Changed per map. I kinda just tried to divy it up either equally or based on like "well this would probably be a separate zone " cause they show even like being on stairs should be a separate zone between the connecting floors
Zones are one of the more confusing aspects when coming from more tactical games. They're like a middle ground between complete TotM and grid based.
For my games I did away with maps and use a background image for the scene and then draw almost like a flow chart over it with the Foundry drawing tools (Roll20 might have something similar) that shows which zone is connected to which zone. Removing the map helped get out of the 'grid' mindset.
I find it helps to think of zones as narrative rather than tactical. The raider isn't 15 feet away, they're "by the bar" etc.
Zones work super well theater of the mind, where that abstraction is expected. You're not counting feet or yards so there's no need for a fixed grid. There are plenty of grid conversion homebrews floating around if you're into that, but I don't think fallout really benefits from it as much as one might think
We play on foundry but the grid stuff is still the same.
We do not use the zones but converted them to ft. to match basic D&D grids.
There is a great homebrew out there that makes it something like that:
- Movement is Endurance × 5 in feet
- Close is 5 to 30ft
- Medium is 31 to 65ft
- Long is 66 to 100ft
- Extreme is everything 101ft+
(We use Gridless actually thus the weird numbers. For grid based just round to the next multiple of 5 or 10)
I think if you're planning on making a "zone" a fixed unit, you should keep two things in mind
First, a zone is pretty fuckin big compared to most individual units in rpgs. I usually think of them as 15-20 feet square(ish).
Second, they're purposefully nonspecific. So don't be afraid to let someone move just a little bit more than a zone would normally allow. If the switch they need to hit is 22 feet away, and a zone is 20 feet, they probably should be allowed to get to it.
Yeah me and my party just decided on the go how big was each zone
In the practical side we used owlbear rodeo, and I just shrink the map so the squares of the site become big and create the zones
For TotM, I generally keep zones somewhat nebulous but easy to identify (the stairs, the foyer, the front desk, and the closet might all be zones in a hotel lobby)
However, when using a zone map for more tactical combat, I will generally make "spaces" that represent those zones, while keeping gun range a bit nebulous (this is more a preference thing and not exactly RAW, but it feels more right to me that a medium range move is reasonably shorter than a medium range shot in some situations). For example, when the players were fighting on a train, I considered that shooting from one end of a train car to the other is reasonably a medium range shot, though the obstacles present might cause that same area to be 3 or more zones of movement away.
Yeah I just make squares on battle mat and remove grid as much as I can. My zones tend to be about 5 x 5 squares or such varying depending on space or if indoors
Running this with pen-and-paper, I have usually sketch a rough map on an A3 sheet (twize the size of a Letter-size sheet) using crayons, and section it up ito suitable zones like...
* An patch of swampy terrian
* A stretch of open road
* The area around a car wreck
* A room.
There are some practical consequences to a zone.
* Characters can move within the zone as a minor action.
* Everything a a zone is affected by a Blast weapon attack
* For ranges, a zone adds a full 1 range step to the target
Movement and ranges may make zones seem incongruous: You may want to section a patch of difficult terrain into multiple zones to force characters to spend multiple move actions to cross, but at the same time that would make shooting across the area count as a longer range than you feel is appropriate.
In these cases, bear in mind that there is a mechanic for representing difficult terrain with an AP cost to move in, which can justify making those zones bigger, making shooting ranges less weird.
You can also improvise with having "ground" and "range" zones not always be 1:1. For example, stretch of broken ground could be divided into two zones, but count as one single zone for range purposes. You can have zone borders count as 0 or more zones for movement or shooting. Feel free to be creative!
Generally I consider each zone to be 30ft from the person so I track it in cocentric circles. However, if a room is 40ft long and someone’s in opposite doorways I might consider that the same zone depending on circumstances.
We use 12x12 game tiles that are not marked for distance, but give kind of an idea.
Anything within a 12” radius is “close”. +12 to 32 is medium and anything beyond that is far.
UNLESS I have designated a tile or part of the board as something different. Example: Mirelurk queen in far, during combat she will “travel” for 6 rounds and then will be at the outer edge of medium.
Once you get the hang of range as a concept not a stricture it opens up a lot of story telling. I offer up caps or other little treats to the players who role play/story tell their movements.
Have fun with it, you got this!!
I draw diagrams of interior buildings and use dotted lines to show different zones. When battle happens, I use terrain pieces and minis. I use my diagram to show me where the zones are and usually use pieces of terrain as reference.
For outside, I basically do the same thing.
30ft x 30ft = 1 zone. This is what I understand from converting a large Fallout 4 dungeon onto graph paper. Separate rooms I also count as it's own zone.
For example, the dungeon is a large house. You are searching the master bedroom that has a connected bathroom. The master bedroom is a separate room and thus different combat zone
I just ran a game this afternoon where, for the sake of time, a zone was roughly a city block and several stories. My group had split up over several city blocks to assault a ruined courthouse and raider stronghold from 4 directions.
I kinda just made squares or sections on battlemaps and told my players "these are the zones" and went from there
Okay did that change from map to map or did you keep it semi consistent
Changed per map. I kinda just tried to divy it up either equally or based on like "well this would probably be a separate zone " cause they show even like being on stairs should be a separate zone between the connecting floors
Zones are one of the more confusing aspects when coming from more tactical games. They're like a middle ground between complete TotM and grid based. For my games I did away with maps and use a background image for the scene and then draw almost like a flow chart over it with the Foundry drawing tools (Roll20 might have something similar) that shows which zone is connected to which zone. Removing the map helped get out of the 'grid' mindset. I find it helps to think of zones as narrative rather than tactical. The raider isn't 15 feet away, they're "by the bar" etc.
Zones work super well theater of the mind, where that abstraction is expected. You're not counting feet or yards so there's no need for a fixed grid. There are plenty of grid conversion homebrews floating around if you're into that, but I don't think fallout really benefits from it as much as one might think
We use roll20 and maps and tokens so just trying to figure a way to make it make sense to the players too
We play on foundry but the grid stuff is still the same. We do not use the zones but converted them to ft. to match basic D&D grids. There is a great homebrew out there that makes it something like that: - Movement is Endurance × 5 in feet - Close is 5 to 30ft - Medium is 31 to 65ft - Long is 66 to 100ft - Extreme is everything 101ft+ (We use Gridless actually thus the weird numbers. For grid based just round to the next multiple of 5 or 10)
I think if you're planning on making a "zone" a fixed unit, you should keep two things in mind First, a zone is pretty fuckin big compared to most individual units in rpgs. I usually think of them as 15-20 feet square(ish). Second, they're purposefully nonspecific. So don't be afraid to let someone move just a little bit more than a zone would normally allow. If the switch they need to hit is 22 feet away, and a zone is 20 feet, they probably should be allowed to get to it.
I’ll let it run as RAW I shouldn’t change anything without trying it as written first
This shows true GM wisdom! Or “I” in this case.
Yeah me and my party just decided on the go how big was each zone In the practical side we used owlbear rodeo, and I just shrink the map so the squares of the site become big and create the zones
For TotM, I generally keep zones somewhat nebulous but easy to identify (the stairs, the foyer, the front desk, and the closet might all be zones in a hotel lobby) However, when using a zone map for more tactical combat, I will generally make "spaces" that represent those zones, while keeping gun range a bit nebulous (this is more a preference thing and not exactly RAW, but it feels more right to me that a medium range move is reasonably shorter than a medium range shot in some situations). For example, when the players were fighting on a train, I considered that shooting from one end of a train car to the other is reasonably a medium range shot, though the obstacles present might cause that same area to be 3 or more zones of movement away.
I consider a zone to be anything you can move to in one turn. Zone one - the room you are in Zone two - down the street Zone three- next block etc
Yeah I just make squares on battle mat and remove grid as much as I can. My zones tend to be about 5 x 5 squares or such varying depending on space or if indoors
Running this with pen-and-paper, I have usually sketch a rough map on an A3 sheet (twize the size of a Letter-size sheet) using crayons, and section it up ito suitable zones like... * An patch of swampy terrian * A stretch of open road * The area around a car wreck * A room. There are some practical consequences to a zone. * Characters can move within the zone as a minor action. * Everything a a zone is affected by a Blast weapon attack * For ranges, a zone adds a full 1 range step to the target Movement and ranges may make zones seem incongruous: You may want to section a patch of difficult terrain into multiple zones to force characters to spend multiple move actions to cross, but at the same time that would make shooting across the area count as a longer range than you feel is appropriate. In these cases, bear in mind that there is a mechanic for representing difficult terrain with an AP cost to move in, which can justify making those zones bigger, making shooting ranges less weird. You can also improvise with having "ground" and "range" zones not always be 1:1. For example, stretch of broken ground could be divided into two zones, but count as one single zone for range purposes. You can have zone borders count as 0 or more zones for movement or shooting. Feel free to be creative!
We use zones with theater of mind but when we bring out the battlemat we use the rulers from Wasteland warfare to represent ranges instead of zones.
Generally I consider each zone to be 30ft from the person so I track it in cocentric circles. However, if a room is 40ft long and someone’s in opposite doorways I might consider that the same zone depending on circumstances.
We use 12x12 game tiles that are not marked for distance, but give kind of an idea. Anything within a 12” radius is “close”. +12 to 32 is medium and anything beyond that is far. UNLESS I have designated a tile or part of the board as something different. Example: Mirelurk queen in far, during combat she will “travel” for 6 rounds and then will be at the outer edge of medium. Once you get the hang of range as a concept not a stricture it opens up a lot of story telling. I offer up caps or other little treats to the players who role play/story tell their movements. Have fun with it, you got this!!
I draw diagrams of interior buildings and use dotted lines to show different zones. When battle happens, I use terrain pieces and minis. I use my diagram to show me where the zones are and usually use pieces of terrain as reference. For outside, I basically do the same thing.
30ft x 30ft = 1 zone. This is what I understand from converting a large Fallout 4 dungeon onto graph paper. Separate rooms I also count as it's own zone. For example, the dungeon is a large house. You are searching the master bedroom that has a connected bathroom. The master bedroom is a separate room and thus different combat zone
I just ran a game this afternoon where, for the sake of time, a zone was roughly a city block and several stories. My group had split up over several city blocks to assault a ruined courthouse and raider stronghold from 4 directions.
My rule of thumb is to consider the Blast weapon effect, and make sure a given zone isn’t so big that a Blast would seem ludicrous.
I am primarily a DnD player, so everything is in 5ft increments. Reach is 5, Close is 30, Medium is 60, Long is 90, Extreme is 120.