Part of my AD&D House Rules, Part 3 - Wilderness Exploration

Wilderness Exploration

Most hexcrawl articles talk about generating a hexcrawl. That is not what this is about. My Spire campaign is an already made hexcrawl map with the adventure sites, lairs, and points of interest detailed. For a better, more general, and instructive guide, check out Melan's post here.

When I discuss these house rules, it's more for what I have found works for me. Having a codified system in my head makes the process of repetition breed efficiency, while at the same time allowing for an array of possible outcomes that reward or punish certain decisions. Seasoned DMs who already have their own favored systems that get the most out of will not find much use in another system. But those DMs who are looking into methods on running their own games might find some useful substance in these posts.

With wilderness exploration there are a few goals of any game and some of those will mirror those goals found in running dungeon exploration. For example: Time isn't free, this is why durations of torches, spells, and random encounters exist. This gives weight to spending time which is the counter balance to on-going play. Exploration in charting out the area in a dungeon is likewise carried forward into the greater world so that adventurers can uncover lost secrets, new adventure sites, and places of respite.

Like in the dungeon, wilderness time matters. Travel isn't free and rarely will be without event. There needs to be a cost in travelling the terrain as well as risks. Random encounters solve some of that. The obstacles such as harsher terrain types, fortresses, camps, and lairs offer more of that. Combine that with the chances of horrible weather and getting lost and the world begins to feel as it should.

In Spire, there are hundreds of detailed hexes. They may be villages, cities, and towns. Often they are lairs, forgotten shrines, and curiosities. Travelling in any direction through any given six hexes should usually result in a random encounter, a chance in terrain, one or two pre-determined hexes, and possibly a hex containing many sub-hexes (that is, more than one adventure site or point of interest with relative location to each other within the hex).

Absolutely quick and dirty for the low attention span:

1. HH points are travelling points to spend per day. Mounted = 12 HH points, Unmounted = 6 HH points.
2. Using the HH chart below, determine the terrain cost (plains cost 2, forests cost 4, etc). That tells you how many hexes to roll for being lost in.
3. Roll d4 and d6 daily for weather and vision, respectively.
4. Roll d10 for each hex travelled for being lost. If lost, then determine direction.
5. Check table for frequency of day/night random encounters.
6. Roll a d8 for each of those. Any encounters hit, roll on the table and adjudicate normally.

This takes me about 20 seconds to adjudicate an entire day of events, describe the day, and begin asking questions about the next steps. Random encounters aside, of course. 

Scale

I use 6 mile hexes. It's not uncommon, but everyone has their reasons. Mine is that I like to break up the hex into it's own adventure site. In Spire, I have a number of hexes that are suited better to 'drilling down'. The below example isn't the best one, but it serves to illustrate the point. Usually in these drilled down hexes, it's convenient to break them up into 1 mile sub-hexes. A 5 mile hex would be a little more awkward for me to manage.

With a 1-mile sub-hex, I can better illustrate vision, which helps to serve a similar function as a branching hallway within a dungeon. You may not know what's on the opposite end of the hex, but you can definitely see wisps of smoke over the plains a little over a mile away and a ruined tower on a hill further off in the distances to the north. By the time you get to the tower, then maybe atop that hill you can see the giant goat-shrine to the north west. Perhaps once you've gotten to the top of the tower you can see the field of petrified soldiers three miles off to the north east. This leads us into the first part of Spire wilderness exploration. 

Determining Vision (d3)

With vision, we're not given rules to adjudicate this and must instead rely on a little bit of science to make up something functional. Because we like to try to root world mechanics in the familiar, the planet that Spire is on is the same size as our Earth. The earth's surface curves out of sight within about 3.1 miles. You can see things like skyscrapers from further away only because there is no horizonal obstruction. Therefore, the maximum range of vision is 3 miles. 

Sort of. You have to common sense the exceptions.

Exceptions

A mountain range is going to be clearly visible from an extremely far distance unless there's obstructions. You don't need to give yourself further brain damage by trying to mechanize this.

A massive 300 foot tall obelisk could be visible from 12 miles away. But not if it was deep inside a canyon. 

You can figure out the exceptions with a brief moment of thought. I believe in you.

Step 1 - Roll for vision conditions for each day

However for standard practice we start with a D3 on most standard hexes. Maybe you only got a 1 and it just happens to be exceptionally heavy with peaks and valleys within the plains. Maybe you got a 3 and the forest is not only a bit sparse on the foliage, but the area is elevated a bit when the party stops to survey their surroundings. 

Step 2 - Factor in weather adjustments

Weather (see Determining Weather), but with a violent storm, visibility might be reduced by 66%. A rain storm might reduce it by 33%. A violent storm might bring the range to 0-1 miles. A rain storm might bring the range to 0-2 miles. This matters when determining getting lost (see Getting Lost).

Example:

Determining Weather (d4)

Weather is gradient for the most part in Spire. When a campaign starts, it'll cycle. Those cycles will change in effect depending on the season. Tracking time in Spire is important and it's already assumed that time will be clear on what season a current game is in. Because we like to try to root world mechanics in the familiar, the planet that Spire is on is the seasonal cycle as our Earth (notably North America).

Campaign starts can merely select a day, from there you may also choose starting weather (or roll d100) to find the weather of this chart:

Note that this is an early draft of Spire weather. The published version has used the 100 roll as a special weather event unique to Spire that I will not share here. 

Once you are in a weather cycle, track it using something like this:

The weather moves through the cycles dependent on what it lands on. The weather will have an effect on travelling speed (see Rate of Travel) and visibility.

On a clear spring day, weather is being tracked at a 73. The adventurers travel through a day and a d4 is rolled, resulting in a 3. The weather being tracked now moves to 76 and now there will be a loss of Hex Hours (see Rate of Travel) as well as visibility.

Step One - Roll the weather increment for each day
Step Two - Note where the current weather now is on the chart.

Getting Lost (d10)

Going through most hexes, unless the territory is charted, results in a check to see if the party gets lost. If they get lost, there is an at-the-table logistics issue to solve. Do you have them fill in a hex and then wait for them to get confused and spend however long trying to figure out where they could have gotten lost, then retrace their steps and remap it? I really don't want to do that. So you're left with two options:

Tax the hell out them for travel time or show them where they got lost to. I find that it's best for the flow of the game to just tell them where they ended up instead of the intended destination. My method for determining the lost chance is extrapolated right out of the 1e DMG. 

Lost Chance:

Plains:  1 in 10    Left or Right (1-2)

Hills:    2 in 10    Left or Right (1-2)

Forest:   7 in 10    Any (1-6)

Swamp:   6 in 10    Any (1-6)

Mountains: 5 in 10    Left or Right, or behind left or right (1-4)

Scrub: 3 in 10 Left or Right (1-2) 

Desert: 4 in 10 Left or Right (1-2)

Step One - Roll the chance of getting lost for each hex

Step Two - If lost, determine where the new direction leads.

Rate of Travel

The 1e DMG gives an extrapolated movement rate, which you can in turn apply math to dependent on the scale of your hexes. In Spire, I know the scale and I want something similar to Outdoor Survival in terms of determining movement. Some exceptions occur, purposefully.

Outdoor Survival, which is not a complete game with the same intentions, has a very handy chart that aids in travel through hexes.

I have adopted a similar system, where I break it up in to Hex Hours. I have a more robust system that factors into greater detail on specific mount speeds and encumbrance but I am not willing to share it in it's full detail at this point, though it relies on the 1e DMG guidelines stated on these topics. That aside, here is the Quick and dirty:

I refer to the points for Spire as Hex Hours (HH), so it illustrates how much is expected on a travel day. This will be carried forth into extending Hex Hours, which will lead to exhaustion effects that will be detailed later. 

On foot, 6 hours of pure travel is typical. Not factoring in packing up camp, stopping to rest and eat, navigating direction, finding a campsite and setting it up, there will be 6 hours of meaningful travel. 

Being mounted doubles the amount of Hex Hours allowed to be spent. In short, 12 Hex Hours (HH) can be spent in travel per day on horseback (riding), 6 HH can be spent while travelling on foot. This is easiest for an overall party average, though I would grant an additional 2 HH if the entire party was travelling light with fast horses. Likewise, heavy mounts with mules and such would be penalized 2.

Working HH rates, bold means mount bonus HH do not apply. Italics means it requires a proper mount to apply bonus HH.

Stopping a fraction of the way into the hex is fine in Spire. This differs from Outdoor Survival in that you must have the entire points required to enter the hex.

For every 2 points spent beyond the days allowance of Hex Hours, exhausted sets in that mirrors the effects of curse (-1 to hit, and morale) which is cumulative.

Examples:

Six plains hexes can be travelled by Horseback each day.

One plains hex and one forest hex can be travelled by foot each day.

Three hexes of open plains, then 1 hex of forest, stopping mid-hex on the second forest hex on horseback.

Random Encounters (d8)

The D8 Check Day refer to the number of checks done when spending 6 HH. 1 in 8 chance for an encounter, unless otherwise specified. A 2d6 table is made for each terrain or area. The D8 Night refer to the number of checks done during camping. 1 in 8 chance for an encounter.

Watches roll a number of d6 depending on terrain. This is detailed by a chart that will define certain terrains more conducive to monster encounters over others. Also, in more populated areas, I use a roll for certain events. Perhaps someone needs rescuing, a merchant carrying unique goods, or the like could occur.

All random encounters follow typical encounter protocols of surprise and distance, then described to the players.

Putting it all together in an example:

D4 (weather increment), D6 (divided by 2 for visibility), D8 (random encounter check), D10 (getting lost check), 2D6 (if a positive random encounter occurs, what is encountered). 

Example set 1: The party, mounted, is moving across the plains (costs 2 HH so they move 3 plains hexes), starting the day with a weather of 34.

Along the path, in the 4th hex, is the Barrowmound of Ultimate Evil. The party travels through 3 plains hexes (6 HH spent) and dice are rolled and the results, in order (d4, d6, d8, 3d10, [2d6]), are respectively 3, 4, 1, (2, 4, 6), [8].

The weather is incremented from 34 to 37 (still clear). The visibility is 2 miles, but a random encounter (1 on the d8) will need to be resolved. The d12 rolled d6+3 wolves for the random encounter. Finally, the party didn’t get lost (2, 4, 6 on a 3d10) during the trip.

The random encounter is resolved and the Barrowmound of Ultimate Evil is presented, but not explored. The next set of 6 HH to spend is three hexes of Hills (costs 3 HH so they move 2 hills hexes). No hex entries are in those hills to consider and dice are rolled and the results, in order (d4, d6, d8, 3d10, [2d6]), are 4, 6, 5, (2, 4, 7), [11].

The weather is incremented from 37 to 41 (still clear). The visibility improves to 3 miles (6 on the d6), there is no random encounter (5 on the d8), but the party has gotten lost on the first hex (2 on the first d10) and the direction is rolled (1-2) which has the party travel into the Hills hex to the right of where they intended. 

The 12 mounted HH are spent for the day and they decide to make camp. At night 1 random encounter check is made during their watches (hills have one d8 check at night) and the result is a 7, so the night is uneventful.

Example set 2: The party, unmounted, is moving east through the Mist Oak (forest, which cost 4 HH each hex), starting the day at weather of 47. Two hexes away is the Goddess Shrine of Blessings. The party travels 1.5 forest hexes for the day (6 HH spent). The dice are rolled and the results, in order (d4, d6, d8, 1d10, [2d6]), are 4, 2, 4, (6), [5].

The weather is incremented to 51 (cloudy). The visibility is pretty bad so even climbing a tall tree can only reveal a mile (2 on the d6). No random encounters were rolled (4 on a d8), but they got lost (6 on a d10) while moving from hex to hex since only one hex was crossed, that is the point of divergence, and the direction is rolled as a 4, which means they somehow took a 90 degree turn to the south and ended up halfway into the hex south, instead of east, by travels end. The unmounted HH is spent for the day and they decide to make camp.

At night, 1 random encounter check is made during their watches (forests have 1 d8 check at night) and the result is a 1. 2d6 is rolled on the random encounter table and Giant Spiders are rolled up (2-5 of them).5 of them are rolled up so during one of the characters watch (roll to see which), 5 of the things circle the camp to attack.