Maps have been an integral part of the fantasy role-playing hobby since its inception, but often we think of the classic gridded dungeon map as the basic map that is used during the game. The overland map is secondary, showing the overall lay of the land, and is perhaps just used to find out the travel distance between the town the adventures starts in and the next dungeon.
But there is another type of map that can see heavy use during the game session: the overland hex map used for a so-called hexcrawl. What is a hexcrawl do you ask? It is a type of game where the adventure consists not of an overarching plot or a specific dungeon that the heroes follow or delve into, but of a region that they can freely explore via a hex map. They go from hex to hex, encountering what the GM or adventure has in store there and then decide where to go next.
I first encountered this type of game (and the accompanying hex maps) not in fantasy gaming, but in science fiction. We used to play Traveller in the day, and hex maps where a big part of the game. Since then, I’ve always loved them but admittedly used them in my games fairly rarely. But now I am starting a new campaign game, and guess what it is in large parts a hexcrawl game. That means I’m looking at creating my own hex maps again, as you can see in our latest YouTube live mapping session.
Hex grids have been a part of Campaign Cartographer for a long time, and in CC3 we introduced special hex symbol functionality to make creating such maps even quicker and easier. Check out the Overland Hex Map style from the Annual Vol. 4, Overland CC3 Hex Maps in Vol. 7, Mike Schley Hex maps in Vol 12, and of course a large variety of hex styles in Cosmographer 3.
None of these are exactly what I’m looking for, so I’ll be creating a new style for my own use, fitting for the Cloud Empress game I’ll be running for a while. That way I can expand the published game world with my own content without breaking the visual style.
I’m looking forward to sharing my progress here and on the ProFantasy forum. Have you used and created hex maps yourself? Do you like creating them, or is their layout too abstract for your liking. I’d love to hear your thoughts.
There is a new update available for Campaign Cartographer 3. Update 11 brings CC3 up to version 3.43 and includes the following additions and changes:
– 1 example map