D&D 5E What Book -- WotC or 3rd Party -- Has the Best Hexcrawl Support

[Reynard]

EDIT: Please don't just suggest OSR stuff. I am asking about 5E stuff for a reason.


In your opinion, which book for 5E -- official WotC, DMsGuild or 3rd Party -- has the best, most accessible, most comprehensive support (including rules, tables, advice, etc...) for running sandboxes and hex crawls?

Please give me more than a name. Give me you experiences with the book and why you think it is best. Thanks!

PS: I own HexBox, which is okay...

 

[iserith]

I take hexcrawl design and ideas from various OSR adventures like Hot Springs Island, Neverland, and Fever Swamp. Each has its own little tweaks that are useful to port over into whatever hexcrawl I'm making for D&D 5e.

 

[darjr]

Not 5e but I’m thinking of running it and stealing rules from it. Ultra Violet Grasslands.

The Ultra Violet Grasslands and the Black City

Softcover Version is currently sold out! PDFs only! "Fair hero, the end, the end alone awaits all travelers and at the end...was the journey all in vain? All journeys end in vanity. In vanity." - Mused the Grand Observer at the end of time. Welcome to The Ultraviolet Grasslands, the roleplaying...

www.exaltedfuneral.com

 

[TwoSix]

Does it have to be specific to 5e, or are system-agnostic resources OK?

 

[theCourier]

Maybe try using Hexcrawl Basics? It's billed as for Old School Essentials but I think you could totally use it for other systems and it goes into detail on a lot of the minutiae of Hexcrawling. Not too long a read, either.

 

[Thunder Brother]

I haven't had a chance to actually use it at the table, but I really like what I've read of Brukesian Duchy Hexcrawl. It's system agnostic, so you could use it with 5e with minimal fuss.

 

[Reynard]

Does it have to be specific to 5e, or are system-agnostic resources OK?

I asked for 5E because I don't want to have to do a bunch of conversion in the process. For example, the PF2 stuff is pretty solid but the design space around skills and DCs is different enough it is kind of a pain.

A point of clarity: I am not asking to learn how to do a hexcrawl. I know how to do that. I am looking for tools to build one in 5E with minimal fuss.

 

[TwoSix]

I asked for 5E because I don't want to have to do a bunch of conversion in the process. For example, the PF2 stuff is pretty solid but the design space around skills and DCs is different enough it is kind of a pain.

A point of clarity: I am not asking to learn how to do a hexcrawl. I know how to do that. I am looking for tools to build one in 5E with minimal fuss.

Hmm. Most hexcrawl stuff I've seen doesn't seem to focus on mechanics, it's more tables with a bunch of hooks and ideas to generate stuff on the fly. (I'm thinking Worlds Without Number here, specifically, which I'm using to populate my Dark Sun hexcrawl.)

Hexcrawl tools that actually give mechanical implementations for items in the hex I'm not as familiar with.

 

[darjr]

Have you seen this? 5E Hexcrawl

by The Alexandrian

 

[MerricB]

EDIT: Please don't just suggest OSR stuff. I am asking about 5E stuff for a reason.


In your opinion, which book for 5E -- official WotC, DMsGuild or 3rd Party -- has the best, most accessible, most comprehensive support (including rules, tables, advice, etc...) for running sandboxes and hex crawls?

Please give me more than a name. Give me you experiences with the book and why you think it is best. Thanks!

PS: I own HexBox, which is okay...

Can you tell us what your ideal hexcrawl ruleset would include?