The rules for wilderness exploration can be broken down into four modules:
- Wilderness Travel, with rules for timekeeping and determining the distance traveled.
- Watch Actions, which allow characters traveling through the wilderness to do activities other than simply moving.
- Navigation, providing a structure for determining where the characters actually go.
- Encounter System, for determining what characters experience during their travels.
To some extent, each of these modules can be used independently of the others, either by simply ignoring a particular module or, in some cases, by assuming a basic default for the module.
For example, instead of using the rules for wilderness travel, you could simply assume that an expedition always moves 24 miles or 2 hexes per day, while still using the rules for navigation to determine where the PCs end up with that distance traveled. Conversely, you could use all the rules for wilderness travel to greatly vary and customize the distance traveled each day, but simultaneously ignore all the rules for navigation and simply checking off the distance traveled towards whatever destination was selected.
But, of course, the four modules are also designed to be used together, with the results produced by one module enhancing and informing the others.
WATCHES
A watch is the basic unit for tracking time. A watch is equal to 4 hours.
Determining Time Within a Watch: To randomly generate a particular time within a watch, use 1d8 to determine the half hour and 1d30 to determine the exact minute (if necessary).
WATCH TYPES
There are six watches per day and three types of watch:
- Active
- Rest
- Travel
While traveling, it is generally assumed that an expedition is spending two watches per day traveling, two watches per day resting, and two watches per day engaged in other activities.
Forced March: If a character spends more than two watches traveling in one day, they must make a Constitution check (DC 10 + 1 per hour of additional travel). On a failure, they suffer one level of exhaustion.
TRAVEL PACE
During each travel watch, the expedition determines their travel pace.
Normal: An expedition traveling at normal pace cannot use Stealth checks to avoid detection.
Slow: While moving at a slow pace, the expedition is purposely being careful. An expedition traveling at slow pace:
- Gains advantage on navigation checks.
- Can make Stealth checks to avoid detection.
- The chance for a non-exploratory encounter is halved. (If a non-exploratory encounter is generated, there is a 50% chance it doesn’t actually happen.)
Exploration: While exploring, an expedition is assumed to be trying out side trails, examining objects of interest, and so forth. While exploring, an expedition:
- Cannot use Stealth checks to avoid detection.
- Gains advantage on navigation checks.
- The chance for encounters is doubled.
Fast: While moving quickly through the wilderness, expeditions traveling at fast pace:
- Cannot use Stealth checks to avoid detection.
- Suffer disadvantage to Wisdom (Perception) checks.
- Suffer a -5 penalty to navigation checks.
BASIC TRAVEL DISTANCE
| Pace | Per Hour | Per Watch | Per Day |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fast | 4.5 miles | 18 miles | 36 miles |
| Normal | 3 miles | 12 miles | 24 miles |
| Slow | 2 miles | 9 miles | 18 miles |
| Exploration | 1.5 miles | 6 miles | 12 miles |
Note: Per Day on this table is based on traveling for two watches (8 hours); i.e., a full day of travel without a forced march.
ADVANCED RULE: MOUNTS & VEHICLES
Gallop: If riding a mount, you can gallop for 1 hour during a watch in which you are traveling at normal or fast pace. During that hour you travel at twice your fast pace speed. (This results in a total watch distance of 18 miles at normal pace or 22.5 miles at fast pace.)
If fresh mounts are available every 8 or 10 miles, characters can cover larger distances at this pace, but this is very rare except in densely populated areas.
Note: If you are using the advanced rules for party speed below, do not use the rule for galloping.
Land Vehicles: Choose pace normally.
Waterborne Vehicles: Distance is limited to the speed of the vessel. On some ships, characters may be able to take rest and active watches even while the ship is moving. This may also allow the ship to travel up to 24 hours a day if the crew can operate in multiple shifts.
Unsuitable Terrain: Most land vehicles are designed to be used on roads, although many will fair well in open terrain (like a prairie). At the GM’s discretion, in unsuitable terrain a vehicle may be limited to a slow pace and ability checks may be required each watch to make any progress at all.
ADVANCED RULE: EXPEDITION SPEED
An expedition’s speed is based on the speed of its slowest member.
- In 1 hour at normal pace, the expedition can travel a number of miles equal to its speed divided by 10.
- At a fast pace, the expedition can travel 150% of its normal speed.
- At a slow pace, the expedition can travel two-thirds of its normal speed.
- At an exploration pace, the expedition can travel one-half of its normal speed.
- Calculate distance per watch based on the expedition’s hourly speed.
On the tables below, distances have been rounded to the nearest half mile.
EXPEDITION SPEED – PER HOUR
| Expedition Speed | Fast Pace | Normal Pace | Slow Pace | Exploration Pace |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 ft. | 3 miles | 2 miles | 1.5 miles | 1 mile |
| 25 ft. | 4 miles | 2.5 miles | 2 miles | 1.5 miles |
| 30 ft. | 4.5 miles | 3 miles | 2 miles | 1.5 miles |
| 40 ft. | 6 miles | 4 miles | 3 miles | 2 miles |
| 60 ft. | 9 miles | 6 miles | 4 miles | 3 miles |
| 100 ft. | 15 miles | 10 miles | 7 miles | 5 miles |
| 300 ft. | 45 miles | 30 miles | 20 miles | 15 miles |
EXPEDITION SPEED – PER WATCH
| Expedition Speed | Fast Pace | Normal Pace | Slow Pace | Exploration Pace |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 20 ft. | 12 miles | 8 miles | 5.5 miles | 4 miles |
| 25 ft. | 15 miles | 10 miles | 7 miles | 5 miles |
| 30 ft. | 18 miles | 12 miles | 8 miles | 6 miles |
| 40 ft. | 24 miles | 16 miles | 11 miles | 8 miles |
| 60 ft. | 36 miles | 24 miles | 16 miles | 12 miles |
| 100 ft. | 60 miles | 40 miles | 27 miles | 20 miles |
| 300 ft. | 180 miles | 120 miles | 80 miles | 60 miles |
Note: You might also choose to generally use the basic travel distance for expeditions, but use the advanced rules for expedition speed for unusual means of conveyance (via magic, mechanism, or fantastical mount, for example).
ADVANCED RULE: TERRAIN
The type of terrain modifies the speed at which an expedition can travel.
- Highway: A highway is a straight, major, paved road.
- Road: A road is a dirt track or similar causeway.
- Trail: An irregular byway. Probably unsuitable for most vehicles and may only allow for single-file travel. Most off-road travel follows local trails. A known trail does not usually require navigation checks, although a known trail in poor repair requires a DC 10 navigation check to follow.
- Trackless: Trackless terrain is a wild area with no paths. +2 to navigation DCs.
| TERRAIN | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Desert | |||||
| Forest (sparse) | |||||
| Forest (medium) | |||||
| Forest (dense) | |||||
| Hills | |||||
| Jungle | |||||
| Moor | |||||
| Mountains | |||||
| Plains | |||||
| Swamp | |||||
| Tundra, frozen |
ADVANCED RULE: CONDITIONS
Certain climate conditions and activities modify the speed at which an expedition can travel.
| CONDITIONS | |
|---|---|
| Cold or hot climate | |
| Giant terrain | |
| Hurricane | |
| Leading mount | |
| Poor visibility (fog, darkness) | |
| River crossing | |
| Snow cover | |
| Snow cover, heavy | |
| Storm | |
| Storm, powerful |
Leading Pack Animal: Under normal circumstances, a pack-puller can lead a file with a number of animals equal to their passive Wisdom (Animal Handling) skill.
Poor Visibility: This condition also gives disadvantage to navigation and forage checks.
River Crossing: This penalty applies to any watch during which a river must be crossed. This does not apply if the characters are following a road which has a bridge on it, but does apply if they’re traveling cross-country and must seek out a bridge.
ADVANCED RULE: ACTUAL DISTANCE TRAVELED
The distance cited on the travel tables is the average distance traveled. The actual distance traveled in a watch is 50% to 150% (2d6+3 x 10%) of that distance.
Characters can ascertain the actual distance traveled with a successful Wisdom (Survival) check made at the navigation DC of the terrain. On a failure, they assume the average value of the distance traveled.
Design Note: The purpose of this rule is to make accurate mapping more difficult. (You could hypothetically adapt a similar rule to dungeon exploration in order to make accurate mapping of the dungeon environment more difficult, too, although the resolution time involved would probably be prohibitive.)
ADVANCED RULE: TRAILBLAZING
Trailblazing is a special travel pace which can be taken in conjunction with other travel paces. It reduces the expedition’s speed by one-half, but also marks an efficient trail through the wilderness with some form of signs – paint, simple carvings, cloth flags, etc.
Once blazed, this is considered a known trail to the expedition.
Hidden Signs: The signs of a trail can be followed by any creature. When blazing a trail, however, the character making the signs can make a Wisdom (Stealth) check to disguise them so that they can only be noticed or found with a Wisdom (Perception) or Intelligence (Investigation) check.
You don’t need to make a Wisdom (Perception) check to follow your own hidden signs (or the hidden signs of a known trail you’ve followed before). Those who are aware of the trail’s existence but who have not followed it before gain advantage on their Wisdom (Perception) or Intelligence (Investigation) check to find the trail sign.
Note: Trail signs – including hidden trail signs – may be encountered as an exploration encounter in a hex the trail passes through.
Optional Rule – Old Trails: Most trail signs are impermanent and likely to decay over time. There is a 1 in 6 chance per season that a trail will decay from good repair to weather worn; from weather worn to poor repair; or from poor repair to no longer existing.
Someone traveling along a weather worn trail can restore it to good repair as long as they are not traveling at fast pace. Trails in poor repair require someone to travel along them at the trailblazing travel pace to restore to good repair.
Note: Erecting more permanent trail signs – like cairns, stone carvings, etc. – is a significant and time-consuming activity, but may be worthwhile on well-traveled trails.
HEXES
1 Hex = 12 miles (center to center / side to side) = 7 mile sides = 124 square miles
Movement on the wilderness hex grid is abstracted. In order to determine if an expedition has left a hex, you must keep track of their progress within the hex.
Starting in a Hex: If an expedition starts movement within a hex, it requires 6 miles of progress to exit any face of the hex.
Optional Rule: You can choose to bias a starting position. For example, you might see that a river flows near the western edge of a hex. If the PCs start traveling from that river, you might decide it only takes 2 miles to exit through the hex’s western face and 10 miles to exit through its eastern face.
Crossing Hex to a Far Side: It requires 12 miles of progress to exit a hex through one of the three faces on the opposite side.
Crossing Hex to a Near Side: It requires 6 miles of progress to exit a hex through one of the two nearest faces.
Changing Direction: Changing direction more than once within a hex will result in the loss of 2 miles of progress each time direction is changed.
Back the Way We Came: If characters deliberately double back along their own trail, simply reduce their progress until they exit the hex. If they leave back through the face through which they entered the hex for any other reason (by getting lost, for example) it requires an additional 1d6-1 miles of progress to exit the hex (unless circumstances suggest some other figure).
Under “WATCHES” I think you meant “use 1d6 to determine the half hour”.
Ok, this is somewhat embarassing… I meant 1d8
It’s enough to make one wish this site used Disqus or something so you could edit your replies, no?
(I mean, Disqus sucks, but so does everything, really. And for comment threads in the 20s or 30s it works okay; it’s when you get hundreds of comments on a single post that things bog down and get wonky, at least IMO.)
That or the Watches were meant to be of 3 hours
Excited about this series!
“Suffer a -5 penalty to navigation checks” Why not use disadvantage?
“This results in a total watch distance of 17 miles at normal pace or 22 miles at fast pace.”
I believe that watch distances for gallop are 18 (normal) and 22,5 (fast) right? I don’t know if I’m getting the rules right. But for normal pace, for example, I’m considering one hour covering 9 miles, and three hours covering 3 miles each.
“If fresh mounts are available every 8 or 10 miles, characters can cover larger distances at this pace, but this is very rare except in densely populated areas.”
By “this pace” you meant pure galloping or 1 hour galloping per watch?
My rule is much simpler. Assign a number to each character. Roll a die. That person is on watch when the monster attacks.
Hex travel is a point system. Party gets 5 points per day to spend. Clear hexes cost 1 point to enter. Hills & light forest cost 2. Heavy forest & desert cost 3. Mountains & Swamps cost 4. It’s so much easier. Why make it so complex?
I’m curious, do you use these rules at your table? It seems like a lot of calculation that most of the time would not add very much to the story. I expect you make a lot of judgment calls about when to break out the tables and count every mile, and when you hand wave, say “it’s two days cross-country to Caer Dineval” and skip to the encounter system?
@Kaique, by “fresh mounts available” it certainly sounds like Justin is talking about pony-express style relay stations, where a rider transfers to a new mount every time he wears out the last one. This lets the rider (and carried messages) sustain 9 mph all day. The Romans and the Mongols also famously maintained systems like this. Procopius described it as letting a courier “cover in a single day, by this means, as great a distance as they would otherwise have covered in ten.”
But it would be strange to imagine this kind of system ever being made available to the typical ruffian band of PCs.
This system seems to use half-miles as the base unit of distance. But in that case, what’s the point of using hexes.
If you can’t always say “You cover X (full) hexes”, then hexes seem like a pretty useless unit.
@Sarivar: The deep allure of the 1d6. Fixed!
@Kaique: Using a modifier instead of a penalty here is actually the base 5E rule. And the reason they do it is because this is a pretty good example of where the advantage system breaks down: If you have disadvantage from some other factor (like, say, foggy weather), you’d suddenly be better off racing through that fog at a fast pace than at a normal pace. “Oh! It’s getting foggy! Let’s go all-out!” is a nonsensical result that you don’t want to bake into the system.
I’ve also fixed the math error on the pre-calculated watch gallop! Thanks!
For those expressing complete bafflement at why the system is designed this way, I refer you to Part 1 of the series which explains in great detail exactly why the system is designed this way.
Hi Justin, Have been following your blog for a few years and it’s made an * incalculable * difference to my GMing. So, thank you for that! You’re easily the best advice source around and excited to see you are getting into Youtube etc.
Not exactly the right spot for it, but at least you’ll see it… Was watching your Avernus Hexcrawl stream this morning and you were having trouble tracking down some hex art. Maybe they were being sneaky, or maybe you saw and weren’t into them, but just wanted to share that Inkwell does have a couple of Hell art packs for hexographer. Not sure about posting the link, but if you go to drivethru and look up inkwell + hexographer and/or hells you should see them: “Classic Style 9 Hells Upper Levels World Map Icons.” There’s a “Lower levels” too. Wastelands, flaming plains, volcanoes, even a Tiamat fortress etc. And made to fit w/ classic, discrete hexes. Might be what you’re after!
@Yora: Hexes have multiple reasons to be used. You can use them as a basic undivisible unit of distance if you want, but Justin use them as a way of indexing a location’s geographic position and abstracting the terrain of a region.
For my experience using this system with OD&D, counting your progress inside of an hex is just as simple as counting more hexes.
@Justin: Thanks for the clarification. I do see the problem now.
So to harken back to a comment thread on Twitter about exploration mechanics and 5e . . . what would be a good approach to tweaking the rules for the ranger class specifically to make the mechanically interesting, rather than the “auto-success” elements? The third pillar of D&D has always felt underserved in this edition but I really want to make the class shine in the hexcrawl environment without it simply being “exploration is now set to Easy mode”.
Is the only effect of having a mount, that you can gallop for an hour, if travelling at Normal or Fast pace? And no effect at all if you’re being Slow or Exploring.
@croald: If you’re using the basic travel rules, basically yes. The rules for 5E basically assume that riding a horse isn’t faster than walking. (There are reasons why I think that the designers think this is true, but it doesn’t sync with the research I’ve done into historical travel times.)
If you’re using the advanced rules for expedition speed, horses have a speed of 60 ft. and will speed your travel across all travel paces.
@Floyd: This series will be supplemented by a series of Hexcrawl Tools posts, one of which is intended to be a close look at specific class abilities, etc. that should be revisited to enhance exploration- and expedition-based play.
@kmur: Thank you for that! No idea why my searches for “hell” and “avernus” weren’t turning those up, but they look very promising!
I’m finding that the more I think about doing a hexcrawl again (the last time was a couple decades ago), the more I’m thinking that pointcrawls are basically a dominant technology. It is not much more difficult (if at all) to create a path map like this, than a hex map:
https://preview.redd.it/c9mkehmxn0g51.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=64b3b0b521b528fb2a903f6232704769c1b78025
And the point crawl path network is very much more associated to what the PCs are actually doing, and at least to me, feels much more rewarding to explore.
You’ve already said you prefer to keep the hexes hidden from the players. It seems to me the natural next step is to switch from asking the players “which of exactly six directions do you want to go?” to “there’s the remains of an ancient road heading east-west. To the northeast, a footpath climbs the cliff. To the south, there’s a game trail along the riverbank.”
Yes, that’s a bit more work to describe, but it’s *effective* work. You probably want to do something like it for the PCs in a hexcrawl situation anyway, but a pointcrawl map framework helps you keep track in a way a hexmap does not.
Even in a “trackless” wilderness, there’s rivers and cliffs and dense underbrush and game trails that make some paths more natural for travel than others. And it’s not difficult to handle bushwhacking off the trail as a special case that creates a new path — the rules for trailblazing above are already most of the way there.
The only thing I can think of where a hex map is actually better is if the PCs’ goal is in fact to survey a terrain map. But in a lot of ways, creating a network map with paths and points of interest is more authentically medieval.
In switching from a hex map to a path map, all the above rules for pace and distance still apply — the only thing that changes is the section on “hexes”, which is by far the clunkiest part.
There are lots of options for standard apps that support making connected network diagrams — PowerPoint or Keynote for two. Slap a pretty map in the background, fade it so the node network stands out, and then you don’t have to worry about finding a non-eye-bleeding set of hex icons for your terrain, too.
I was just looking back at Part 1 and was reminded that hex-clearing can be a thing. So yes, I can see the if the PCs are concerned with *controlling* territory rather than travelling or exploring, a hex map would be useful.
Justin, while I use a system similar to (and inspired by) yours, I find that a 4 watches system (morning, afternoon, evening to midnight and midnight to dawn). Maybe that’s bc we have words for each watch in portuguese (manhã, tarde, noite e madrugada), but the general result is very similar (the typical travel day is 2 watches traveling, 2 resting). What is the benefit of those 2 “extra” actions per day, or rather, what do your system offer the player as options during a travel day?
No, Justin, part I decidedly does not explain why you would be using the abstraction of hex at this point, instead of just eyeballing what’s close enough to interact with, or what type of terrain the party is on currently. Because at this point, I think you would get about the same result, but without having to bend over backwards to incorporate hexes into a basically hexless travel system.
@Omiguma: I believe he’ll explain that in the next post, “Watch Actions”. I struggled to find good words in portuguese too, but the thing is that your players may not know about the watch structure. Like the hexes, watches are a way of abstracting something real to make the game easier to run. Your players are immersed.
@Kaique The post about watches is out. And I still don’t see that much gain on dividing the day in six slots instead of four.
Also, the hexcrawl is a GM-only system. The players – at least my players – don’t say “I wan to explore the next hex”. They say they want to search the Hobgoblin’s Hideout by the river, and I use the hex map to see how long it will take, what the terrain looks like, and what encounters they can find.
Also, I’ve incorporated the random encounters mechanic into the 4-watches system. I call it the Safety Dice. Each region (a group of hexes that share the same characteristics) has a Safety Dice, that goes from d6 to d12. At the start of the day, the GM roll one safety dice per watch (I usually go morning, afternoon, evening and late night), and if you roll a 1, a random encounter occurs in that watch.
That way, the player’s actions during the trip can influence how dangerous of safe the exploration is just by increasing or lowering the Safety Dice. For example, of the party decides to travel at night with a light source, you can lower the safety dice to reflect the fact that is easier to spot them.
@Oniguma, @Kaique: The resting rule says that everyone needs two *consecutive* watches of sleep to get a Long Rest. The only way everyone can do this, and have someone awake on watch all the time, is if the group stops for 4 watches every day. Change that rule and you can reduce the number of watches you need in a day.
(In standard D&D 5e, a group of at least 4 can complete a long rest in 8 hours with everyone taking 2 hrs watch; a group of 3 needs 10 hours and a pair needs 12 hours. Requiring 16 by these rules, to get rest with someone always awake, is a bit … unadventurous.)
Fast pace – 150% of normal?
Not +1/3 ?
Why?
(i Know that if take 30 miles then we will get some troubles with base speed 20 ft which get us 16 miles normal pace and 21…. miles fast )
And why take 12 miles hex?
For base speed 30 ft and normal pace = 12 miles per watch?
But if you actively uses terrain and conditions – then 6 miles can be simpler?
Also, i not remember where but i read that for land vehicles is better use slow pace = 18 miles per day.
@Croald that’s one other reason for the 6-hour watch. During rest, it’s assumed that the party stops, make camp, cooks, tend to equipment and take turns guarding the camp.
@croald: “The resting rule says that everyone needs two *consecutive* watches of sleep to get a Long Rest.”
No, it doesn’t. 8 hours (2 watches) of rest, not sleep. You must sleep for at least 6 hours, and perform light activity for 2. Please refer to Long Rest rules on PHB.
@Kaique: These hexcrawl rules are inconsistent with the PHB. Part 3 (https://thealexandrian.net/wordpress/46116/roleplaying-games/5e-hexcrawl-part-3-watch-actions) says flatly “A character must take the Resting watch action for two rest watches in a row in order to gain the benefits of a Long Rest,” and also “A member of an expedition acting as a sentinel can make Wisdom (Perception) checks to detect threats or notice anything else out of the ordinary. *Design Note: If you use passive Wisdom (Perception) scores, their use on journeys is also limited to sentinels.*”
That doesn’t seem to leave a lot of room for characters who are resting to also be able to be on watch, or for Sentinels to be able to get rest without the party being stationary for quite a while.
Maybe that’s not what Justin intended to say?
@croald
Requiring the players to be stationary for long periods to receive the benefit of a long rest is good. I run a crawl with 4 watches per day, and require the party to be stationary and inactive for 4 consecutive watches in order to gain a long rest. It works very well for us.
@Tyler, if it works for you that’s all that matters. But I’m not sure I understand: they have to be stationary an entire 24 hours to gain a long rest? They travel one day, stop in the afternoon, and can’t leave til the afternoon the next day, so they have to march into the night? Or do you mean four watches per daylight hours, and another four watches per night?
In my game, each day has 4 watches: 3 daylight and 1 dark/night. The party can move, explore, or rest during each watch. It’s heavily simplified, where we don’t track speed or anything nuanced within that. Spend a watch to move a space. Spend a watch to explore a space. Often I have a player-facing clock showing activity happening elsewhere to give a sense of time passing, and each region has variance in random encounter chance.
If they go 4 consecutive watches without spending 1 of them resting, they begin to risk Exhaustion with an escalating chance each watch without rest.
If they go 4 consecutive watches all resting, they gain a Long Rest.
This encourages them to find a safe place with low or zero chance of random encounters before attempting to gain a Long Rest. In play, it’s often near-instantaneous: “we’ve reached our safe spot and spend 4 watches resting…”
Regarding slow pace: I assume your encounter tables include non-hostile options. I can understand why “purposely being careful” would reduce the odds of running into dangerous beasts, bandits, or environmental hazards, but why would it also reduce the odds of meeting friendly travelers on the road? Is it just that moving more slowly means you’re covering less ground and therefore the frequency of encounters is lower?
Regarding old trails: You said that a known trail in poor repair requires a Navigation check to follow, but what about the difficulty of finding the trail if you’re not already familiar with it?
@Wyvern, “purposefully being careful” can include choosing less-travelled paths, so you’re less likely to meet *anyone*.
If the PCs are travelling slowly more because they want to explore than avoid dangers, they could travel normally while moving and then do whatever’s going to be in the Part 7: Explore during the time saved by moving faster.
It could also be possible to add a third option on success at Scouting: instead of helping navigate or pathfinding, the scout could discover a lead to something worth investigating.
@Wyvern, also, I think you’ve misread the description. Travelling slowly *only* reduces the chance of hostile (“non-exploratory”) encounters.
“If the PCs are travelling slowly more because they want to explore than avoid dangers, they could travel normally while moving and then do whatever’s going to be in the Part 7: Explore during the time saved by moving faster.”
I’m not sure what you’re getting at. He defines exploration as a separate travel mode, and it’s not described as “moving faster than normal and then using the time saved to explore”. It’s even *slower* than “slow pace”, because you’re stopping to smell the roses. In any case, it’s not relevant to the question I asked, which was about the reduced chance of encounters when traveling at a slow pace (in fact, you’ll note that exploration mode *doubles* the chance of encounters).
“I think you’ve misread the description. Travelling slowly *only* reduces the chance of hostile (“non-exploratory”) encounters.”
No, I didn’t miss that. I just don’t think that he intends for all non-exploratory encounters to be hostile ones. As I interpret it, an exploratory encounter is one that has to be actively sought out, whereas non-exploratory encounters are ones that come to you (or at least, that you can stumble upon without searching for them). Meeting fellow travelers on the road would qualify as the latter.
If a carriage is being drawn by draft horses (40 ft speed) with no one walking at a lower speed, its normal pace become 4 miles an hour right?
Hi Justin!
When you say: “Erecting more permanent trail signs (…) is a significant and time-consuming activity” do you mean as a watch activity, or a more costly trailblazing pace? And how does this translates into mechanics, 1 in 1d12 to decay?
Thanks!
Great stuff! I really like how you use the concept of a 4 hour watch to break up the day.
I know D&D is supposed to be heroic, but 4.5 miles/hour is running or racewalking. Especially with that being an average speed over a 4 hour watch, thus needing a faster (5-6mph) moving speed to accommodate getting water, navigating and bathroom breaks. The official 5e rules are slower and are still too fast.
To set speeds a bit more accurately:
a Pacific Crest Trail hiker carrying 20-30 pounds of gear will do 20-30 miles per day travelling 12-16 hours per day. The speed record for the PCT is ~40 miles/day. That is a well maintained trail in hilly and mountainous terrain.
A normal walking pace is 2-2.5mph on a flat paved surface. Taking reasonable breaks for getting water, eating, etc. will reduce speed by 20% or more over several hours.
With the typical weight carried by adventurers, assuming a character with a 30′ move speed using 3mph for fast, 2mph for normal and 1mph for slow/stealthy is quite heroic.
Anyway, like I said, you have a lot of really good ideas in this series, the speeds are my only complaint. Thanks!
Re: fast travel imposing a -5 to navigation, instead of disadvantage, Justin wrote:
“If you have disadvantage from some other factor (like, say, foggy weather), you’d suddenly be better off racing through that fog at a fast pace than at a normal pace.”
Sure, but doesn’t this same principle apply to Perception, which you *are* using disadvantage for?
For our game, I broke out Road and Trail with slightly different modifiers, introduced a rule that you can’t bring wheeled vehicles anywhere the terrain modifier is 1/2 or less, and added conditions for portaging rowboats, transporting unconscious, and using wheeled vehicles; all over at https://dndnerds.org/2021/07/28/hexcrawl-travel-modifiers/ if you want to have a look.
I have converted your system into the metric system, using 20km as the distance of a hex instead of 12 miles (~19,5 km). If you’re interested, I can pass the values to you to publish on your blog.