5-mile Hex

[Mike]

Just about every wilderness map I look at these days has a scale of 5 miles per hex.

Why so?

Movement rates tend to be divisible by 3 (3, 6, 9, 12) which makes the 5-mile hex redundant for gauging movement.

I have a radical proposal... The 6-mile hex!

Who's with me?

[vito]

Six sided polygon = six miles?

Makes sense to me.

[chicagowiz]

I've used a 5 mile hex inside 30 mile hexes for a long time. Why? It's just how it suited me.

[Harbinger]

I ignore individual movement rates at larger scales and go with the OD&D movement rates, which are based on 5 mile hexes.

Plus I'm lazy and counting by 6's is too much work.

[coffee]

The Cook/Marsh Expert Set suggests a scale of 6 miles per hex (p. X19). I've never had a problem with it.

But the 5 mile hex comes straight from OD&D.

[Mike]

Apr 27, 2011 9:17:27 GMT -6 coffee said:

The Cook/Marsh Expert Set suggests a scale of 6 miles per hex (p. X19). I've never had a problem with it.

But the 5 mile hex comes straight from OD&D.

Well that answers that then!

I'll have to get out OD&D and check it out again.

Many thanks

[howandwhy99]

I draw maps based upon the size of my paper and the size of the area I'm attempting to create.

The size of the paper may be bigger or smaller, it really depends upon the amount of detail I need to include based upon my ruleset. I need to be able to draw and see easily this detail.

The distance scales are therefore all variable.

However, it is fairly easy to break these down into a hexgrid of 10 feet, 10 yards, or 1 or more miles distance grid-free. On those without a grid I simply require a 1/2" or 1" sheet length scales to a round number. So some maps are 3 miles / 1" hex, some are 5, some 20 miles / hex.

I use 1" & 1/2" hex transparency overlays for my overland maps instead of hex paper.

[Finarvyn]

Apr 27, 2011 8:00:07 GMT -6 Harbinger said:

I ignore individual movement rates at larger scales and go with the OD&D movement rates, which are based on 5 mile hexes.

That's my biggie as well.

I think that Dave Arneson's FFC map of the Blackmoor campaign is set up with 10 miles to the hex, by the way. Always frustrating since the maps are done identically to the other Judges Guild maps, but the other JG maps are 5 mile hexes. So the maps look like they fit togeher but don't quite....

[geoffrey]

Apr 30, 2011 4:15:52 GMT -6 Finarvyn said:

[I think that Dave Arneson's FFC map of the Blackmoor campaign is set up with 10 miles to the hex, by the way.

I prefer a 10-mile hex. This measure allows for small details, but prevents the PCs from traveling too quickly across the campaign map.

[DungeonDevil]

I too use 10-mile hexes, per the FFC map.

[coffee]

If you're using the First Fantasy Campaign version of the map, that's fine.

But if you use the one from the later TSR module DA1: Adventures in Blackmoor, it shows the same map -- but the scale is changed to 24 miles per hex.

I have no idea why.

[tombowings]

They might be going for a day's travel = 1 hex sort of thing, Coffee. But never having seen the module, I can't really say.

[waysoftheearth]

Numerous sources seem to indicate that the Romans marched an average of 10 to 15 miles per day, depending on terrain, weather and daylight.

Perhaps the 5 mile hex isn't such a bad thing then... the Romans could cover two 5 mile hexes per day in poor going, or three 5 mile hexes per day in good going.

[talysman]

Well, a league (one hour's walk) is somewhere around 2.5 to 3 miles, traditionally, so you can see a 5-mile hex as two leagues/two hours, and a 10-mile hex as four hours. How far you can travel in a day depends on how long you can walk/march/ride between rests and how long you can travel before making camp for the evening; trained military like the Roman Legion can 15 miles under good circumstances (perhaps 20 over existing roads?) That's maybe 1.5 hours to break camp, another 1.5 hours to make a new camp, and an hour total for brief stops or minor incidents during travel, and six hours of actual travel time.

In hogscape's defense, if you use the high-end estimate of 3 miles to the league, you can have six-mile hexes and keep all the above proportions: two hours to the hex, 3 hexes in a day for good conditions.

[jjarvis]

Last time I DM'd in the Wilderlands I used a scale 5 leagues to a hex. So a day of normal travel could cover 2 hexes. An hour of travel per league on easy terrain also was a good way to keep track of terrain and distance (with leagues being about 3-3.4 miles).

Long distance overland travel doesn't have to tie too closely to small scale movement.

[thorswulf]

Just wondering out loud here, but does anybody use larger square maps with one large 1" square equal to 5/6/10 miles. This can be subdivided into smaller squares of normal graph paper. In FFC Arneson splits up a hex like this into segments. I know years ago I saw somebody do this for their campaign world, and held it all in a binder.

[DungeonDevil]

May 2, 2011 17:05:22 GMT -6 waysoftheearth said:

Numerous sources seem to indicate that the Romans marched an average of 10 to 15 miles per day, depending on terrain, weather and daylight.

Sounds 'bout right. In my readings on the Seven Years War it was normal to march around 15 miles/day on average. Now, in the Napoleonic Wars that was already passe as the Grande Armee could cover a lot more.

If a party in the campaign is laden down with gear, supplies and travelling on foot, I allow 15 mpd, but if they are more lightly equipped and a ranger or barbarian is leading them they could cover a good deal more.

[Deleted]

I'm drawing a map now that uses 6 mile hexes. I'd guess, however, that the 5 mile hex arose due to the ability to then be able to break down a hex into 1 mile subhexes per hex. The 6 mile hex, while the actual measurments work out nice, doesn't break down into subhexes quite as neatly.