The Truth About Maps

   Maps are a universal staple of tabletop role-playing games. Everybody loves maps. But I recently came to the realization that maps are, in fact, almost useless. And here’s why.

   For four years now, I have been running a First Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons campaign set in Greyhawk, 150 years before the Nyrond / Great Kingdom split. After fourteen game sessions and 9 different adventures, the player characters still don’t own a map of their region – and they don’t seem to need one. The ranger knows how to get from point A to point B most of the time, and even my own “DM’s map” is nothing more than a sketch made in 2015, onto which I keep adding details and numbers as the campaign progresses.

   One cannot even compare my lousy DM sketch to the gorgeous map of the Sword Coast people use when they run 5E. But honestly though, I don’t think I need much more than this little sketch. If the PCs ever leave the area and head for Rauxes, Irongate, or Greyhawk, I’ll just make another sketch, and continue the story.

   In The Lord of the Rings, the heroes don’t have maps – they have guides, which is much more reliable. Gandalf knows a shortcut to get from Rivendell to Lothlórien. Aragorn knows the way from Lothlórien to Edoras. Gollum knows how to get into Mordor without going through the Black Gate...

   “Hold your horses,” I can hear someone say. “Tabletop role-playing games stems from Tolkien and Robert E. Howard – and these books had maps!”

   Sure, I say. There’s no denying it: we are a visual generation. The Lord of the Rings have beautiful maps, but they’re meant for the reader. Aragorn himself don’t have these maps, and never will. What kind of mapping do people in a medieval world really have access to? Think about it. Drawing accurate maps is a hard thing. Even good old Italy is a misshapen blob on most medieval maps – and Italy is a rather straightforward peninsula! If they couldn’t even get Italy right, what about the rest?

   Even Florida (and that is after the end of the Middle Ages) is fucked up on some sixteenth-century maps. Florida is even simpler than Italy, and they still couldn’t get it right until 1820!

   If I ever provide my players with a map of Rel Mord and its surroundings, it’ll be full of hilarious mistakes and wildly inaccurate, believe me.

   And what about those beloved dungeon maps? As Dungeon Masters, do we really need such maps or could we possibly do without them? The Caves of Chaos, that is okay. The Tomb of Horrors, alright. But what about sprawling megadungeons like the Tekumel Underworld or the Underdark – who needs a complete and accurate map of that?

   In my First Edition AD&D game, I no longer map my dungeons. I build interesting rooms and passages – bottleneck locations where fighting is bound to occur, and that’s it. The only other thing I need is an intuitive chart of what that labyrinthine complex might look like. A “dungeon flowchart,” if you will.

   The Three-Tiered Room is a complete diorama, and so is the Obelisk Chamber. The Duergar Throne Room and the Shrine of No Spells both use the same basic terrain, only with different bits and accessories. The Duergar Maze and the Deep Lakes don’t have fixed, pre-assigned terrain. And all remaining areas can be described orally. I don’t need a map.

   “You went through eleven different rooms, nine of them smallish and all of them empty except for excessively thick dust and a few pieces of decayed furniture. No secret doors and no scattered bones anywhere.”

   “Can you map these rooms for us?”

   “You go right ahead and do it yourselves. The nine small rooms are more or less clustered around the two larger rooms, separated by various short passages.”

   Players 1 and 2 come up with two very different maps. Roll INT checks. “Maybe the cleric was a little muddled. There is a slight stench in the air; spores, maybe, or weird unseen fungi... Anyway, the thief appears to be right. His map is fairly accurate. Now, what do you want to do?”

   If the players should ever decide to lure the Duergars away from their Throne Room and ambush them in some corridor where they can take them two at a time, no problem. I can whip up any stretch of corridor with modular dungeon walls. “You made enough noise banging shields together for five minutes – the Duergars are coming. You already see five or six of them. Do you prefer a straight corridor, a T-shape, or one with a 90-degree angle?” The Duergar Maze sector certainly has at least one straight corridor, one T-shaped passage, and many 90-degree angles. I’ll build whatever I need. What I don’t need is a complete blueprint of that rather large maze.

   Again, maps are a universal staple of tabletop role-playing games, and that ain’t going to change anytime soon. Everybody loves maps – and that includes Yours Truly. Because a beautiful fantasy map is like a beautifully painted Tiamat or Orcus figure: it’s pretty nice to have, but you can run memorable games and campaigns without it.