In wargame design you have four main types of maps. The type of map you choose depends on the setting and scale of your game. First up is hexes. Most common in classic wargames. Presents the maximum possible choice of movement (every unit can move in 6 different directions) while still being visually easy to parse. A square grid is similar but is used less often than hexes - squares only offer 4 directions not 6, unless you allow diagonal movement. But if you allow diagonal movement you have this weird effect where it's just as easy to cross the map diagonally as straight - geometrically it feels wrong. I would suggest hexes are essential for tactical level games where you need a consistent ground scale and maximum flexibility of movement. But if you use hexes be warned - most people will see it as a "serious" wargame so you are missing out on a lot of potential customers. Next is area movement. Each space on the map is an irregular polygon, of varying sizes and shapes. Typically these map onto political geography, e.g. in a strategic level game each country might be a single area space on the map. It can also be used to show terrain in a creative way, e.g. dense terrain means lots of areas packed together, while roads or rivers are long and thin, open fields are big rectangles, etc. These tend to look nicer than hexes and are often used for mass market sci-fi or fantasy wargames to avoid the serious hex look. They are probably best used at strategic level rather than tactical or operational - but can still work. If you go down the route of area movement it pays to have a good graphic designer, as the map will become an artistic centrepiece of the game. Have a look at War of the Ring. It's a game set in Tolkien's Middle Earth, so naturally you want a map of Middle Earth that looks like something from the books. Then you have point-to-point. This is my preferred map type, for 3 reasons. First, it is easier to make from a design point of view. You can layer a point-to-point grid over the top of a real world map quite easily, for example. Secondly, it's very clear and focuses the player's attention only on the key points, rather than having lots of "empty" map space that doesn't get used. Thirdly, it shows the spatial relationship between places in a way that actual military commanders (especially pre-modern) would have imagined them. The emphasis is on key points linked by a network of pathways. So basically cities and fortresses linked together by paths, roads or railways. Nodes and networks. Especially for logistical planning, this is military operations are often imagined. For this reason, I believe this is the best format for operational level games and is pretty good for strategic level as well. One more thing to point out - it is functionally identical to area movement, it just shows the connection between spaces more directly. You could translate an area movement map to a point-to-point map without losing any of the meaningful decisions for players. So, it's really an aesthetic choice. One of my favourite point-to-point maps is used in Virgin Queen - the graphic designer Mark Mahaffey said it is like "the world in the mind of Phillip II." Lastly, you could go for a totally abstract map. Like cards laid out in a line, or just no map at all. This can be fine if you're making a game where physical geography is not that important, e.g. cyber warfare. But I don't like abstract boards and I suspect a lot of other wargamers don't like them either. We like looking at maps. We like planning things out on maps. We like seeing units move across maps. If there's another layer of abstraction we have to imagine rather than see it becomes a lot harder to immerse yourself in the world of the game.