Aquatic Hexcrawl Follow Up

[Flallen]

I realize it's been a long time since I updated anyone on from this thread: https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?616639-Building-an-Aquatic-Hexcrawl so I wanted to make good on the request that I keep people in the loop.

For my home campaign, this was roughly what the map ended up looking like (on the GM side of the screen):

https://i.ibb.co/Zzf2Mns/The-Sink-Map.png

The campaign had them heading to this region to search for a sunken ship which used to belong to an old spelljamming gnome wizard at the behest of the Warlock's celestial patron who had imposed a geas on him to win a major race with that specific vessel. In exchange for this, their friend who was currently absolutely-not-an-intellect-devourer-in-disguise would be resurrected.

The players really enjoyed exploring the region and particularly got invested in the political intrigue of the Sea Elves (0103) and the idiosyncratic mannerisms of the kuo-toa (0301). But the thing they got most invested in was freeing the Marid, Saeadet il-Malak Samak who was bound to a magic conch shell in the possession of a sea dragon (from Kobold Press' Tome of Beasts).

The exploration mechanics mostly worked smoothly. I had the Sea Elf town willing to sell them a regular supply of potions of water breathing as a reward for getting involved in and solving a political crisis favourably for the main factions. They found most of the more dangerous things first because one they started their search near the island waters of hex 0104, they worked in a spiral pattern, leading them out into the deeper hexes first.

After discovering the ship giving it some basic repairs and restoring the helm, I allowed them to float the ship to surface and slowly limp their way to shore where more substantive repairs could be made. The race that happened afterward was ok, I didn't love how the mechanics worked for porting chase rules to ship sailing, but it did well enough. I threw in obstacles for the race like explosive flotsam which some of the competitors used to attack their ship to create opportunities for them to make decisions ("do you want to steer to avoid the flotsam and lose some pace or drive through the debris and risk damage to your ship", e.g.). While I didn't love it, the players liked it, so it probably worked better than I felt it did.

Some reflections from afterward:

1. I think I really needed to push more on my writing to increase the number of locations per hex to a consistent minimum of three and to more imaginatively spread them out. Some of the hexes only had two locations, or they had more, but the locations were all clumped too close together within the hex and it made the area feel smaller than was intended.
2. Combat in 3 dimensions actually really sucks to run. If I were to do another fight like this, there needs to be some better constraints.
3. I needed more random NPCs. They loved the exploration, but I think the various regional narratives I embedded in the area were what really made it compelling for them. They certainly didn't enjoy getting ambushed by Sahuagin that much! So more NPCs might have improved it.

I've had a few more ideas for things to put in the region, so I've been working on trying to add a few more hexes to the map and am considering how to adjust the material so that I could run it for characters at lower levels as well.

I'm considering using this format again for the end of the campaign, but I'm suspecting that levels 12 to 15 might be too high for this to not feel incredibly artificial.

Thanks to those who posted in the last thread!

[Segev]

Why three locations per hex as your goal? The natural number, to me, would be one, such that hexes don't need sub-dividing under most circumstances. But you've got playtest experience under your belt, now, and you feel that they need 3 locations-of-interest each, so I'm curious what makes that seem like the right number, based on your game. You mention they felt "small" when the locations were "clumped up." Are the hexes mapped out individually in a fashion that makes "one hex" being a place with multiple locales of interest more meaningful with greater distances?

[Flallen]

Why three locations per hex as your goal? The natural number, to me, would be one, such that hexes don't need sub-dividing under most circumstances. But you've got playtest experience under your belt, now, and you feel that they need 3 locations-of-interest each, so I'm curious what makes that seem like the right number, based on your game. You mention they felt "small" when the locations were "clumped up." Are the hexes mapped out individually in a fashion that makes "one hex" being a place with multiple locales of interest more meaningful with greater distances?

Three is generally an arbitrary number. When I started making this I was really enamored with how Swordfish Island's Hot Spring Island campaign was structured and I thought it was really cool that the party could return to a hex to find new locations later. I wanted to keep that concept, so I took it as an influence. In practice, I had wanted things loosely coded to sub-regions, but when I was writing up some of the locations they were too tied to other places in the same hex and ended up feeling like you had a mostly empty hex and then one area with a high density of points of interest (for example, having three Sahuagin related locations in on hex that should logically have probably been one massive dungeon rather than three smaller ones). I could just triple the number of hexes and spread things out, but I like how that map looks!

[Sparky McDibben]

Some reflections from afterward:

1. I think I really needed to push more on my writing to increase the number of locations per hex to a consistent minimum of three and to more imaginatively spread them out. Some of the hexes only had two locations, or they had more, but the locations were all clumped too close together within the hex and it made the area feel smaller than was intended.

That's interesting. I went with a similar approach, and randomly triggered which point of interest the PCs encountered. I also had hidden points of interest that could only be found by exploring (which reduced your speed). There was no roll to discover a hidden location; if you were exploring you automatically found the hidden location. Of course, you probably don't want to explore all the time, so I also seeded maps, treasure, and rumors to the hidden locations, pointing the players to where they needed to be to discover the location.

The other interesting thing about this is that given how fast boats travel (per Saltmarsh), the distances in an aquatic hexcrawl have to be massive. Most terrestrial hexcrawls recommend hexes between 3 to 12 miles per hex, but ships can travel 72 - 120 miles per day. How big are your hexes? And how often are you checking for random encounters? What's the encounter distance table look like? (sorry for all the questions, but I never get to talk about hexcrawls and I love them)


2. Combat in 3 dimensions actually really sucks to run. If I were to do another fight like this, there needs to be some better constraints.

100%. Designed an encounter with a whirlpool once. Never again.


I'm considering using this format again for the end of the campaign, but I'm suspecting that levels 12 to 15 might be too high for this to not feel incredibly artificial.

Not necessarily. I just find that you need barriers that only PCs of that level can overcome. Permanent hurricanes covering treacherous reefs patrolled by hyper-intelligent sharks, for example, would be one way to explain why no one has ever returned from visiting Stonefang Island. If the hurricanes rain necrotic energy, turning any who die from exposure into undead, so much the better - now the island is patrolled by desperately hungry ghouls who have turning resistance (from all the necrotic rain). There's no food or clean water on the island, of course, and whatever's there has bound coral elementals into the reefs (as stone golems, but vulnerability to bludgeoning damage and does poison damage if it hits with its slam attack).

This is just my version of doing high-level exploration, though; there are definitely better ones out there. :)

[Segev]

Three is generally an arbitrary number. When I started making this I was really enamored with how Swordfish Island's Hot Spring Island campaign was structured and I thought it was really cool that the party could return to a hex to find new locations later. I wanted to keep that concept, so I took it as an influence. In practice, I had wanted things loosely coded to sub-regions, but when I was writing up some of the locations they were too tied to other places in the same hex and ended up feeling like you had a mostly empty hex and then one area with a high density of points of interest (for example, having three Sahuagin related locations in on hex that should logically have probably been one massive dungeon rather than three smaller ones). I could just triple the number of hexes and spread things out, but I like how that map looks!

I think your observation about "having three Sahuagin related locations in on hex that should logically have probably been one massive dungeon rather than three smaller ones" points more towards one site per hex working, as long as you're not trying to force yourself to add more locations and wind up, for lack of a better word, "cheating" yourself this way.

My suggestion - again, admittedly, never playtested, so your experience should trump here - would be to make the rule "at least one location of interest per hex," and a secondary one of multiple locations in the same hex needing to be spread out enough that they don't work as a single site/dungeon. This requires judgment, obviously, but keep in mind the purpose you have is that the party could return to a hex and find a location they hadn't found last time, so they should be separated enough in both function and location that this is feasible. While they may relate in some way (three sahuagin settlements might trade between each other, or be at war, or two settlements might have a third site they're working on together to make a joint olympics-like thing happen at), they should have distinct separation and require "entering the overworld map" to get from one to the other, conceptually.

And there's no need to force it. 2-site hexes being uncommon and 3-site hexes being rare makes both more special, and means players don't feel like they HAVE to go back to search for ALL THE THINGS in EACH hex. They never know if there's another thing to find, so they aren't tallying that.

[Flallen]

That's interesting. I went with a similar approach, and randomly triggered which point of interest the PCs encountered. I also had hidden points of interest that could only be found by exploring (which reduced your speed). There was no roll to discover a hidden location; if you were exploring you automatically found the hidden location. Of course, you probably don't want to explore all the time, so I also seeded maps, treasure, and rumors to the hidden locations, pointing the players to where they needed to be to discover the location.

The other interesting thing about this is that given how fast boats travel (per Saltmarsh), the distances in an aquatic hexcrawl have to be massive. Most terrestrial hexcrawls recommend hexes between 3 to 12 miles per hex, but ships can travel 72 - 120 miles per day. How big are your hexes? And how often are you checking for random encounters? What's the encounter distance table look like? (sorry for all the questions, but I never get to talk about hexcrawls and I love them)

I used 6 mile hexes, but the way I got around this problem, in practice was to equalize some thing. No matter how far the boat is traveling, moving to another hex requires one watch. The benefit of the boat is that you could go more than one hex in that time, but even if you want to move to the adjacent hex it takes four hours to get back to the boat, get the ship ready, and stop at the right place (since all points of reference are deep enough that you can't just see them).

My exploration system was also automatic. I gave the extra locations loose compass directions which I would ask them for when they decided to spend time exploring the hex they are in and they would find whichever was closer to the direction they chose to explore in.



Not necessarily. I just find that you need barriers that only PCs of that level can overcome. Permanent hurricanes covering treacherous reefs patrolled by hyper-intelligent sharks, for example, would be one way to explain why no one has ever returned from visiting Stonefang Island. If the hurricanes rain necrotic energy, turning any who die from exposure into undead, so much the better - now the island is patrolled by desperately hungry ghouls who have turning resistance (from all the necrotic rain). There's no food or clean water on the island, of course, and whatever's there has bound coral elementals into the reefs (as stone golems, but vulnerability to bludgeoning damage and does poison damage if it hits with its slam attack).

This is just my version of doing high-level exploration, though; there are definitely better ones out there. :)

I was thinking about this, but it can be difficult when you have to balance the existing drama that they are embroiled (currently they are attempting to stop Lord Cassalanter from taking revenge on the city for the fall out of the published module). My gut instinct was to take them to Hell, but one of my players just ran us all through the Descent into Avernus module and I don't want to retread her turf when it is so fresh.


I think your observation about "having three Sahuagin related locations in on hex that should logically have probably been one massive dungeon rather than three smaller ones" points more towards one site per hex working, as long as you're not trying to force yourself to add more locations and wind up, for lack of a better word, "cheating" yourself this way.

I think what I meant more was that I should have broken up the Sahuagin stuff and placed it in different hexes, which you mention below as well. There's a fairly vulnerable hex not far from the village which would have made for an excellent place to slot in a hostile military encampment. The three Sahuagin locations weren't meant to be treated as one, but once they stuck around exploring it just became one giant combat chain.


My suggestion - again, admittedly, never playtested, so your experience should trump here - would be to make the rule "at least one location of interest per hex," and a secondary one of multiple locations in the same hex needing to be spread out enough that they don't work as a single site/dungeon. This requires judgment, obviously, but keep in mind the purpose you have is that the party could return to a hex and find a location they hadn't found last time, so they should be separated enough in both function and location that this is feasible. While they may relate in some way (three sahuagin settlements might trade between each other, or be at war, or two settlements might have a third site they're working on together to make a joint olympics-like thing happen at), they should have distinct separation and require "entering the overworld map" to get from one to the other, conceptually.

And there's no need to force it. 2-site hexes being uncommon and 3-site hexes being rare makes both more special, and means players don't feel like they HAVE to go back to search for ALL THE THINGS in EACH hex. They never know if there's another thing to find, so they aren't tallying that.

I am going to think about this a bit. You make a good point about predictability which I hadn't considered. I've already added a few more hexes to that original map that don't currently have any points of interest associated with them, so I could thin it out into those, but I did appreciate some of the density. I might have to take a look at some of the locations that were weaker and see if moving them to new hexes would improve them.

The other thing that I am considering doing is working on some lower level material so that there is more flexibility with regards to what kinds of adventures can be run in the area, it would also mean I could turn the Sea Elf village and Kuo-Toa town into quest hubs. Time is the current limitation though because I still need to do a bunch of writing for my actual sessions as well.

[Segev]

The other thing that I am considering doing is working on some lower level material so that there is more flexibility with regards to what kinds of adventures can be run in the area, it would also mean I could turn the Sea Elf village and Kuo-Toa town into quest hubs. Time is the current limitation though because I still need to do a bunch of writing for my actual sessions as well.

Yeah, definitely focus on what will be used, and not on what might be used "if." You can always expand the map for another game later, but you can't always make up for having made something that this game will never use when you need time to make things for this game.

One of the perks, I think, of high-level play tends to be the ability to turn it sort-of sandboxy. You've already got some of that with this hex crawl: they control where they explore. Perhaps, rather than "taking them to hell," there's a portal to one of the aquatic parts of one of the layers. Or maybe just to the Elemental Plane of Water, near a particularly awful Marid's domain, said Marid having grown so supernaturally powerful that it has regional and lair effects. Doing something weird and spooky with the "Silver Sea" merging/butting up against the actual sea would give possible Astral Plane access. A fight with an Astral Dreadnaught that is reaching up out of the ocean could be a hint of something mysterious going on in the region.

So perhaps one of the hexes flows (un)naturally into an interface between the Elemental Plane of Water below and the Silver Sea above (manifesting as an eerie fog), and you're literally between the two when sailing on it. You could even have color pools be encounter locations here. The hex actually has an exit to more of these hexes as well as back to the mortal Prime, and you can make navigating to that hex and finding your way back out to it to return part of the high-level adventure.

</random idea; literally had it while typing, so take it for what it's worth>

[Flallen]

Yeah, definitely focus on what will be used, and not on what might be used "if." You can always expand the map for another game later, but you can't always make up for having made something that this game will never use when you need time to make things for this game.

One of the perks, I think, of high-level play tends to be the ability to turn it sort-of sandboxy. You've already got some of that with this hex crawl: they control where they explore. Perhaps, rather than "taking them to hell," there's a portal to one of the aquatic parts of one of the layers. Or maybe just to the Elemental Plane of Water, near a particularly awful Marid's domain, said Marid having grown so supernaturally powerful that it has regional and lair effects. Doing something weird and spooky with the "Silver Sea" merging/butting up against the actual sea would give possible Astral Plane access. A fight with an Astral Dreadnaught that is reaching up out of the ocean could be a hint of something mysterious going on in the region.

So perhaps one of the hexes flows (un)naturally into an interface between the Elemental Plane of Water below and the Silver Sea above (manifesting as an eerie fog), and you're literally between the two when sailing on it. You could even have color pools be encounter locations here. The hex actually has an exit to more of these hexes as well as back to the mortal Prime, and you can make navigating to that hex and finding your way back out to it to return part of the high-level adventure.

</random idea; literally had it while typing, so take it for what it's worth>

The party is currently boarding a spelljammer vessel which they plan on flying to the High Forest to track down the villain. :)

Any work I do on the aquatic adventure is for future campaigns at this point. The structure of this adventure is such that I am trying to give them a new theme or style of play with each narrative arc. So we did urban, we did mega-dungeon, and we did hexcrawl. This next segment is going to be structured as more of a point crawl with the Unicorn Run as a central navigational point and all points of interest being in reference to the river. There's going to be a major event timer and I will use a watch system to track their progress towards an objective with many opportunities to wander which might give advantage in exchange for time from the clock. If they get their too late it just means they might be at a disadvantage for the final confrontation.

I'm a bit behind on the writing for this arc, so I've gotta hammer that out before I start building material for a theoretical campaign. :)

[Segev]

The party is currently boarding a spelljammer vessel which they plan on flying to the High Forest to track down the villain. :)

Any work I do on the aquatic adventure is for future campaigns at this point. The structure of this adventure is such that I am trying to give them a new theme or style of play with each narrative arc. So we did urban, we did mega-dungeon, and we did hexcrawl. This next segment is going to be structured as more of a point crawl with the Unicorn Run as a central navigational point and all points of interest being in reference to the river. There's going to be a major event timer and I will use a watch system to track their progress towards an objective with many opportunities to wander which might give advantage in exchange for time from the clock. If they get their too late it just means they might be at a disadvantage for the final confrontation.

I'm a bit behind on the writing for this arc, so I've gotta hammer that out before I start building material for a theoretical campaign. :)

Ah, my mistake, I thought the hex crawl was still for this game. Then yes, by all means, focus on the Unicorn Run map and area you've got developing!