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Post by tetramorph on Sept 13, 2019 15:16:05 GMT -6
How do you make a treasure map both useful and entertaining in your campaign?
Like, when you roll one up, how do you make it cool?
I was reading that great Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser story The Jewels in the Forest.
They are working from a "treasure map" they found by ripping a page out of a book in some library that mentioned treasure and where it was. It is written like a challenge from the person who hid the treasure. There is later scribbling on it from someone else who read it. It is just awesome.
I just don't have that kind of literary mind or imagination unless a random table or something gives my mind a place to start.
I need fodder for a random table that describes not just the content of the treasure (as the M&T does) but describes the nature of the map. I need some kind of a hook to make them more entertaining.
Also, to make it useful, how do you link it to a treasure in the dungeon, on the same level, on a different level, or in another location all together? How do you imagine that and make those links? I need some advice to make the map rolls more useful for my players as well.
Thanks for any help, folks.
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Post by derv on Sept 13, 2019 16:40:25 GMT -6
I'm a visual person. I remember people and places because my brain represents them with an image. I'm terrible with names and phone numbers; memorization takes effort on my part. All that to say, a visual representation is far more interesting than a GM telling me about a map. I don't care if it's a quick rough scribble. It's still of greater value.
Besides that, I find a map will have more draw on your players if it contains at least one familiar element. That could be a place they have visited in the past or maybe a story they have been told at the tavern. Maybe the map reveals a secret doors location in an area of a dungeon they have already mapped and explored. Perhaps they already know the stories of Captain Tinselmops hidden treasure in the loss Mines of Cradle Cap.
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Post by grodog on Sept 13, 2019 23:19:51 GMT -6
How do you make a treasure map both useful and entertaining in your campaign? Like, when you roll one up, how do you make it cool? [snip] I need fodder for a random table that describes not just the content of the treasure (as the M&T does) but describes the nature of the map. I need some kind of a hook to make them more entertaining. This is exactly what I wrote about in my two "Combined Hoards as Adventure Hooks: Treasure Maps in the Mega-Dungeon" articles in The Twisting Stair #1 and #2. TTS#1 covers: - Intro - Treasure Maps as In-Game Rewards - Now What? - The Engagement Feedback Loop - The Mechanics of Treasure Maps - How I Handle Treasure Maps in My Campaigns with the following new/modified tables (baselining from the DMG page 120): - I. MAP OR MAGIC DETERMINATION REVISED - II. MAP TABLE – REVISED - II. MAP DISTANCE TABLE – REVISED - II.A. MONETARY TREASURE - REVISED TTS#2 covers: Treasure Maps From Traditional to Engimatic - II.D TREASURE MAP TYPE - II.D.1 TRADITIONAL TREASURE MAP MEDIUM - II.D.2 TRANSCRIBED OR RECITED MAP MEDIUM - II.D.3 ENIGMATIC TREASURE MAP MEDIUM - II.E MAP PROTECTION - II.E.1 PROTECTED CONTENT - II.E.2 PHYSICALLY CONCEALED - II.E.3 PHYSICALLY PROTECTED - II.E.4 MAGICALLY CONCEALED - II.E.5 MAGICALLY PROTECTED (II.C remains as-is from the DMG, although I realized later I actually need to update that one too, since I revised II.A in the first issue) Using these tables, I crafted the following treasure map which is located in my version of Castle Greyhawk: Hopefully that gives you a good idea about how to put the tables to work in your games? Also, to make it useful, how do you link it to a treasure in the dungeon, on the same level, on a different level, or in another location all together? How do you imagine that and make those links? I need some advice to make the map rolls more useful for my players as well. This is actually something Guy Fullerton and I were discussing in the same K&K thread where I pulled the above quote from, and in our follow-up posts we noodled a bit on "treasure map geomorphs" for use as add-ons to existing dungeon levels, and Tony and I spend some more time further kicking this idea around some. More to come on that front, but the DMG tables in general should provide you with good ideas on how to build out treasure maps away from the existing dungeon location; Jason "Philotomy Jurament" Cone also wrote some thoughts on Treasure Maps in Knockspell #2 which are well-worth checking out, of course! Allan.
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Post by grodog on Sept 13, 2019 23:30:03 GMT -6
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Post by doublejig2 on Sept 14, 2019 1:12:41 GMT -6
A treasure map should deliver multiple times - thinking Goonies.
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Post by tetramorph on Sept 14, 2019 7:58:06 GMT -6
I'm a visual person. I remember people and places because my brain represents them with an image. . . . All that to say, a visual representation is far more interesting than a GM telling me about a map. I don't care if it's a quick rough scribble. It's still of greater value. Besides that, I find a map will have more draw on your players if it contains at least one familiar element. That could be a place they have visited in the past or maybe a story they have been told at the tavern. Maybe the map reveals a secret doors location in an area of a dungeon they have already mapped and explored. Perhaps they already know the stories of Captain Tinselmops hidden treasure in the loss Mines of Cradle Cap. This is very straightforward and helpful advice and has already helped me at the table at my game last night. Thanks! grodog, those are great links and points and a cool map! I've already got some good ideas from that. Thanks!
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Post by Scott Anderson on Sept 14, 2019 9:56:01 GMT -6
Wait til the character have some extended downtime.
Then give them the treasure.
Sorry I’m boring
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Post by tetramorph on Sept 14, 2019 12:37:37 GMT -6
Wait til the character have some extended downtime. Then give them the treasure. Sorry I’m boring I don’t get this. Are you saying you just use randomly rolled treasure maps as a kind of delayed release treasure? Dude, you wrote a game called Treasure Hunters. Help me out here. ;)
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Post by grodog on Sept 15, 2019 18:12:08 GMT -6
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Post by Scott Anderson on Sept 18, 2019 13:45:44 GMT -6
Wait til the character have some extended downtime. Then give them the treasure. Sorry I’m boring I don’t get this. Are you saying you just use randomly rolled treasure maps as a kind of delayed release treasure? Dude, you wrote a game called Treasure Hunters. Help me out here. I thought treasure maps were prizes rather than challenges. Guess I’m playing it wrong!
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Post by tetramorph on Sept 18, 2019 15:52:36 GMT -6
Scott Anderson, the way I look at it is that, since this is a game of adventure, another opportunity for adventure is itself the prize. You can't play wrong. But you might start having more fun with treasure maps now!
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Post by gemini476 on Sept 19, 2019 13:48:14 GMT -6
I don’t get this. Are you saying you just use randomly rolled treasure maps as a kind of delayed release treasure? Dude, you wrote a game called Treasure Hunters. Help me out here. I thought treasure maps were prizes rather than challenges. Guess I’m playing it wrong! If nothing else, the books encourage not making it too easy for the players: Given the strength of the listed monsters (Mummies and Hydrae and Vampires, oh my!), I suspect that the writer of this paragraph intended it for the generally higher-level wilderness. (Compare also the Treasure Types' "Maps or Magic" vs. Vol.3 p.7's plain "Magic".) Not to say that having a dungeon map to a dragon's lair is improper, mind you!
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Post by Scott Anderson on Sept 20, 2019 6:37:22 GMT -6
In terrible at making up dungeons. But Donjon makes them up for you. So maybe that’s how to do it - bring an iPad and put the computer generated dungeon in the next hex.
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Post by gemini476 on Sept 20, 2019 9:14:56 GMT -6
Personally I'm partial to having the map point to some random semi-distant wilderness hex, and then having the treasure be in some shallow cave or ruin that is easily explorable after beating the monster that assaults them as they near the place. It gives some much-needed goals to the wilderness hexcrawl. The adventure in this case is getting there, and then defeating the monster that guards it; there's no need to make things much more complicated after the fact. (Not to say that you can't have a map lead to El Dorado, The Lost City of Gold and Adventure, but that's a much more involved thing.)
The dungeon treasure map is trickier, but it's easy enough to sketch out a small path through the dungeon leading to some notable hidden treasure trove and then see the players get excited as they recognize the layout from their own maps of the place. This needs to be done in advance, however, and is less friendly to random in-game generation than the above "random wilderness hex" method.
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Post by grodog on Sept 20, 2019 13:10:15 GMT -6
Personally I'm partial to having the map point to some random semi-distant wilderness hex, and then having the treasure be in some shallow cave or ruin that is easily explorable after beating the monster that assaults them as they near the place. It gives some much-needed goals to the wilderness hexcrawl. The adventure in this case is getting there, and then defeating the monster that guards it; there's no need to make things much more complicated after the fact. (Not to say that you can't have a map lead to El Dorado, The Lost City of Gold and Adventure, but that's a much more involved thing.) The dungeon treasure map is trickier, but it's easy enough to sketch out a small path through the dungeon leading to some notable hidden treasure trove and then see the players get excited as they recognize the layout from their own maps of the place. This needs to be done in advance, however, and is less friendly to random in-game generation than the above "random wilderness hex" method. This is exactly what I discuss in my "player engagement loop" section of the TTS articles I referenced above, and helps reward players who take the time to map properly (which I actually discuss in my column in TTS#3 ). When the players are scouring portions of the dungeon to try to map them so that they can compare their mapped sections to the portions on the treasure map, it's all win! =) Allan.
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