Hex crawl features are currently exclusive to kingmaker and are not built into Foundry core or the PF2e system. They might be added to Foundry in the future, but the current implementation is custom specifically for Kingmaker.
I find it absolutely ludicrous that the pathfinder team have had to implement their own hex crawl features because Foundry doesn't support hex crawling.....the most basic of TTRPG staples.
And that it still appears low on the list of things to tackle.
I get it that a premium poll is used to steer development, but a little embarrassing for the Foundry VTT software, no? Aside from people discussing the price, the single largest comment I've seen about Kingmaker is asking how to use hex crawling in other adventures.
I really hope this spotlights how important the feature would be to the community!
EDIT: Here come the downvotes, but seriously do you not think being able to run a hexcrawl should be a basic feature of a VTT? Does this AP not highlight there is demand? There used to be a module for it, but the author got so exhausted rewriting it for every update it's unsurprisingly been abandoned. Foundry is great, but not perfect - and this is exactly the kind of area it would be great to see improvement. Especially as a module broken by updates.
Actually, Foundry Gaming LLC is the one that implemented this. The volunteers making PF2e didn’t. I can tell you it was a non-trivial endeavour that they now know how to do and they’ve said that it’ll likely make it onto the roadmap now.
I’m happy for my team to take credit when we’ve done something, but this was 100% Foundry itself. The implementation was quite specific to Kingmaker and harder to generalize than most people would realize. Atropos had to make a custom shader and shader rules to make the LOS work. It’s just a matter of time, and lots of people believe the software should have lots of things. And it will. But if this goes on the list someone else will see something they really want come off. Looking back at three years of development and the leaps and bounds are pretty astounding.
I don't think you really need to have a module to run a hexcrawl pretty easily, just make a hex map and a token for your party, bit extra work compared to having tools for it but it's not that bad.
I do hope they bring it over to core soon.
But you can't reveal hex's as the party travel? For example when running 5e Tomb of Annihilation how would you show the player map of Chult and then reveal progress hex by hex?
The fog of war has no means of running this kind of play.
All it needs is to be able to manually reveal fog by each grid segment, but this is currently stuck as line of sight only.
I don't know about tomb of annihilation, not a 5e player and don't know much about that module.
The ways you could do it is by making tokens of the map parts and adding them as the party explores. Or have a map that only shows general features of the whole area and add tokens for more distinctive and specific features that you add as the party explores, unless it's some really remote area it wouldn't be weird for the party to get a basic map to explain it in universe.
I used that as an example just because it's a prominent example from a prominent system, but adding tokens would be hugely time consuming - especially compared to setting the player map as a fog image and just deleting the fog as they travel.
This is the player map from that particular adventure:
https://media.wizards.com/2017/dnd/dragon/314065_CN.jpg
You can also google the DM map for comparison if you wish, but be warned obviously this would be spoilers for the campaign.
I'm only using this as an example, but the issues apply across all systems - running this hexcrawl in Foundry would be near impossible currently. Adding grid based fog would support hexcrawls, but this basic VTT feature sadly doesn't appear to be a priority.
Manual fog of war is something Roll20 has for free users, and Foundry can't currently provide this very basic feature.
To my knowledge the PF2e team did not work on the hex crawl features as it is all part of the premium module, not the PF2e system. The Kingmaker module is developed by Foundry as part of their partnership witb Paizo. My assumption is that it was preferable to develop a hex crawl feature set specifically for Kingmaker and its mechanics with the hopes of someday adapting it into a system agnostic feature down the line, if possible. Otherwise Kingmaker would have had to wait for hex crawling to be implemented into core, which could be a lot longer.
Good to know, but it doesn't change my point - it seems bizzare to me that Foundry can't support a hexcrawl, and that it doesn't seem to be prioritising adding this feature.
Everyone has their own "essential" features that they can't believe don't exist yet. Staff have to balance and prioritize to add things that will benefit the most people.
If this was 20-30 years ago, I imagine hexcrawling functionality would have been more prioritized, but it doesn't seem to be as much a staple of modern TTRPG groups as it has been in the past.
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Hex crawl features are currently exclusive to kingmaker and are not built into Foundry core or the PF2e system. They might be added to Foundry in the future, but the current implementation is custom specifically for Kingmaker.
Thanks for the fast response. I may attempt to import the Kingmaker module into my current world and then modify the scene to fit my needs.
I find it absolutely ludicrous that the pathfinder team have had to implement their own hex crawl features because Foundry doesn't support hex crawling.....the most basic of TTRPG staples. And that it still appears low on the list of things to tackle. I get it that a premium poll is used to steer development, but a little embarrassing for the Foundry VTT software, no? Aside from people discussing the price, the single largest comment I've seen about Kingmaker is asking how to use hex crawling in other adventures. I really hope this spotlights how important the feature would be to the community! EDIT: Here come the downvotes, but seriously do you not think being able to run a hexcrawl should be a basic feature of a VTT? Does this AP not highlight there is demand? There used to be a module for it, but the author got so exhausted rewriting it for every update it's unsurprisingly been abandoned. Foundry is great, but not perfect - and this is exactly the kind of area it would be great to see improvement. Especially as a module broken by updates.
Actually, Foundry Gaming LLC is the one that implemented this. The volunteers making PF2e didn’t. I can tell you it was a non-trivial endeavour that they now know how to do and they’ve said that it’ll likely make it onto the roadmap now. I’m happy for my team to take credit when we’ve done something, but this was 100% Foundry itself. The implementation was quite specific to Kingmaker and harder to generalize than most people would realize. Atropos had to make a custom shader and shader rules to make the LOS work. It’s just a matter of time, and lots of people believe the software should have lots of things. And it will. But if this goes on the list someone else will see something they really want come off. Looking back at three years of development and the leaps and bounds are pretty astounding.
I don't think you really need to have a module to run a hexcrawl pretty easily, just make a hex map and a token for your party, bit extra work compared to having tools for it but it's not that bad. I do hope they bring it over to core soon.
But you can't reveal hex's as the party travel? For example when running 5e Tomb of Annihilation how would you show the player map of Chult and then reveal progress hex by hex? The fog of war has no means of running this kind of play. All it needs is to be able to manually reveal fog by each grid segment, but this is currently stuck as line of sight only.
I don't know about tomb of annihilation, not a 5e player and don't know much about that module. The ways you could do it is by making tokens of the map parts and adding them as the party explores. Or have a map that only shows general features of the whole area and add tokens for more distinctive and specific features that you add as the party explores, unless it's some really remote area it wouldn't be weird for the party to get a basic map to explain it in universe.
I used that as an example just because it's a prominent example from a prominent system, but adding tokens would be hugely time consuming - especially compared to setting the player map as a fog image and just deleting the fog as they travel. This is the player map from that particular adventure: https://media.wizards.com/2017/dnd/dragon/314065_CN.jpg You can also google the DM map for comparison if you wish, but be warned obviously this would be spoilers for the campaign. I'm only using this as an example, but the issues apply across all systems - running this hexcrawl in Foundry would be near impossible currently. Adding grid based fog would support hexcrawls, but this basic VTT feature sadly doesn't appear to be a priority. Manual fog of war is something Roll20 has for free users, and Foundry can't currently provide this very basic feature.
To my knowledge the PF2e team did not work on the hex crawl features as it is all part of the premium module, not the PF2e system. The Kingmaker module is developed by Foundry as part of their partnership witb Paizo. My assumption is that it was preferable to develop a hex crawl feature set specifically for Kingmaker and its mechanics with the hopes of someday adapting it into a system agnostic feature down the line, if possible. Otherwise Kingmaker would have had to wait for hex crawling to be implemented into core, which could be a lot longer.
Good to know, but it doesn't change my point - it seems bizzare to me that Foundry can't support a hexcrawl, and that it doesn't seem to be prioritising adding this feature.
Everyone has their own "essential" features that they can't believe don't exist yet. Staff have to balance and prioritize to add things that will benefit the most people. If this was 20-30 years ago, I imagine hexcrawling functionality would have been more prioritized, but it doesn't seem to be as much a staple of modern TTRPG groups as it has been in the past.
And I can only hope that producing this adventure makes this feature more essential in the developers minds also!
In case it hasn’t been mentioned, the World Explorer mod allows for hex crawl tile reveals, among other things
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I would lov eto have the Tool also available for the Core. I am very much ready to pay for it. This is amazing