Category: Huge Maps

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The Great Hall of Brazenthrone – Second Level

Here’s the second level of Brazenthrone at last. Sorry, this took me longer than I’d have liked. The illness I mentioned in the last post declined to go away, which is not conducive to productive mapmaking. In any case, I think it’s over and I should have the next map up in around 4-5 days.

Next up is the third level of the Great Hall, then I’ll be doing a ranger outpost, which I think I’ve got an interesting idea for. Alright, back to work!


Here’s the non-annotated version. There’s also a Patrons’ Edition of this map with all the rooms of the numbered buildings marked and labeled available on the patreon.

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The Great Hall of Brazenthrone – Ground Level

Well, here it is, finally. I promise you won’t have to wait this long for any other part of Brazenthrone. This is easily the biggest piece of the city.

Here’s the non-annotated version. There’s a Patrons’ Edition of this map with all the rooms of the numbered buildings marked and labeled (it is monstrous), as well as a VTT version, and all the other usual stuff available on the patreon. There will be DM notes as well, once the upper floors are finished.

Also, here’s the first edition of Brazenthrone’s History and Lore. I’ll update it as I write more throughout the process of making the map:

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The Gates of Brazenthrone Remastered

I remade the Gates of Brazenthrone for two reasons. One, there was a mistake in the annotated version. And two, the more I looked at it, the more I started to dislike it. So I decided to simplify the background and make the whole thing vertical (which I don’t normally like to do, since this is a website and your monitor is horizontal).

Anyway, I hope you like it. Also, here’s the non-annotated version. Alright, back to it.

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The Dwarven City of Brazenthrone – The Layout

Here’s the black and white version and the non-annotated version.

This is the basic layout of the map I will be drawing over the next year.  Keep in mind that this is at a 70 foot scale, which means that each tile here will become 196 tiles when drawn at a 5 foot scale.  To illustrate how big this will be, the Great Hall, marked as (4) here, is about the size of the ground level of Finbarr’s Marsh (including the surrounding water).

A few things to mention:

  • All of these will have multiple levels.
  • The mines are just a sketch. They will look completely different in the 5 foot scale maps.
  • I will be drawing the residential districts (the unmarked chambers on the map).
  • All of the chambers here will be assembled as one big map when they’re all finished.  And that one map will be so huge it’ll be impractical to use, but it’ll probably be really cool.
  • Finally, any and all of this is subject to change.  A measurement error here and a new idea there will almost certainly lead to changes and/or additions at some point.  But this is the general idea.

I will be alternating between drawing maps for this and drawing other maps.  My next map will be an airship.  After that, Brazenthrone’s Surface Outpost. Then something else.  Then back to Brazenthrone.  And so on.

Alright, let’s do this.

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Tortuga – Overview and DM Notes

Here’s the final map of Tortuga: the overview.  The image above is the gridless version because I think it looks better.  I’m not sure why.  Here’s the gridded map.

Also, I’m giving away the DM notes on this one because they explain some important things about this map, as well as my thoughts on the ways it can be used in a campaign (especially as a traveling home city for PCs).  Here they are:

So, now that the six-story turtle town is out of the way, it’s time to start on something much, much bigger: Brazenthrone.  I’ll have a map of the layout of the city up on Monday.

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The Town of Tortuga Upon the Great Zaratan Monhatnus – Main Deck

 

First off:  “What is a zaratan?”

A zaratan is a giant turtle that sleeps for years at a time.  They often come to look like islands, with plants and even trees growing from their backs.  Sometimes, people– knowingly or unknowingly– inhabit those “islands.”  The main problem with living on a zaratan is this: when they get hungry, they wake up and look for food.  And when they look for food, they dive.  Which is catastrophic for anyone living on the creature’s back.  So, in order to prevent this, the zaratan must be fed.  Even sleeping, it will eat anything coming into its mouth.  The town of Tortuga is well-prepared to handle this, having a small fleet of fishing boats and a large crane to deliver their offerings.

The idea for this map came from a patron, who suggested a city on a zaratan.  That’s been done before, of course, but it’s typically a small village with a few huts.  I thought it’d be interesting to make the most overpopulated zaratan ever.

My idea was that the town of Tortuga grew so much that they had to keep building higher and higher, which necessitated constructing the wooden deck on their host’s back.  After all, it’s hard to build a solid foundation on a curved surface, especially when you can’t dig or drill down into it without pissing off a creature that can bite the head off a storm giant.

Here’s a (mostly) gridless version, a black and white version, a version without annotations and a gridless version without annotations.

Since this map is so complicated, I’m releasing this partially annotated edition to all, but there is a fully annotated Patrons’ Edition with around 45 rooms marked available on the patreon.