Characters can take watch actions to contribute to the expedition’s success or achieve other tasks while traveling. Some watch actions are limited to specific types of watch or travel pace.
Playtest Tip: It’s usually a good idea to get an expedition’s “standing orders” instead of asking everyone to declare their watch action during every single watch. An easy example is that if the ranger has been doing the navigating for the last eight days, he’s probably going to continue navigating for the next four hours and you don’t need to confirm that.
FORAGER
Characters can forage during an active watch or while traveling at a slow pace. Foragers make a Wisdom (Survival) check against the Forage DC of the terrain. On a success, the forager either gains 1 ration of food or finds a source of fresh water (allowing the expedition to drink their daily ration of water and for waterskins to be refilled). An additional ration of food or source of fresh water can be found for every 2 points by which the check result exceeds the DC.
Advanced Rule – Sparse Biome: At the GM’s discretion, a biome may be deemed sparse. In a sparse biome, each source of fresh water discovered only yields one gallon of water.
Advanced Rule – Grazing: Some animals (like horses) can simply graze for sustenance. In an appropriate biome (as determined by the GM), they will be fully fed as long as they are allowed to graze for one watch per day. In a sparse biome, they must graze for two watches per day and it may be necessary to also provide fresh water for them.
FOOD & WATER
Food: Small or Medium creatures require 1 ration of food per day. They can go without food for a number of days equal to 3 + their Constitution modifier (minimum 1) before suffering 1 exhaustion level per day thereafter. A normal day of eating resets the count of days without food to zero.
A creature on half rations counts as going a ½ day without food (and these half days accumulate until they can eat full rations).
Water: Small or Medium creatures require 1 gallon of water per day, or twice that in hot weather. A creature on a half ration of water must succeed on a DC 15 Constitution check at the end of each day or suffer a level of exhaustion. If they drink less water than that, they suffer a level of exhaustion automatically. If the character already has one or more levels of exhaustion, the character takes two levels instead of one level in either case.
Waterskins hold a half-ration of water.
Recovery: Any exhaustion suffered from lack of food or water cannot be removed until after a full day of normal consumption.
Large & Tiny Creatures: Tiny creatures require one-quarter ration of food and water per day. Large creatures (like horses) require four rations of food and water per day.
NAVIGATOR
The expedition’s navigator is responsible for making navigation checks. A second navigator can assist, granting advantage to the navigation checks.
PACK-PULLER
A pack-puller is responsible for managing an expeditions pack animals. A pack-puller can lead a number of animals equal to their passive Wisdom (Animal Handling) score. (This number includes the pack-puller’s mount, if any.)
RESTING
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. (See the rules for Long Rests regarding which types of interruptions are possible without disrupting the Resting action.)
Advanced Rule – Lack of Sleep: If a character does not spend at least one full watch per day resting, they must succeed at a Constitution saving throw (DC 16 – the number of hours they slept, if any) or suffer a level of exhaustion.
SCOUT
A scout can journey out from an expedition in an effort to chart a course or learn the lay of the land. When scouting, they can choose one of two actions:
- Reporting: If the navigator receives a scout’s report, they gain advantage on their navigation checks for the next travel watch.
- Pathfinding: The scout attempts a Wisdom (Survival) score using the area’s Navigation DC. On a success, the expedition can treat trackless terrain as if it had a trail for one watch.
A character can scout during a watch in which an expedition is traveling only if their speed is faster than the expedition’s. Alternatively, scouts can be sent out during watches in which the rest of the expedition are active or resting (but not traveling).
An additional encounter check is made for each scouting group. (They are effectively a separate expedition while engaged in scouting.)
SENTINEL
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. I do not.
Advanced Rule – Outrider: During a travel watch, a character can journey out in an effort to protect the expedition from detection or threats. Whenever an encounter is generated for the expedition, each outrider group can attempt a Wisdom (Perception) check (DC 15 or opposed by the encounter’s Stealth check) to detect the encounter before it’s encountered by the expedition.
However, an additional encounter check is also made for each outrider group at one-half the normal chance of an encounter. (It’s possible for outriders to discover locations or encounter creatures which would have otherwise been missed by the main expedition.)
SIGHTING
During an active watch, a character can take a watch action to find an outlook – a good sighting place which will allow the character to significantly extend the distance to which they can see the surrounding wilderness. (See Hexcrawl Tools: Spot Distances.)
At the GM’s discretion, a skill check may be required to identify or reach the outlook. (For example, a Strength (Athletics) check to reach the top of an appropriately positioned tree.)
TRACKER
Finding Tracks: Searching a significant wilderness area for tracks is an active watch action. The tracker makes a Wisdom (Perception) check against the appropriate Track DC.
Following Tracks: Once tracks have been found, a tracker can follow the trail during a travel watch by making a Wisdom (Survival) check against the appropriate Track DC. A new check must be made each time the trail enter a new hex.
If a trail is lost, it may be possible to reacquire it using the Finding Tracks action.
Design Note: Generally speaking, it’s appropriate to use let it ride techniques when tracking a quarry. In this case, however, navigation (and possibly getting lost) is a significant component of the hexcrawl structure and these additional checks are meaningful.
However, you could easily decide to go the other direction: A single successful Wisdom (Survival) check could follow the trail all the way to its end. Alternatively, you might only call for new checks when the terrain (the tracks enter the desert) or conditions (it starts raining) change, creating points of uncertainty.
TRACK DCs
| SURFACE | DC |
|---|---|
| Very soft ground (snow, wet mud) | 5 |
| Soft ground (sand) | 10 |
| Firm ground (fields, woods, thick rugs, dusty floors) | 15 |
| Hard ground (bare rock, indoor floor, streambeds) | 20 |
| CONDITION | MODIFIER |
| Multiple people | -2 |
| Large group | -4 |
| Very large group | -8 |
| Creature is bleeding | -4 |
| Every day since the trail was made | +1 per day |
| Every hour of rain since the trail was made | +1 per hour |
| Fresh snow cover since the trail was made | +10 |
Advanced Rule – Cover Your Tracks: As a watch action, a character can attempt to cover the expedition’s tracks. This is a stealth action, requiring the expedition to be moving at a slow pace. The character makes a Wisdom (Stealth) or Wisdom (Survival) check to set the Track DC for any pursuer attempting to find or follow their tracks. The check suffers disadvantage in very soft ground, but gains advantage on hard ground. Condition modifiers apply normally to the pursuer’s tracking check.
TRAILBLAZER
When an expedition is trailblazing (see Advanced Rule: Trailblazing), one member of the expedition must use their watch action to blaze the trail. If hidden signs are being employed, an additional character can assist the trailblazer on their Wisdom (Stealth) check.
How many watches are there per day?
Eric: It was covered in part 2. Each watch is 4 hours, and there are 6 in a day.
“They can go without food for a number of days equal to 3 + their Constitution modifier (minimum 1) before suffering 1 exhaustion level per day thereafter. A normal day of eating resets the count of days without food to zero.”
Practically speaking though, that means a creature only needs to eat once every 4+con mod days without any penalty. Which seems fairly…little
@Yorick I noticed that too.
I assume the assumption is that it’s close enough as a simplifying abstraction as long as nobody deliberately abuses it, and if they do the GM can handle that using their judgement?
@Yorick @Paul Goodman
He’s actually using the rules as they are in the DMG for this. In the name of 5e compatibility it makes sense.
You aren’t really playing D&D if you haven’t house ruled a fix to something broken in the DMG… It’s simple enough to scribble in the margin that it takes a week of regular eating to reset the count of days without food, or that each day of regular eating subtracts one from the current accumulated count. You know, if it ever comes up.
Would be interesting if you organize these actions by type of watch they’re allowed. Or put a little “A”, “R”, “T” on their names in the cheat sheet. I’m still confused if you can use Sighting with Resting for watches in the middle of the night.
Correction: Sentinel with Resting.
Sorry.
Too many things for me to remember and/or look up! How can these hex travel rules be stream lined into a page or less?
@Robin: As described in Part 2, the entire system is modular and also has advanced options specifically flagged. Dial in whatever level of complexity you want.
It seems like almost all watch actions require a Wisdom roll of some kind during Travel or Active watches. What are characters with low Wisdom supposed to do?
Navigator: Wisdom (Survival),
Sentinel: Wisdom (Perception),
Scout: Wisdom (Perception) / Wisdom (Survival),
Forager: Wisdom (Survival),
Tracker: Wisdom (Perception) / Wisdom (Survival) [Some Stealth if going slow]
Sighting: No specific roll, maybe Athletics or Acrobatics
Marc raises an important question, and I’d love to see what Justin has to say. What activities can PCs without a good Wisdom score and related skills do? While all of these activities are logical on their surface, if I’m presenting more options for the characters to get involved it seems like there should be something for those other characters to do without essentially making high Wisdom scores a necessity for all characters in the campaign.
This is basically a consequence of 5th Edition’s skill system.
You might look at subbing in Intelligence (Nature) checks where appropriate.
Starting our new Hexcrawl campaign tonight! Here’s our draft version of the Hexcrawl Actions, mostly taken from yours, but with a few addtions: https://dndnerds.org/2021/07/15/wilderness-hexcrawl-procedure/
Coming from the simple (and lacking) rules of wilderness travel in 5E, this almost feels intimidating, but goddamn is it really attractive how in-depth it is. Love this series.
I have a few questions about Watch Actions, if anyone could help:
1. It’s required to take the Pack-Puller action during Active Watches to take care of the animals? Or the action is required only during Travel Watches to lead the pack?
2. By the DMG, a character in a long rest can “performs no more than 2 hours of light activity, such as […] standing watch”. It’s possible for the whole party to take the Rest Action at the same time during a Rest Watch, and still take turns standing watch for that period? The character standing watch would be able to use their perception to notice threads (like the Sentinel Action)? (because if not, what’s the point)
3. “scouts can be sent out during watches in which the rest of the expedition are active or resting”. If the expedition is taking the Rest Action, and one character is taking the Scout Action, for gaming purposes, it’s considered a Rest Watch for the whole group, or just for the people resting?
4. Should we track Scout’s progress separately?
@Bryant says: “essentially making high Wisdom scores a necessity for all characters in the campaign.”
Would it, though? I doubt many parties would turn away archmage or super-tank characters, even if their Wis were crappy and they weren’t much help when making camp.
Though, it does imply that the cleric will be probably better at foraging, navigating, and keeping watch than the barbarian, or maybe even the ranger. Maybe that’s not ideal, but if it bothers those characters they can just train the skills. Or you can just houserule calling for Con(Survival) or Dex(Nature) checks whenever it makes sense.
“A pack-puller can lead a number of animals equal to their passive Wisdom (Animal Handling) score. (This number includes the pack-puller’s mount, if any.)”
I’m a little unclear on this number. So a level 1 character with a 12 Wisdom (+1 mod) and proficiency (+2) in Animal Handling would have a passive Wisdom (Animal Handling) score of 8+2+1 = 11. Meaning they could lead 11 animals in a pack? This seems like a lot.
Sorry for the double post but I realized I made a mistake in my calculation (I was thinking of saving throw DC’s). The passive wisdom score in my example should be 12, not 11. The question still stands though because being able to lead 12 animals at level 1 seems like like far too many based on what Justin has written in the article.
Looking up muleteers I found this note “The crew consisted of a boss packer, a packer for each 10 mules, and the bell-boy who doubled as cook, led the kitchen mule.”
https://lostcoastoutpost.com/2023/aug/12/humboldt-history-trains-mules-opened-humboldt-inte/
based upon the cursory search, allowing 12-15 per packer (for adventurers are made of sterner stuff than the ordinary being) and rewarding more able/skilled characters to handle more in a magical world is not out of the question.
you may just declare 10 per person with animal handling as a flat number instead based upon this research.