Say what you will about mind flayers, but they understand the need for a well-funded space program.
The Floating Market
Everybody having a good holidays? I hope so, but if not, remember that 2020 is almost over, which is a cause for celebration by itself. And, with tomorrow being New Year’s Eve, it’s completely acceptable to drink your way across the finish line.
This map kind of feels like something someone else drew. It’s a completely reasonable size, it’s almost all outdoors and the map takes up the entire image with no convenient place to put a title. I mean, I did draw this and I remember doing it, but… how do I put this? It’s like watching a movie with Liam Neeson in it and he doesn’t kill a single person the whole time. It’s not bad, necessarily, but it feels a bit strange.
By the way, floating markets aren’t a thing I made up. They used to be fairly common in Southeast Asia and there are still a few around today. It’s a very practical idea if you think about it. How do you get your stuff to the market? On a boat. Where do you sell it from once you get there? How about the boat? Then how do you get home? Throw the boat in reverse and you’re on your way.
I considered drawing a bridge across the river, but I decided against it. That might seem like a strange choice, but I think it’s actually better without one. If the players need to cross, they’ll have to figure out how. There are plenty of possibilities if they aren’t in a hurry, but if they are, they might have to do something crazy, like jump from boat to boat. It’s a recipe for chaos, and chaos makes for interesting encounters. That’s my thinking, but if you have any other thoughts about it, I’d love to hear them.
Anyway, next up is a mind flayer dreadnought, which is a spelljammer warship. After that, I’ll be drawing an aarakocra village. But, as I promised earlier, I’ll be taking a day to work on the dynamic lighting for Brazenthrone first. This has been going much more quickly than I thought and I suspect it’ll be done by the end of January.
Well, I’d better get started on that. Let me know what you think of the map!
Spells and the Jamming Thereof
I was asked to make a couple of minor changes to the Leviathan of Tyria to make it work better as a sci-fi vessel, but I ended up getting carried away and removing the boats, anchor and bilges, changing the background and recoloring a few things. It’s still not wildly futuristic, but it looks a lot more ready to cruise the void than it did before.
This could also work as an airship, but, more than anything, I think it’d make an excellent spelljammer, if anyone’s still out there jamming spells in the 21st century.
I also made another, somewhat less mainstream version for someone who’s been asking for something like it for a long time. Of course, if anyone else has a use for it, work away.
As with the regular version of this map, all the patron content for this is free and you can download it from Google Drive or from this post on my patreon.
Alright, back to work on Brazenthrone!
The Leviathan of Tyria – Everyone’s Edition
I’m making all the patron content for this map free for everyone. I’m pretty proud of this absolute monstrosity of a ship. I made a ton of stuff for it and I want you all to have it. You can download everything from my Google Drive here.
So, let’s talk about this gigantic boat. The Leviathan of Tyria is a catamaran (two-hulled) warship which is powered by both rowers and sails. Armed with rams, artillery and a complement of marines, it is dangerous both up close and at range. In addition, the Leviathan carries four gunboats on board which it can deploy in battle to surround and distract enemies.
I made three versions of this ship to help it fit into everyone’s game. The first is armed with gunpowder weapons, the second is armed with ballistas and the third has neither, allowing you to customize the ship’s weapon loadout as you see fit. There are artillery tokens included to customize it on VTTs, as well as copy-and-paste-able artillery to modify the print versions of the map.
The pre-armed versions have around 25 guns/ballistas each. You can add more if needed, but before you turn the Leviathan into a 120-gun ship-of-the-line, let me suggest that you count how many D20s you own. I’m not saying you shouldn’t arm it to the teeth, just shop around for a dice rolling app before you have to start making hit rolls.
Here are the DM notes and the annotated version of the gunpowder Leviathan. Everything else is in the link above. Have fun with it!
There’s one more thing I wanted to mention: my wife is raising money for a charity called LauraLynn Children’s Hospice and I told her I’d post a link on my site in case anyone wanted to donate. I know this has been a tough year for most people and children’s hospices are kind of a super depressing thing to bring up, but they do important work and, if 2020 has been merciful enough that you can afford to donate, I’m sure they’d appreciate it.
I can’t think of a way to transition from that back to maps without it being awkward, so let’s just do it. Next up is Greenstone Hall, one of the four remaining chambers of Brazenthrone. It’s a small residential district which shouldn’t take long. After that, I’ll be drawing draw last month’s Cartographic Congress winner, a hanging wizard’s tower built into a stalactite. Or a stalagmite? The one that points down.
Anyway, hope you like the ship! If you’ve got any questions about it, just ask!
The Floating Fortress is Inked
Yeah, there are boats in that boat. They’re called gun yawls and they look like this. They’re basically large rowboats with a single cannon. The idea is that they’re maneuverable and hard to hit. Apparently they were very popular in Scandinavia, which is something you might have guessed from the picture, in which there’s a Danish flag that is almost as big as the entire vessel itself. Presumably, this is meant to be used as a sail in the event that everyone’s arms get tired.
I’m going to make three versions of this: one with cannons, one with ballistas and one with no armaments. I’ve got a ballista and five different cannons you can copy and paste onto the map or use as VTT tokens to arm it as you like.
There’s one other thing I wanted to point out. I drew a ship called the Ebonclad about two years ago. You can fit that ship into one of the floating fortress’ hulls. You can almost fit two into each hull. This thing’s pretty big.
Floating Fortress Warship Sketches
These are some sketches I did while planning out the floating fortress warship I’m drawing next. I played around with some other designs, but they just ended up looking too normal. They were big ships, but nothing about them said FLOATING FORTRESS. I think this one does.
Let me break this ship down for you. It’s a catamaran, which is a ship with two hulls. This gives it stability and a wide deck with a lot of space. The primary means of propulsion is rowing, but it also has a single mast with a Bermuda Sloop sail rig. There are rams at the bows of both hulls and other armaments will be included as well. I’ll probably do a ballista version and a gunpowder version.
This is a flagship with a crew in the hundreds, including oarsmen, sailors, officers, marines and other support staff such as medics, mages, a chaplain and so on. It’s a castle on the sea. I can’t promise you’ll like it or that you’ll have a use for it, but I can tell you it’ll definitely be something different.
I’m an idiot. Here’s the actual alternate version of Whiskey Point.
The previous “alternate version” of Whiskey Point was identical to the regular version. I guess I saved the wrong file without noticing. Sorry about that. I especially apologize to anyone who was staring at the two files, trying to figure out what the difference was.
Anyway, I just noticed this, so I’m posting the actual alternate version. The difference is at the top floor of the lighthouse. If it still doesn’t look different, reload the page. You may have the old file cached.
Whiskey Point
Here’s an alternate version (explained below) and a ballista token I made for no specific reason.
Whiskey Point is a ruined fort and lighthouse which has been reclaimed by pirates, who patched it up and now run a black market from inside its walls. Other pirates come here to fence their loot and have a few drinks before getting back to work.
The alternate version only has one difference: at the top of the lighthouse, instead of a pyre, there’s a crystal. In this version, the idea is that the lighthouse is actually an arcane weapon that fires powerful beams of light. Should you use this version of the map? Look, I’m not trying to tell anyone how to run their game, but I just want to say two words to you, okay? Just two. Laser pirates.
Next up is Brazenthrone‘s Mushroom Farms. It won’t just be a cave full of mushrooms. It’s also where most of the city’s breweries are. And it’s where all the city’s funerals are held, since it’s the farthest downriver and the dwarves of Brazenthrone do Viking-style funerals. That’s where the deceased is placed on a boat, then the boat is lit on fire and sent down the river. Dwarves aren’t known for their love of boats, but they do live under a mountain and they can’t have dead people stinking up the place.
Ironbird Aerie – Gunpowder-Free Version
Here’s the alternate version of Ironbird Aerie without the cannons and fancy engines. Some DMs make their players kill a dragon the old fashioned way. Others let them blow a hole through its chest with an 18-pound smoothbore siege gun, spraying chunks of Sky Godzilla into the next county. Both are perfectly valid options and now this place can accommodate either.
Next up is an area of Brazenthrone currently under excavation. This unfinished and unnamed hall is at 19 on this map. After that, we’re doing the next Great Vote map, Greenskin Rock. This map will feature one or more sea stacks with a goblin or kobold community living in tunnels inside. I’ve wanted to put a sea stack in a map for a while now and my day has arrived! Also, the flying creature tokens I mentioned will be along sometime in the next week or so.
Anyway, I don’t think the Brazenthrone map will take long, so I’ll be back with that soon!
Ironbird Aerie – Gunpowder Version
Ironbird Aerie might look like a truck stop for airships and flying mounts, but that’s only because it kind of is. This is the first of two versions of this map, the second of which will be a little lower-tech, with no gunpowder weapons or mechanical engines. It won’t take long to modify and I should have it for you tomorrow.
I’m also going to make some tokens for flying creatures to go with this. The list I’ve got so far includes: dragon, griffon, hippogriff, pegasus, nightmare and giant eagle. If there’s anything notable I’m forgetting about, leave a comment and I’ll add it to the list.
If you need an airship to roll into this place on, might I suggest the highly reasonable Century Pelican or the highly unreasonable Tempest of Reckoning?
There’s an annotated version of this map and DM notes available to patrons.