Requiring Players To Draw The Dungeon Map!

[mhacdebhandia]

If the players don't enjoy the kind of activity that may require mapping for navigation, they have no business stepping foot inside a dungeon.

Wank.

Wank.

Wank.

 

[Gentlegamer]

I disagree. "Mental/physical" is not really an appropriate distinction in a game that features characters that have Int/Wis/Cha scores, social skill ranks, and knowledge that is separate from that of their players.

It is wholly appropriate given the medium in which the game is played: the participants' imaginations. Mental challenges are not an all or nothing affair: there are some "mental abilities" that only the character possess, there are others that the player possess. The key to refereeing a good role-playing game is adjudicating the challenges appropriately. Since the purpose of the game is to challenge the players (and create fun as a by-product), many mental activities will fall along the player skill side.

Moreover, the analogy between mapping and strategy is a false one, as I pointed out with puzzle solving. Mapping is not a series of decisions; it's an activity. Players should not be required to perform activities in which their characters have demonstrable competence. To analogize appropriately to something like combat strategy, the only relevant decisions the player should face, if his character has a high enough Int score and/or ranks in Knowledge (dungeoneering) and Survival, is whether to purchase mapmaking equipment (a light source, quill, and parchment), and whether to map or not to map. The rest is procedure, just like swinging a sword or casting a spell.

So what then? This player then may demand the DM provide him with a map? If a player has a character of these abilities, he can still draw the map and ask as many questions as he likes (within the character's sensory capacity) to get it "accurate." Absolute accuracy should never be the goal of a compatant mapper: not getting lost is! Getting lost is one of the risks the players incur adventuring in a complex dungeon environment; if they take no active role to keep track of things, that is their peril.

If the players enjoy mapping, great. They're jotting down a graphic chronicle of their adventures that gives the same sense of accomplishment as, say, the party bard composing a great song or epic poem to catalogue the PCs' exploits. But just as I wouldn't force the party bard's player to come up with a new stanza every time he makes a Perform check, I wouldn't force the player of a skilled explorer to sit there drawing a detailed map and cutting into everyone else's active play time and my own narrating as DM.

I guess that is the difference between our views: to you, mapping is extraneous to the game being played; to me, mapping is intrinsic to the game-play experience of dungeoneering.

 

[Gentlegamer]

Eh, what? My group loves dungeon crawls, but we never got that 'players draw map' to work. Nobody liked it, and there were too many mistakes anyone who was actually in the dungeon wouldn't make. So, in general, you're basically wrong.

As a DM, I prefer to draw the players map. I draw it one room / corridor / whatever they happen to see at a time, as they go along. It's more fun for me than trying to describe really complex dungeons. I don't really see it as doing the players work .. it's a game.

If that works for you and your group, great. I would still say you're missing out on one of the core experiences of navigating a complex dungeon environment. Dungeon-lite, it might be said.

 

[Gentlegamer]

What I (and, I think, everyone on this thread who's on the "no mapping" side) very specifically objects to is the task of rendering a 2D (or worse, 3D) replica of the GM's map based on a verbal description.

Good heavens! That should never be the goal of mapping! The goal is not to get lost, or, in some cases, to find a specific thing (secret door, hidden alcove, etc.). This doesn't require a replica of the DM's map! Even the DM's map is just a visual aid for adjudicating the game and not 100% accurate to the environment it represents.

Since getting it right is impossible short of having surveying equipment and a protractor, I don't see how this is either fair or a fun way to spend a good third of your gaming time (which seems to be the minimum amount of time it can take).

Getting it right doesn't require this level of effort, getting it right requires enough detail to avoid getting lost (in most cases).

The "un-funness" is doubled by the knowledge that the PC would have an easier time mapping a dungeon than you (the player) merely because he can actually see where he's going (the player is mostly blind). Unless you get a direct pleasure from the task of mapping itself, there's just so many reasonable and faster alternatives to "mapping" in the old school sense.

To me, this seems to be an indictment against the form of the role-playing game itself. The a large part of the game consists of the DM describing what is perceived by the characters' sensory abilities. Just because the mental picture formed by the players doesn't match what is in the head (or on the map) of the DM isn't itself reason to do away with using verbal descriptions.

Of course, if you get do derive pleasure from drawing maps (as opposed to all of the other game elements found in D&D), there's plenty of other ways to do this. This sounds more like a hobby similar to model train building than anything I would call "role playing."

Drawing a map of the imaginary terrain that your role-playing alter ego is exploring is very much part of "role-playing."

Good point. I will follow your example the next time I GM. When that character with 10 Ranks in Decipher Script wants to read the ancient document, I'll hand him a page written in Ancient Greek. No need to roll your Skill Check - it's part of the challenge of RPG's, and clearly anyone who isn't interested in deciphering ancient documents should not step foot in Candlekeep Library. As for that Archer PC (we play Iron Heroes), if he can't explain why he can ignore the cover the Orcish sniper has found for himself, well then, he can just forget about that particular class ability. I mean, if he can't visualize and describe his ability to hit the Orc regardless of cover, then he shouldn't expect to be able to do so. After all, any PC who isn't up for the challenges of playing an Archer should leave that yew branch on the tree.

As I noted above, these things are not all or nothing affairs. Don't try to construct a strawman based on that. Some things are for the players, some things are for the characters.

Making the decisions necessary to navigate a complex dungeon requires some mental output on the part of the players; maps are a valuable tool for this activity and the skilled player will make use of them as need arises.

What's the point of putting 10 ranks into Survival if I can't use half the functions described in the books? Heck, by your rules my PC could have a +20 mod each in Profession (Surveyor) and Craft (Cartography) and I (the player) would still be expected to map by hand. What would be the benefit of that? You'd give me the "right" dimensions? Should I assume then that everyone else is getting the wrong ones?

If you had such a skilled character, I would give you more exact dimensions when asked. Otherwise, you will get roughly accurate dimensions (as tall as a pike-staff, the room is 10 paces wide (left, right instead of north, south). Some things you won't know about unless your character possess an ability to detect it (such as very subtle grades in slopes that dwarves can detect as a race ability). In the subtle slope grade, even the skilled player can detect if he wants to (by seeing if a ball will roll in a direction when placed on the floor, or pouring liquid on the ground and see if it pools or flows).

(2) even in OD&D, a Magic-User's player could say "Sorry, I (the player) am not going to map. Emirkol has an Intelligence of 15, and spends an hour every day memorizing complex spell formulas. Memorizing lefts and rights and number of doors will be a cake walk. He will spend several rounds before leaving any room to firmly set the details in his mind."

What would you do then?

It sounds like the player is attempting to dictate to the DM the results of Emirkol's attempt at mental map making. If the player wishes to leverage the M-U's mental abilities this way (and if I agree to his interpretation of them as applied to mapping), I would rule that the player may take as long as he wants to draw and make notes while time is "frozen." If Emirkol has a divination spell that can give him greater accuracy, I may provide him with some pre-drawn maps (whose accuracy in turn is subject to the vagaries of divinations in general . . . oracles are often less precise then desired!).

If you are truly playing old-school, why is the M-U handling the mapping? That's the thief's job!

 

[Piratecat]

Wank.

Wank.

Wank.

There are much better ways to express that you disagree with someone. Please use them next time.

 

[mmu1]

I don't believe in making the players do the mapping for a number of reasons:

1. I have not met a DM yet who could describe the scene both quickly and efficiently enough that everyone wasn't well served if he supplemented it with a sketch on the paper or the battlemat.

2. I like to use irregularly (not randomly, mind you) shaped battlefields rather than making everything fit perfectly into a 5' grid, so even if I wanted the players to draw them themselves, it isn't really possible.

3. Frankly, I don't enjoy playing in any setting which is both complicated and repetitive enough that mapping is necessary to get around - so I don't use anything like it when I DM.

 

[Gentlegamer]

I'll add that in no event would I force a player to map, but neither will the player force me to provide a map for him (the DM drawing the map is just shifting the mapping to another player). Maps are tools; they are there to be used or disregarded as the player decides.

 

[Lanefan]

We run on a chalkboard with 2" = 10' grids drawn on it. Usually, the DM describes what we see, and if it's simple ("the door opens into a 20x30 room, you're coming in at the middle of one of the 30' sides") someone draws it on the board, and the mapper adds it to the paper map before the board gets erased for the next map.

If it's a complicated or odd-shaped area, or natural caverns, the DM (usually) draws it on the board himself and the mapper transfers it to a paper map.

It's not difficult - well, not *that* difficult - and the finished map gives us as players a tangible record of having played the adventure. It's also handy to have a map so we as players/characters can *prove* we have a map should the party ever need to go back to the same dungeon again years later...this happens surprisingly often.

Lanefan

 

[ruleslawyer]

It is wholly appropriate given the medium in which the game is played: the participants' imaginations. Mental challenges are not an all or nothing affair: there are some "mental abilities" that only the character possess, there are others that the player possess. The key to refereeing a good role-playing game is adjudicating the challenges appropriately.

Right. Drawing a map is perfectly within the character abilities, not the player's.

So what then? This player then may demand the DM provide him with a map?

Yes; the player may demand that the DM provide him with the map that his character is capable of drawing.

Likewise, if I make a Spot check, I expect the DM to provide me with a description and location of the stuff I see. If we're using a map and/or minis, I expect those things to be illustrated on the map or mini terrain. Why should a dungeon map be different?

If a player has a character of these abilities, he can still draw the map and ask as many questions as he likes (within the character's sensory capacity) to get it "accurate."

Why? To what in tarnation is the player's act of drawing the map essential?

I guess that is the difference between our views: to you, mapping is extraneous to the game being played; to me, mapping is intrinsic to the game-play experience of dungeoneering.

So's combat, but that activity, like many others essential to dungeoneering, is performed by the character, and determined by the character's capabilities in that arena.

In short, you've just lost me here.

 

[Gentlegamer]

Right. Drawing a map is perfectly within the character abilities, not the player's.

The map has to come from somewhere. Just because the character has surveying skill doesn't make a map materialize in the player's hand.

Yes; the player may demand that the DM provide him with the map that his character is capable of drawing.

So your answer to the question in the OP is yes: you require a player to map. The DM is a player, too. You just prefer shifting the map making to another player; indeed, demand that another player make the map.

I really don't know what to say to that.