
Archives of Nethys

Archives of Nethys

Pathfinder RPG (1st Edition) Pathfinder RPG (2nd Edition) Starfinder RPG

Rules Index | GM Screen | Player's Guide
Chapter 1: Gamemastery Basics / Running Encounters

Maps and Miniatures

Source Gamemastery Guide pg. 13
A grid and miniatures can make it easier to visualize combat for players and give a visual centerpiece for the players to focus on. Some advice for drawing maps appears on pages 52–53. A setup can range from a basic grid with some hasty marker lines and coins for miniatures to a full-color Flip- Mat with official prepainted minis or cardboard pawns, all the way to a set of 3-D dungeon terrain and hand-painted minis for each character. Many online tabletops have preset maps, token packs, and built-in functions for movement and line of sight. All these are fun to play on! Your setup should match your time commitment, budget, and the aesthetics you want.

You can also bring the setting alive by describing sensory details like sounds, smells, temperature, and 3-D elements that aren’t represented on your map. Including the echoing ring of a sword striking a shield, an errant ray of frost freezing solid an apple in a bowl of fruit on the table, and the like makes the game feel more alive.

Placing miniatures on a grid can make it feel like you need to be exacting with the rules, but there’s still room for improvisation! You might give another 5 feet of movement to someone running downhill if it will make their turn more dramatic. You’re empowered to give players minor boosts that fit the story you want to tell, and to fill in nuances of the location beyond the elements covered in the Core Rulebook.

Variant Rules on the Grid

These two variants can change up how distance and movement work in your game.

Uniform Diagonals

If you like, your group can count all diagonals as 5 feet instead of counting every other diagonal as 10 feet. This speeds up play, but some people find it breaks their suspension of disbelief. This is most noticeable when someone moves a long distance along a diagonal all at once or when characters start moving diagonally as much as possible to cover more distance. Using this variant requires thinking of the game map in more abstract terms, and less like a real physical environment where the map is accurately reflecting the size of the room or encounter area. You can choose whether you measure radius-based areas of spells in the same way or visualize them as circles or other round shapes. The latter works best if you have templates to use.

Hex Grids

Some of the challenges of diagonal movement can be fixed by using a hex grid instead of a square grid, or by using a grid with offset squares, which works similarly. This allows you to count movement the same in all directions. However, it makes flanking a bit harder to pull off, requires you to arrange standard Large and larger miniatures differently, and causes challenges when drawing maps that consist primarily of rectangular structures, since you’ll have a lot of partially occupied hexes.

Cover

Source Gamemastery Guide pg. 13
You determine whether a character has cover. The rules for drawing lines found in the Core Rulebook are useful in simple cases, but in more complicated situations, use your own discretion to make the call. Consider the details of the environment and 3-D space beyond what’s on the battle mat. For instance, hanging banners might give cover, or a PC who has climbed onto a ledge might have a clear shot at an enemy standing behind a short wall. Be generous to PCs who use creativity to get into smart positions, especially if they spend valuable actions to move or Take Cover.

Splitting and Combining Movement

Source Gamemastery Guide pg. 14
The different types of actions representing movement are split up for convenience of understanding how the rules work with a creature’s actions. However, you can end up in odd situations, such as when a creature wants to jump vertically to get something and needs to move just a bit to get in range, then Leap, then continue moving. This can end up feeling like they’re losing a lot of their movement to make this happen. At your discretion, you can allow the PCs to essentially combine these into one fluid movement as a 2-action activity: moving into range for a Leap, then Leaping, then using the rest of their Speed.

This typically works only for chaining types of movement together. Doing something like Interacting to open a door or making a Strike usually arrests movement long enough that doing so in the middle of movement isn’t practical.

Going Gridless

Source Gamemastery Guide pg. 14
As described on page 494 of the Core Rulebook, you can play encounters without a grid. This is best for groups who can easily imagine their surroundings without a visual aid, and for battles that don’t require understanding a complex physical space. Your game doesn’t have to be entirely on or entirely off maps—you might decide to play out most simple fights without a grid, then use one for highly tactical fights or major set pieces. As noted in the Core Rulebook, the 3-action structure is your best friend. You might find yourself answering a lot of questions about actions and space, like “Can I get there this turn,” or “How many of the gnolls can I catch in a fireball?” If you find yourself needing to repeatedly remind players of the physical features of the environment or enemy positioning, that might mean you’re making your encounters too tactical for what a gridless game supports. This style works better to encourage imaginative, cinematic action and quick play without getting too hung up on details.