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I'm curious how others deal with navigating dungeons or other areas with their players. Do you have all character tokesn on the map and wait for each player to move their tokens or do you have one icon for the party and keep a marching order? I'm especially interested on how you deal with traps and surprise etc. It's like pulling teeth to get some of my players to move their tokens and then when something happens they argue about their positioning.
Each player controls their own tokens. If a player stumbles upon a trap then they stumble upon a trap. No arguements.
Like most things in life, it depends.
When I'm running Undermountain, I have a massive map of the whole level. We do not put PC tokens on it, rather I use a single 'Party' tokens to represent them all. Then on the Party Sheet we use the Order tab to show the generic marching and watch order. I highly recommend this. Its simple for you to say "unless you place your tokens otherwise, this is the way you are marching" (with top being the direction of travel.)
On smaller maps where all the tokens are, players move their tokens. If they don't move them then they get left behind and when combat starts they are where their tokens are, even if it's 200 feet behind. And, if they move their tokens ahead, then they trigger what they do and they might be all alone fighting whatever for 2 rounds while the rest of the party catches up to them.
Players will quickly start to keep their tokens in play, if you force them to.
I have one player who is easily bored. If the party stands around in a room discussing what to do, he will start nudging his token off toward a side door and eventually just start exploring without the rest of them. This has had very unfortunate results for the party such as triggering three encounters at once, all of which could otherwise have been avoided easily, or setting of large traps that catch everyone, etc. The net positive of this is that my players are quite precise about where they are standing at all times, just because they never know what he's going to unleash on them, and they want to be in the best possible spot when the unexpected happens.
To follow up on what LordEntrails mentioned about the party sheet and using a party icon for bigger maps, there is an extension that makes it into a 2x2 grid with a hallway, a campsite, etc. So you can have default party formations pre-defined for several different situations. I always forget what that one is called.
Much like LE, I use a Party token except in combat or a few very rare circumstances. In Order order tab, I have sections for 5', 10', 15'+ hallways so they can base their order and positioning on how open the region they are traveling through is at the moment.
Then when combat begins, I'll have the players place their tokens where they think they would be. But if it's obvious they're trying to gain some advantage, I'll make them use the Order they already established. I'm lucky, my players will actually put themselves in a bad spot if they think it's where their character would be, so enforcing position almost never happens.
I find that once the party knows there is at least one trap, they become ultra cautious and it gets very tedius with them peek around corners and listening at every door and inching forward.
Same with secret doors etc.Quote:
Originally Posted by FlyingNorseman
As a GM I make sure to telegraph when the party needs to be cautious and when they don't need to be. Use of passive perception can help, i.e. "Ardwill notices an a strange echo coming from the hallway ahead of the party. The noise the party is making does not echo like it should." Or a quick "you thoroughly search the room, there is nothing of interest here."
Your players will learn to trust you, that you will let them know when they need to, or not, be detail oriented. Also I'm a big subscriber to the philosophy that such challenges should be important to the story, and that anything of important is never left to a single die roll. i.e. if they have to find the secret door to defeat the BBEG, then they always find it.
Our campaign is in Ghosts of the Saltmarsh and I am running them through Isle of the Abbey. They are in the area with all of the traps leading to the treasure room and there are a lot of traps so they are extremely cautious right now. I don't blame them, but it is slowing things down.
This can become a balancing act and it can be hard to find the right settings for your group and your style.
You could go old school and roll a dice to see which character trips the trap, not if, and if its an area of effect use the marching order to suck some more victims in.
I find movement on maps with long corridors very tedious and will tend to handwave it away if I can.