Mapping my Friend's Dungeon World campaign
Hey, I've been mapping my friend's Dungeon World campaign setting as we play, creating towns as we visit them and then adding the keys to the maps as we make up locations on the fly.
This is my first time mapping cities with CC3, so here's what I've done so far:
The World Map:
This is the world, called Andren. Our DM hasn't decided if this is just a small part of a much larger world or not - given that we're playing Dungeon World, you just kinda start with one small town and expand out as you play. You'll notice many areas of the map have no detail at all, that's because we haven't gone there, so it won't flesh out until we do that.
The city of Brekford:
This is the first larger settlement we've visited, a thieves' den of a town perched upon the river. I've tried to give it a load of small alleyways and side passages between buildings, a thief's highway of planks and tracks across rooftops. It could probably do with more clutter to fill in some of the blank areas. This is my first city made with CD3, so it's been a learning experience of building out my sheets. I've attached the FCW file if you want to have a look at the map and what sheets and effects I am using.
Any tips for finalising this city would be appreciated!
This is my first time mapping cities with CC3, so here's what I've done so far:
The World Map:
This is the world, called Andren. Our DM hasn't decided if this is just a small part of a much larger world or not - given that we're playing Dungeon World, you just kinda start with one small town and expand out as you play. You'll notice many areas of the map have no detail at all, that's because we haven't gone there, so it won't flesh out until we do that.
The city of Brekford:
This is the first larger settlement we've visited, a thieves' den of a town perched upon the river. I've tried to give it a load of small alleyways and side passages between buildings, a thief's highway of planks and tracks across rooftops. It could probably do with more clutter to fill in some of the blank areas. This is my first city made with CD3, so it's been a learning experience of building out my sheets. I've attached the FCW file if you want to have a look at the map and what sheets and effects I am using.
Any tips for finalising this city would be appreciated!
Comments
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I took the liberty of editing your post and changing the displayed size of your images, they were difficult to view at a normal computer screen at that scale. Please try to stay within the 1024px width outlined in the forum guidelines, and provide a link to higher-resolution images instead if desired.
May I make a suggestion?
Some of the text is a little difficult to read with that drop shadow effect on it. Perhaps a Glow Effect (outer) might make it a bit easier to read?
Other than that, really quite impressive
Honestly, the only thing I can think of off the top of my head is that, for a thieves' den, it sure looks pretty clean. Maybe add a new sheet for "FILTH" or something, and then add some splashes of additional "terrain" textures. Add a transparency effect and a good edge fade, inner effect to the sheet to help it blend in. If you have DD3, even better. DD3 has textures that include patches of transparency on them that helps them look "splotchy." The textures kind of look like cow hides when you look at their thumbnails. They have a "T" at the end (for "transparency," I presume).
Otherwise, this is a nice, small, crowded settlement and a great first outing with CD3. I forgot to mention the nice use of the custom house tool to make some of the buildings odd shapes to fit their locations. Thanks for sharing.
Cheers,
~Dogtag
@Sue - yeah, i've been thinking about the drop shadow - I've been slowly making new text sheets and removing it from some parts of it. I'll try swapping to an outline and see what it's like.
@Dogtag - I have DD3, I've never actually used those tiles. Thought the white was supposed to be snow or something! :S Sounds like it will be really useful! I'll have a go at making it more filthy and see what it's like. The font is a very old one (think it was made in 2001) called Middle Ages, link: Middle Ages
Okay, so here we have the updated maps:
The Region/World of Andren:
Brekford:
I use a 3-screen setup myself, but when at work I only have full-HD displays (Which is what most people have) and your images was difficult to view properly, because the browser doesn't shrink an image embedded in a web site like it would do if viewing the image directly. My monitors at home is a bit better, so everything looks smaller there, but you would still like your images to be viewed properly by most people, not just me
I noticed that you had deleted the original images, making your first post link some rather ugly "black boxes". You should probably edit your first post and replace the bad links.
I like your city btw, you've managed to nicely illustrate the cramped conditions inside the wall. The trees inside the wall look a little out of place though, considering space is such a premium, why haven't anyone built there?
LLAP
Nacon4
On the other side of the map the river that starts at Mt. Atron looks like it's flowing uphill toward the mountainous area where Untergrad is. Basically with the way that river flows, everything up to the point where it meets the other river "South" of Brekford has to be lower than everything to the North, which means The Feywood area where the river flows through must be at really high elevation, and past that you've got a very rapid drop from into the coastline. The rivers flowing to The Vilemoor and Verminwood just terminate there again, instead of flowing onward toward the sea.
Sorry
The main river flows from Mt Atron to Andoc, where it's joined by a tributary stream flowing in from the walled town northeast of Rilion. The river carries on, dropping over an escarpment, then past Brekford, where it's joined by a second tributary stream flowing out of the Ethrin Vale (the junction point might bear a small degree of adjustment here, perhaps). Beyond that, the river heads into a deep gorge, then round or beneath the volcano in Untergrad, before emptying into the lake in the Vilemoor.
Alternatively, the northern flow pattern might be the same, but the southern flows could be different. The Ethrin Vale stream and the river from the north side of the Untergrad volcano might actually flow towards Brekford and the escarpment, so what seems to be merely a waterfall there might actually be a huge sinkhole into which both the north- and south-flowing rivers pour. A separate stream would then flow from the southern flanks of the Untergrad volcano into the Vilemoor lake.
Really lovely couple of maps whatever the case. I especially like the "crowded medieval" feel to Brekford. And glad to know you'd also taken the plunge and tried out those DD3 "snow" textures too, Eoneill!
Only things to add might be a scale and a compass indicator?
I like the city map, I just wonder about the scale. The Hobbled Jester looks really large in comparison to the other buildings, but I suppose that's probably going for the old inn and tavern with a lot of people staying there. Adding some sort of scale would definitely help provide a sense of how big the city and various buildings are. Not exactly map related, but the Alchemist's Shop (or should that be Shoppe?) could probably benefit from a more creative name ("Bubbling Beaker", "Potion's Galore", etc).