No Empty Spaces

An encounter table, but for small, interpersonal narrative encounters rather than fights or treasures.

In a lot of fantasy adventures, vast swaths of the world could be thought of as liminal space. Overland travel is often about calculations and logistics, but the actual act of travelling tends to casually encompass dozens or even hundreds of hours of the player characters’ lives.

One way that hex crawls (and most of the common advice around them) attempt to mitigate the boredom of overland travel is by putting something intriguing in every hex on the map. But surely that isn’t the only way to make our fantasy worlds are big, or to make stories still happen in the empty or transitional spaces throughout them.

So if a dense forest or a mountain pass is equivalent to an empty hallway in a fantasy adventure, why should it only contain monsters, loot or nothing at all? In the real world, liminal spaces pace our lives; hallways between rooms and streets we walk home down give us space to think, observe, and process. In fiction, liminal spaces are opportunities for more introspective and personal storytelling.

You can think of this as a storygame designer trying to put his spin on a hex crawl encounter table. I tried to write options that invite play around party dynamics, character backstory, and even game design itself.

Travel Encounters

1. Nature — GM: Share a favorite poem of yours about the landscape in which the party is travelling. Invite players to share anything that inspires them as well, or any material they’re using to help them visualize the world, including specific artwork from rulebooks.
   • The GM can search https://poets.org/poems ahead of time and bookmark a couple of favorites
   • Alternatively (or additionally), share any artwork or writing about similar natural settings that moves you
2. Boredom — “Your wounds are bandaged, your weapons polished, and your belly full. There is time yet before you must sleep, and boredom sets in. What hobby, craft, or idle thoughts do you spend your time with?”
   • Pose the question to each player. Ask if they interact with each other, or keep to themselves.
   • If they have a creative hobby like playing a song or writing a poem, ask them to briefly describe what sort of piece they’re working on.
   • You can encourage players to interact with each other in character and make note of each others pastimes if you like, but there’s nothing wrong with staying in the characters’ heads.
3. Camp — “Despite your best efforts, you can’t seem to find a decent spot to camp for the night. What makes your surroundings inhospitable? Do you press on until later than you hoped in search of a better respite, or do you cut your losses and make the best of what you can find when night falls? How does a less comfortable night’s sleep affect everyone’s mood?”
   • As the GM, you might clarify or hint at some of the answers to these questions yourself if it helps you tease or introduce upcoming plot details or characters.
   • If the friction from this event brings out conflicts between player characters, encourage the players to talk about what that looks like or even play out arguments in a scene (while looking out for each other at the table, as always).
4. Friendly competition — “Never have you happened upon a more perfect spot for one of your favorite games. You can spare a bit of daylight, why not have a match? Who proposes the game, and what sort of game is it? Come up with a way to determine who wins and play it out.”
   • Ask the players to provide at least the core idea of the game they’ll play. “It’s like dodgeball, but played in treetops” or “it uses a conjured magical orb that floats like a beach ball” or “it’s literally just cornhole” are all great. Imagine a couple of elves playing cornhole and tell me that doesn’t amuse you.
   • You should invite the players to come up with a resolution mechanic of their own choosing, and then play it out. Skill contests, simple die rolls, rock paper scissors, combinations thereof, etc. Don’t spend all session on it, but take a moment to be creative together.
5. A conversation — “There are far too many hours in the day to spend every one of them on talking, but the silence can become unpleasant in its own way. As the day wears on, which one of you feels the need to start a conversation? Do you have something you actually want to talk about, or do you just want to fill the silence?”
   • This can of course be an in-character moment, but it doesn’t have to be.
   • For a bit of extra fun, though, you can play this out more directly. Describe the place where the player characters are walking, remind them that they’ve been walking in silence for a long while, and then let that silence hang and see who speaks up.
6. Small things — “When you break for food, someone’s pack tumbles open. Whose was it? As you put things back together, you consider how you’re distributing the burdens you carry. Who carries the most? Whose supplies dwindle, and whose are untouched? Redistribute as you like.”
   • This can function as an opportunity for players to revisit their inventories and remember the items they’ve forgotten.
   • Encourage players to think about how exactly they carry all of this. If they have infrequently used items, ask what kind of scenario they might be saving it for. If they have mementos of past adventures, ask if they reminisce often.

Additional Options

When an option on the above table has been rolled, swap it out for one of the following before rolling again for another travel day.

• A welcome bath — “The place where you’ve made camp this evening is near a bit of clean, fresh water; a perfect chance to wash off the grime of travel. What sort of place is it? Do you share the space, or are you self-conscious enough to take turns?”
  • This is an opportunity to think about the sorts of boundaries player characters do or don’t establish around each other.
  • There are much more juvenile directions that players might take this, and there isn’t necessarily anything wrong with that, but make sure that players are respectful to each other and keep each others’ comfort in mind.
  • Relatedly, any scenes that involve violating boundaries (peeping on one another, pressuring characters to bathe with others if they don’t want to, etc.) are heavily discouraged unless players can all enthusiastically agree that they’re interested in them.
• Secret ingredient — “You’ve found something during your travel today that you can whip up into a rare treat. What sort of ingredient is it, and what dish will it make? Who’s the best chef among you, and what part does each of you play in preparing this special meal?”
  • Encourage players to think through the meal they make, including how they season it or what else they pair it with. How does it compare to their standard meals or rations?
  • To whom is this dish or delicacy familiar, and what memories do they associate with it? To whom is it a new experience, and how do they end up liking it?
• Marching formation — “One of you naturally travels at a different pace than the others. Who is it? Is this a source of friction, or do you all adjust to keep pace? Have you found ways to ”
  • Let this be an opportunity for players to express otherwise-unsaid things about their characters. Are they gracious enough to slow down for their companions, or do they insist on scouting ahead? Do they feel bad for slowing others down, or do they feel that their pace is more reasonable?
  • Make sure to remind players that mechanical notions of individual movement speed, initiative, etc. don’t necessarily translate to how a character fares during days of foot travel. You might be the slowest of the group when dashing around a fight, but still impatient and brisk on long hikes.