One Hex In! - Mapping the Hex pt. 3
- Parnell Dubson
- Jun 25, 2023
- 5 min read
Hidey-hoo, neighborinos! I can finally get Denckash on his little walkies
Disclaimer: I utilize the Mythic Game Master Emulator (Mythic or Mythic GME) as well as The Solo Adventurer's Toolbox 1&2 (TSAT) & the Solo Wilderness Crawler (SWC) to supplement the adventure and build the terrain. I prepared little outside of the game world I already created, basic hex maps, and some lore that was already written from previous adventures. I will leave links to their respective links to support the authors at the end of this post. I encourage giving them a look!
(Bold text will indicate the story being told
Normal text will indicate DM/Oracle rolls
Italic text will indicate notes explaining stuff I feel needs a reason behind it, as well as tips, tricks, and methodology)
As a reminder, here is where we are on the Hexcrawl
Denckash officially starts his adventure to explore the province of Susshannah. He decides to hug the coast and go east.
CL=4, Chaos Roll 1d10= 7, no modifications.
Scenes will be divided by days during the hex crawl. Following the rules of Hexcrawling in 5e & Solo Wilderness Guide to create the world and Mythic/TSAT to fill in the blanks. If a dungeon or urban exploration happens, we will consider that the start of a new scene.
Let's see what the weather is going to be today
Weather: Same as Scene 1 (30 degrees colder than normal, roughly 30 degrees F)
On current terrain can explore 18 miles per day (3 hexes)
DC 10 to navigate
He is good on water and food, so he decides to just press on. He sees a wooded coastline, staying far enough away from the water to avoid a rogue wave, which was unlikely enough. The weather was crisp but thankfully with no wind.
Entering Hex M-1 - Terrain: Forest
Area Description: Continuing forest
There are four stages of exploring per HI-5 (Hexcrawling In 5e, I'm very funny) Help, Search, Forage, & Navigate. There is nothing of note generated for this hex and, as stated before, we are good on food and water (10-days' worth, actually!) though his waterskin only held a half a gallon of water, we will have to forage at some point. Per the DMG (pgs 242-243), when exploring a larger area, 1 hex=6 miles, thus 4 hexes a day. I need a challenge though, while it is considered a well-defined route at a normal pace is 24 miles a day. So far, there is not road, but we are along the coastline. I will be moving at a normal pace at 18 miles per day (3 hexes). If I find a road on my travels, I will update it, but I am going to assume there isn't a road going east because, logically, it’s a forested coastline, so I am not feeling a road right here. The point of this is wilderness exploration. This also equates to 1 hex every 2 hours.
He regretted not purchasing a backup waterskin, he will now have to forage at some point. Maybe he will run into a traveling merchant or something.
Navigate Survival (Wis) DC 10; d20+3= 15+3=18, he navigates successfully
Random Encounter: d6=1, Wandering Monster
Distance away from monster: 130 ft away
Creature Motivation: Trying to overcome an obstacle
After walking along the coast he comes upon a large piece of driftwood about 130 ft away from him. It appeared two lizards were attempting to climb up on a log, presumably to bask. He decides to move in closer to them to see if he can identify them. Eventually, he gets in range just close enough to get a good look at them. Hmm, I wonder what those are? He thinks to himself.
I have adopted a system I found on Reddit do determine difficulty because, for solo play, I don't think the standard system in the DMG & PHB are suited for it. Essentially, the user suggested rolling 3d6 for easy or medium difficulty skill checks (i.e. druid identifying a plant or sneaking up on a sleeping walrus) and 4d6 for hard or impossible tasks (Starting a fire with wet wood or climbing a tree with no feet like your cousin Jeff that one summer.) I will be trying it with this check because I overthought which DC to set it at. Normally I set the DC to 15 and call it a day. With skills I am proficient in, though, I think its silly to get it to 15 when I am almost guaranteed a success. And what defines difficulty? Is it difficult in general, or difficult to the character? Because I can obviously say that Denckash is a druid so of course he knows about identifying animals, so for him it would be a DC5, but if its a rare and exotic animal or one of a varied species, it could generally be difficult to identify. So, to add spontaneity, I adopted this. This way, fate is in the dice. It can favor me or make my day harder. This is why I love solo, you can't predict the next step.
Nature (Int) DC15; d20+1= 14+1=15, success!
He notices their green skin is speckled with red flecks, their tail is fan shape and it looked like they were trying to use it to give themselves a boost but buffeting the air, he had seen these before and he recalled the Fantailed Geckgons, but these two seemed to be unable to get a good grip on the log to get up. Being a druid after all, he approached them to try to help them up.
He approaches the log slowly and calmy, as not to scare them.
Stealth (Dex) DC 10; d20+0=7, fail.
Denckash steps on a branch that snaps loudly, scaring the geckgons away. He shrugged his shoulders and moved on, he tried and wasn't going to be curtailed by his, presumably, primitive cousins.
He continued on, crossing over into the next hex
He finishes the first hex in 2 hours, the time is 11:35am.
I think that was interesting. I have personally been trying not to overload my characters with combat because I don't want to write a story about a murder hobo. Had Denckash succeeded in help those lizards on their obstacle, I would have awarded him the same XP he would have received had he fought them. Logically, it wouldn't be in my best interest as a druid to wantonly stomp a couple of weird looking bearded dragons unprovoked. However, if I rolled on the table for Creature Motivation/Behavior in HI-5 that says it attacks me outright as if I were a threat, I may have dealt with them or just tried to get away. As a rule, I try not to fight what I consider "critters" like rats, beetles, or anything considered Tiny. unless it poses a threat like a malicious fairy or something similar. CR 0 creatures I either try to shoo away or ignore them. I don't know why, it is just a thing. I think it may stem from how I won't kill bugs if I am camping, because I am in their home and they are just vibing.
I wanted to make this all one post but as I was building the next hex, I could tell that there will be A LOT to deal with. Maybe I will post examples of my worldbuilding notes, if anyone wanted to see them.
I hope you enjoyed journeying through our first hex, I am excited to see where we go next.
Happy Adventuring!
The Solo Adventurer's Toolbox & others: https://www.dmsguild.com/browse.php?author=5E%20Solo%20Gamebooks
I'm glad you used Denckash's Druid status to adjust the rolls - it makes for a better story and doesn't make character's classes only relevant for battle, which is lame. Anyway, the increase in "verisimilitude" makes for a more engaging game! And if it doesn't tell a good story, then why bother, ya know?