the natives will have all kinds of adventure hooks that they need attended to before they will hand over the maps the PCs want

This instantly gives your PCs a long-term goal that requires lots of shorter-term adventures, which can themselves all be quite different. It gives lots of opportunities for RP (negotiating with the natives for maps, organising safe passage to new areas, being called on to judge ancient feuds) and for more direct 'kill things and take their stuff' gaming (we will give you our maps .... but first you must cleanse our ancient burial caves of undead; or you must slay the beast of the marsh; or you must add your swords to ours as we defend our walls from the orcish horde).

 

[Len]

Wandering from hex to hex and mapping them would be fairly dull. Not to mention massively time-consuming (in terms of in-game time).

That's not how I see it working at all. When we play D&D, the DM says things like "You follow the trail as it skirts the mountains, until you hear the roar of a waterfall in the fog ahead." If we sketched maps based on all those descriptions, we'd end up with just the sort of hilariously inaccurate maps that people used to draw before airplanes, sextants, etc.

But anyway, that's not the point of the campaign at all. It's not about the map. It's about what happens while you're exploring.

 

[scourger]

I also think it's an interesting campaign premise. I had never considered it before. I think I would do it by printing small-scale maps on cardstock that is perforated into 4 smaller sheets and hand them out as the players adventure. There could be plenty of adventure along the way as they explore or at least cross each new quadrant to get to the next area.

I customarily give maps to the players as a representation of ranks in knowledge, particularly geography. I find it the best way to avoid thos eskills that get little game play and have no use in combat. Some players still cry foul that they don't know about the campaign world, but I remind them that their character doesn't have any ranks in any knowledge skills or a public education or library or newspapers or TV or anything really. I like to ask them to imagine they are in a pre-industrial, feudal, agrarian society with magic & monsters. But I digress.

The other way I plan to use a map is to have a quest to find a treasure map that was torn in four parts (printed on the above-mentioned perforated card stock). Of course, they won't know where it is or even that they're looking for it until the game commences. And the character with knowledge skills will probably be the one to put the puzzle together.

 

[Umbran]

Yet, amazingly enough, they have been making maps for hundreds, nay, thousands of years...how can they possibly do it?

Yes, people have been makingmaps for hundreds, even thousands, of years. And for the majority of that time, the maps were pretty godawfully inaccurate. Before sextant-type tools and accurate clocks, judging position on the globe accurately was nigh impossible, and so maps were prety darned lousy.

 

[Hoog]

I have once had the party hired as guides to explore and map a new continent that was found. The party did not actually draw out the map each session I did. They did have to make Knowledge geography checks and one of the group learned map making. The group had a great time of finding out what was on a new continent as everything was new to them.