One thing GURPS Dungeon Fantasy specifies is that a character needs to be mapping if the players want to make a map.
"For the players to be allowed to make a map in the real world, a party member must serve as “mapper” in the game world. He requires ink, paper, and two free hands. He can't carry a ready torch, shield, weapon, etc."
- GURPS Dungeon Fantasy 2: Dungeons, p. 6
In my current game, Nakar does most of the mapping. He has a (pretty silly) item that lets him draw a map on paper held on the inside of his shield - basically a shield-mount clipboard. I don't actually care which player does the mapping, as long as one character is set up to do so.
In fact Nakar's player maps sometimes, and another player maps another time. But if Nakar doesn't show, and no one has ink, paper, and the inclination to map instead of staying armed, no mapping can be done.
Does anyone else play this way? Is this very unusual?
I know for us, this makes it seem more real. My players have even bought into it so far as to pay to make a copy of the map and leave it in town, in case the map gets lost and they need to replace it (or need to buy it for their new PCs, in case of a TPK). But I can see some people disliking this.
If you allow mapping for the PCs without a mapping character (IOW, no one has to have ink, free hands, etc.), does this every affect the verisimilitude of the game?
It's good to hear something of how this idea works in practice. I like the theory of it, but don't remember how we did things in relation to maps back in the '80s, and wasn't sure how it would work at the table. If you have more information to share on the subject, I'd be happy to hear it.
ReplyDeleteI'll post a bit more on how we do mapping!
DeletePosted: http://dungeonfantastic.blogspot.com/2012/10/more-on-mapping.html
DeleteFor my group the map represents what the PCs know about the location. It is their shared reality of the dungeon or town. If I show them an illustration and say "This is the Pirate Queen" the illustration doesn't exist in the campaign... just the Pirate Queen does.
ReplyDeleteOf course players may have their PCs create maps of the same location in the game to sell or to prove their deeds or somesuch.
In neither case is it necessary for a PC to "do mapping" while exploring a lethal dungeon. I'd say doing any such thing is about as plausible as all the protagonists of Found Footage Films recording their panicked flight from murderous covens.
Spelunkers may map limestone caverns on a quiet summer's eve... I doubt they'd do it if they thought there might be an Aboleth in the vicinity.
So, no. Not mapping in the game world isn't implausible for us. The reverse is.
I dunno. It's about as plausible as someone exploring a lethal dungeon without a map - if you expect to come back over and over, and getting lost is a real concern, it's worth charting your course. Even if there is a nearby aboleth - kill the sucker and then go back and fill in the map.
DeleteIf getting lost or coming back isn't a concern, yeah, you don't need to map.
I "map out" what the players see as we go, using legos and props or my own hand-drawn maps. If they want to write it down, they need to write it down themselves. If I hand it to them, though, any prop soon becomes a game-world prop. Leave that picture out and they'll say, "We hand the guy this picture of the pirate queen and ask if he saw her." I understand why, so I don't hand out anything I don't mean for them to keep and use.
We do the player -> character map transitivity thing. It creates interesting decisions—and an interesting situation if the mapper goes down.
ReplyDeleteI am not sure we've ever mapped a dungeon. I'm G+ing about it as I post this.
ReplyDeletePost a link when you, I'd love to hear what you say.
DeleteWe didn't map "back in the day" either, ever. We mapped the heck out of video games before automaps made that a thing of the past (thankfully), but not dungeons. I don't recall why.
Maps are vulnerable to fire and immersion in water. Just sayin... it might mean the map is lost if that character is toasted or dunked. Yes, the player = the character for mapping, in our games.
ReplyDeleteI do the same with maps. Although I don't care which player maps, as long as some character is mapping. Usually the players rotate the mapper, even though one specific PC is doing the mapping.
DeleteWe did mapping back in the day, but it looked nothing like what the GM had. Our maps were usually lines connecting squares or circles. The squares or circles were the rooms, and the lines were the halls. There might be a note here and there talking about a pit trap or a "magic mouth" and the rooms usually had a title ("Goblin room with table" for example) and not much else -- mostly they were just so we could find our way back out, not so we could define every inch of the dungeon.
ReplyDelete