This article is a follow-up to Exploring the Wilderness: Navigation and Player Agency. It focuses on "micronavigation," or the ability for player characters to explore small spaces, like encounter areas.
A Journey into the Wilderness
A few weeks ago, I went camping on the Hoh River in western Washington’s gorgeous temperate rainforests. Our camp was deep in the forest, near a dirt-and-gravel road that ran parallel to the freezing Hoh River. On the right of the road was a steep hill filled with titanic old-growth cedars and twisting nets of mossy boughs, and to the left was an equally perilous slope leading down to the rocky bank of the river. There was also an outhouse about 100 feet or so down the road.
As I walked down the road to the outhouse one night, the path lit only by the light of my electric lantern, I thought this would be a perfect place for an ambush. I went on to think about this forest road for the rest of the trip. There were dozens of places along it that would have made for fascinating encounter areas, like a wide open plain of clear-cut forest covered in the bleached-white remains of fallen trees, a set of twisting switchbacks up a hill perfect for rolling boulders down, and so forth.
Each one of these areas were complex and interesting, filled with striking imagery and inventive ideas for combat encounters, but the spot that I kept coming back to was the plain stretch of road between my campsite and the outhouse. It reminded me a little bit of the epic finale of The Fellowship of the Ring, a three-part skirmish in which Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli fight orcs by a ruined hilltop structure, Boromir tries to protect Merry and Pippin from uruk-hai in the forest, and Frodo and Sam flee from the crumbling Fellowship across the River Anduin.
This climax would make a poor D&D encounter thanks to its large party size and how divided the entire cast is. It’s essentially three encounters at once with three different parties. But let’s take a similar situation, but with a typical four-player D&D party. This party is traveling down a forest road. On their right is a steep upward hill leading to a forested shelf, on their left is sharp downward grade toward the rocky bank of a fast-flowing and freezing river. Each hill rises about 15 feet upward over the same number of feet laterally.
Dynamic Encounter Areas
Combat is typically where D&D players have the most agency—a here defined as “the freedom to make meaningful decisions”—because combat affords players with lots of clear-cut choices. What monster do you attack? Where to you move? What spell do you cast, and where do you cast it? But once an encounter starts, all of the navigational agency that we talked about last week falls away; you’re locked into a combat in a specific area. It doesn’t have to be this way! If you want to increase your players’ ability to make meaningful choices in combat, consider creating dynamic encounter areas instead of static encounter areas.
A static encounter area (SEA) should be familiar to all Dungeon Masters. Most published adventures use them for simplicity. Most dungeon rooms are SEAs. They’re any location in which an encounter is expected to both begin in and end in. A dynamic encounter area (DEA) is a location where an encounter begins, but either changes dramatically by the end of the encounter (like a collapsing cliffside, an erupting volcano, or a sinking ship) or is designed to encourage movement between different sub-locations. The forest path I explored by the Hoh River is a three-part DEA. The environment itself isn’t designed to change, but there are three sub-locations within the area: the path, the forest, and the river. All three sub-locations are connected by hills that are challenging but not impossible to traverse. Let’s take a look at this three-part dynamic encounter area.
The Three-Part DEA
Using the forest path as an example, let’s look at the power of a three-part dynamic encounter area. A DEA doesn’t have to be complex and filled with special mechanics. This area only has three mechanics: climbing/falling down a hill, fighting in a dense forest, and being washed away in a river. Here’s how I took notes on this encounter area in my notebook:
Encounter: Goblin Ambush
A group of six hobgoblins lurk in the underbrush at the side of a road running through a dark forest. Six goblin hide in the treetops above the road, waiting for the hobgoblins’ signal.
Area 1: Road
- This area is a 15-foot-wide gravel road with 2.5-foot-wide shallow ditches on either side.
- A 15-foot-tall hill on the east side of the road climbs to a flat forested area (area 2: Dense Forest), and a 15-foot-tall hill on the west side of the road descends to the river (area 3: River Bank).
- Climbing up or down a hill costs 2 feet of movement for every 1 foot moved. A character can make a DC 13 Strength (Athletics) check as an action when it moves, spending no extra movement on a success. If the check fails by 5 or more, the creature falls and takes 3 (1d6) bludgeoning damage. A creature that is moved down a hill against its will must make a DC 13 Strength saving throw, taking 3 (1d6) bludgeoning damage and falling prone at the bottom of the hill on a failed save, or taking no damage on a successful one.
- The six hobgoblins are lurking the undergrowth on the eastern hill, while six goblins are in the canopy directly above the path. Any character who makes a successful DC 17 Wisdom (Perception) check spots either one group or the other.
Area 2: Dense Forest
- The trees here have grown so thick and tangled that it is hard to maneuver. Moving in the forest costs 2 feet of movement for every 1 foot moved, and all creatures in this area have three-quarters cover against creatures in area 1 and total cover against creatures in area 3.
- A creature that makes a successful DC 15 Strength (Athletics) or Dexterity (Acrobatics) check can climb to the top of a tree, allowing it to see creatures in area 3 and granting it total cover against creatures in area 1.
Area 3: River Bank
- A fast-flowing, 60-foot-wide river runs through the forest. A creature that moves at least 10 feet into the river must make a DC 13 Strength saving throw, taking 3 (1d6) bludgeoning damage and 3 (1d6) cold damage on a failed save and be washed 15 feet downstream. A creature takes no bludgeoning damage and is not moved on a successful save.
- The bank of the river is made up entirely of broad, flat stones. A creature that falls prone here takes 3 (1d6) piercing damage.
Your Own Dynamic Encounters
The above dynamic encounter area has a very potent benefit: the monsters can force the characters to interact with the terrain. If your players are interested in making more dynamic choices in combat, but aren’t sure how to do it, or when they can do it, you can use their foes to show them how. A hobgoblin can hurl the wizard down the hill from the road onto the rocks by the river while a goblin snipes from heavy cover in the dense forest. After the enemies making use of the different encounter areas, your players will realize that they can do the same.
Dynamic encounter areas can improve your combat encounters because they can give your players more ways of interacting with the world around them than just figuring out who to attack or where to cast a spell. They can also encourage creative combat maneuvers, like pushing creatures down cliffs or hurling them into a river. DEAs aren’t suitable for every combat encounter; a simple roadside skirmish with goblins like the one at the beginning of Lost Mine of Phandelver doesn’t need a ton of baked-in decision points. But when you’re setting up climactic encounters that you want your players to talk about forever, consider making the environment just as important as the monsters, and finding ways for the players and monsters to use that environment to their advantage.
Do you prefer dynamic encounter areas, or are straightforward static encounters that get out of the way of the plot more your speed?
James Haeck is the lead writer for D&D Beyond, the co-author of Waterdeep: Dragon Heist and the Critical Role Tal'Dorei Campaign Setting, and is also a freelance writer for Wizards of the Coast, the D&D Adventurers League, and Kobold Press. He lives in Seattle, Washington with his partner Hannah and two little ambushers, Mei and Marzipan. You can usually find him wasting time on Twitter at @jamesjhaeck.
Anything besides an unimaginative 30ft square room with 0 difficult terrain is welcome by me. Seems every game I join has the most bland encounters ever. If only the dynamic encounters didn't require (in this case) 3 times the work. Now instead of prepping one room, you have to prep the room, the cliff and the river. Think it all comes down to how lazy your DM is.
That moment you realize you're an adult and still playing pretend in your back yard. Last time I turned real world location into an encounter area one my players kept calling a goblin by my name. I asked why and they said "Eighteen to push him into the ravine." I roll for fall damage the goblin falls and breaks his neck. "You remember when that was almost you? Cause I do. There's a reason we don't play around the ravine Mr. DM."
After two decades in the military, I often catch myself looking at my environment with a strategic mindset IRL. Where are the chokepoints? What's the most defensible position? What gives me an advantage or disadvantage? What's the best exit plan? I never really thought to adapt that to my tabletop gaming though. So many options for creating and adapting situations to bump it to the next level. I plan on adding this to games I play in as well as games I DM. It will definitely make the world more realistic and engaging. Great article, James.
When I took the train from Wisconsin to Chicago for CR C2E2 I passed a lot of marshland. I was looking and the gullies and shallow hills. The trees, some areas were thick with them and others thin. Where the water pools were. For an hour while riding in the country I was thinking of "wilderness survival". Perception checks. Skill and size penalties. Full and partial cover. I took about 16 pictures trying to snap a picture of "oo that would be a great encounter spot' as the train flew past. Most often too fast :)
As a DM, I try to make it as interesting as I would like to have it as player.
Sometimes, static encounters are really okay. Not every single encounter must be full of strategic finesse. Sometimes it's more about the message, like "This city has a problem with criminals" or "There are really many wild animals in this forest" or jsut the involved enemies have a story on their own.
However, i definitly like to switch things up. A everchanging enviroment can be easily implemented in some dungeons, like magically moving platforms or activation of levers to change the terrain. #WrongLeverKronk
Outside...Go with the flair. In the forest/grassland you have (moving) water, stone and wood at your desposition.
In cities some interesting architecture, furniture, and carts on the streets
Moutains? Steep ramps, differences in altidude, snow where you don't know what hides beneath. Or Lava, when you go for vulcanoes.
Aboard a ship? Just watch any sailing/pirate movie, really
I could go on and on with that. If you can't visit exotic places yourself to get inspired, watch some nature documentaries or google for keywords like "fascinating places in the world"
Ah, so that's where you were the whole time James
My way of DMing mirrors this line of thought, to make the characters BE a true part of the scene, not just interact with it, but really live IN it. So dynamic areas are the best for me, and I try to teach this to all my RPG friends when playing with my group. Nice text, James.
Every time I make the drive from western to eastern Washington, I find myself glued to the window watching the different climates pass through, and picturing how differently goblins (why is it always goblins?) would ambush in each of them. Thick brambly underbrush in the coastal forests, steep treacherous cliffs and canyons with raging waters, dry rocky hills pocked with dry pines... I'm so tired of games always feeling like LARPing in springtime in the English countryside, there's so much cool stuff you can do with weather and terrain!
One of my favorite articles in a long time.
If you want to have some more fun read about the goblinoids in volo's guide to monsters if you haven't. Then think about how a hobgoblin mastermind would plan the whole thing. A few hobgoblins or bugbears can change everything.
There're dynamic, and then there are DYNAMIC encounter areas. There was one particular such encounter area I borrowed from a film; the players enjoyed it immensely. The film? The dynamic encounter area?
This.
Just some ideas off the top of my head to make the players (and potential DMs) think about environment/terrain.
What route they take could depend on -
Was pretty much expecting a rickroll there. Clicked through anyway.
My only caveat (I largely agree with your point) is a lot of D&D dungeon design (physical) and population (critters) makes no sense. There is no sense in which the creatures have food and water access, waste areas, and the areas (from castles, to ruins, to dungeons, to natural caves) often lack any logic other than 'The players need diverse encounters'.
That (for myself and the people I game with) is more frustrating than sensible layouts where the furniture, physical construction, and population of encounter spaces has a logic that survives at least brief scrutiny.
Worst of all are the geo-morph dungeons that have round rooms (who builtds those?), triangular rooms (again, who?), and a geography that could never be a functional lived space.
I like my encounters to have options - I love it when a player flips a table or jumps on one, where someone uses a capstan bar to whack a bad guy, or where someone elects to take an enemy off the battlement into a tree canopy because they have a good chance of grabbing something and the big baddie not so much...
But thee has to be a discernable logic underneath it all.
Not only do you need to consider chokepoints, high ground, fields of fire, etc. in terrain, you need to consider what abilities you or your foes have that might mean those standard categorizations and tags might not mean the same as they would between two mundane human forces. If you have someone who can run along tree branches (light, small character with good dex skills) or you have someone who is unhindered by certain terrain types, those basic assumptions that we'd make about how the terrain would affect humans may not apply.
I've paintballed and exercised in various sorts of terrain - from the mild to the quite adverse. I've been in mixed forest thick enough navigation was brutal (no lines of sight and you had to constantly go around trees and shrubs). I've been in a brush-less forest of birch trees - ranged shots are about 50/50 for hitting a tree, but you aren't sneaking up on anyone in this terrain. I've been in gullies populated by thick, prickly bushes (like a rosebush) that you had to crawl through at parts - slow, and if a foe caught you there from better vantage, you'd be a sitting duck. I've climbed sand dunes that shifted under my feet and made walking exhausting within 10 minutes and slowed one down considerably.
D&D tends to model one type of difficult terrain as do many wargames and assumes that one type has the same impacts on sight distances and various skills (at least historically in prior versions). The reality is you can have a forest with easy movement and fairly open spotting and another that is so thick you probably move 1/4 or less of regular movement and spotting beyond 20' is tough (hearing might be feasible a bit further if you were still). And a marsh can be anything from some slightly spongy ground with wet boots to swimmable channels, hip to neck deep otherwise, with quicksand and predators.
Your best guide is if you have walked a piece of terrain, you'll know how easy or hard it was to climb, cross, or navigate in and see. If you are camping or hiking, take pictures, make notes of visibility distances (and how variable that is based on your exact position), on places it would be good to hide or defend and places that would be terrible - bad footing, back against a wall with no retreat, etc. Does the ground have a leaf carpet in fall that is crunchy or slippery when wet? Are there small boulders or tree roots to trip up people moving quickly or in the dark? The list goes on. You can make a really lively encounter using this kind of terrain.
And if you don't want to write it all out, take a note or two, take your pics, or DL some from google, and use them when you run the encounter and rule things that make sense right then and there at the table.
I like your post :)