The Hangman Trap

The road through the waterlogged forest curves slightly, yielding to a small cliff. A solitary tree in the bend towers high above the surrounding shrubbery. Dangling from its branches is a hanged knight, the toes of his sabatons just out of reach for a person standing underneath. You enter in the low-right corner.

Target 11

X = Dead knight, hanged from a large tree. A great helm covers his face and shield and tabard is missing, preventing identification w/o first lowering the body. A golden necklace gleams from the broken neck.

- - = Pit trap, meticulously hidden, covering area under knight and 2" radius (1d6 damage, no armour).

o = Bandits. 2HD, leather armour (2) & shield (1d4 / +2 defense), axes 1d8+deadly: reroll ones, bow 1d6. No real interest in fighting, only in taking things.

:: = waterlogged shrubbery, small trees, reed. Movement halved, provides half cover (full cover if crawling)

TT = cliff, STR to climb

Timer: 1d4, reinforcement. 2 more bandits arrive from the shrubbery, responding to a secret signal.

Bandit tactics (in order of preference): 

1. Hope PCs fall into pit, demand ransom for their lives

2. Reveal themselves, demand PCs surrender and give up their equipment for safe passage

3. Fire arrows from cliff to draw PCs there, signal to reinforcement to steal anything left behind (such as pack animals), then flee with the loot

4. Fight!

1d4 blessed ruins

1. An old church, overgrown with moss. Inside is a magnificent organ with silver pipes, tended by shy monks who sneak in at night to play it when the Giant Bat (HD4, Bite: 1d8+poison, Flight, MV9, Huge: +2d8) that resides in the ruin is out hunting. In an unmarked grave is the corpse of Caelfarn, father of old Corwyn and agent of the Occ Empire, buried with his elfin maille (armour as mail, weight as gambeson) and blessed sword (1d8, +1d4 damage against unliving).

2. A small monument stands some twenty paces into a shallow lake, lined with bones. Blackened inscriptions on the monument declare that on this site, Holy Severinus converted 101 pagans to the true Faith.

3. Remains of a beacon tower, high as a light-house but abandoned mid-construction. The tower carries the royal insignia of Occ. In a stone sarcophagus, overgrown with weed, a knight of the second conquest lies buried - blessing the construction with his death. Five winged demons (3HD, claws 1d8, sightless) live in the upper half of the tower, defiling the holy repose with their droppings.

4. The ruins of an abbey amid a lifeless field. Its insides are black from fire, its treasures reduced to molten lumps of metal and wood. Only a charred statue of the God Mother remains, twisted by the flames. Worshipped locally as the Ash Lady, anyone kneeling before her in allegiance must make an unmodified death save. If the roll is below SPI, the supplicant gains the power to conjure flames from their blood. Each character can only attempt this once in their life. A squire (2HD, leather & helm, axe 1d8+deadly, shield 1d6) sits brooding by a small fireplace; loyal to Guiselbert the Bold he came for the idol's aid in freeing his master from the Black Knight, but has yet to find the courage to endure its deadly trial.

 

12 remnants of the Witch King's rule

1 Crucifixion Field. A hundred of old wooden crosses, some standing Ts, others like spokes of a wheel attached to trees, yet others leaning against another or lying crashed to the ground. Yellow bones and torn cloth covers the soil, or sit stuck like grisly trophies on the ash-gray frames.
2 The vanished host. The helmets and harnesses of a great host lie scattered here, as if the soldiers wearing them disappeared into thin air. Thin vines run across the rusty metal like capillaries, the scent of their dark flowers mingling with soot and iron. During storms, lightning strikes here with alarming frequency.
3 Feasting crows. Wicker baskets containing human remains hang from leafless trees.  Crows leap from the branches or sit on the ground, too fat to fly. A small band of goblins are here, ransacking the baskets for anything of value (2d6, 1HD, spears 1d6+poison: save or 1d6 for 1d6 rounds). A tiny silver ring lies in one of the baskets.
4 The Bone construct. A mile-long trail of debris and broken vegetation leads west, ending in a mass of charred bones and corroded copper vaguely resembling a toppled giant. The spirits that once held the construct together have nearly disspated, but their sighs echo like a low drone. Each night the abomination briefly animates again, crawling towards Ys under great agony.
5 Witch-King's Highway. A black road runs like a cruel scar through the land. Built with the relentless trample of iron boots and dread sorcery as its architects, the road cuts unflinching through razed villages and excavated hillsides for miles without a bend. Locals and wildlife both react to those traveling the road with instinctive fear, and prefer not to cross it.
6 Watch tower. A dark watch-tower, its door sealed with lead. If opened, a wind of decay rushes out with a scream (save vs magic or all equipment is dented). Inside is a golden trumpet, which can produce a similar gust if blown.
7 Village of condemned. Circling a crude cross of gray timber are eight wooden houses, built in haste and - it seems from their placement - animosity. The houses live pale ogrish men (4HD, hide, wrought iron spears 1d10, size +1d4) and their hounds (1HD, bite 1d6, close). All of them have faces covered in runes of the Witch-King, and their eyes are gorged out and their tongues cut. An itinerant monk, brother Amfred, is held hostage in hope that his prayers will absolve them of their curse, but their recurrent fits of rage suggest that it is far from done.
8 Sinking village. A small village, abandoned for years, sinking into the swamp. Five ragged women (2HD, bows 1d6, spears 1d8) are resting among the houses, while tracking down a knight golem than killed their husbands to visit their revenge.
9 Abandoned fishing village. Rotting shacks, slowly falling into the gray ocean. Torn nets like spider web between the houses, over a ground yellow with fish bones. In the decrepit houses 4d6 silver-haired children live, soldiers from the Witch King's army (as 1/2HD wolves). Monstrous from war they move like a pack of dogs, raiding and killing whatever they find for food.
10 A sentry. A thin figure, wearing a badly damaged suit of armor (3HD, maille+helm, rusted scimitar: 1d8, fast, demon: 2 actions). Its head is covered by maille and an iron helm, but the silhouette seems too featureless for a human. When it spots the PCs, it lifts a bronze horn in signal, but no sound emerges. All PCs must make a magic save; on a miss their head rings with haunting trumpet blasts as soon as no other sound is heard, making perception checks HARD and making good sleep impossible.
11 Howling soldiers. A pack of howling soldiers (2d6, 4HD, wrought iron over pale flesh, black maces 1d8 + concussion, size +1d4).
12 Knight golem. A rusting knight golem (8HD, plate+helm, giant scimitar: 1d12+bleeding: 1 fatigue/round, demonic: double actions). It moves on all four with animal grace, and reacts to human presence with predatory instincts. Killing it produces a strong blast (1d8, reach 5) but anyone who survives it gains +1d4 SPI. Within it is a thick golden ring (+2 to climbing and jumping checks), that fuels it through some sorcery.

20 forest locations

Untamed wilderness is a staple in many campaigns, yet it is seldom present in encounters or hex keys. This became a problem in my home campaign, where the PCs kept running into people or things constructed by people an awful lot for being alone in the wilderness. So here are 20 locations that are just wilderness: no dead adventurers, no overgrown ruins, no elfin hunting parties - just things that could presumably be there regardless of civilization.

1. A suffocating blanket of spider web covers the land, with only the tallest firs piercing through it. Sounds become muffled and light dim, as countless broken threads fill the air.
2. Elk cemetery. The remains of a hundred elks that have come to die here, remarkably intact as if unmolested by scavengers
3. Hunting ground. Mangled remains of deer and beavers hang from the forking branches of old trees, their stench attracting flies and wasps in the millions.
4. A small pond, only a few feet across, where a large toad is being eaten alive by tadpoles.
5. The forest is silent here, and dead birds litter the ground.
6. For as far as the eye can see all trees stand dead, with lichens like cerements covering their gaunt frames.
7. A wild-fire must have raged here, for the pale birches are charred and broken and the damp ground black with soot. When the wind blows, burnt branches fall in clouds of ash silent save for the muffled thud at impact.
8. A large boulder lies fallen from the skies in the bog. Migrating birds flock around it; incapable of leaving its magnetism, they cackle in fear and confusion or turn to cannibalism as they starve.
9. Under the roots of this old alder lies countless broken skulls, as if the tree grew out of them.
10. Tumorous mushrooms cover the aspens here, draining their life. The air is thick with spores.
11. A dead Auroch. Birds are eating it clear to the bone, but the head remains intact and strangely life-like.
12. A giant wolf lies dead by a pond, apparently drowned. Banded leeches crawl over its body in a futile search for blood.
13. A dying elk lies by a wind-fell. Attacked and abandoned by a predator that took its hind-leg, it brays to its kin in panicked confusion.
14. The alder-trees are crawling with pale larvae that eat their leaves and spin silky cocoons from the naked branches.
15. Black vortices of swarming insects rise and fall over the bog. Anything yellow will attract thousands of them, laying eggs and stinging indiscriminately.
16. The trees stand skeletal under black cormorant nests on a ground made sterile by their droppings.
17. A sinewy vine is piercing the old trees here, slowly toppling them with its strangling grasp.
18. The corpse of a great wyrm, more than twenty paces long. Dead for long, its inherent toxicity have prevented it from being eaten and left it in a half-mummified state.
19. Animal mass-grave. In a crevice lies the bones of countless hares, squirrels and other small animals. All bones are split and the marrow removed, but there is no sign of tools.
20. The hundred-man oak. A gnarled tree, tall as a hundred men. A wyvern (HD7, L, bite 1d10+poison) lives among its branches, poisoning the proud tree with its saliva. Anyone touching the tree must save or be beset by hopelessness causing them to always act last.

10 weather features for wilderness encounters

As mentioned earlier, I've been trying to come up with simple setups and situational rules that make random wilderness encounters more tactically interesting without turning them into elaborate set-pieces. Turns out, the always-excellent Emmy Allen had included several in her Narrative Wargame of Chivalric Medieval Romance. Still, many of these ideas were not mechanically explicit, or included things that are hard to recreate in a game with several players and one referee. So I re-wrote the list to make it more mechanically specific. I've used ICRPG notation, so to use it with another system consider hard/easy to be disadvantage/advantage or bonus/penalty, and target to mean AC/DC/TN or any other number that you need to meet or beat to succeed with your action if you use roll-over, or a number to be added to your die roll if you play roll-under.

Also, if you're new to the series, by "board" I refer to any physical surface or visual aid used to frame and represent the spatial relations of the fictional location where an encounter or similar takes place: grid, battle mat, tabletop, graph paper map, wilderness tile, Legos, chessboard...

source: Aths-Art

Random Weather Conditions (adapted from Dolorous Stroke)

Roll 1d12 (or 1d20, depending on how frequent you want weather conditions to be.)
1. Sunrise. In the raking light of the rising sun, normal actions relying on sight are HARD for characters facing East, but deciphering petroglyphs, magical writing and seeing the invisible is EASY.

2. Sunset. Every other round, target increases by +1 (max +5) as darkness decends.

3. Clearing heavens. Every other round, target is reduced by -1 (min -3) as sun breaks through the overcast skies.

4. Searing heat. Physical actions are HARD for all characters wearing heavy armor (plate, or +5 or more ARMOR).

5. Gale. Perception checks, ranged weapon use is HARD, and orders don't carry far in the wind.

6. Blasting Winds. On a 1d4 timer, all actions become HARD for a round, and any exposed and weak terrain feature has a 1-in-6 chance of falling down.

7. Lightning storm. Divide the board in 6 sectors. On a 1d4 timer lightning strikes, hitting the most standout target in a randomly determined sector for 1d12 damage and automatic knockdown. Factors that make a target stand out:
i. elevation,
ii. height relative to neighboring elements (a Large model near Medium models, a Small near no-one),
iii. metal worn
iv. height
If no-one stands out (for example if everyone throw themselves to the ground), decide at random.

8. Lashing rain. The rain makes the ground slippery and visibility poor. Dexterity, perception and ranged weapon use is HARD.

9. Fog. Line of sight is reduced to 6 squares; beyond that it is impossible to discern friend from foe or even characters from objects. Models and terrain are deployed as markers that are only revealed when a PC is within this range and hidden again once out of range. All markers (including those representing unrevealed terrain) move at a speed of 2 squares during the referee's turn.

10. Biting cold. Fumbles occur on both 1 and 2.

11+. Perfect conditions.

1d8 more wilderness encounter locations

For the first set, see here

Roll 1d8
1. Scarp: A steep but low cliff runs across the board. HARD to climb.

2. Abri: A steep but low cliff runs across the board - half of the distance contains a shallow rock shelter. Character under the abri are hidden to all characters above them but easily cornered by other enemies. The cliff is HARD to climb.

3. Giant's kettles: The bedrock surface is here perforated by 2d4 deep, circular holes.

4. Stormthrows: Dead trees lie scattered here, uprooted and broken by storms or the rage of some unknown Giant.

5. Krum-woods: Battered by relentless winds or beset by some curse, the trees here cower behind each other in uneven lines, bent and swollen like rheumatic pilgrims.

6. Stunted forest: The trees here appear old yet curiously small, as if they sprouted directly to senescence. The vegetation blocks line of sight but only to small or crawling characters.

7. Mound: A large circular mound in the middle of the board. Blocks line of sight, and movement is reduced when going uphill.

8. Forking stream: An icy stream or deep ditch runs across the board, forking at the middle. Jumping across is easy, but on a failed roll the character lands off balance and must forfeit the rest of their movement.

1d8 Random encounter locations

Most of these setups are based on locations in Judarskogen, outside Stockholm

I really like Runehammer's videos on room design. The idea of that series is to present a "room", basically a game board or grid's worth of level design, and highlight why it was set up like it was. This makes a lot of sense if you want to play with minis. Setting up a "room" or board takes more time than not doing it and includes carrying and buying extra stuff. So for it to be worthwhile, it must logically add more gameplay than overhead. Therefore, the craft of setting up a board becomes a key GM tool.

That said, there doesn't seem to be much discussion on this topic outside the aforementioned Youtube channel. Maybe this is because most people don't care about grids, or are happy just crafting cool terrain and don't mind just placing it as scatter. But probably, it is also that people who are good at it make set up their boards so instinctively that they no longer think of it as a skill. But for people who - like me - don't fall into any of the above categories, this is an attempt to continue the discussion.

Where does the encounter play out?

Playing on a grid lets you design encounters with a lot of interesting tactical options, with placement, movement, cover, half-hidden details, &c. But since players are free to go where they want and do what they please, most encounters cannot be planned in any great detail. This can create a weird discrepancy between the elaborate set pieces and improvised or random encounters that have very little detail.

As a remedy, I offer 8 dirt-simple setups that adds a twist to your random wilderness encounters.

The PCs start at one edge of the board, the monsters at another. The winner of the first initiative or surprise check decides who starts where, but each side places its own models.

1d8 random encounter locations
Slippery slope: With every move, a character must also move one sq downhill (two if dashing). Moving uphill requires a DEX roll, on a miss the character must use both hands to hold on: attacks against her are EASY.

Thickets: the path runs like an S between thickets. The thickets block line of sight and are so dense that riding or dashing is impossible, and using long weapons &c is HARD.

Criss-crossing paths: several patches of dense forest vegetation. These copses block line of sight from the outside but not for characters looking out from them.

Dark pond: a small but deep pond in the center of the board, just wide enough to be impossible to jump over.

Erratic Rocks: a field of large moss-covered boulders. The boulders are tall enough that it takes a STR roll to climb and DEX roll to avoid damage if falling, and stand close enough to allow jumping between them.

Moraine wall: uneven rocks form a natural wall across the board . DEX to cross.

Ford: A rapid river downstream a ford, running diagonally across the board. Crossing the river outside the ford requires a STR test, on a failure the character is swept downstream to the pond at the far end of the board.

Leading lines: three pairs of statues stand by the edges of a bog. Each pair indicate a leading line where passage is safe and unhindered; a character stepping more than one square out of the line is stuck and must roll STR to get out (EASY with aid, HARD otherwise).

1d10 bridges

Another set of hidden kingdom-style encounters.

BRIDGES
The path you travel gradually widens to a road, overgrown with weed and rarely used but paved with the rectangular stones of a distant empire. Still, the old bridge surprises you - so stark is the contrast between this landmark and the surrounding wilderness it defiantly rises over. Built by unknown masters it appears at first to have withstood time's wear remarkably well. But as you look closer, an ominous feeling grips you.

If the tower is approached, roll 1d10:

1. The ground has sunk or the river risen, for this low stone bridge is currently two feet below the slow, clear water. In the surrounding reed lives an ancient pike of astonishing proportions. The pike (HD 3, dmg 1d6) lunges out of the water to snatch and drown its prey. Its belly is full of half-digested equipment, including a golden ring of growth (+1 CON, bearer must save or begin to grow).

2. Fallen trees and other debris has piled up against this sturdy bridge, turning it into a dam of sorts. The overflowing water forms a roaring cascade that makes passage perilous.

3. Hundreds of crows have gathered on this bridge, forming a heaving mass of deafening noise and black feathers. Like the lazy pidgeons of a city, they move only reluctantly for passers by.

4. On the far side of this bridge, a knight sits atop his horse still as if sleeping. As soon as anyone sets foot on the bridge he stirs, lowering his lance to charge.

Enchanted Knight: HD 4, Lance (dmg 1d10), Shield (+3) and Sword (dmg 1d8).

5. Scattered across this bridge are the planks, tarps and ropes of a broken cart. Throning on this debris, a golden chalice gleams - curiously clean and standing proudly on its foot.
Hidden under the debris is a great snare, set by a bloated troll that lives under the bridge and used for pulling anyone approaching the chalice into the river below to be suffocated and eaten.

Fishing Troll: Large, HD 2, fillet knife (dmg 1d6, bleeding +1). The fishing troll rerolls HP each round.

6. A section of this bridge is missing, but it appears someone is working on its repair for tools and sawdust litter the bridge and a system of ropes and pulleys secures a gangway hanging suspended over the hole. The gangway is damp and worn and easily rocked, but the sturdy wood supports the weight of a horse.
Four outlaws (HD 1) hide nearby, ready to cut the rope that suspend the gangway and plunder the corpses. At the bottom of the river is 1d10 gold crowns that the outlaws have failed to salvage.

7. At each head of this long bridge is a tower, where a black portcullis blocks passage. An intricate construction allows the them to be lifted one at a time, but only from the opposite bridgehead.
In the far tower rests a raid of harpies, anxious to not let anyone near their plunder. In 1d6 days, they will be gone.

Homebound Harpies: HD 2, flying.

8. A crone has set up shop on this bridge, selling salves and potions and remedies for broken hearts. She is friendly and knowledgeable, but acceppts only the barrowmen's coins.

9. Time has withered down this bridge to the point where it is little more than a moss-covered arc over the busy brook far below. Three ropes dangle from its crest, old but with nooses still intact.

Downstream, the remains of three women can be found along with a silver amulet of the Old Faith (+1 WIS, wear the skin of an animal to learn its tongue). A skinless beast (HD 3) will begin hunting the bearer in 1d6 nights unless the remains are properly buried. However, with a christian burial the amulet's magic wanes after one use.

10. In the middle of the bridge is an enormous ogre, clad in iron and maille it reclines on a heap of plunder and appears to be napping. A large dog rests by its side. Tethered to a large iron pot and a split-open heaume, it produces a terrible noise that will wake the giant if it moves.

Hrud, the half-giant: Giant, HD 6, AC +8 (wrought iron), stone sword (dmg 1d14).
Millud, the hound: HD2, AC +2 (fur), dmg 1d6.