Ergon Game Map and Gaming Recap

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Recently my gaming group has had to change the venue of our sessions because I am getting several cats in the near future and have two players who are very, very allergic.  This is kind of a bummer for me, because I like gaming in my own house and have been building a very cumbersome modular dungeon to use in my games that I do no want to lug around from place to place.

So to resolve my immediate issues regarding having a more mobile gaming set-up, I invested in an Ergon Gaming Mat that I spotted on an ad from Amazon.  I have a Chessex game mat, the kind that folds up and takes all kind of punishment, but I was curious about what a more flexible silicone mat might be able to do.  In addition to having the normal grid on one side, it also had hexes on the other (which suited my constant dreams of running Champions again).  The mat showed the dry-erase marker clearly and could be rolled up, even squished with no signs of damage.  Using a dry paper towel didn't remove the marks, however, but left ghost images behind.  A wet towel, on the other hand, left the mat completely pristine.

Unlike the Chessex mat, you can't use permanent marker on the Ergon mat (but why would you, unless by accident).  On the plus side, with no creases or folds and the ability to unroll the mat as the group goes along, I think that this will become my travel mat of choice.

Speaking of the gaming session, the group continued their alliance with the coven of witches they discovered in the Whispering Elms Forest (an ethically murky decision given the coven's affiliation with local bugbear tribes) and managed to acquire a monster to replace the guard of the coven's previous layer, which they had slain in the last session.  At this point, the campaign is a bit of a crossroads in terms of direction.  Initially it had been a mega-dungeon crawl, but the group seems to be getting bored with that and may want to shift to more of an wilderness hexcrawl format.  Other players seem to be interested in doing more "worldbuilding" by getting involved in local politics, etc.  For my own sense of campaign design, I need to talk to the group about what they want to do, lest I end up preparing for one thing and watching them wander off in another direction.