8×d(6-10) Where does this encounter happen?

26 Jun, 2023

One of my minor pet peeves with encounter tables is that they usually leave the GM to improvise an encounter from general terrain type, a monster, and possibly a reaction roll. To remedy this, I wrote a set of tables with lightly evocative locales in which to situate an encounter.

Each is intended to provide just one visual hook to ‘anchor’ a scene. Some are more specific (complications given in italics), but I deliberately tried to avoid over-engineered entries in favor of speed and reusability. For example:

Old: ‘As you travel through this forest hex, the road turns a corner and you see three bugbears, huddled in inaudible conversation’.

New: ‘As you travel through this forest hex, the road turns a corner and you see three bugbears huddled together between the roots of a particularly large tree, having an inaudible conversation.’

Is it much different? No, but if they fight I now have some terrain to work with, and if a wider sub-plot spins out of it I can attack further significance to the big tree. But if neither happens, it isn’t so unique that my players will assume it contains an important point of interest, nor does it horribly strain disbelief if I roll it again later.

Italicized text provides suggested special mechanics or extra flavor that can be swapped out if the site is re-rolled.

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Forest

1. At small clearing with a ramshackle moss-covered hut (rusty axe, a few dolls, candle stubs, a rusty cooking pot, and a jar of honey)
2. Within a fairy ring of mushrooms (magical mishaps twice as likely)
3. In a small, rocky ravine or gulch
4. Amongst the roots of an enormous tree
5. On the banks of a babbling brook
6. In a thicket of dense, thorny shrubs (movement and visibility reduced)
7. In the overgrown ruins of a keep or watchtower
8. By the remains of a makeshift lean-to, long abandoned
9. In a small clearing filled with (wildflowers/dead leaves/snow)
10. In the hollowed-out bark of a fallen dead tree

Desert

1. At a small oasis with several date palms
2. In the shadow of a butte or mesa
3. At the crest of a large dune
4. In the middle of an expansive salt flat
5. By a lone obelisk or plinth
6. Between two large cacti
7. Between three large cacti
8. Amidst the bleached bones of a dead caravan

Grassland

1. Near a large herd of grazing animals
2. In the ruins of an abandoned farmstead or windmill
3. In a thicket of tall grass
4. In the shade of a lonely oak tree
5. On the marshy banks of a small lake
6. In the remains of a nomad camp
7. Near an old hedgerow
8. Atop a rolling hill

Jungle

1. At the base of an overgrown stone carving
2. On a rickety rope bridge strung across a ravine
3. In a tunnel carved through an enormous tree
4. On the banks of a misty lake
5. In a dense thicket of ferns
6. Amidst a swarm of ants (downed players get 1 turn before being devoured)
7. In a clearing scattered with the remnants of cyclopean masonry
8. On a stretch of trail [by/under] a small waterfall

Tundra

1. In a vast expanse of snow
2. By a grove of pine trees
3. On a barren hillock
4. In a furrow carved through a large snowdrift
5. By a steaming hot spring
6. By an abandoned hut (seal skins, a flint knife, knucklebones, and several clay pots)
7. Amidst the foundations of a ruined fort
8. Between a pair of ancient runestones

Coast/island

1. By an abandoned lighthouse (rambling journal, a spyglass, 3d10 candles, a tattered coat, and a chess set)
2. On cliffs overlooking the sea
3. In the remains of a beached ship (chest with 4d10 gold buried in the sand in the hold, littered with skeletons, rusty armor, and spears)
4. Between rocky tidepools
5. At the mouth of a seaside cave
6. By an abandoned jetty
7. On a pleasant, sandy beach
8. At the mouth of a small stream
9. By the salt-bleached bones of a leviathan
10. In an abandoned fishing village (fishbones, fishing rods, nets, sinister stone idol)

Swamp

1. Amidst the vaulted roots of a Mangrove tree
2. By a ramshackle hut on stilts (box of occult totems, pouches of rotting herbs, and several shrunken heads)
3. Knee-deep in a pool of slime
4. On a rickety footbridge over a stagnant pond
5. On a huge lily pad
6. Along the remains of an old berm or levee

Mountains

1. On a narrow ledge over a deep crevasse
2. On a winding path that switchbacks up a mountainside
3. Under a large and precarious outcropping (Moderate difficulty to dislodge a boulder)
4. Atop the snow-capped summit of a mountain
5. In an idyllic alpine meadow
6. Amongst the ruins of an abandoned watchtower
7. Near a hilltop cairn
8. By a giant's burial mound
9. On a narrow stone bridge over a deep rift
10. In a copse of pine trees

#archons-and-armigers #random-tables