WIP: New Dungeon Commission
jmabbott
🖼️ 34 images Mapmaker
Hi Folks,
It's been awhile. Here is a WIP of the 1st level of a 4 level dungeon.
Due to the quality of the scan I can't get the grids to line up properly after scaling the import, but it's good enough. Due to the irregular shapes, I decided to use a drawing tool to do the floors first, then I can go and trace the walls, copy the floor to the Wall Mask sheet and change the fill etc...Then add the symbols. This seems to be a reasonably efficient workflow. I'm about 2/3rds done with the floor. Over on the left will primarily use a fractal tool...
Comments
A good start. Too many square/rectangular rooms in dungeons out there.
Hi Ya Folks,
Working on multiple projects at the moment; this mapping commission, a TTRPG game using Chaosium's, Basic Roleplaying Universal Game Engine - a long title but this is the current ORC version (for those of you aware of such things) - got the layout more or less sorted in Affinity Publisher now and it's looking pretty good, as well as playing twice a week. Of course, I also have to try and fit in some work and family time... just not enough hours...
Anyhow here is an update. The major part of the walls are done, only the left hand side to do but that's mostly fractal, the walls for secret passages/rooms and of course the wall masks (with secret rooms going on the GM layer of course) including the ones I missed bottom right.
Hi Y'all,
Here is another update. Due to my CC3+ installation being on my work PC, I'm connecting via my home Mac running MS Remote Desktop and tonight, the lag for some reason is just not conducive to being productive...
Anyhow, fixed a couple of things which requires other bits to be re-done but overall I'm happy with the progress so far.
Hi Ya Folks,
Here is the current GM map showing the full dungeon. I believe I've created it in accordance with the provided shetch, i.e. got all the rooms & secret doors correct. This creates a problem however. On the player map, the bottom right side is completely blank and the central 3 sections are isolated, there is no way for the players to navigate between them without finding a secret door or two...so why should they be visible...
I've sent a copy of both to the client for advice...
The next level, while still a bit labyrinthine is soo much easier, basically all rooms are square or rectangular with the odd curved or triangular alcove - easy-peasy!
Hi Folks,
Here is a quick look at the last level...GM and player versions.
What has been others experience with accuracy scaling PDFs? All of these maps I get close but it's off enough so that a small area lines up with the grid almost perfectly, making tracing very easy and then it gradually turns to cow dung, and I have to do the best I can. This map was a nightmare...
Note: This is just the structure, I have to confirm floors and other objects...
Looking good so far, I like it when dungeons have oddly shaped rooms and zig-zaggy corridors and it's not just rectangular rooms and corridors with 90 degree angles. Much more interesting to look at and explore.
Copying maps from PDFs or image files is indeed a bit of a hassle. What I do is open the image with image editing software (I use GIMP but you can do this in Photoshop as well) and align it as best I can to a grid. This is the most finicky part and requires some scaling and rotating. Once I have it aligned I enable 'snap to grid' and crop the image to remove margins. Starting a new CC3 file I set the dimensions and grid to match the edited image and insert it on a separate layer and sheet. It doesn't always match perfectly but in that case I simply eyeball it, as long as it roughly matches it's good enough
Thanks Steven. Re this set of maps, you wouldn't want to fail too many Perception/Detect Traps rolls, they're insanely deadly...
I just scale in CC3+, for the next commission I'll try what you suggest in Affinity Photo and see if it makes a difference - I'm going to say where things go awry is in the scanning process - if they're not scanned perfectly straight and flat there will be issues - oh well the, hassles of being a cartographer for hire...😉