Recently, I have wanted to add support for zones in my core rules as I have found they work better for Freelancer’s Guide than hexes do. Hexes are great for the steampunk/fantasy settings I use for testing, and hexes were what the game was originally made for, but zones perform better is certain types of encounters. Zones have their place; grids have their place. Now let’s talk about what that place is.
The difference between Zones and Grids comes down to granularity in the rules. Just so we are all clear with what I mean by granularity, it is the level of detail that the rules cover. You might be thinking, why wouldn’t you want to the rpg system to be detailed enough to cover any situation. Detail comes at a price. The more details you have, the more you need to think about, the more you need to process, and the longer the game takes. Putting it another way, there is a reason we do not roleplay every moment in a game, we skip the boring parts; we abstract out what we do not need. There is a place for both and their have their strengths, so I want to talk about why I originally went with hexes for the core system, and after I’ll take about why zones work best for Freelancer’s Guide.
Hexes are tactical. I went with hexes in the core game because of the tactical aspects they bring to combat. The smaller steps in movement, and how well they work with maneuvers makes for some complex and engaging combat to play (check out Missfortunate Morning for a prime example). The steampunk/fantasy setting works well for this because combat last 2 to 4 rounds so while each round and choice has weight, there is still enough time for tactics to be employed.
When I started playtesting Freelancer’s Guide, I would draw up hexes when we started an encounter so we could easily represent the movement. While hexes were fine, they made the encounters feel too slow. I think is because of two parts. Because guns and longer range are involved in Freelancer’s guide, a lot of the encounters are about managing objectives over larger distances and also because the fights were faster and deadly, see guns again doing player health in damage by default.
When I switched to zones, the encounters became faster and more interesting because the players were deciding less, where will I step, and more, can I solve this problem and also help shoot the enemies, or do I only get to complete the objective. Zones are less granular than hexes, therefore fewer micro decisions, therefore less time needs to be spent. That time spent is fine when the choices are meaningful and tactical, but since the combat would last 1-2 rounds, tactics were more in the setup of the fight or the pathing of the chase, than the mid fight tactics. So I am moving Freelancer’s Guide to a profit focused living to hexes and it will be better for it.
That does not mean the hexes are gone from the core system. No, I think they still add value to the system but I am making minor adjustments to the wording to accommodate both methods. They both have their place in the system and when applied correctly, make an encounter that much more exciting. So, highlighting what this situations are, hexes are still going to be the default for combat with melee weapons and premodern adventures. Zones come into play for encounters on larger scales in distance, for longer time periods between rounds, and modern and up settings. The system can adapt to either with every 6m of movement being the ability to move one zone, and a few maneuvers and ranges explained slight differently, it will be a relatively simple transition that I think will make the system better.
In your games when do you like to use Zones, when do you like to use Grids?
Let me know what you think by commenting here or following me on twitter @c22system or join my discord (https://discord.gg/gAJpjZXuYq)