I started making battle maps by hand, pencil on large quad paper, in the early 1980's and they were well recieved. Life broke up that group and I didn't really get invovled with any new games for some time.

I had to look back into the online store to figure out I originally purchased CC3+ and add-ons in 2016 and dabbled with it on and off.

It wasn't until 202o that I joined this community and was inspired to become active. Getting a request from an old friend to run a DnD campaign on a virtual table top kicked things into high gear and I haven't looked back. This forum has helped immensely as have the tutorials and videos. I'm looking forward to retirement in a few years when I can really figure out how to use this software properly ;-)

Wyvern, thank you for the feedback, I took a closer look at the symbols and positioned them more appropriately...whilst making a few changes. I was focusing on Sue's feedback and aging the tables & chairs. Your suggestion of soot on the fireplace was something I overlooked. Windows are currently missing on purpose. This building was initially a frontier outpost built to withstand raids by warbands of orcs & ogres, so either no windows or arrow slits. Haven't decided yet. still playing with the common room furnishings too

I did drop in a solid sheet between the cave stone and dirt layers. It helps but the different fill patterns are just not cooperating. Part of the issue comes and goes when applying a Blend effect to the uper most "dirt fill" sheet. I think I will revisit this map and use a differnt strategy to build up the different features like the cliff face, rock cave walls and the bulk fill area by changing the order of the sheets.

I did try a .png file print at the same level of map size and resolution and it looks about the same....and uses ~10x as much memory. It was worth trying though.

Here's one I made several years ago. Mostly SS2A. Made this before I started using lighting. Kobolds live in the sewer and are charges with taking care of it.

Mike Schley (SS4) is a favorite for dungeons and battle maps, but I agree with Monsen that there are many opportunities to expand SS4 but maybe expanding the symbol selection for SS2 Dungeon A can also be considered. I always try to create a map in SS2 D-A first but frequently end up defaulting to SS4 because of the much larger symbol selection. More choices are usually better even if is more options for existing symbols.

Mine symbols with a theme: Orc, goblin, kobold, dwarf, etc.

More crypts, sarcophagi, coffins

General merchant shops: more shelves with various merchandise, weapons racks, etc. with a top-down perspective

Wagons, food carts, market stalls

Small shrines

Horse troughs

Docks: Cranes, hanging nets, net makers shop, drydocks, bollards, mooring points, more boat/ship symbols

For cities, I'd suggest row houses mixing house sizes, materials of (roof) construction and shape. As one speaker commented during a mapping seminar recently, many fantasy city maps show single houses ("Americanized"), but the reality of many medieval cities contained no space between buildings in most poorer neighborhoods.

Most worldbuilding "how to" literature points out that many cities will be co-located with rivers, lakes & coastlines but I feel that the dock ward symbols are underrepresented in many styles.

Thanks DaltonSpence. I added the Jakes and a small fireplace to the main room. The world is a high magic environment, there are simple spells that can mask things like strong odors that are powered by ley lines.

The stairs go up, not down but I liek the idea of adding a basement with a kitchen as well

Why yes, that is exactly what they didn't do.... 😛

Great tool. I like the create 2 dungeons on top of each other ability even though it is unintended. Gives some funky results.

Minor detail, the stairs are oriented such that they suggest the party is descending into the dungeon when placed at the top or left of the map but are oriented suggesting the party is ascending into the dungeon when the stairs are on the bottom or right side of the map. At some point in the distant future it would bee nice to be able to select the number of staircases and orientation. Easily fixed manually though.

Some of the doors, like the one at the bottom center of the map below don't always visualize but maybe that's my system. I just scroll in or out and it appears.

Suggestions/wish list

1. Hallways. I generated >30 maps in the preview mode just to try it out and every dungeon has rooms connected to rooms, no hallways except on rare occasions. I set minimum room size to 1 and max room size to 1 with 5' squares and still didn't get hallways.
2. Fewer doors. All maps add doors to every adjacent room (see below). Some opennings don't need doors but I guess it was easier to code that way. Not too hard to fix manually but but might be easier to add doors instead of substract. Maybe a "Door density" tool?
3. Non square/rectangular rooms
4. Caverns

Thank you LoopySue. I did not consider using shadow effects on individual sheets but could do it. I do have separate sheets for upper and lower symbols and terrain, and the cliffs use three sheets (lower, middle upper rocks). I will also experiment with the polygons, another good thought.

Cheers

Just wondering if the open sewage canal in the basement of the town hall was a "subtle" comment on the state of local politics in the city of Vertshusen? ;-)