Ask Bryce
- Thread starter Osrnoob
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@bryce0lynch first question! You said you don't understand hex crawls numerous time in the past few years (Neverland, Nod31, Basic Fantasy, Isle of Dread) but looking over old reviews,( Nod 1 vs 31 for example) you used to be way more excited by them (see hot springs island, Hex Crawl Chronicles). Hex Crawl Chronicles in particular I don't know if you would best now. Not saying to remove it (I am actually anti besting/ debesting after the fact. writing is time and place) but I want to dig into why.
It seems like you used to like them more or they used to feel more like adventures?
Have your standards changed or become greater over time? If so how?
Love to hear more any way the question spurs you
With love,
It seems like you used to like them more or they used to feel more like adventures?
Have your standards changed or become greater over time? If so how?
Love to hear more any way the question spurs you
With love,
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I shall elaborate ...
My understanding of them is not, I think, related to their utility. Hex crawls needs things that other adventures don't, or, perhaps, need more of things that other adventures need also. You gotta know what you can see from one hex to the next. You need some idea of how the various hexes work together. You need good encounters, interactive ones. That could all, though, be related to things in traditional exploratory dungeons. They all have analogues there.
If we look at the question Why Go In To The Dungeon? then we get closer to my issue. Why does your character go in to the ground in the first place? Well, that's for the player to figure out, right? You need to motivate your character. "Gold" is a good one, by default, so, off to the hole in the ground we all go, Hi Ho, Hi Ho!
But why are we wandering from hex to hex? For the same reason? Gold? It seems less motivational in a hex crawl. Yes, the analogue holds, you must find a motivation for your character, but, it seems harder to me in a hex crawl. I don't understand the core conceit of the crawling. And because I don't understand this most basic of issues, I don't feel like I understand ANYTHING about them. Like, what do you do, as a DM, to keep the game going?
My understanding of them is not, I think, related to their utility. Hex crawls needs things that other adventures don't, or, perhaps, need more of things that other adventures need also. You gotta know what you can see from one hex to the next. You need some idea of how the various hexes work together. You need good encounters, interactive ones. That could all, though, be related to things in traditional exploratory dungeons. They all have analogues there.
If we look at the question Why Go In To The Dungeon? then we get closer to my issue. Why does your character go in to the ground in the first place? Well, that's for the player to figure out, right? You need to motivate your character. "Gold" is a good one, by default, so, off to the hole in the ground we all go, Hi Ho, Hi Ho!
But why are we wandering from hex to hex? For the same reason? Gold? It seems less motivational in a hex crawl. Yes, the analogue holds, you must find a motivation for your character, but, it seems harder to me in a hex crawl. I don't understand the core conceit of the crawling. And because I don't understand this most basic of issues, I don't feel like I understand ANYTHING about them. Like, what do you do, as a DM, to keep the game going?
I'm in a sportball bar listening to the men talk about sportsball. A sportball man quit and and another sportball is no longer spirtballing after tinight
The1True
8, 8, I forget what is for
This hits the nail on the head succinctly. I've been prepping Irradiated Paradox for Roll20 playtest and I ended up in a swamp of ennui thinking about starting hooks. When I wrote the thing I just kind of dumped people there in medias res, and maybe I'll stick to that. My hexcrawl enthusiasm has been buoyed largely by the great time we had a few years back filling in the Players Map in X1. But, that adventure gets the players going with promises of treasure, the aforementioned blank map and then critically, a leisurely cruise to the island which allows players to come at it from a variety of angles or even circumnavigate the thing, in the process hopefully getting drawn into the weirdness of the island by all the cool stuff along the coast. So the players end up wanting to clear away the blanks in the middle to see what else is hidden there. It's no longer a matter of gold, but of discovery.
I want that feeling on both sides of the screen and I think I've got the ingredients for it; I'm just looking for a way to get the players there in the first place and then break them out of this superfocused game mentality my group has fallen into where we're basically railroading ourselves.
Beoric
8, 8, I forget what is for
I think the core motivations are (1) to go somewhere, (2) to find something, and (3) to clear an area. All of those can be motivated by GP as easily as any other scenario.
The most obvious thing you need to find is the dungeon. So initially in B2 the main purpose of overland travel is to find the Caves of Chaos, and the motive for overland travel is merely an extension of the motive to explore the dungeon. And it adds to the logistical problem of moving loot back to the Keep, especially after you have stirred the hornets nest and have to worry about humanoids either chasing you or laying ambushes along the road. So that is an example of (1) and (2).
For (3), there is of course clearing an area to build a stronghold, but you could use the "clearing" activity even at lower levels. Imagine the local baron places a bounty of 50 gp for each pair of orc's ears, but you have to go root out the orcs and find their camp. So you aren't just passing through, you are actively exploring the area trying to find the hidden bits (sticking to the roads is not going to cut it), and the motivation here is also GP.
For less cash oriented games, you could riff on the caravan guard trope and work for the fantasy equivalent of Marco Polo, trying to find a trade route to a rumoured civilization. This could also work for other escort missions, like helping a scholar to find ruins in the jungle. Or you could be military scouts trying to find a safe pass through the mountains so the army can pass through - or for that matter scouting enemy territory trying to map it or find the enemy forces.
All you really need is a reason to go to areas that aren't on the road.
robertsconley
Should be playing D&D instead
First off using a grid of numbered hexes and writing series of locales keyed to that grid is just a type of format for a setting. One that efficient at handling a lot of local level details without cluttering the map itself.
Crawling from hex to hex exploring is a campaign style. One that is a niche of niche probably enjoyed by as many hobbyists who enjoy the ultra gritty realism of GURPs and all it technical supplements. They are there, there are more than handful, but not that much more.
In contrast the wider category of sandbox campaigns is much broader.
You start off with an Initial Context that establish who the characters are and why are they are there at that moment in time. The player pursue whatever goals that make sense for them as their characters in the setting. Around their doings the referee brings the setting to life using a bunch of techniques lumped under World in Motion. Things happen on their own, things happens as result of what the PCs do or do not do as their characters. It require a creative touch to make it hang together. The referee will be improvise a lot using a bunch of techniques that I call the Bag of Stuff. There is prep but the Bag of Stuff allows the referee to handle things until they can get some prep time.
The end result is that the players are free to trash the setting in the manner they see fit. On my blog I have several accounts of different campaigns and how they unfolded. A while ago you reviewed my Scourge of the Demon Wolf. The first time I ran that adventure it was a result of a random event. The characters became friends with a Baron and at one point I rolled that the Baron wanted something done. I just saw Brotherhood of the Wolf so came up with the basic situation. The player wanted to talk to the Baron and the Baron wanted his village and the wolves dealt with. The players went there made some friends, dealt with the demon wolf, thought the mages were dicks, and the Baron rewarded them with more patronage along with handling their original request.
But I didn’t know any of that was going to happen two sessions prior. But because the players said “We need to see the Baron”, I started to generate stuff to bring the Baron’s timeline up to the present campaign time.
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robertsconley
Should be playing D&D instead
For a more specific example consider this. This is a campaign I documented for my blog in 2013. I am not going to go blow by blow but highlight the unforeseen changes in the campaign that resulted from the players deciding to go right instead of left.
For more details see this pair of blog post. And yes I am guilty of not finishing part 3.
Part 1
Part 2
The campaign starts out in A. The players decided to start out as a mercenary company. I pitched several "contracts" to start out with. The one they opted to go with is working for the Baron of Abberset patrolling the Estoil Hill that was the southern frontier of the Principality of Nomar.
The cast of Characters (created with GURPS)
Delvin - a dwarven fighter from Thunderhold wandering human lands to seek his fortune.
Durgo - a forester from southern Nomar who left his home and village under bad circumstances
Sir Cei Kerac - a hedge knight hiring on as a mercenary to regain the fortune he lost gambling
Aeron - a ordinary common man with special skills
Kermit - a half Viridian (demon), half Karian (Japanese) magic using puppeteer.
Sir Henry Kiefer - a young knight seeking to regain the manor that is rightfully his.
Brom - A Warrior seeking his fortune.
After the first few sessions they learned the following in the linked PDF. This was created at the players' request to summarized what they learned.
Summary of the Halkmenan Rebels info
The first left instead of right change occurred between D & E. The players used a map they captured to find a dungeon (it was one level). Explored it and found the treasure. Sir Cei Kerac's players convinced the group that it would be more lucrative to move north and sign up with the Prince of Dorn (the ruling prince of the country) who was hiring mercenaries to fight the Skandian Vikings of Ossary along the frontier. Think of the prince as a version of King Arthur or King Alfred, and the Skandian Vikings like Saxons or Danes. Not quite a all out war but not quite peace either. Most of the treasure was used to buy out their contract with the Baron of Abberset. Who wasn't happy but the party did everything properly and legally so that was that for the Baron.
This decision totally trashed a lot of my prep but as usual I rolled with it and used my Bag of Stuff and some random tables to handle the journey north. I used the following two weeks to prep what was to happen when the party reached 'I' on the map.
The next phase went well and due to the party's attention to detail wound up with them capturing the King of Ossary. This is was the point where Sir Cei Kerac's player couldn't continue with the game and had to leave. The party received an substantial offer from the Prince of Dorn to purchase the king's ransom from the party. The party then traveled to the capital of Dorn and purchased land on the crossroads at N in order to build an inn.
The capture of the king was unexpected. They figured out the king's schedule of hunts, patrols, and visits and acted accordingly. But the king had a substantial guard with him so the outcome wasn't certain. The most likely I thought was the party giving the king an ass-beating forcing him to retreat and losing many of his personal companions. But they bagged him alive and in doing so realize they had a literal king's ransom in their hands.
As Sir Cei's player was the driving force behind being mercenary and more importantly working this particular spot in the world. The party felt no obligation to stay there after he left. So they debated their future and settled on building an inn. Figuring asking for the land as a freehold, it was a feudal society, was a reasonable ask. Then using the reward as capital.
So this required me be to do another round of prep centered on the crossroads at H. Again I had about two weeks as the players went Dorn got their charter, and then went to H. The rest of the campaign was spent dealing with the situation around the crossroads. Namely dealing with the Baron of Oxcross who was offended at the party getting a freehold. And the problems of the Plain of Cairns to the east. Mostly exploring barrows, fighting undead, and winding up with breaking the curse of the cairns.
After the curse was broken, the inn was built and that where the campaign ended as it felt like a natural stopping point.
Rob's Notes
I hope this illustrate what people do in sandbox campaign. It started with the question to the group "What would everyone like to play?". They threw out an idea, mercenaries. I pitched several situations. They picked Nomar and Abberset. I then set down to prep it. Because they were employed mercenaries they were subject to orders, which means missions. Which most at first glance would not consider to be a sandbox.
However I didn't consider the campaign premise to rest on the fact they were mercenaries in the employ of the Baron of Abberset. As long as you are willing to abide by the consequences, don't worry about what I have to do. Go left instead of right if that makes sense to you. Which why the party decided to pay off the Baron of Abberset as they didn't want that millstone hanging around their necks. They knew if they just left that eventually in the next few months of game time that the Baron would catch up to them and there would be hell to pay. And given that this a feudal society and the best the party can muster socially were knights. They would be fucked especially the knights who may lose their title and privileges as a result of breaking a legal contract.
The same with the transition from the second to third phase (inn building) of the campaign. Except the players knew their fate was in their hands given the opportunity that laid before them, the capture and ransoming of a king. So they were much more proactive about this compared to lucky find of a dungeon and its treasure the previous time around.
Mostly of my campaigns are like this. Slow development of the player's goals followed by a sudden change in the course of the campaign as result of circumstances or deliberate decisions. Yes a small number of these campaign amounted crawling from hex to hex when the player wanted to explore and region. For example the orc infested Forest of Dearthwood next to the City State of the Invincible Overlord.
For more details see this pair of blog post. And yes I am guilty of not finishing part 3.
Part 1
Part 2
The campaign starts out in A. The players decided to start out as a mercenary company. I pitched several "contracts" to start out with. The one they opted to go with is working for the Baron of Abberset patrolling the Estoil Hill that was the southern frontier of the Principality of Nomar.
The cast of Characters (created with GURPS)
Delvin - a dwarven fighter from Thunderhold wandering human lands to seek his fortune.
Durgo - a forester from southern Nomar who left his home and village under bad circumstances
Sir Cei Kerac - a hedge knight hiring on as a mercenary to regain the fortune he lost gambling
Aeron - a ordinary common man with special skills
Kermit - a half Viridian (demon), half Karian (Japanese) magic using puppeteer.
Sir Henry Kiefer - a young knight seeking to regain the manor that is rightfully his.
Brom - A Warrior seeking his fortune.
After the first few sessions they learned the following in the linked PDF. This was created at the players' request to summarized what they learned.
Summary of the Halkmenan Rebels info
The first left instead of right change occurred between D & E. The players used a map they captured to find a dungeon (it was one level). Explored it and found the treasure. Sir Cei Kerac's players convinced the group that it would be more lucrative to move north and sign up with the Prince of Dorn (the ruling prince of the country) who was hiring mercenaries to fight the Skandian Vikings of Ossary along the frontier. Think of the prince as a version of King Arthur or King Alfred, and the Skandian Vikings like Saxons or Danes. Not quite a all out war but not quite peace either. Most of the treasure was used to buy out their contract with the Baron of Abberset. Who wasn't happy but the party did everything properly and legally so that was that for the Baron.
This decision totally trashed a lot of my prep but as usual I rolled with it and used my Bag of Stuff and some random tables to handle the journey north. I used the following two weeks to prep what was to happen when the party reached 'I' on the map.
The next phase went well and due to the party's attention to detail wound up with them capturing the King of Ossary. This is was the point where Sir Cei Kerac's player couldn't continue with the game and had to leave. The party received an substantial offer from the Prince of Dorn to purchase the king's ransom from the party. The party then traveled to the capital of Dorn and purchased land on the crossroads at N in order to build an inn.
The capture of the king was unexpected. They figured out the king's schedule of hunts, patrols, and visits and acted accordingly. But the king had a substantial guard with him so the outcome wasn't certain. The most likely I thought was the party giving the king an ass-beating forcing him to retreat and losing many of his personal companions. But they bagged him alive and in doing so realize they had a literal king's ransom in their hands.
As Sir Cei's player was the driving force behind being mercenary and more importantly working this particular spot in the world. The party felt no obligation to stay there after he left. So they debated their future and settled on building an inn. Figuring asking for the land as a freehold, it was a feudal society, was a reasonable ask. Then using the reward as capital.
So this required me be to do another round of prep centered on the crossroads at H. Again I had about two weeks as the players went Dorn got their charter, and then went to H. The rest of the campaign was spent dealing with the situation around the crossroads. Namely dealing with the Baron of Oxcross who was offended at the party getting a freehold. And the problems of the Plain of Cairns to the east. Mostly exploring barrows, fighting undead, and winding up with breaking the curse of the cairns.
After the curse was broken, the inn was built and that where the campaign ended as it felt like a natural stopping point.
Rob's Notes
I hope this illustrate what people do in sandbox campaign. It started with the question to the group "What would everyone like to play?". They threw out an idea, mercenaries. I pitched several situations. They picked Nomar and Abberset. I then set down to prep it. Because they were employed mercenaries they were subject to orders, which means missions. Which most at first glance would not consider to be a sandbox.
However I didn't consider the campaign premise to rest on the fact they were mercenaries in the employ of the Baron of Abberset. As long as you are willing to abide by the consequences, don't worry about what I have to do. Go left instead of right if that makes sense to you. Which why the party decided to pay off the Baron of Abberset as they didn't want that millstone hanging around their necks. They knew if they just left that eventually in the next few months of game time that the Baron would catch up to them and there would be hell to pay. And given that this a feudal society and the best the party can muster socially were knights. They would be fucked especially the knights who may lose their title and privileges as a result of breaking a legal contract.
The same with the transition from the second to third phase (inn building) of the campaign. Except the players knew their fate was in their hands given the opportunity that laid before them, the capture and ransoming of a king. So they were much more proactive about this compared to lucky find of a dungeon and its treasure the previous time around.
Mostly of my campaigns are like this. Slow development of the player's goals followed by a sudden change in the course of the campaign as result of circumstances or deliberate decisions. Yes a small number of these campaign amounted crawling from hex to hex when the player wanted to explore and region. For example the orc infested Forest of Dearthwood next to the City State of the Invincible Overlord.
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