After hiking in Georgia last summer I totally changed my thoughts on the “you can explore a six mile hex in one day” theory. I took Google maps and overlaid it on a map of my town and the amount of area within a single hex was eye opening. Helps put it in perspective. Unless you are searching for a building or something large, good luck searching an entire hex in a single day. Finding a partially hidden dungeon entrance is neigh impossible.
@jonhadley5768
3 жыл бұрын
yeah the mechanics of hexcrawling don't seem generous but they actually are still gamified to make sure things happen at some point and the party doesnt waste a month searching a cluster of 3 hexes
@HouseOfGrudge
3 жыл бұрын
This comment is absolutely fucking spot on
@joshuaclabeaux1470
3 жыл бұрын
Don't forget, though, in a hex-crawl you are typically traveling THROUGH a hex and just seeing the main sites. Sure, you can cover a 6-mile hexagon in one day, but NOT if you're thoroughly "combing" it; if you are, that could take a week! As a DM I would rule that you can CROSS 3 hexes a day on foot, but if you're SEARCHING one for something specific, that will probably take at least 2 days (or just one if you're lucky or let's say have a ranger in the party) for just a SINGLE hex. During that search all kinds of things can happen.
@FluffyTheGryphon
3 жыл бұрын
Yeah, a 6 miles hex is like 32 square miles? The entire game of skyrim will fit in a hex with room to spare.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Thanks for commenting and sharing!
@BobWorldBuilder
3 жыл бұрын
It’s so cool to see the guest showing off a module he’s had since he was ten! Really expresses his care for the game as much as his experience.
@rogerfarley3300
3 жыл бұрын
In my 20s, I was in the Army and road-marched 100 miles through the Adirondack Mountains in upper state NY, and we averaged 20-25 miles per day for the first 3 days, then 15 the 4th day and then 10 the last. Full gear, with radios and ammo and an M60 tripod. It is doable if you are fit enough. At my current age, yes, 10 miles can be devastating on the knees, feet and hips. lol
@josephwilliams5732
3 жыл бұрын
Yes sir. I was about to write the same thing. 8 miles weighted down is a warm up. An adventurer would be traveling often while carrying a full ruck, they could easily do 8 miles. I love the idea of the hex map, however, their standards of travel in a day should be raised.
@DMXXCorps
3 жыл бұрын
Around 5 minutes he mentions the difference in shoes. Could you imagine doing that in basically cowboy boots? I totally agree you could do something like 12-16 a day as an average.
@josephwilliams5732
3 жыл бұрын
I disagree. If your means of travel is walking, your feet would adapt to your shoe wear. Your feet may bleed at first but you build calluses eventually. I've marched with full battle rattle 12mi in 4hrs easy. It is not as hard as it seems, once you are doing it all the time. I feel this is a better reference. It was supposed to helpful.
@randomusernameCallin
3 жыл бұрын
Through dangerous land it would be slower with speed. They need to travel an amount the keep them combat ready.
@midshipman8654
3 жыл бұрын
uah, i would think the civil war statistic would include bagage trains and the like. stuff to support whole regiments of troops rather than single indiviguals (even with heavy gear).
@1979benmitchell
3 жыл бұрын
My brothers and I took a summer to hike the Appalachian Trail when we were younger. That gives you a whole new perspective on adventuring.
@charlieblocher7456
3 жыл бұрын
Getting the balance right between random encounters and area events seems like the main learning curve for hex mapping/wilderness adventures. The random encounters and challenges help highlight that you're in the wilderness, but too many detracts from the exploration of notable landmarks and locations. Pivoting seems helpful too - turn a random encounter into a part of one of the fixed encounters, like a disease being unleashed by an evil cleric in the ruins of an ancient temple, or a pack of gnolls working for a bandit lord in a wooden fort.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Great ideas!
@jasonreid9267
3 жыл бұрын
I thought the 6 mile hex came from the notion of a 3-mile horizon line so that from the center of the hex you could conceivably see to the edge of it.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Maybe. I dunno. It comes from the Wilderness Survival Game.
@markfaulkner8191
3 жыл бұрын
@@DUNGEONCRAFT1 I suggest you read my comment above as to why the 6 mile hex is objectively the best scale. I am a huge fan of the old Mystara hex maps, the kind you would find in BX modules and BECMI Gazetteers. They were not always six miles, but they were all units divisible by six and/or eight. Like, for large areas or sea travel, they would be as high as 24 or even 72 miles! The Ilse of Dread map for the Sea of Dread is like that, We did a "sea hex" crawl all the way from Specularum to Tanaroa. (Locations on that map and in the Expert rulebook map of the Known World). But whatever scale you use, for many calculations it is best if the number is divisible by both 2 and 3. Numbers such as 6, 24, and 72. On a side not, I would *love* a hex map of South America!
@stormd
3 жыл бұрын
For better or wore, the 6-mile hex is usually the default because that's what's in the actual rulebook (DMG, Chapter 1, "Mapping Your Campaign - Kingdom Scale"), and matches up identically to the Travel Pace table in the movement rules (PHB, Chapter 9, "Movement - Travel Pace"), Slow pace = 3 hexes/day but allows for stealth or other activities while traveling, Normal pace = 4 hexes/day, Fast pace = 5 hexes/day but you take penalties on perception, etc. The rules probably aren't the most realistic for historical re-enactment, but they're reasonably well-balanced for the purposes of gameplay. I know these rules go back way further than the 5e books, because I remember them being more or less the same when I started playing 2e in 1990, and I'm curious if they're not straight from Outdoor Survival.
@hallking7441
3 жыл бұрын
The Isle of Dread is the ultimate hex crawl. My characters spent months exploring the coasts on a boat before they ever started exploring the main island and it was a blast.
@twilightgardenspresentatio6384
3 жыл бұрын
Within moments I already wish I could game with your buddy here. He seems like an awesome dude to chill with.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
He is indeed.
@quonomonna8126
3 жыл бұрын
This is the only channel on all of KZitem where I like the video before I even press play. I love hex crawls. I know exactly where everything is, what the terrain is, which monsters are wandering around in them, and my players really enjoy it as well. The world is more immersive and really comes to life.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Thanks for your kind words. I really appreciate your viewership!
@Wizzard033
3 жыл бұрын
As an Infantry man in the rangers we would march 20+ miles sometimes several times in a short period (several days) with a 60lb pack, 8lb rifle, Kevlar and LCE. 10-15mi a day is nothing. I used to run 8mi 3-4 times a week. takes about 45-50 minutes. And yes that's a fast running pace but we did it as a group and we were training for combat. Most people NEVER realize how far they can push their bodies until they a forced as a means of survival.
@yzfool6639
3 жыл бұрын
In the desert? Over hills? Were you just ignoring the possibility of Orc ambush, or had the area already been cleared out? ;-)
@toddpickens
3 жыл бұрын
Indeed. First of all, thanks for the excellent video. But I would challenge the experience you had with covering terrain. Former Marathon runner. I've trained and fought in former. Spent multiple days at a time on my feet in it. Have hiked with heavy packs for days at a time. I'm inclined to think of the average adventure as being experienced at overland travel and hauling a load. You get used to that pretty damn quickly. So I would be a little more generous with their ability to cover train and the impact it would have up on them. Surviving off of the land while covering train is a whole other ball game. 5e has of course broken a lot of that with things like goodberry.
@mattjackson
3 жыл бұрын
So the magic-user is fit and could pass a PT test? While I agree they would like be more fit than the average person today, I absolutely disagree that they would all be fit like top of the line infantry troops. I think your average MU would be more like support troops, same for the cleric and thief - better fit than your average person but they are not humping 80lbs, rucking 15 miles a day, through orc/ogre/dragon infested lands with zero air superiority and no intel. A more realistic thing to compare adventurers to would frontiersmen from the 1600s when the land was still wild with hostile natives, French/British explorers, and you were trekking through unexplored and untamed lands.
@johnevans9156
3 жыл бұрын
@@toddpickens Goodberry is from 1e. Just a heads up. 2nd lvl Cleric spell from UA.
@toddpickens
3 жыл бұрын
@@mattjackson you make a good point sir.
@swaghauler8334
3 жыл бұрын
In the 10th Mountain, we were REQUIRED to be able to march 20 miles with FULL RUCK (120lbs in my case) AND THEN fight a battle. We also rucked (our slang for road marches) 30 miles a couple of times a year. The average Army grunt is expected to be able to move 12 miles with full ruck. Most patrols are designed around this range (out and back). On a related note, the 10-mile distance is common in the US (most small towns are 10 miles apart) because this is the distance that oxen or draft horses could pull a heavy wagon without injury.
@BusyBadger
3 жыл бұрын
Having done both Nijmegen and Swiss March when I was in Germany, I was smiling and shaking my head at the distances they were talking about walking.
@adrianwebster6923
3 жыл бұрын
This may be true but adventurers are not soldiers and the journey would often have very different goals. probably with more stops and less physical endurance training. This is especially true if the party consists of a mix of classes/professions, the group is unlikely to have the range of a patrol.
@admaerable
2 жыл бұрын
@@adrianwebster6923 There are usually different rules for different type of travel. Three 6 mile hexes per day are for "just walking on flat land". If you do a forced march, or gather food or looking for something, your speed will be different. Even DMG 5e mentioning this. As a sidenote, I did some backpacking myself and I believe 30km/day on a flat land is more than realistic for a seasoned traveler.
@SuperFunkmachine
Жыл бұрын
10/12 miles is about as far as you can walk to the next village an walk home again.
@Vargavinter83
3 жыл бұрын
Reason for 6 mile hexes: According to PHB page 182. Slow travel speed: 18 miles/day (3 hexes) Normal travel speed: 24 miles/day (4 hexes) Fast travel speed: 30 miles/day (5 hexes)
@garrick3727
3 жыл бұрын
Most of my games, particularly when I was younger, were hex crawls. We did not call them that, we just called it playing D&D. I did not have hex graph paper, and I am not a fan of it anyway, so Square Crawls would be a better name for what we were doing. The party had some kind of reason for the journey, and they did spend a lot of time on roads. I just had a random monster table, and a random encounter table, where the encounters were mostly "named NPCs" who would help or hinder the party. What actually happened was mostly invented on the spot, including some dungeons. One of the advantages of being in the UK was access to the detailed Ordinance Survey maps, which I used for villages or terrain if something was happening that required specific location details. Areas like the Lake District, the North Yorkshire Moors, most of Scotland, were full of small villages where the map showed most of the buildings, and the layout was distinctly medieval. Ordinance Survey is online these days, and for a small subscription you can access all the maps. No hexes, although you could add your own. Seriously though, I prefer the old maps from the 1940s and 50s because there were fewer major roads.
@markfaulkner8191
3 жыл бұрын
The six-mile hex is objectively the best scale to use. From line to line is six miles, and corner to corner is seven miles. Three miles is the horizon limit on an Earth sized planet, so from the middle of a hex characters should be able to identify what is in the next hex. As for travel speed, that is based on the terrain, not the actual size of the hex. If you check page 88 of the Rules Cyclopedia (the only cannon OSR in print still), it rates how far you can travel in a day based upon both encumbrance and terrain. Most of those numbers are divisible by six, a few only by four but one can count that as two thirds a hex (or two hexes instead of three). If you zoom in to nesting hexes, you can fit seven smaller hexes inside a large hex. In the middle that would be three hexes wide. Count each smaller hex as two miles and it all matches up. Ease of math and efficient game play creates more "verisimilitude" than researching the American Civil War.
@krispalermo8133
3 жыл бұрын
Then factor in if you had a good road of mostly flat field, supply wagons only cover about 15 miles per day.
@Elric54
3 жыл бұрын
Nice breakdown
@BlackJar72
3 жыл бұрын
Most campaign settings use 24 or 32 mile hexes; if it says 32 I just call it 24 anyway. Of those, 24 is a good number, as it's not hard to subdivide that into 6 mile hexes.
@trikepilot101
3 жыл бұрын
It is about 3 miles to the horizon but remember big stuff like steeples and dragons stick up above the horizon.
@markfaulkner8191
3 жыл бұрын
@Ze ro I am referring only to planet Earth and land movement. Sea level does not apply. The Earth curves about 8 inches per mile. As a result, on a flat surface with your eyes 5 feet or so off the ground, the farthest edge that you can see is about 3 miles away.
@travisbarker6019
3 жыл бұрын
Hiking 20 miles a day with gear is very feasible for anyone who enjoys hiking and camping. I have hiked 20 miles in a day many times while carrying between 50-60 pounds of camping gear. The more important question is how much can you really explore if you're hiking at a certain rate.
@MacLooken9019
3 ай бұрын
I'm glad I came across this old episode. I have been getting into solo play, and hex-crawl is great. Love the New York accents! It makes me miss the East coast.
@jaketionary2543
3 жыл бұрын
Thank you, professors. I've been looking for advice on building up my exploration pillar, and the help of such scholars is truly invaluable
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
We appreciate your viewership!
@matthewlangford5304
3 жыл бұрын
On the topic of food and water, in the boy scouts we were taught "3 weeks without food, 3 days without water". I've fasted before to see how long I could last, water only after a day of soup to ween myself off food. I was 22 at the time, in shape, and working a low physically intense job. I was fine for the first three days, after that I started to have trouble focusing. The feeling of hunger went away after that, but after a week I was struggling to pick up a 5 gallon bucket of water, about 40 pounds. There would be no way I could ruck like I did in the army in that condition either!
@dminard1
3 жыл бұрын
Great video! A problem that we have in hex crawl adventures is that the players are often just dumped into the world and asked, "what do you want to do?" Its important to pack your world with people and rumors to give it lore otherwise it's hard to get buy in from the players.
@murgel2006
2 жыл бұрын
I used to be an infantry man for 15 years. We had to march massive distances during boot camp and later on as well. There are a few VERY elite units that test you up to 65 kilometres in a night but after that you rest LONG! For a specifically trained young man with adequate equipment and sufficient water supply it is possible to walk 100km in a day ONCE but you are not fit for combat after that. The same young man may do a 20 km hike for 4-5 consecutive days but combat will be hard after that. When we talked about distance that can be done we talk about 20-30km a day IF you do not need to fight, just travel as fast as you can. Personally, I have done 35km and fought the next day. But believe me, you need to be accustomed to that kind of abuse. And the "old" style equipment of adventures will work against them. Magic healing however will make some things possible. So I say, for adventures 20-25km on path or road is doable for several days, but travel only.
@AyarARJ
3 жыл бұрын
OMG, so glad to see the Outdoor Survival box! After seeing the map, pausing, rewinding, I couldn't remember the name of the game the map was from. Saved my sanity. I've got that Isle of Dread booklet around somewhere.Nice vid.
@gmjeremy3627
Жыл бұрын
I found the 8 to 14 (the video says 13) independently. Soldiers marching 8 to 14 miles a day was a large group of soldiers, held back by the slowest in the group. A smaller group can move faster than a whole army, the army had scouts that were smaller units that would move ahead, etc. With six mile hexes, two hexes a day is 12 miles. It's fantasy gaming, so we generally let the players move three hexes a day through open terrain like fields or grassland, at six miles a hex that's 18 miles a day, which is way more than the 14 miles a soldiers could cover on a good day.
@kennethdale9538
3 жыл бұрын
Hex crawls have been a mainstay of my campaign for the last 30 years- mainly because the guy on the right was my DM since I was 5. Now my players love searching hex maps. The caravan game mentioned in the video is worth a purchase- it’s a lot of fun either as a component of a larger campaign- or as a stand alone. Pick it up- well worth the money.
@Acewarren
3 жыл бұрын
Great video Profs! Love seeing you collaborating with these other peeps in the hobby. This is a great intro into hexcrawl concepts, and I would add that West Marches/Hexcrawl type campaigns/maps make for great options for a type of 1-shot world, where if you aren’t playing your regular game and want to run, you can keep all of your 1-shots in the same “world”.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
More "West Marches" stuff on the way!
@nicklarocco4178
3 жыл бұрын
The reason for a 6 mile hex mostly has to do with making math easier. A 6 mile hex face to face is 7 miles vertex to vertex, and contains just about 31 square miles. Whereas with an 8 mile hex (usually the second most popular size) everything starts to get into really messy decimals.
@Bryon1187
3 жыл бұрын
The way we played when I was younger was dungeons were where low-level characters could get enough experience to be able to survive wilderness adventures - where the real monsters were and the real treasure could be gotten.
@jarrettperdue3328
3 жыл бұрын
The game is certainly structured that way ... which always seemed a bit backwards to me.
@klonekreations2822
Жыл бұрын
I live in the southern US. My sons and I have tested the 2 hex march on state park trail loops that would accommodate horse travel. 6 miles in 4 hours of overland foot travel is a reasonable distance, and 2 marches a day is manageable (though there may be morale checks involved for untrained hikers). I think the march structure and the 3 mile border paralleling the real-world horizon sell the 6 mile hex for me.
@GenuineMattyC
3 жыл бұрын
I never understood hexcrawls before; this video was super helpful to better understand them. I always wondered "why hexes and not squares?" - The answer was so simple and make so much sense. Keep up the good work!
@dndsl3436
3 жыл бұрын
When I hear hex-crawl, I immediately think of Twilight: 2000 and the sandbox fun that was to be had in that game. In the current edition, each hex is 10km (6 miles according to WolframAlpha) across. Some of my students are interested in doing more DnD. You've made me keen to design my own hex-crawl for them.
@DLeif-bk3ye
2 жыл бұрын
Twilight 2000 so underrated. Great game.
@mrgunn2726
3 жыл бұрын
Hexcrawls, lovingly known as, the Wilderness Campaign. I remember well the light that came on (I think it was the sun) when I realized the dungeon could be outside! The ranger and the druid suddenly had something useful to do. Ahh OSG... I liked this video and your guest.
@vincentlorenzo1689
3 жыл бұрын
Great video with some wonderful information. Hex maps are a lot of fun as a player, and recently I have been running a game in 3.5 edition and my hexes have been 8 miles, as was mentioned in the video. I chose this because the Overland movement chart has one day of overland travel covering either 12 miles, 16 miles, 24 miles, or 32 miles depending on the speed of the party as 15 feet, 20 feet, 30 feet or 40 feet. So any of those numbers work really well with 8 mile hexes.
@WandersNowherre
3 жыл бұрын
Thanks, guys, this is a REALLY handy video to have not only for DMing but also for writers working in certain genres. I'm rather geographically-challenged when it comes to wrapping my brain around distance and time elements in my games, it's one of my biggest weak points as a DM and as an author, so having a guide like this is invaluable. For the maps I made for my home game, I didn't even bother measuring distances; I just made 1 hex = 1 day's unhindered travel. So I could look at my map, count hexes between locations, and tell my party "it's six days travel to the next city" and adjust that up or down based on difficult terrain, weather events, encounters, etc.
@twilightgardenspresentatio6384
3 жыл бұрын
Definitely like the reminders on harsh weather slowing or exhausting travel during a march. Makes the times with nice weather feel special.
@omowotomo19
3 жыл бұрын
The reason I think the standard is 6 miles hexes is in Page x19 in the expert book where the slowest member of 30' per turn can travel 6 miles per day which you take you movement per turn and divide by 5. Most groups slowest member is usually 60' per turn which you can travel 2 hexes per day. You have to adjust speed by terrain as well. This makes it easier for new players to learn and also allows groups who are encumbered with a lot of treasure to know exactly how long it would take to travel back to town. This game mechanic was very intentional.
@Alkis05
Жыл бұрын
That is not it. A hexagon of 6 miles face to face has 7 miles vertex to vertex, because 6/7 is proximately (√3)/2. It is the best single digit approximation. The next best approximation, by the way, is 13:15 and 84:97. That way it is easy to approximate linear distances in the 12 directions of a hex map.
@dirigoallagash3464
3 жыл бұрын
Head over heels for the hex crawl/survival aspect of Free League's Forbidden Lands. Such a fun game!
@sleepinggiant4062
3 жыл бұрын
Tomb of Annihilation has a pretty good hex crawl part. I enjoyed embellishing on it and making it fun.
@kristopherostling5100
3 жыл бұрын
This video could not have been made at a better time for me. I’ve been working on mapping the area of my campaign setting that my players are in, expanding the map as they venture forth. All of your videos are so insightful, they really guide me to creating a fun and immersive campaign. Thanks again for another great video, and thanks to your guest too. P.S. The 6 mile hex comes from the scale for kingdom maps from the DMG.
@tarano1467
Жыл бұрын
Thanks guys, I have been watching a lot of your videos. I finally got the courage to start my own campaign, and now as INTJ have to overthink everything. In all seriousness I appropriate things like this for more realism even if my players probably never will.
@billharm6006
2 жыл бұрын
I recall reading about travel on the Oregon Trail and the Mormon migration into the American West. A very good day's travel with ox-drawn wagons over virtually no road (breaking trail through prairie grass) was 20 miles. This travel typically took place over 10 hours, non-stop (if you needed a bio-break, you ran to catch up). The implied average rate of 2 miles/hour--a casual walking pace--does not seem unreasonable. The travel seemed to be split between riding on the wagons and walking (the impression I got was that very few rode--or even had--horses). In one case, the person journaling their journey had linked a mechanical revolution counter to a wagon wheel to measure distance (thus, the distance was not a completely uninformed estimate). Such 20 mile days were uncommon. Another support for the "twenty mile day" comes from that strange but common land measurement called an "Acre." { I now (dangerously) marry travel distance to land area and extend the result to detailed searching. } When I dug into the origin of the acre, the most common explanation that I found was that it was the amount of land that a man with an ox and a one-bottom plow could till in one day. Assuming a 2 mph pace, 10 hours of labor, and an assumption about furrow width (I measured a freshly plowed nearby field and also looked up advertised spacing on modern multi-bottom plows), The land area covered came out very close to one acre. I know. Lots of assumptions. Old methods probably had different furrow spacing (especially the medieval era "ridge and furrow" field preparation technique). Still, It was interesting to see that approximately 20 miles of furrow were being plowed in one day. I mention the acre and use the furrow plowing analogy because that seems to be about the amount of relatively unobstructed area that could be thoroughly searched by one person in one day. Of course, pacing the ground at one-furrow-width intervals when looking for a wizards tower might be a bit overdone.
@joshuaclabeaux1470
3 жыл бұрын
You're absolutely right; this IS "the answer"! You'd be surprised to read this, but I've been a Dungeon Master for 28 years and I've NEVER done a hex-crawl before! I've used hex-maps, but not in this way! This is the missing piece in my game design; that which corresponds to overworld action in The Legend of Zelda. This is where you get random combat and terrain encounters that are fairly easy for the PC's to win, but they still take skill and resources. This also involves wilderness searches for dungeons and settlements. I will be using this far more in the future than I could have imagined. This is the most helpful Dungeon Craft video for me personally so far. Thank you both so much!
@SteveSwannJr
3 жыл бұрын
We hiked the Centennial Trail in South Dakota which is 111 mi long in 5 and 1/2 days. The first 15 mi we enjoyed the trip and the scenery. The last 10 to 12 mi we saw the feet of the person in front of us. Our perception checks weren't a disadvantage, they didn't exist.
@patrickclapp9898
2 жыл бұрын
L1 is one of the best adventures I have ever run. I have done it a few times as. 1E module and used material from it for custom 5E adventures as well.
@zan917
3 жыл бұрын
I made a hex map and called each hex a “league,” 3 miles center-to-center. The party was able to move something like 18 miles in a day and could go farther with various exhaustion penalties.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Cool ideas!
@korth9107
3 жыл бұрын
I just started building my own rules for a hex crawl and the very next day this video comes out. So many great ideas and information. I would love to hear more from our new co-professer. Thank professors
@mrlicopoli
3 жыл бұрын
Nice. Love the light bulb 'budget' comment! I think the biggest piece of advice for a gamemaster is to know when to be random and when not to be random. Sometimes I like to 'minimize' the randomness to a brief weather event, etc. so that the goals/quests can still be accomplished (if there are any at that time) in a shorter amount of time. Players can sometimes get fatigued. We play in my science classes so we have to keep 'moving' most of the time. Thanks for all that you do Professor!
@bruced648
3 жыл бұрын
as a medieval re-enactor, dressed in 1400 period clothing (yes, modern materials). we would walk between 9-12 miles each Saturday and Sunday. while it was in a town setting, it was on dirt/gravel streets. when I was younger, I would wear half plate and chain mail (total wt 70+ pounds). on days of 90-100 degree Temps, I was drinking a half gallon water skin every hour, for 7 or 8 hours. some of us are dumb enough to experience the low tech world in similar conditions. this was all in a town setting, can't imagine being on a prolonged journey (weeks or months).
@shepahotep
3 жыл бұрын
I've taken up 3D printing in preparation for my next campaign and I am completely enamored with Hexton Hills hex tiles for a 3D hex crawl.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Cool!
@yzfool6639
3 жыл бұрын
Those are cool! You can make them with a 3D printer?
@SteveSwannJr
3 жыл бұрын
Great interview (guest speaker)! So many people want to do an interview and never let their guests talk; they're just looking for confirmation on their own thoughts. You did an excellent job!
@dougsundseth6904
3 жыл бұрын
If you're on established trails, 20 miles in a day with a pack is entirely possible. But you have to be relatively athletic and acclimated to hiking. (The 20 mile hike is fairly common for both Boy Scouts and military units.) If you're going cross-country, things get much more difficult. Even in prairies, you are high-stepping to move your feet above the tops of the clumps of grass, avoiding the small holes that will cause a turned ankle, crossing washes and gullies (that seem to appear out of nowhere), and the like. And water is very difficult to find in many places as well. If you're in a forest, even continuing in a vaguely straight line is difficult. Without fieldcraft of one sort or another, you're likely to wander in circles (if there's no visible sun) or zig zag back and forth, losing a lot of time. In mountains, you're heavily constrained by the terrain. Even if you know which way you want to go, you often can't go that way without miles of backtracking.
@terrybeal2252
3 жыл бұрын
I LOVED Isle of Dread! My favorite old school adventure.
@Sarados1980
2 жыл бұрын
Regarding the "walking per day" distance: During my basic military training we have to do our "Combat March" which consists of 52km (32 miles) with full combat gear (roughly 30 kg/60 lbs + radio & MG3 + Ammo (total additional ~ 30 kg split between the group)). Half of the march was through wilderness, the other on roads/pathes. It also inlcuded things like "crossing a river via rope", ABC-drill and "movin through enemy territory" (so try to hide, scout ahead etc.). This was in at the end of my second month at the military, so after two month of daily physical training. I think this would be a good comparision to a "Adventure travel through uncharted wilderness". We started at 08:00 am and reached our desitination at 03:00 am (and were exhausted as hell!). So the 24 miles per day normal travel speed given in the core rule books sound reasonable for me (if it's straight moving from A to B without any encounters). If people should be able to fight I would go more with the slow speed (18 miles/day or even less). P.S.: Don't underestimate effect of regular training (what adventureres should have^^). Now 20 years later, when I'm in full armor on LARP Events, I coughing after a 5 km march, back in the military, this was our daily routine.
@bholl6546
3 жыл бұрын
Literally about to start the hex crawl leg portion of my campaign week. This could not have come out at a better time. Thanks prof!
@LadyElaineLovegood
3 жыл бұрын
Thanks for the interesting video. One point of minutiae, a party's water needs can also be covered by having a Water Genasi or an Alchemy Jug although neither would be much help as a healer (unless the problem could be treated with honey or mayo.)
@robbyslilshadow1948
3 жыл бұрын
Thank you for this topic. I'd really love to see some work getting a sense for all sorts of different possible exotic mounts, pack animals and monsters that serve as beasts of burden hauling equipment.
@TheCortex13
3 жыл бұрын
I am just running some test this very week on hexcrawl to begin a West march with some fellow compagnions. This is just what I was looping for, tks !
@Patoshlenain
3 жыл бұрын
I like these interviews/ guest episodes but I really would recommend a different PoV for the camera. It would much more interesting to see you both at least some kind of face to face layout like they used to do at WEB DM before covid. That's my opinion but i get that it would be more trouble :)
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
we tried to do that--but the space isn't big enough!
@mattjackson
3 жыл бұрын
I was wondering if that was the issue, watching the ol’ Prof looking over his shoulder awkwardly was painful and I figured there had to be a reason. Next stop…. Prof DM Studios!
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
@@mattjackson I have one. It's just small. Like less than a bathroom small!
@ericjome7284
3 жыл бұрын
Outdoor Survival. Also known as Dying Of Thirst Outside. :)
@twilightgardenspresentatio6384
3 жыл бұрын
Ha! I’ll boil a raccoon or a monitor lizard down til what comes out is a glass of water! I have no problem turning my foes into craft and Chem materials.
@adrianwebster6923
3 жыл бұрын
A number of people posting here arguing about hiking distances are forgetting that medieval people were as a whole far less healthy, well fed or physically trained for endurance than modern hikers and soldiers. adventuring parties are not soldiers, they may have some, but mages, clerics etc. will generally not have the same ability to travel distances that the fighters do. Plus parties will have different goals than a military march, patrol or hike, meaning they will make more stops, explore etc. not to mention spending more time foraging. Even our wilderness is generally tamer and safer. There is a reason that people travelled in large groups and even 18th century travellers generally carried as much as possible with pack animals etc when travelling in the wilderness. All of these lend themselves to shorter distances covered not longer.
@johnm384
3 жыл бұрын
Beautiful artwork and great tutorial! Well done!
@jestersjokers
3 жыл бұрын
I love seeing the older Gen of dnd players. It’s kind of heart warming. Like seeing blink 182 grow old instead of dying of drug overdose. Gives me hope for the future
@joshpotter9261
3 жыл бұрын
Hard to call them old, but Mark Hoppus is dealing with cancer😔
@johnmickey5017
3 жыл бұрын
Random encounters and wilderness incidents are only sensible when combined with a matching health system that allows for long term exhaustion and resource attrition. Also, when I was seasoned, a 20m hike on established trails was trivial provided there was enough daylight. Historically wilderness travel is done on foot with pack mule support due to the lack of established paths. In theory horseback may be possible but you add extra resource consumption and limit approachable terrain. Civil war and roman legionaries are not great comparison points because their travels largely were on established and scouted roads through civilized areas which is not at all like a wilderness expedition.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Good points.
@edwardromero3580
3 жыл бұрын
Back in my Infantry days (I was 18) we would regularly do five mile marches with 40lbs ruck sacks and weapons. Occasionally, we would do a grueling 20 mile road march. So it’s possible but it ain’t fun. 🙂
@DungeonMiser
3 жыл бұрын
I see Tolkien's obsession with walking still making players forget about horses and carts lol
@patrickbuckley7259
3 жыл бұрын
Yeah, I try to emphasis the importance of mounts and carts in my games, it's not helped by the other major GM in my group murdering mounts and pack animals whenever possible...
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
Tolkien loved walking, for sure!
@nicklarocco4178
3 жыл бұрын
The problem with horses and carts is you can't take them everywhere. And once you have to leave them behind you need to suddenly decide what you can go without.
@samurguybriyongtan146
3 жыл бұрын
@@nicklarocco4178 this is my problem in Breath of the Wild!
@rcrawford42
3 жыл бұрын
The Fellowship had horses (and ponies like Bill) until they had to go through Moria.
@wingtrek8914
2 жыл бұрын
I'm 19, it's 1979, and I'm a grunt. Ground pounder, beetle crusher. Our CO was a Vietnam veteran. Most of our NCO's were Vietnam grunts. We did a 20 mile forced march across mostly level terrain, on a good road. With 80lb packs and full gear. So nearly 100lbs carried. It was a cool day, with some rain in the afternoon. 90% of the unit didn't make the entire hike. We started falling out after 12 miles. We are talking hardened young men in the flower of their strength and endurance. The next day was a rest day. As was the day after. Much respect to those Roman units who did this in sandals. When men were men. Damned few of those left today.
@darkranger116
3 жыл бұрын
WoW!! Great minds truly think alike!! Im quite literally, making my own hexbased overworld travel tabletop game (with the place-holder name Caravan), set in a Roadside Picnic after-future! Wonderful video, very helpful for a person in my position atm
@justanothercaptain6566
3 жыл бұрын
Great video! I love the guests you’re bringing on to your videos. Cheers 🍻
@BusyBadger
3 жыл бұрын
"I don't know how you could do more than 10 miles a day..." *laughs in Nijmegen Military March*
@VosperCDN
3 жыл бұрын
40km per day, for 4 consecutive days - for those not familiar with this event.
@tahm22
3 жыл бұрын
Love the teacher joke at the end! Keep up the great work Professor!
@desdichado-007
3 жыл бұрын
I've always thought that Gary's comparison of movement to armies on the march was completely missing the point. Overland travel in a small group, you're doing better consulting hikers/backpackers in terms of what is a reasonable thing to do. Twenty miles in a day is hard work for people who sit around in an office all day. Not for people who walk a lot all day. Thru-hikers ROUTINELY do 20+ miles a day, and when they really do their big days, they can do more than 40.
@desdichado-007
3 жыл бұрын
To be fair, that assumes relatively good road/trail conditions and relatively flat terrain. Having to cross a big river or go through thick brush or do serious up and downs through the mountains can slow you down a fair bit.
@michaelhorn6029
3 жыл бұрын
But different classes are physically different. Wizards do have to sit and read for days at a time. Constitution scores vary.
@desdichado-007
3 жыл бұрын
@@michaelhorn6029 Well, that's true, but wizards don't do that, actually, if they're PCs. They're adventurers. By definition in the game. You'd be surprised how people of obviously different "Constitution scores" adapt to walking longer distances in just a couple of weeks. But that's not really my point. My point is that hikers make a better analog for the movement of a small group than armies do.
@vinimagus
Ай бұрын
But the nerd wizard... Is an office worker. Endurance is sort of CON. ;)
@gatonegroloco
3 жыл бұрын
I remember seeing something where someone used settlers of cattan for a hex crawl.
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
3 жыл бұрын
That's a cool idea!
@GeekGamers01
3 жыл бұрын
That possibly was me... I definitely recommended the tiles in a vid-hard to recall where I used them
@gatonegroloco
3 жыл бұрын
@@GeekGamers01 I saw it in a thread when I googled settlers of cattan dnd. But when you find your vid let me know. I’d love to see it.
@vinimagus
Ай бұрын
@@GeekGamers01and you also used Outdoor Survival. Love your videos, gg!!!❤
@DMRaptorJesus
3 жыл бұрын
In my hexcrawl I make my hexes 3 miles because thats the distance someone can walk in an hour over flat ground (like plains or a hardpacked desert). Another trick, many are not going to like, is that your not supposed to roll on random encounter tables during the game. These are world building tools that you roll on before the game or in between sessions to build the world and give you time to flesh it out. On my GM map, I write a symbol for that encounter or just a number where I have all my encounter written out for use of reference (an encounters notebook if you will) So many times have I played in a hexcrawl where the GM does this "Ok, so your traveling through the dark woods and" *rolls dice* "Ok you find 13" *rolls dice* "Frogmen...in a..." *rolls dice* "...uhh a...well? umm...roll initiative?" You don't want to be embarrassed like this during the game, it makes the players think your not ready for the session and they may start to loose interest. Just roll your encounters in X area before hand, when they defeat that encounter you can roll another one that shows up in a month, and if they never cross that hex that monster roams don't worry about it - keep it until they do or just save it for next campaign.
@petegiant
3 жыл бұрын
The problem with that method is it doesn't take into account any actions the PCs have done leading upto the point of the random encounter roll.
@cooldogspot4855
3 жыл бұрын
@@petegiant it certainly does, having predetermined encounters as set pieces for what may happen on the road is only to fill the spaces between point A and B, in other words you'd have to know beforehand they are traveling. Further, this method also helps you craft meaningful encounters and not just skirmish mini games.
@petegiant
3 жыл бұрын
@@cooldogspot4855 how does that take into account the actions of party leading to rolling? All the encounters written on a 2d6 table with most dangerous at the extremes, so you can modify the roll if the party has been acting recklessly for example?
@michaellinke6448
3 жыл бұрын
We use hexes because all adjoining spaces are equidistant. With squares, you have to deal with the fact that diagonal moves cover more distance than orthogonal moves.
@vinimagus
Ай бұрын
Great point. However, if the side of a square is 5, the diagonal is 7. I this believe square crawling is very feasible.
@michaellinke6448
Ай бұрын
@@vinimagus It's not 7. It's 7.07106781186... etc. But even if it was just "7", the point isn't that we don't know the distance of a diagonal move, it's simple that a diagonal move is not the same distance as the orthogonal move.
@johnevans9156
3 жыл бұрын
A professors constitution and lifestyle doesn’t lend itself to overland travel. 🤣 Born in a time and culture where this activity is ubiquitous will condition one to this activity with little to no adverse effects. Myself growing up in Alaska during the 70’s, we used to hike with 40lb packs as kids, and would do 10 miles a day cracking jokes and eating squaw candy. Wouldn’t even cross our mind that it was hard or rugged.
@rikwilliams6352
7 ай бұрын
5:20 Welcome to the world of the infantry lol.
@alainmetellus1565
3 жыл бұрын
Amazing and thorough!! Thank you both for articulating this so well...
@sirguy6678
3 жыл бұрын
Great video! Hex crawls are a next level of gaming once the party leaves the dungeon
@iantaran2843
2 жыл бұрын
I love this, I always laugh when I get someone who's only played 5e and after a game with me they ask what adventure had all these events and I just show them all of my random tables 😂 it's one of two reactions "what even is this" and *eyes start to glitter with interest* not to mention how my friends brother was losing it at how cool Maze of the Medusa is when he asks what we are playing 😅 like no it's ok I get it, most of the main line D&D adventures don't have very impressive covers or construction. My friend that I bought all of 5e with got to keep all of them when I lost interest and last time I saw them, pretty much everything other than the adventures are falling apart, and those only made it cause they weren't in constant use... The players hand book is just sitting out of its cover with the pages that fell out in a folder he keeps with it.
@sw33n3yto00
3 жыл бұрын
Deathbringer must be a common core teacher.
@Chilrona
3 жыл бұрын
Whoa perfect! I needed for my session prep today
@carpma11
3 жыл бұрын
As a new-ish RPG player I think the hex crawl seems like a very cool game element and I wish it was still more of a thing. This product seems like a buy, especially once in print.
@awaytoanywhere699
3 жыл бұрын
10 miles (16 km) a day is good stretch. and keep in mind possible elevation/altitude too. it is not all paved sidewalks…
@frederickcoen7862
3 жыл бұрын
OMG, I bought that mentioned game - Outdoor Survival - for my father as a Christmas present 40 years ago! (Boy Scouts) Crazy to see it mentioned here and tied to D&D and Gygax!
@B00Radl33
3 жыл бұрын
I've been wanting to run a Hex crawl campaign for a while now. I'm a bit of a perfectionist and I have no idea where to start. This looks as good as any. 🙂
@krispalermo8133
3 жыл бұрын
Being a bit of a perfectionist myself, nothing is really good enough and it create hang ups trying to put a game together & run. Flip a coin or roll some dice and start working off the fly. As a counter measure to DMing a game, I put together a NPC bard and I run the game as if I was recounting a story told second hand. Coming up with a Tall Tale on the spot.
@cidlunius1076
Жыл бұрын
I'm only subscribing because Deathbringer is absolutely metal.
@emarsk77
3 жыл бұрын
The reason to use hexes is not just having more directions to move, it's that they don't have the "diagonal problem" squares have: in a hex grid, distances can be measured counting tiles with good approximation in any direction, while with a square grid distances along the diagonals are heavily distorted.
@elyonsilvarath6854
2 жыл бұрын
Outdoor survival's maps are just beautiful
@gregorscott3073
3 жыл бұрын
My solution was that a world hex took one day to travel through on a horse on a road. On foot it would take two days. Remember a road is to get you quickly from one place to another. Then I came up with reasonable penalties for off-road travel, travel on tracks, trails, etc. As for exploring the hex for interesting stuff, there would be clues, tracks, attacks, requests, strange activity, etc. that would point out things that might be worth a closer look. The party wouldn't have to spend time turning over rocks. If the characters asked for directions the NPC would give terrain features and say something like, "My Uncle Mort took three days to walk there once." Measured distances would only be for things like Imperial Roadways and the like. I didn't fixate on mileage.
@gregorscott3073
3 жыл бұрын
@Carolyn Stell OK. I got the travel speed metric I've used from the AD&D 1979 Edition of the DMG, p 58, which gives movement rates for normal terrain as: on a light horse 60 miles a day, on foot lightly burdened 30 miles a day. I suspect GG based this on a common cultural prejudice (rather than horse sense), i.e., on a horse you go further, faster and you arrive rested. (If not, why spend all that money on them?) Since we all live in a mechanized society free from walking and horseback, this belief is supported by fiction (westerns, fantasy, etc.), and historical accounts of a people more use to physical activity than ourselves. But I will rest my case on this final point: fantasy horses are faster than real ones. :)
@gregorscott3073
3 жыл бұрын
Another point folks are discussing is how long would it take to closely search a six mile hex. As I write a search has concluded for a person of interest in a nature preserve approximately 38 square miles in size. An area about 50% bigger than the square mileage of a six mile diameter hex. With the use of personnel on the ground, riding ATVs, with dogs and drones, it’s been just about a week to complete with no success. Now the report of this person being in the preserve may have been a red herring to throw off the scent, but the point is it takes a substantially amount of time to search an area. I would hazard a rule of thumb that an adventuring party of four would take a month to make sure no stone remained unturned in a hex.
@TheGuidermichael
3 жыл бұрын
Caravan sounds like the game I've been looking for!
@dungeoncrawlinghobo7248
11 ай бұрын
In the Marie Corps we hiked 16 to 20 miles with 60 lb pack
@DUNGEONCRAFT1
11 ай бұрын
The US Marine Corp are tougher than D&D fighters.
@badunius_code
2 жыл бұрын
As a surveyor I used to cover 6 to 10 miles on a daily basis without any effort. Sometimes taking a 12 mile hikes to the next town and back just to visit my friends there on a day off. It is doable if you are used to it.
@RyuuKageDesu
3 жыл бұрын
That light bulb crack! Brutal.
@meltingskeleton2082
3 жыл бұрын
My rule of thumb for Hexcrawls is to keep it simple and divisible by the amount it would take your adventurers to get from start to finish if they new exactly the destination location. I.E. if they are 60miles from the destination then I would make the hex done by either 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 MAYBE 10 miles per hex. This helps control the pace of the hex itself. If you want to make a bunch of random tables n stuff using the least divisible number is perfect, if you want a higher chance for specific encounters to happen, 6 miles per hex is better and so on. If you are going for 10miles plus for each hex, make each hex an entire days worth of adventure. Keeps moving from place to place very smooth and kinda organic.
@Goshin65
Жыл бұрын
I did a lot of hiking when I was younger. On kinda-flat trails I could do 2mph with a pack, 3mph unloaded, 12-15m for days in a row when I was in good shape. MOUNTAIN or hilly terrain, totally different thing: hills 5-10 miles per day, mountain 2-6. Woods with no trail about the same as hills. Back in the day when most people walked everywhere, they were better at walking than modern people. :)
@garrick3727
3 жыл бұрын
I think the people saying they can hike 50 miles in a day no problemo, or whatever, are missing some of the key points: 1. In the roadless wilderness of hills, swamps, icy wastes? 2. For many days at a time? 3. With medieval shoes, clothing, armor (let's face it - adventurers don't take their armor off to travel)? 4. Avoiding ogres, giants and owlbears? (Yes, you could fight them, but that takes up time) 5. With 3 out of 8 hit points?
@Lodane
3 жыл бұрын
Watched twice. I don't feel fully confident on designing a hexcrawl. Can we get a part two... perhaps with an example? (Guest was great, BTW, bring him back for second installment!)
@tomdulski3729
3 жыл бұрын
agree bring him back
@VosperCDN
3 жыл бұрын
That cover of Bone Hill looks like a superhero more than sword & sorcery ... (No Capes!)
@endieposts
2 жыл бұрын
The discussion at 5:30 onwards is two kinda town-dwelling, middle-aged guys talking about ten miles a day is the limit before someone with a pack collapses. I've walked with three days' food for two people, tent, sleeping bag, mat, water, spare clothes etc for 14 miles on the first day, 28 miles over the Minigaig Pass (in horrendous snow and rain) then 22 miles up Feshie into the Spey valley and at that point I needed a rest. Yes, that's less than a Roman legionary would be carrying and in better footwear, but I was 44 and a computer programmer, not 25 and a professional soldier drilled on route marches and camp building!
@sherizaahd
Жыл бұрын
20 miles. A Roman recruit marched 20 miles a day, wearing all armour and carrying equipment. Though, I guess their miles were shorter than ours, so for us it might be just over 18 miles per day for them. Once trained they were expected to go 24 miles (22 modern) in "5 summer hours" (summer hours being 75 minute, so 6.25 regular hours) and then build overnight defenses afterwards. I found this on Wikipedia, it's cited there to Vegetius. He said they were only carrying equipment and a 45 lb pack though.
@goobiecaro8135
3 жыл бұрын
If you are used to walking as your main mode of transportation, you would endure more terrain and recover quicker. Your pace would also be more consistant and higher than one who drives everywhere and leads a sedentary lifestyle. Keep in mind when designing/designating hex distance, etc.
@Dra8er
3 жыл бұрын
You can ABSOLUTELY Hex Crawl in a City. We did Hex crawls (and Point Crawl) everything in the 70's.
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