The displacer beasts in the hills would represent a discrete challenge, that may be broken into sub-challenges: 1.
See last week's post for advice on traditional dungeon design. The B plots are the lingering remnants of the histories of the ruins in the area. The next step is to dream up the B plots for each one. "the ruined coliseum needs to be cleared of displacer beasts before the lizardfolk will stop protecting the pirates") and each plot point is an excuse to have a dungeon. In D&D, each POI contains a plot point (e.g.
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For non-D&D games, each faction or threat is relevant because of its relationship to the local milieu.īut if you're running D&D, you have another step! You need to install proper dungeons in each location. If you are using random encounters, use the dangers in your POIs to decide what encounters are likely to occur in what geographical areas.įor non-D&D games, this is all you really need. Get some hex paper and put a different terrain type in each hex. This milieu gives us several POIs with solid A plots. He spends his time in the crypt below the temple, plotting a "new strategy" for dealing with "those pesky villagers." The pirates are having their own problems: Their leader recently became "ill" and cannot tolerate sunlight. The tribe of lizardfolk cannot get meat for themselves because displacer beasts lair in an old coliseum, in the hills and prey on the game that the lizardfolk used to hunt, killing deer, goats and lizardfolk hunters equally. The village used to be protected by the wizard in the nearby tower, but the wizard recently disappeared after saying he was going off to explore a mysterious palace that appeared in the mountains above the hills across the river. The pirates are enemies of the fishing village across the river that the PCs find themselves in. The lizardfolk disapprove of the pirates' predation, but depend on the purloined meat the pirates bribe them with. The pirate band is allied with a local lizardfolk tribe who live in an abandoned gold mine. When they get to the village, they learn about a band of pirates operating out of the ruined temple on the other bank of the wide river. They have a map showing a village and a wizard's tower. Because you have a map with several POIs on it - known and secret - the different POIs exist in a milieu that should generate relationships, conflicts, alliances, and plots.Įxample: The PCs are looking for an ancient artifact called Sehanine's Tear in the ruins of a river valley. The current monsters represent the " A plot" of the POIs. Undead are unique because they might connect the history of the ruin with the present (or not - they could be recent undead say a vampire that moved in, or a necromancer making trouble, or a recently hanged criminal's ghost). Humans hide out in ruins or make new villages inside or atop them. In large ruins, often multiple kinds of monsters form a symbiotic existence. These creatures can be friendly, neutral, or hostile. At the POIs, the players encounter monsters, humans, or undead living in ancient ruins. The POIs on the hex map are the meat and drink of the hex crawl. Then of course, the PCs will find more hooks along the way.
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It feels like free exploration, though there are usually good story hooks for why they're here in the first place. The player experience of a hex crawl is that of uncovering a lot of secrets about an area and exploring it however they want. As they travel, the different areas of wilderness have "random" encounters, which are actually based on the terrain type and nearby monster lairs. They also tell the GM what route the players will take as they travel, which may lead to the players stumbling upon hidden POIs. These help the players and GM determine how far apart things are, and whether the PCs will need to camp in the wilderness along the way. The map is divided into hexagons, hence the name.
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They usually have a reason for exploring the area, but it's not clear how to achieve their objective without exploring the map more first. The map is given to the players, usually as an in-character item. In a hex crawl, the GM produces a map of interesting Points of Interest (POIs) for the players to explore within a fairly large geographic area.
What is it? Why should it interest you if you're not an "OSR" fan?Ī hex crawl is an open-ended sandbox-style adventure that originated in old school D&D games. So you've heard about this thing called a Hex Crawl.