Alternates boardgame maps for hexcrawling

[Deleted]

The Outdoor Survival thread got me thinking about other boardgame maps that can be used for a simple outdoor hexcrawl.

Here's three from Heritage games dating from the early 80s. All are available to download at:
dwarfstar.brainiac.com/ds_barbarianprince.html

1-Barbarian Prince
dwarfstar.brainiac.com/barbarianprince/barbarianprince_onepiecemap.jpg
Pros-The map has a variety of terrain (deserts, swamps, civilized area) including ruins and temples. The game already pre-keyed the map with adventures.
Con-The variety of terrain makes the map unrealistic. Lack of roads.

2-Demonlord
dwarfstar.brainiac.com/demonlord/remastered_demonlord_map_complete.jpg
Pros-Cool background with lots of interesting characters (Cloud Prince, Old Ones, Forest Spirit). Has a definite good-guy area and bad-guy area.
Con-Map is horrible to behold. Hills are bright orange.

3-Goblin
dwarfstar.brainiac.com/goblin/goblin_map2.jpg
Pros-Map is a fairly small scale (the city takes three hexes) and has a decent ratio of villages to towns and cities. It's also nicely drawn. Good if realism is your thing.
Con-Game is horrible. Because the map represents a peaceful kingdom for the goblins to raid, their isn't much in the way of adventure on the map itself.

Anyone have other suggestions? I figure for the map to work the hex scale should be 30 miles or less.

[talysman]

Magic Realm?

I'm thinking just the map hexes, here, not the rest of the rules, in the same vein as Outdoor Survival. Definitely has roads, multiple locations in each hex. Not sure what scale the hexes would be.

[tombowings]

4 - Divine Right

4.bp.blogspot.com/-bxRMSMYSL04/Thnk0aHVR5I/AAAAAAAAAOU/CzRCV_hVeA4/s1600/minaria.jpg

Pros - inspiring names, multitudes of adventure locations, well defined political boundaries
Cons - quite a large scale, no key

[Deleted]

Jan 29, 2013 14:59:05 GMT -6 talysman said:

Magic Realm?

IIRC each character could move 4 spaces in a day and most of the clear hexes had two spaces. So each hex would be 1/2 of the daily movement in clear terrain. One of the cool things about Magic Realm is how you can enchant a hex and change the layout of the roads. Not sure how that would work in a D&D context but it would be awesome.

[runequester]

You can get old Battletech hex maps fairly cheap, and the non urban ones are pretty neat for terrain features and whatnot. You could use tokens or counters to add cities and similar.

[Zenopus]

The Barbarian Prince and Divine Right maps are awesome, hadn't seen either of them before. Thanks for posting, guys.

Wizards was a 1982 Avalon Hill game where you placed hexagonal tiles on a board. Each tile was composed of 19 smaller hexes, so these could be used for constructing random boards for hex crawls. It's an interesting game that I recently re-bought. (I had a copy when I was younger but only played it a few times).

boardgamegeek.com/image/352742/wizards

A bit different, but some have suggested using board game maps for D&D campaigns. I wrote about using the Warlocks & Warriors (TSR, 1977) map for a Holmes Basic campaign setting. Movement is more much limited if you stick to the game path but could work for kids or if your players need more direction.

zenopusarchives.blogspot.com/2012/06/warlocks-warriors-wilderness-map.html

[owlorbs]

Some that spring to mind are the maps from the Runebound series from FFG, Wizard Kings from Columbia Games, Wizard’s Quest from Avalon Hill (Area Movement but still viable), Dragonhunt by Avalon Hill, Albion: Land of Faerie by SPI, Valley of the Four Winds by GW, Dark Emperor by Avalon Hill, Many of the Metagaming microgames, even Sticks & Stones (small tactical prehistoric wilderness), Ragnarok by SPI, Sorcerer King (tactical) by Wotan, Sorcerer by SPI (may cause flashbacks), King’s Bounty (area map) by TFG. I could go on, there are definitely more in my collection.

[makofan]

I used SPI's Swords and Sorcery map in a campaign once - very good stuff.

boardgamegeek.com/image/1298906/swords-sorcery

[doctorx]

I love that game and possess said map! I've given thought to running a D&D campaign set in the Valley of the Great Sword more than once...

[kesher]

Here's a bigger view of the Swords & Sorcery map.

I adore the Divine Right map, and the Demon Lord one is pretty cool, too--evocative names.

[Deleted]

Jan 30, 2013 16:24:41 GMT -6 kesher said:

Here's a bigger view of the Swords & Sorcery map.

What were they thinking with those names ...
Nattily Woods
EvAlyn Woods
Aardvark Wallow

[makofan]

It is a very tongue-in-cheek game; it has 50' tall Killer Penguins, a Rex Rotary device that creates Tyrannosaurus Rex's, Corflu Cultists with bomb-dropping zeppelins, and of course the elven bowman Logarithm son of Algorithm

[kesher]

and of course the elven bowman Logarithm son of Algorithm

Okay, that made me laugh outloud...

[scottenkainen]

I've long been tempted to try running a D&D game using the Talisman board...

~Scott "-enkainen" Casper

[kesher]

That would be an interesting experiment; how would you use it in play?

[keith418]

Can I just say that these kinds of posts are why I totally LOVE this forum? Does anyone know if Fedex/Kinkos can print images this size on paper?

[scottenkainen]

Some belated thoughts on running a Talisman D&D game:

The campaign setting would be a demi-plane divided into three semi-planes. PCs would be able to reach the middle semi-plane at levels 4+ and the upper semi-plane at levels 8+. The demi-plane is circular, so if you keep traveling too far from the City, you reach the City again eventually.

Overland travel would be determined by rolling 1d6 for the entire party, with that being the number of squares they would cross per day. Cards would be treated as wandering encounters. Combats would be handled by normal D&D rules instead of Talisman rules.

~Scott "-enkainen" Casper

[jmccann]

Wow, there are a lot of Swords & Sorcery fans! any interest in getting a PBM game going? After my computer room is set up I may ask again.

Back to the thread topic, I have a couple of suggestions that have been missed so far (a lot of good suggestions already):

Dragon Pass, set in Glorantha: boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/1720/dragon-pass

White Bear, Red Moon: also Glorantha: boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/10884/white-bear-red-moon

[jmccann]

Jan 31, 2013 10:26:59 GMT -6 kesher said:

and of course the elven bowman Logarithm son of Algorithm

Okay, that made me laugh outloud...

Don't forget Gygax Dragonlord!
boardgamegeek.com/image/387987/swords-sorcery

[makofan]

One of the great things about Swords & Sorcery is you can wargame with 4 or 5 people. We used to play the scenario with the Cronks, Cultists, Empire, Swamp Creatures and Endore a lot for that reason

[Deleted]

That Albion game is available for download. The map is cool but wierd. Each hex is 4 leagues which I think is about 1/2 a day's travel.
archive.org/details/AresMagazine11_AlbionLandofFaerie

Feb 5, 2013 21:27:42 GMT -6 jmccann said:

Dragon Pass, set in Glorantha:
White Bear, Red Moon: also Glorantha:

I have those as well as Nomad Gods. I thought it would be cheating to put them on this thread as they are already RPG gameworlds.

Another game I have is Dinosaurs of the Lost World
boardgamegeek.com/image/132741/dinosaurs-of-the-lost-world?size=large
The game is set in a hidden dinosaur valley and the players are exploring it. It is a hexcrawl game already with little hidden encounter markers that you can go and find.

[kesher]

Feb 5, 2013 15:51:19 GMT -6 scottenkainen said:

Some belated thoughts on running a Talisman D&D game:

The campaign setting would be a demi-plane divided into three semi-planes. PCs would be able to reach the middle semi-plane at levels 4+ and the upper semi-plane at levels 8+. The demi-plane is circular, so if you keep traveling too far from the City, you reach the City again eventually.

Overland travel would be determined by rolling 1d6 for the entire party, with that being the number of squares they would cross per day. Cards would be treated as wandering encounters. Combats would be handled by normal D&D rules instead of Talisman rules.

~Scott "-enkainen" Casper

That would be awesome, especially if characters could pick up followers, ala the actual game...

[blackknight]

Feb 6, 2013 10:23:14 GMT -6 @hedgehobbit said:

Each hex is 4 leagues which I think is about 1/2 a day's travel.

depending on the country source you use, a league is from 1.4 miles (Ancient Rome) to 11.299 miles (Norway). could be a very long day...

League

Also, My Dungeon mapping of Choice is my Warhammer Quest Boxed Set and all the 100s of maps I found years (1998) back when it was actually only just going out of print.

[talysman]

Feb 26, 2013 12:17:29 GMT -6 blackknight said:

Feb 6, 2013 10:23:14 GMT -6 @hedgehobbit said:

Each hex is 4 leagues which I think is about 1/2 a day's travel.

depending on the country source you use, a league is from 1.4 miles (Ancient Rome) to 11.299 miles (Norway). could be a very long day...

League

You're misreading that table. From the article: "Miles are also included in this list because of the linkage between the two units." The Norwegian mil is not a league, and it's not 11 miles; it's 11.29 km.

But more importantly, the article explains that the league originally meant the distance a person could walk in one hour, which varies from terrain to terrain and body type to body type, but in generally is between 2 1/2 to 3 miles. Which is what hedgehobbit was referring to. I'm in favor of completely ditching the conversion to miles and using 1 league = 1 hour's walk over normal terrain, because it gets rid of the debate over 5 mile vs. 6 mile hexes. They're both two leagues.

[Deleted]

The Wizard Kings maps get my vote. One big advantage they have is that they are interchangeable/geomorphic. You can set them up in many different combinations. Another is that you don't have to buy the boxed game to get the maps from Columbia. To top it off there are symbol sets and templates available to create your own maps in that style.

Paul

[Sean Michael Kelly]

Feb 5, 2013 15:25:08 GMT -6 keith418 said:

Can I just say that these kinds of posts are why I totally LOVE this forum? Does anyone know if Fedex/Kinkos can print images this size on paper?

Usually, yes, but it's not cheap! I was going to reprint some old Star Frontiers maps and laminate them. Might be cheaper looking on eBay.

[jmccann]

I just finished up a game of "through the desert". It is an old euro game which is new to me. It uses a hex map and has desert and mountain terrain. It has oases and water holes. Tthe board is significantly smaller than OS, but you could easily whip up a variant of the wilderness rules in UAWA, giving everything an African or mid-eastern flavor. Or maybe set it in the Sea of Dust in GH.



This image from BGG shows the terrain fairly well: boardgamegeek.com/image/748108/through-the-desert

-- edited for accuracy and updated w/ image link

[Deleted]

Was packing up my stuff for a move and noticed an old game I bought on the cheap years ago. It's called War of Resistance and is about the Chinese and Japanese fighting in the 30s and 40s. The map is huge and covers almost all of China at 16 miles per hex. What was interesting is that the map includes cultivated land (rice paddies, from the looks of them) around the various cities and such.

Here's an image of the area around Hong Kong.
boardgamegeek.com/image/484452/war-of-resistance

As China wasn't fully industrialized in the 30s, the ratio of cultivated lands to cities should be reasonable for a D&D world. Displaying the cultivated land lets you easily visualize civilized regions and the wilderness surrounding them in a way that most hex maps don't. Oh, and it includes random weather charts as well.

Here's the full map in all it's glory:

boardgamegeek.com/image/304088/war-of-resistance

There's a sister game that has the Phillippine islands at the same scale.

[Deleted]

It is asking for a log in to see the map. Do you know any other site at which it can be viewed?

[Deleted]

Mar 26, 2013 13:33:53 GMT -6 @dubeers said:

It is asking for a log in to see the map. Do you know any other site at which it can be viewed?

I've changed the links. Apparently boardgamegeek only lets you view the full scale images if you have an account but will let you view the reduced sized ones. They should be enough to get a feel for how it looks.

I wish the maps were a bit more colorful. The green used for forest doesn't stand out enough.