Hex Crawling Procedure

Each adventuring day can be broken down into the following steps:

1. Morning – Roll Weather, Call for morning actions and business in the current hex
2. First Move Action
3. Lunch – Call for business in the current hex
4. Second Move Action (as first)
5. End of Day – call for final business, deduct rations and water, and check for nighttime encounters.

Move Action Procedure

1. The Party chooses a direction
2. The DM calls for player actions
3. Resolve navigation
4. Resolve tracking and foraging
5. Check for random encounters

Move Actions

Assume a ‘move action’ is 2d4 hours. Advantage may be rolled for any of the following conditions:

• A path is clearly marked
• The hex is described as light terrain

Individual Travel Actions

In addition to the party-level ‘move actions’, each individual character also receives an action during the move. Possible actions include:

• Look for Danger (Notice Threats)
• Navigate
• Draw a Map
• Track
• Forage

Let’s talk about what each of these means.

Look for Danger

Looking for Danger means that the character gets to roll Wisdom (Perception) rolls to spot monsters and roll surprise. Characters who are busy doing other things must rely on their fellows to keep them out of trouble.

Navigation

Getting lost in the wild is a constant (and potentially deadly) threat. Navigating characters make a Wisdom (Survival) check against the DC of the terrain they’re on: 5, 10 or 15 depending on its difficulty.

Rules as written, failure indicates that you’ve lost 1d6 hours getting back on track, but we recommend rolling 1d6 to randomly determine which direction your party goes. Getting lost is all part of the adventure!

Remember that weather may grant Disadvantage on these checks, but, if they can see the sun, the stars, or a map, presume the navigator has Advantage.

Draw A Map

No ability check is required to draw a map on behalf of the party, but encourage your players to actually draw the map in real life. It makes a great memento of the campaign, and it’s easy to pass around a table. Remember, the characters don’t see the world as a tessellating set of hexagons anymore than you do, so the map shouldn’t have any on it. Consider all messy, poorly-scaled maps to be a personal achievement in historical accuracy.

Track

If you’re rolling those Wisdom (Survival) rolls to track something, you can’t be Foraging, Mapping, Navigating, or Looking for Danger (unless you’re a Ranger, of course). New checks are made after rests or when weather and terrain cause a new difficulty.

Forage

Roll a Wisdom (Survival) check of DC 10, 15, or 20, depending on how much fresh water and food there is in the hexes being moved through. Successful characters gain a number of Rations equal to 1d6 + their Wisdom Modifier. Roll the same again for Gallons of Drinkable Water.

End of Day

Start the End of Day procedure by having each player deduct one Ration and one Gallon of Water. Remember that horses (and other large creatures) consume four times this amount.

Always check for random nighttime Encounters. Add bonuses if the party is disruptive. For example, if the party lights a fire at night, that might bump a 1-in-6 chance of encounter to a 2-in-6. If they’re also babysitting a noble bard who wants to caterwaul into the night, you could go to 3-in-6, etc.

Don’t prompt the party to set watches or look for defensible positions; they’ll learn soon enough.