D&D General Why Exploration Is the Worst Pillar

[prabe]

What is it that makes getting parties onto ships for some maritime adventuring so bloody hard?

Convincing players who expect storms, sea monsters, and pirates on every sea voyage to have their land-based characters go on a sea voyage is difficult. I think it's because the players don't want (at the moment) to do a pirates adventure, or an underwater adventure, or a deserted island adventure. The only times I've ever known of players who wanted to do any of those things were for campaigns (using the broader meaning of that, not your specific one, @Lanefan ) pitched as one or more of those things.

 

[Fanaelialae]

My experience as a player in a few maritime adventures is that they tend to take away player agency. The captain makes you tend to mundane tasks, you get blown far off course and stranded, you watch fellow party members get keel hauled, you get trapped in tight quarters combats by raiding parties and can't escape short of diving into shark infested waters, you leave behind all the contacts you had on the mainland and connection to that campaign world, you're basically trapped in a floating hamlet where everyone knows you (bad for rogues), you're usually at sea for months with little happening, it typically involves several boring sessions of preparation just to launch the expedition, there aren't good rules for it in the core books (and thus it's out of the scope the core game can handle), heavily armored characters sink and drown easily. I could go on.
I have yet to play in a good nautical adventure, and I'd be wary about signing up for one after the horrible ones I've played in. I know they can be done well by a DM who has done the work to avoid situations like the ones I mentioned above, but I'd really have to trust that DM.

Just let them be in charge of the ship. If they're the captain(s) then they can plot their own destiny, or assign their own mundane tasks as they see fit. Don't have a deus ex machina storm blow them off course, but of course if a storm does happen and they're unable to deal with it successfully, they could end up shipwrecked (but they'll know it was their bad rolls rather than a predetermined plot). If they successfully deal with it they won't.

I played in a pirate campaign that was fairly enjoyable, but what made it so was that we were the ones in charge.

If the PCs charter a vessel, then it's just a means to an end. Things might happen during the journey, but it isn't a nautical campaign, just a campaign where they took a boat to get somewhere.

Personally, the only time I've use the shipwrecked plot is when it was part of the backstory. The PCs shipwrecked, washed up on a strange island, and that's where the campaign began.

 

[Retreater]

Just let them be in charge of the ship.

Sure, that's how I'd handle it if I were the DM. However, I've never been a player in a game where this has been the case.
Even official adventures (like Skull & Shackles from Paizo) does a bad job at this and is guilty of many of the "nautical crimes" I listed above.
Maybe now that we have Saltmarsh and Theros from WotC, we'll see better examples - though I haven't run either.
I have a bad taste in my mouth from previous experiences. That's going to take some really good design to overcome.

 

[GlassJaw]

Exploration is actually my favorite pillar! It's literally everything when they players aren't in combat or talking to NPCs. And it's why sandbox campaigns are my favorite.

But this is very accurate:

I think it's because it's the hardest of the pillars for a DM to do well. You have to build a world full of interesting things for players to discover, and they have to be things your particular players actually want to discover.

Although you don't really need to "...build a world full of interesting things..." Sandboxes do require more effort up front but you only need to build enough to get your players engaged. I HIGHLY recommend checking out The Beast of Graenseskov on DMs Guild. It is an amazing blueprint for creating a mystery sandbox is very small wilderness area.

Once you have the foundation for your sandbox, your players will do the rest. They will create the Exploration pillar for you! You can sit back and listen to them fill in the blanks and speculate wildly. It's the most fun I have as a DM BY FAR.

I think the Exploration pillar gets ignored is because it's difficult to reproduce in modules and those that are can be difficult to run.

 

[Todd Roybark]

My experience as a player in a few maritime adventures is that they tend to take away player agency

Storms and survival scenarios, in my opinion enhance player agency. In real life the choices you make, in horrible circumstances, literally control whether you live or die.

Isn't that the whole point of player agency, determining your own fate?

Not to get, too Campbellian, but mythology is replete with tales about reluctant heroes. Folks that were forced to adapt to extreme circumstances.

you leave behind all the contacts you had on the mainland and connection to that campaign world,

Not necessarily, approximately 90% of human habitation in the real world is on large bodies of water, because, in part, sailing is a great way for peoples to stay connected.

There is nothing stopping campaigns from having floating cities or ships, that are socially, well connected to other groups. Polynesian culture is a great source of inspiration on how to model this.

heavily armored characters sink and drown easily

They also can die of heat exhaustion in the desert. I find the challenge of trying to the thrive even when situational elements remove my ideal tools for achieving statistical dominance, to be thrilling.

I would also rather be a Paladin without use of plate mail, then be a Sorcerer in an Anti Magic zone. Spellcasters routinely are expected to overcome environmental factors that hinder spell casting. The same can and probably should be true for armor.

To each their own, everything you mentioned as a detracting element for your enjoyment, sounded like fun things to me.

 

[Undrave]

So the three pillars of play are combat, role-playing, and exploration. Combat we discuss a lot and have many rules to make dynamic and exciting, hordes of monsters, reams of magical spells, and numerous tomes of battle equipment. Role-playing is theatric, and we have seen it done with character arcs, accents, and know how it has been long elevated as the height of good Game-Mastering ("Role-play" NOT "ROLL-play.")
But exploration? It's the neglected middle child of the pillars. Why? I think because it's the in-between of interesting things.
It's the trek through the wilderness listening to the DM trying to use purple prose to describe the forest that exists to waste your time between getting the quest from the haughty noble (role-playing) to the bandit hideout (combat). It's the long, featureless corridors that may contain a ho-hum trap (which is likely going to be less dangerous than a single monster of your party's level), but that trap will be avoided with a Passive Perception check you don't even have to roll. That hallway may connect two exciting combat encounters, but the hallway itself is just a line on a flowchart.
Exploration is the session that you're buying supplies for your journey and making preparations, which can be easily avoided with a die roll. ("Did we bring enough food? Here, let me roll randomly. Good, you have enough food.")
How much game time is wasted on exploration? Would the experience be better by simply asking the players: "Do you want to go to Fight A with the troll barbarian or Fight B in the vampire's crypt?" We could speed through literal sessions of actual games that require wilderness travel from the starting town to the dungeon.
But the only advice I've ever seen for improving exploration mode is to use better descriptive phrases, wandering monsters, or have a few skill checks that are going to ultimately have no impact on the game (maybe you lose some hit dice, maybe have to spend a few spell slots, etc.). But even with most of that advice, it's telling you to make exploration mode better by adding combat (wandering monsters).
So what do you think? Am I wrong on this?

Have you read AngryGM's articles on exploration? Especially this one. They're pretty good and I agree with the general idea.

I disagree with essentially everything in the OP but I want to address the idea that "exploration is shopping."

No, it's not.

The degree to which resource management is important during any aspect of play is totally dependent on the preferences of the group. Counting arrows or healing kits is no different than counting rations or rope.

You can totally have an enjoyable exploration pillar without resource management. Exploration is crawling through the dungeon and traveling through the wilds, but it's also learning the layout of the city and finding hidden alcoves in the library and talking to contacts seeking the next adventure.

D&D makes resource management both a drag and too easy to ignore.

I would add another element, to be enjoyable, exploration should be done for the sake of itself, not to find a goal. If they need to find "The Tower of the Evil Necromancer" the hexcrawl becomes frustrating if they can't find it soon, but if they explore the exes for other reasons, like to find the perfect place where to build their stronghold, exploration would become no moreonly a way to reach the goal but the goal itself.

I agree. Exploration is not 'finding goal A', it's 'finding X while looking for goal A', it's going down a road you don't need to just to see what's over there. If you're in a rush it's not gonna happen.

While I agree with some that DM's can and do, do it well. I think there is an underlying factor why many do not - D&D.

For the most part, in order to make something a pillar of the game, the rules need to coalesce around the pillar. There are too many outs for players to take, and this leads to a landslide of DM's not wanting to think about it. Environmental factors are a perfect example. Exhaustion is the rule set for much of environmental conditions. But it is so easy to negate. In the desert, no water - create food and water. In an icy cave - heat metal or any number of spells that can insulate or warm you. The same is true for environmental obstacles. Need to ford that raging river? I fly over it. I mage hand and tie knots with the rope. Need to climb that cliff wall? Levitate. Is the hallway trapped? Send in the familiar. These outs, while they may use a bit of resources, are almost always there. So the DM stops describing the exploration side little by little because the players always have a way of negating it.
And I do realize there are DM's that can and do push exploration. But sometimes, the way the rules and powers are, it's just a game of gotchya! Which is always viewed with rolled eyes from most tables. So over the course of time, it gets used less and less.

Don't forget how a Ranger can obviate an entire chunk of rules related to outdoor survival by just BEING there. Getting lost? Nope. Need to find food? Forage while travelling full speed or just Goodberry.

 

[Greg Benage]

First I just want to say how astonishing it is to see so many D&D players equate "exploration" and "travel" (or worse, shopping).

Loathe as I am to otherwise link to him, this is a point at which the Angry GM hits the nail on the head.

Gaming for Fun (Part 1): Eight Kinds of Fun

Every player and game master sits down to the table for a different reason. Or a different combination of reasons. And understanding the reason why people play is the key to get them to keep coming…

theangrygm.com

When we apply the Eight Aesthetics of Play (a video game design theory but applies well to all forms of games) to D&D and three pillars especially, we see that the Exploration pillar fits really well with Discovery, but takes work to fit in Fantasy or Challenge, and I would guess struggles mightily to include any other Aesthetics.

Just real quick:

1. Sensory pleasure: Maps! Terrain! Handouts with art depicting the wondrous locations to explore, or mysterious features within those locations.

2. Fantasy: Exploration is the primary vessel for "sense of wonder" and immersion in the fantasy setting.

3. Narrative: I think this is super important. Places have stories ("history," even). Through exploration, characters can piece together the story of a place and come to understand where they fit into all of it. Tolkien is fantastic at this, with the Barrow-downs, Weathertop and a hundred other places, and how the Hobbits piece together from their experiences with these places how they fit into this much grander story.

4. Challenge: Overcoming obstacles and hazards is a huge part of exploration and can be great fun. For me, it's one of the main reasons low- to mid-level D&D is more fun than high-level D&D, where these mundane challenges are often obsoleted by magic.

5. Fellowship: Effective use of the exploration pillar requires teamwork, which greatly enhances the sense of fellowship.

6. Discovery: Goes without saying and really ties all the other aesthetics together.

7. Expression: The exploration pillar is a great way to give players an opportunity to impose their creative will on the world. This is the pillar where players are most "free to try anything" and "describe their character's actions any way." It's also one aesthetic where I believe the relative lack of rules is important.

8. Submission: If this is an important aesthetic for you, you want to mix in crawls (dungeon, hex, node, whatever) that are well suited to standard operating procedures: search the room, scout for adventure locations, look for clues.

While I recognize intellectually that different players like different things, this thread is really mind-blowing to me. To me, exploration is the pillar that TTRPGs (including and perhaps especially D&D) does better than any other game form. I think it explains the enduring popularity of D&D and Call of Cthulhu (where the particular form of exploration is often investigation). I was hooked the first time I played and my buddies started pulling out ropes and torches to go down into a hole under a pyramid to find out what was there, and it's why I still play after 40 years.

It's harder for the DM than "building a combat encounter" or creating interesting NPCs with whom the PCs can interract, but man, it's so important in my opinion. You have to create places (or mysteries/events) that feature these aesthetics, but happily, that kind of localized world-building is also one of my favorite parts of DMing.

 

[Asisreo]

Rewarding a behaviour you want to encourage is fine only until the reward becomes automatic, and thus expected.

That means if the behavior isn't automatic, you need to establish the behavior first.

Ideally, an exploration action could have one or more of three outcomes: reward (treasure, info, shortcut), punishment (trap, monster, misdirection), or nothing. Finding nothing is not a punishment.

Behind the screen, though, you needn't actually give direct punishments. You can disguise the reward as a punishment until they overcome a challenge but players should walk away glad that they opened the door.

You've had different players than I, then. Here, I could put every discouragement known to DMs on a door and they'd still try to find a way through it. (then again, how do the players know whether they're 'suppoesed' to open a door or not, until after they've already done it?)

It's not about what they know, it's about what they think they know. If they think they know the door isn't supposed to be opened, they'll stop trying. If they think they know that a door is trapped with nothing behind it, why even open it?

In part you answered your first question with your second sentence: in part perhaps it is there to confuse, misdirect, or delay. As for the second question, the only way to find out is to go through it and look.

You don't want to confuse your players, though. It's frustrating being confused and it makes you feel dumb. Now, I don't have a problem with an occasional misdirection, but they shouldn't be misguided often as it feels like they can't trust information and therefore do not have true agency over their decisions.

As the party, busy exploring deep in an old castle, opens a door and looks in I lay out the scene: "Behind the door is a round room about 30' across. An open-grid metal spiral staircase leads upward from the middle and passes through a hole in the ceiling. An open archway across from you seems to exit directly into another room, on your left and right are closed wooden doors. A bright torch in a sconce above each exit provides light. The only furniture is three sets of shelves, curved to match the room's walls, standing one between each pair of doors except to your immediate left. On the shelves are an assortment of knick-knacks, a few books and papers, and - as you can see even from here - quite a lot of dust."

So you've got four known exits other than the door you're coming in: ahead, left, right, and up. What comes next?

It's not a very voluntary type of exploration. A party that decides doing too much might make their lives harder will randomly guess (most likely the open archway) to see if they can just get to the boss and leave. If they take the wrong turn, they wasted time and resources and are forced to backtrack to try door number 2, then door number 3 until they find the correct door.

 

[Undrave]

Ideally, an exploration action could have one or more of three outcomes: reward (treasure, info, shortcut), punishment (trap, monster, misdirection), or nothing. Finding nothing is not a punishment.

Nothing totally is a punishment. It's NOTHING. It's a waste of time and session time is precious enough. Don't give me a hallway with eight doors, only to have seven of them be empty and the last one leading to ANOTHER hallway of doors. At that point I'm gonna check out and not bother going into details anymore, I'll just go "we check all the doors until something happens.".

 

[Scott Christian]

Don't forget how a Ranger can obviate an entire chunk of rules related to outdoor survival by just BEING there. Getting lost? Nope. Need to find food? Forage while travelling full speed or just Goodberry.

Great point. Can't believe I forgot it.