Overland Travel in D&D

In this video we discuss overland travel in D&D. The reasons the party might want to travel and how we can make this part of the game interesting and fun. From equipping the expedition to hiring scouts and henchmen.
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[@christopherdecator9742]

It surprises me how much paradigm, i.e. method of play, is explicitly encoded in the B/X material. When I got started with AD&D at the end of 1e, it didn't really occur to us to hire mercinaries or make elaborate preparations. I didn't even learn what a hex crawl was until later in life. Now, its my preferred style of play.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@aaronsmith5055]

Maybe some of it has to do with the fact (at least for me) I've finally passed the age of the guys who wrote & edited it in the first place.

[@MyrddintheBard]

My players are part of a travelling Carnival, the first 5 days of the journey I ask one of them to describe the mood and something interesting, funny or tragic happening with the Carnies or their characters. Bringing players into describing the world and events is so useful.

[@BanditsKeep]

Awesome

[@mookiewilson4166]

Vignettes is the perfect imagery for how to accomplish immersive but quick overland travel and making travel mean something in RPGs without devoting entire sessions to them. As usual, finest long-form RPG content on the interwebs. Keep making them!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@victoryfish]

I always implement The One Ring 2e travel system into my OSR and B/X games. Giving each player a travelling role is great to keep everyone engaged for my group.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice!

[@AtillaBuyukurvay]

I second this!

[@SimonAshworthWood]

The BECMI Expert Set recommends that adventurers bring at least 50% more food than they predict they’ll need. If I was adventuring in a desert, I’d bring even more food than that, unless knowledgeable NPCs say that there are plenty of foraging and/or hunting opportunities.

[@BanditsKeep]

Good idea!

[@danroscigno187]

Waterborne travel: Yes please!

[@BanditsKeep]

🚤

[@derekburge5294]

All the reasons you cited for PCs to begin traveling are good... But I'm surprised you didn't mention the most common reason: fleeing consequences.

[@BanditsKeep]

Ha ha - true, I guess my players are more tame than most, they’ve only burned down one city in recent memory

[@NegativeHeadspace]

The players want some "thing" to run into as they travel. My players love random encounters on long marches. Little things work as well as big. I always have them in my campaigns when the party goes anywhere. Great vid!

[@BanditsKeep]

So true. Thanks!

[@Motavian]

Great video! For my home B/X game I like to add a couple of mechanics in for encounters. First, if I confirm an encounter during the day I will also roll if the party finds a spoor, trace, tracks, lair or the monster itself. This mitigates a lot of the risk associated with overland travel and since I like to create encounter tables for regions (in addition to the encounter tables by terrain.) It gives regions distinctive flair without always relying on a plain monster encounter to do so. In addition, I'm also a fan of "the dice chain". So a d6 check during the day and a d12 check during the night, but what if the party wants to create a campfire? What if follower morale is low and they want music and/or ale? Well, for every choice the party makes to mitigate or try to ignore these needs, the dice "shrinks" or "grows" accordingly depending on the action taken. (Foraging/hunting can also be considered an action that expands the parties presence/foot print.) Pippin and Merry starting a fire on weathertop? The d12 shrinks into a d10. The Nazgul were already in fast approach? That d10 becomes a d8, etc, etc.

[@BanditsKeep]

I like this!

[@Grimlore82]

Man this channel is growing fast ;-) Keep it up my friend, you have a niche here, and we want more!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@mysticbarbarism3172]

Your videos are far and away my favourite ttrpg content on this site. But my god, the comments sections are also a goldmine. Ya'll are smart.

[@BanditsKeep]

Thanks! I am happy to have such a great community here

[@williamlee7482]

I always include a weather table in my encounter tables when the party is traveling overland and I also include an omen table with things like a recent battle where the bodies are still warm to an aincent ruin that's overgrown where the party can set up camp for the night and have a safe place to sleep . I'll even include animal encounters such as a herd of deer or maybe a bear or two . But I try to keep things interesting without going overboard on the details

[@primusinterpares5767]

Weather table is essential. Omen table sounds pretty cool!

[@BanditsKeep]

Ah yes, for sure!

[@BanditsKeep]

I had a really fun table that I called “signs of destruction as well

[@williamlee7482]

@@BanditsKeep Sound cool , was it a d20 table or something else ? I got the idea for including the omen table from TSR's 3rd edition Gamma World but I expanded upon it into a d100 table

[@tobiasholm2717]

@@BanditsKeep I'm running my second session in my first campaign this Saturday and I'm actually going to use that Signs of Destruction table, along with the others from that video. Thanks for being a great inspiration for this campaign.

[@markt2021]

I was psyched about this video. Thanks. In my campaign, we've had outdoor adventures on a series of islands, for months now, for characters levels 1-3. I do have to be careful so a couple of wyverns don't show-up and wipe-out the party but with trails, small encounter areas, and care, we've had a lot of great encounters outside and beside the sea. It is fun because of the contrast we get when the party does find a cavern or a tomb or something. You can really feel it when, after being in the sun for awhile, they go down into the earth. I wanted to share that, and my thanks for your great ideas and videos.

[@BanditsKeep]

Sounds awesome

[@a13xw71]

You like the Old School sage. Your advice is practical and super useful for veterans or new players. Keep it up.👍👍

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@ivanshiek]

The GM could also keep a global event record. Things like player renown in a kingdom, something they did caused a ripple effect globally, or the party's reputation went down with a faction or kingdom because of one player's actions. If factions are going to be introduced then it should be tracked as a party rating rather than individual. The party is it's own faction. There could be a newspaper that is delivered to the party whenever they reach a town or city, One Piece style, relaying all the major global events that happened while they were away. Perhaps the party learns that they are wanted fugitives with a bounty on each head. Maybe the party slayed a monster that was terrorizing a town, and it is mentioned in the global news, garnering attention from neighboring kingdoms and crime lords alike, increasing their reputation in towns and lowering their rep in the underground..

[@SusCalvin]

In Mutant Y0, they have sort of re-discovered hexcrawling. But they are doing it on the lesser geometric form, the cube, so it's like walking on a chess set. One boon you can stumble on in a square is a vantage point letting you see neighbouring squares. If you have a zone-stalker PC with you, they can pick up hints of what's inside the next square. It helps the players gauge the risk and reward ahead.

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice

[@CaptCook999]

In a high level campaign, we had to map out the rivers in our Domains. So we hired some locals to teach us all how to use kayaks so we could traverse the rivers and explore them. One by one we explored each characters rivers. It made for quite the little adventures here and there and we met small tribes and convinced them to join with us. They of course had to pay tribute to their new Lords. A little magic here and there made them very cooperative if they didn't want to join with us. We also had encounters with a river dragon as well as a few other nasties that we needed to remove from our territories.

[@paavohirn3728]

Good stuff! I'm really digging the wilderness exploration aspect with resource management and all after a couple of years break from that. It's also great if you have classes like ranger in the system. It does take a bit of planning to make it interesting. Randomization tools are great! Also honorable mentions to Forbidden Lands, Dolmenwood (Wormskins) and Worlds Without Number.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure, all great systems.

[@lbur7119]

Great video. Another thing to mention is the % in lair for "wandering monsters". The party might stumble across an interesting lair (with lair treasure) rather than a wandering monster crossing their path.

[@BanditsKeep]

Indeed!

[@nathanaelthomas9243]

Thanks for the video, I really enjoyed it!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thanks for watching

[@countmrvhs776]

Great channel! I've been digging through your videos the past few days. Love these type of adventure design videos in particular - especially how you'll toss out a bunch of potential ideas for encounters and events. I struggle to come up with those things, but you make it look easy! You're making the B/X ruleset really come to life for me - and as someone who only got into D&D with the later editions, I appreciate it! Keep 'em coming :)

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@davidb4020]

Really interested in listening to this! Always been a complex subject. So many ways to do this!

[@BanditsKeep]

Awesome, let me know what you think

[@ForeverYoungKickboxer]

Great video. I'd like to see you roll out the whole process, like a mock session, summarize whatever happed in play, and then show us your rolls for prep the encounters, and or the in session rolls and adjustments. My use of travel is very similar to yours. Recently ran a 1994 version of Gamma World (pretty much 2nd ed Ad&d) mash up with our old Star Frontiers campaign. Switching between mutant and human campaigns to allow the players to enjoy the New World from different perspectives. I used these same old school rules from Expert set! Had different tables the farther they got from or closer to areas of "civilization", filled with homemade mutants, and stuff borrowed from Mutant Epoch, MCC, etc. Now we're in a Darksun campaign. I get to be a player while my brother DM's. One thing we started doing back in the day was letting the guy at the table who always rolled the lowest to roll for the encounters. If our DM doesn't care he let's the player, let's call him Brad, roll the d6 and many more times than probable ot would end up a "1".

[@BanditsKeep]

Nice! Sounds like a fun campaign

[@alexwilson4792]

Great video. On the topic of henchmen and mercenaries, I hope that we can hear your thoughts on larger scale combats/battles soon

[@BanditsKeep]

Thanks, good topic for sure

[@TheArcturusProject]

I like that shirt!

[@BanditsKeep]

Thank You!

[@Astartes36]

Travel has always been something that I have had trouble with. I don’t want to make it too fast because, as you said, then why haven’t other people gone here? I also don’t want to make it too hard. Nice ideas on the balance of things.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@SusCalvin]

Sometimes the danger is reversed. The wasteland is relatively non-deadly to cross but the dungeon is a horrible threat. People know Wight Hill is there but they take pains to travel around it.

[@theodoredansen6152]

I really dig Fear of a Black Dragon with Jason and Tom.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure

[@KayttakaaHumehia]

I pre-write some interesting events and happenstances for the specific area that I can pull out as necessary. Then I just describe the beautiful scenery and make the party throw their random encounters and write off used resources. Throw in some of those prepped things as needed. It is a good point to go ahead and ask often what do the PCs want to do and how do they react to these things. Usually by speaking slowly enough they blurt out their reactions in real-time. But not too slow.

[@BanditsKeep]

Indeed

[@ChuckBarchuk]

My tip for traveling: Bring plenty of Ale.

[@BanditsKeep]

Indeed 🍺

[@gebatron604]

id like a water travel video!

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@rosascreativeworks5403]

Ahhhh, I miss the old "Basic" and "Expert" days. Things have gotten so convoluted these days.

[@BanditsKeep]

BX is my favorite rule set for sure

[@m4thewrezidy611]

Water Travel? Yes Please.

[@BanditsKeep]

Ah yes, I need to do that still!

[@michelettovolpe]

Daniel, what are your thoughts on the Companion, Master, and Immortal set rules? I'd love to see a video discussing these.

[@BanditsKeep]

I have never read them… but high level play is not typically my jam. Immortals seems very interesting though

[@TheArcturusProject]

Ooh yea waterborne might be fun! That is definitely the part I just skip right over. I see it and I turn the page XD

[@BanditsKeep]

I hear you, that’s not uncommon!

[@mitchellslate1249]

Desert crocs! Egyptian evil gods of course! What do you mean you don't think Immersion is the goal? Buying items aside, you just described everything we believe in and designing for more Immersive travel. The journey is a part of the adventure, yes! Yes, make your own Tables! You should also just make your STory World ahead of time to know where most everything is, and the likelihood of things, so you know if a dragon does make sense, if you should roll for monsters in a dense monstered wood and wild, and so forth. The Game MAster should just be able to create and roll dice as desired to build on the fly a Wizard's Tower, absolutely, if a possibility they foresee or want to build something with some dice rolls for being indeterminate as a possibility. I do see it as more about maintaining the experience of the Story World and not about the Purpose of the PArty or a "plot" as it were. The Story and the World are one, you write both together. So make the World, you make the Story. Make the Story, and you have made the World. If in the Story World there are encounters overland or should be, then have it! Did you just make a comment about illicit Caravans? Are you offending my Khajiit? That is it! Rolling on the assassin table! How dare you insult my wares! I am offering good, clean, fresh hearts here, and you dare insult me! Lizard-Men, take their beating chests! This is why there are Desert Crocs!

[@BanditsKeep]

🐊

[@radelc]

I hear about how some people absolutely hate the Jason Cordova Dungeon world style of allowing player input into the narrative and I don’t really get it. Most of my players are newer to rpgs but they love to indulge in vignettes about their own characters. Also I vehemently agree with pre-rolling encounters.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure, I love the way Jason does this

[@SusCalvin]

If they're on a trailblazer job, you can set it up so they are rewarded directly for that. The landgraaf wants to know more about the landscape of Mars, and he bankrolls expeditions. So you give them an amount, maybe 50-200 coin, per hex they explore and map out. And now they got a direct, tangiable reward for going out of their way to check all these nooks around the wilderness. You can throw in that the landgraaf pays 500 in bonus for each special site of interest they find, like the Glass Monastary, a town, the Stone Heads etc. Make this count as adventuring money, so they get xp per hex as well. The nine hexes outside Neuköln are already half-explored and you don't want the players mucking about in the countryside? Make them exempt, they already have those parts mapped and give no reward for them. MERP gave xp per hundred miles walked, it sounds silly but I think they were on to something.

[@BanditsKeep]

Very cool ideas. I’m doing something similar in my solo actual play - using a single character “the mapper” to scout the land.

[@SusCalvin]

@@BanditsKeep I first read it from what's his name, author of Broodmother Skyfortress, about giving xp for events and discoveries in the region. In their version, there was no gold reward and you just got xp for viewing cool vistas. 200 xp per hex I think with more if you visit a point of interest the first time. 100 xp each time you see a dragon. It's got to be a concrete, defined goal. People in civilization can give the bums jobs out in the wilderness and the reward money will count as adventure-derived, xp-giving treasure. So I figured I'd try to give it for information and mapping as well. You'd be a bunch of adventuring paramilitary spies essentially who get a payoff for secrets you find and sell to people. No one during the playtest wanted to turn informants for the prince-bishop yet.

[@ChuckBarchuk]

I would love if you did sample example of overland travel.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool

[@CODEFORTYTWO]

yes please open water and river travel video

[@BanditsKeep]

Will do

[@dlmcnamara]

If their intent is “clear the area”, I’d give them signs - trails, smoke in the distance and so on, then allow the players to decide to investigate or avoid

[@BanditsKeep]

Makes sense

[@radelc]

I would love info on sea travel and nautical campaigns. I've always wanted to run one but have always been intimidated by it.

[@BanditsKeep]

Cool!

[@davidb4020]

It's not a bad idea to nominate someone to take care of logistics. What naturally happens at my table (and I think is also organic within the fictional world too), is that we are very detailed until they have so much cash and status they don't care anymore, i.e. around lvl 4. I stop bothering them around that level too. Prerolling is good, but I never get around to do it because the terrain might change, or the tactics of the player, etc. I agree with monsters not attacking on sight and so on. I have a small table of "what do the monster do" and I try to keep it so that it's not necessarily combat, sometimes it's just sighting and so on. I'm still unsatisfied with almost every system (and I tried many), but nowadays I tend to prefer doing it as with OD&D, i.e. so many "points" of movement per day and so on.

[@BanditsKeep]

Good points!

[@solohelion]

Boats boats boats! I’ve tried to bring in boats before but haven’t ever got them into the spotlight. I’m going to call them spaceships this time around… One of the issues that I’m paranoid about is they’ll get in the boat and effortlessly sail away from my scenario, and it will be my own fault for being excited about boats.

[@BanditsKeep]

That’s the nature of boats, they sail away 😂

[@JamesAnderson-dp1dt]

So you’re looking for ways to somewhat constrain the players’ options? I haven’t gm’d, but I’ve read a lot about boats. Prior to the advent of steam, and especially further back in medieval and ancient times, boats lacked a lot of capability that we kind of assume now. I’ll post a couple examples shortly.

[@JamesAnderson-dp1dt]

If the players are using a boat on a river, perhaps the current is fairly strong; once headed downstream, going back up might take so much time they’d run out of food before getting to the next town. While headed downstream, perhaps they encounter a place where they have to portage, which will take a few days. Perhaps the water level in the river falls and they have to (edit) stop along the bank and wait for a freshet.

[@JamesAnderson-dp1dt]

For a ship, medieval ships had very limited ability to sail into the wind (basically impossible) or even across the wind. A contrary wind could stick them in a port or wilderness Anchorage for days or weeks. Once on course for a given city, it might be impossible to turn around (contrary wind) or change to another destination (prevailing winds/currents don’t go that way, and they’d get stuck in doldrums if they tried to get into a different wind belt). The prevailing winds might even force them to only go one way, like the monsoon winds made it possible to sail east across the Indian Ocean half the year, but you had to wait months before you could sail back edit:west.

[@solohelion]

@@JamesAnderson-dp1dt I definitely like the flood idea. And the winds not blowing reminds me of a scene from the odyssey involving menelaus I believe. He was stranded on an island until a goddess told him his men were bothering the locals and how to club seals and therefore set sail properly. Or something like that.

[@Goblinerd]

In a few of your videos, you've mentioned that during overland travel the PCs don't recover HP. Why is that, and where is it referenced in BX (and also in OSE if possible)?

[@BanditsKeep]

Page B25 “HEALING WOUNDS: Wounds may be cured in two ways: by rest- ing or by magic. To cure wounds by resting, the wounded creature must telax in a safe place, and may do nothing but rest. Each full day of complete rest will restore 1-3 hit points” I imagine in OSE it would be in the same area?

[@Goblinerd]

@@BanditsKeep thanks! I may want to adapt that for my DCC game!

[@jayteepodcast]

I found giving your bow 20 hp and just rolling 1d4 per attack is easier and let the character say i collect my arrows and add it back.

[@BanditsKeep]

Hmm. But what if they just shoot 1 arrow?

[@jayteepodcast]

@@BanditsKeep if they choose to do so they can, but i find that most player only count arrows that hit and not miss. I think some people make resoure managment harder than it is.

[@BanditsKeep]

@@jayteepodcast I’ve not experienced that, but whatever works for your table is cool

[@Siofragames]

Have you done many games with waterborne travel? It seems like one of those stereotypes of B/X that people often don't use those rules.

[@BanditsKeep]

I mean the first module in the Expert series is on an island 😊 - my current group has a boat they travel on and my longest running campaign (that finished) they had a boat and eventually converted it into a spelljammer ship

[@Siofragames]

@@BanditsKeep I'd love to hear more about it in some videos then. Most people I hear from don't use it much.

[@eprohoda]

How is it going?.great ! catch you later~

[@BanditsKeep]

I’m doing well, thanks 🙏🏻

[@PvtSchlock]

I don't want to track arrows? No way. Just nfw. I key encounters to weather on a 2-36 table. I can't believe the number of times I've seen a DM let the travel to the first dungeon consume the entire first session. As with public performance: speak up and keep the act moving.

[@BanditsKeep]

Don’t want to? Then don’t use a bow 🤷🏻‍♂️

[@PvtSchlock]

@@BanditsKeep no, I mean I can't believe someone would say that. It makes no sense to me.

[@sgtbigballs666]

What's really boring, Daniel, is having "good luck" and encountering no random monsters while traveling, for 2 sessions My DM mentor is phoning it in I think, and my friends that I'm introducing to the game are bored, what to do..

[@BanditsKeep]

If you are having no encounters, why is it taking so long?

[@sgtbigballs666]

@@BanditsKeep an excellent question, wish I knew haha

[@aaronsmith5055]

It's easy to forget how much of this is already set up in b/X... It's almost more than is reasonable, but a super jumping off point. Thanks for this reminder. As always, you bring tons of inspiration basically just by reminding us what has already existed ever since I was that kid in elementary school skipping past rules.

[@BanditsKeep]

For sure, the BX books are rich with inspiration and tools