Carto Cacography

Map Roundup - 01 February 2012

2012-02-01T22:46:00.000-06:00

A very short map roundup today--one item short. In case you missed it, this is one from several days ago.

FrDave over at Blood of Prokopius (26 Jan 2012) posted this nice map of a Manor House. Really nice work.

More Dungeons in Fiction

2012-01-27T00:48:00.000-06:00

So back here, I asked the question, "Does anyone know of any megadungeons in modern fantasy literature?" I received a few answers (thanks for those, guys) and that gave me some food for thought.

I have a follow-up question, although it is only slightly different from the original, so the same answers might apply. Does anyone know of any works of fiction that include a "Campaign Dungeon"? In case you aren't familiar, the term basically means a dungeon that is the main (perhaps only) adventuring locale for an entire campaign of play.

You may be wondering--or perhaps you aren't--why I'm asking questions about dungeons in fiction. The short reason is because I am actually in the process of writing a story (goal length 60-75k words) that is basically just that--a big old dungeon with a small group of adventurers going into it looking for riches. My reason for asking is to help me determine if the idea is as unique (in fiction) as I think it is, or is it trite and old. I have to admit that I haven't read any fantasy is a LONG time and may not know about something that is out there.

So, if you know of something, please speak up. Thanks.

"Thanks!" and "WTF Blogger?!?"

2012-01-23T00:32:00.000-06:00

So I asked a question in my last post about dungeons in fiction and I received some replies and I wanted to say thanks to those guys for answering my question. They definitely provided some things for me to look into.

Now you may be asking yourself, "Why is he thanking them in a new post? Wouldn't it make more sense to just throw a comment and thank them there?"

The answer to the second question is, yes, of course it would.

But that brings me to part 2 of this post.

WTF Blogger?!?

You see, for some reason that I am unable to fathom, I cannot see any specific Blogger blog post with comments. I can read a blog and read the last X number of posts, but if I try to click on a specific post to read the comments associated with it, nothing. My IE opens a new tab and then refuses to put anything into it. That goes for any blog post, my own included.

(Now I know that many of you scoff at the fact that I use Internet Explorer, but I do. It's never really bothered me before now.)

I guess the question is, is this an issue with Blogger, an issue with IE, or some other issue?

Can anyone help me?!

Question about Dungeons in Fiction

2012-01-22T01:56:00.000-06:00

Or more specifically, megadungeons. Are there any megadungeons who have played a significant role in fantasy (and/or any of its "offshoots") literature in the last twenty-five years?

The Mines of Moria are perhaps the most well-known example of a megadungeon in fiction. And while they are important to the Lord of the Rings as an obstacle to be overcome by or as a road to be traversed by the Fellowship or, if I remember correctly, as a means to separate Gandalf from the others, they don't play much of a role in the story. The time spent in their halls by that adventuring group (in words) isn't all that great compared to the entirety of the trilogy.

But are there any other examples of megadungeons in modern fiction? I'm interested and would really appreciate any other examples. Thanks!

Names, Names, Names

2012-01-06T19:33:00.000-06:00

Speaking of names, what he said.

Also, thank you, Brendan, for pointing me toward this. A handy little name generator that, based on my initial playing-around, works nicely indeed.

Artist Unfamiliar (before now) to Me

2012-01-05T23:31:00.000-06:00

Stefan Poag is an impressive artist in his own right and has done some amazing work. First, I say to Stefan, thank you for the drawings that you have done that have "leaked" out into the world. I say "leaked" because I've not purchased anything with his art in it, but it is always a joy to look at. And I'm really looking forward to his Drawing-a-Day. I hope he posts all of his drawings.

Secondly, I want to say thank you to Stefan for pointing me toward Rich Longmore.

To Rich, I can only say, "Wow." I love his aesthetic. Some of his pieces are reminiscent of the best drawings from the Fiend Folio, but more "realistic" (Is that possible in fantasy art?). At the same time, I feel like each of his pictures tells a story.

(That is a phrase that I've heard many times about illustrations, perhaps too many, but, in the case of Rich's art, I think that it is completely appropriate.)

They are full of detail, action, and style. Don't want to sound too much like my fifteen year old self from days past, but, "Awesome!"

Knowing that his art is in Carcosa is perhaps one more reason I may need to purchase that.

Map Roundup - 05 January 2012

2012-01-04T23:27:00.000-06:00

Lost in Time (05 Jan 2012), a new blog (and new to me) posted these maps from the early days. Love them. Perfect mix of home-made awesome with a bit of skill thrown in.

Thankyou, Trollsmyth (04 Jan 2012) for this post about perhaps the last great map of hte United States. (And you thought I only liked fantastic cartography?) And, just in case, here is a link to the actual article.

Aaron over at Paladin in Citadel (04 Jan 2012) shows us Magic Realm, a pretty nifty looking board game about wilderness hex crawling. I like board games that get built as you play them. I've found them to be a lot of fun. It sounds like a fun little game. The actual hexes are pretty nice looking, too!

Not an extensive roundup, but all I have time for today. Until next time...

D&D - Past, Present and Future

2012-01-01T03:55:00.000-06:00

So where I am currently typing this, the New Year has not yet rolled in. It is about ten minutes to midnight, and I am surrounded by sounds of explosions, large and small, welcoming the coming passage.

So, I guess first thing's first--Happy New Year to all of you who are already on the far side of this celebration. I hope that you had a fun, and safe, time.

But on to the point.

I'm not a regular reader of the Escapist, but these articles caught my attention. A guy by the name of Greg Tito has written three articles about D&D, talking about its Past, Present, and Future. Interesting read, all in all, whether or not you agree with what he has to say or if you think that these articles have any relevance to the real world. But I always enjoy hearing from "insiders" so I found these articles a fun read. Perhaps you will as well.

Small Map Roundup - 29 December

2011-12-29T20:26:00.000-06:00

Back when I had more time to devote to this blog, one of my regular features was Map Roundups, wherein I would include links to all of the map related blog posts in our little corner of the blogosphere.

I truly miss doing the Roundups, because I know that I have missed out on a LOT of mapping goodness over the past several months. In any event, I wanted to do a mini-Roundup today, because I came across two posts that really spoke to me.

The first comes to us from Telecanter, he of the Receding Rules. He discusses the concept of a Pre-Mapped Dungeon, which are exactly what they sound like: Dungeons to be explored by a party of adventurers who are already in possession of a map of the dungeon. I love this concept and think that a creative DM could come up with (not one but) several really interesting adventures with this is mind. I wonder if a module has ever been published that employs this conceit. (Anyone know?) Maybe I need to write one...

The second comes to us from JDJarvis over at Aeons & Augauries. He is discussing one method of mapping for megadungeons. Basically (or at least the aspect that most speaks to me), he is saying that you could map a small collection of rooms--actually several small sections of rooms--and then link them in whatever manner you desire, i.e. as long as you track how each group of rooms links together, you don't need to produce a detailed 10'x10' gridded map connecting everything. I immediately think back to a question that James over at Grognardia posted several weeks ago regarding the "ideal" way to include maps in his upcoming Dwimmermount product. Several people described basically what JD is talking about. (I think that he might have spoken up in the comments to that post.) IF I were ever to publish a megadungeon, I think that this is how I would do it. Map the small, interesting areas and let the connections between them be done randomly, via geomorphs, or on-the-fly by the DM.

And, yes, I would LOVE to publish a megadungeon someday. If only...

Star Clans - A New Blog Worth Paying Attention To

2011-12-26T15:37:00.000-06:00

Here's a new blog that might be interesting to people. I'm not sure where it is headed, but I know the author really well. He is a whiz at world creation, and I'm sure that this new project will produce lots of interesting material for use in your own campaign or just to get your creative juices flowing.

Sounds like it might be a science-fantasy setting, but perhaps not. He's been known to include elements of science fiction into the origin and background of the setting that never actually make their way into the world that that players see.

Gotta Love those Random Tables

2011-11-14T17:51:00.001-06:00

Aeons & Augauries is one of my favorite old school blogs. I absolutely love JDJarvis' work. Recently, he has been posting a collection of random tables to help characterize various standard dungeon items (think statue, fountain, etc.).

Well, quickly glancing through those showed all sorts of goodness. But then I thought, mmmmm, what else has he posted with the same label (random table) that might be of interest? And this is what you find.

Pure win.

I wonder if he's ever thought about including all of those in a nice pdf...

Star Wars Goodness or Super Lazy Post

2011-11-14T01:48:00.000-06:00

A link like this cannot be passed up: Star Wars scripts, many versions, all goodness.

"Old School" Products

2011-11-11T12:00:00.002-06:00

Not really a frequenter of Dragonsfoot. And, frankly, from what I've heard of the place, I don't want to be.

But this is some useful information.

I Agree with Him

2011-11-10T00:38:00.000-06:00

So I've been scarce around these parts lately. Mostly due to the new job and the hours worked to get everything under control.

My posting has been pathetic.

And, unfortunately, it will remain so for the time being. Any posting that I do will consist of linking to something interesting that I have seen on the interweb and then commenting on it. Like this:

...

Today, I saw this that JB posted over at B/X Blackrazor. I completely agree with everything that he says.

I think that most of the commenters to his post went off on various tangents about gaming, which movies they like, various opinions about GL, but his point that there is a massive universe with some cool "core" items that could be used in other stories is spot on. Why don't authors of fiction mine those things for other adventures?

Damned if I know.

What is that?!

2011-09-02T22:00:00.001-05:00

So while I was writing my last post earlier today, I glanced at the 'Stats' tab for this blog, and I noticed a huge spike in readership a few days ago. I also noticed that most of the spike came from a website that I had never heard of before, by the name of Gothise.

Anybody know that this place is or what it is about? I suppose that I could sign up for an account, and then I would see, but I am past the stage of signing up for every website out there just because.

Any information would be greatly appreciated.

Star Wars Goodness in Buttercup Valley

2011-09-02T18:48:00.000-05:00

I know that the past several months have seen very little activity at Carto Cacography. I also know that what little activity there has been has not been original or, even, cartography related. Interestingly enough (and NOT surprisingly), this has led to a drop in the number of followers that I have. Unfortunately, the real world has conspired to drastically limit my free time, and while I usually have the time to read those blogs that interest me, I have not had the time to post my own material. I wish I could say that that is going to change in the near future...

This is another post wherein I will direct you, inhabitant of the blogosphere, to something that I found and was really excited about.

I am a Star Wars fan. This link will take you to a bunch of behind-the-scenes photos from Return of the Jedi. I really dig this stuff, and I hope that you do as well.

Production Diary for "The Hobbit"!!!

2011-07-10T03:20:00.000-05:00

This may be more of interest to people interested in movie making, but there are certainly bits of fantasy in this 10+ minute video. It is a video design-diary by Peter Jackson about teh current state of the movie version of "The Hobbit".

Take a look.

Purple Worm Graveyard - Soon!

2011-07-01T04:32:00.000-05:00

Over at Year of the Dungeon, Tony Dowler has (almost) made a very exciting announcement.

Okay, so why do I find this announcement exciting? I did the layout work for Tony's nifty little adventure, and I am pretty pleased with my work. Better yet, it was a paid gig. Most importantly, he was pleased with my work. (That is, unless he is the nicest man on the planet and didn't tell me how he really felt about it.)

I already have in my possession a complimentary hardcopy of the module, and I think that it came out very nicely. The adventure itself is a lot of fun, and I highly recommend it.

Not D&D --- Harrison Ford

2011-06-29T04:30:00.000-05:00

As soon as I watched the first clip from this post, I knew that I had to link to it. Sorry--not at all D&D or even rpg related, but I am a huge Harrison Ford fan, so this was a no-brainer for me.

Enjoy these interview clips.

Been a Long Time, so Roll a D6

2011-06-24T03:51:00.000-05:00

I've been gone from these parts for a long time now. I'm hoping to slip back in and start posting soon.

Came across this and had to link to it. If only so I won't forget about it.

And thanks to joethelawyer for posting it first.

$$ $$ $$

2011-04-25T23:38:00.000-05:00

It is a topic that many people love to discuss--sometimes related to their desires to make money in our little hobby.

I recently ran across two short articles by Monte Cook regarding the topic. (I know that, to some, he is the devil, but I typically find his thoughts to be insightful and interesting.)

Here he writes about the highest paid authors in 2010.

Here he talks about rpg designers and money.

I do have to admit, however, that when he discusses money, I am left with the feeling that his words would be more meaningful if he would inform us of how well he does in his writing. Obviously, well. But numbers would be interesting. I realize that it is personal, and that it is truly none of my business, but it would be informative nonetheless.

I also know that the vast majority of people in this world (that I have ever met) do not like to discuss money issues--at least their own personal money issues. I suppose it makes people uncomfortable. Emotions get involved, etc, etc. I, on the other hand, don't feel that way.

To be fair, as an officer in the US Navy, my pay is fully public knowledge. With a few pieces of information, such as where I live, how long I've been in the services, etc., any one of you could google some numbers and determine EXACTLY what the Navy pays me. I guess in a way, that is liberating.

But I would still be interested in knowing what Monte Cook makes in a given year.

...

This post is also a little experiment to determine if the title leads to increased traffic over my typical posts. Apologies if my experiment offends.

Perhaps Worth a Look

2011-04-20T21:58:00.000-05:00

So I found myself over at Goodman Games' website, at this page specifically, and they've put up three "design diaries" about their new Dungeon Crawl Classics rpg. I'm not sure if people have already been talking about it, because I've been pretty scarce around these parts lately, but I found what details they've released to be pretty intriguing.

Here are links to the design diaries:

General thoughts on the game.
Appendix N in 'modern' gaming format.
Magic Use.

I really, really like their ideas for magic use. I like the fact that they are purposefully making spellcasting more unpredictable. That is the way it should be.

Are These Design Principles Relevant?

2011-03-30T02:57:00.000-05:00

Jeff over at the Bottom Feeder continues to impress me with his observations and wisdom. In this post, he reviews Minecraft, a computer game that, frankly, I know nothing about. (Although after reading his review and the comments following, it sounds like a game any D&D player could love.)

But better than just reviewing it (which would be not very helpful, because he makes it clear very early that he likes it), he offers some thoughts on why it has been successful. The question now becomes, could those aspects of Minecraft that Jeff thinks makes it a good game be applied to pen-and-paper adventure design?

Geomorphs Bonanza!

2011-03-18T21:29:00.000-05:00

Go take a look at this if you like geomorphs.

Thanks to Thomas Denmark for showing me the way.

Zombie Fungus - FOR REAL?!

2011-03-16T22:27:00.000-05:00

Yes. This will be the last one, for tonight at least.

The video here is one of the creepiest things I've seen in a long time, especially toward the end when you are confronted with the sight of corpse after corpse while listening to strange children's-music-box music and the voice of that British guy whose name I cannot remember.

And for this, I have to thank joethelawyer.

Perhaps the best part is right at the end when the narrator says, "But these attacks do have a positive effect on the jungle's diversity, since parasites like these stop any one group of animal from getting the upper hand. The more numerous a species becomes, the more likely it will be attacked by its nemesis, a cordyceps fungus."

Perhaps that species is humanity?!?

Nice.

Gaming Economics

2011-03-16T22:11:00.000-05:00

To continue the trend from the previous post, I'd like to thank the Greyhawk Grognard for this little post regarding the costs of rpgs. In his post, he discusses the cost of 1E core rules in their day and compares them to the cost of 4E core rules today.

Saturn Brilliant

2011-03-16T21:54:00.000-05:00

For at least a few more weeks, I'm not going to be able to post regularly or with anything that requires much effort on my part. What that means is that what little posting there is will probably be things of which I want to save a record.

This video is one such thing. Absolutely amazing, in my opinion.

Many thanks to Trollsmyth for linking to it.

The D&D Article at Salon

2011-03-11T23:04:00.000-06:00

I don't know if people have linked to this yet or not, because I've been away from the blogosphere for almost two weeks now. (Busy at work in general, and focusing on that BIG project that is due the first week of April.) It's nice to see D&D once again rearing its head in the mainstream media--especially when it is in a positive light.

Beach Creatures

2011-02-25T14:07:00.000-06:00

I'm always looking for real world sources of inspiration for my gaming. I like this video.

pdf Pricing - Yeah

2011-02-18T19:57:00.000-06:00

I'm going to have to agree with what he said. I just don't see a pdf as being worth that price, any pdf.

Because it is a topic that interests me a lot, I thought that I would link to several posts that Tenkar has written over at his tavern. First, he starts with some general questions pertaining to the pricing of pdfs. I think that the questions he poses are all valid. Unforunately for the erstwhile publisher, the answers to those questions vary across the buying public. Valid questions that might be impossible to answer, unless one does market research, which by its very nature is not done by publishers in our little corner. Too expensive.

Later, Tenkar discusses the pricing of the Castle Keeper's Guide and what he might have charged for it. Thanks, Tenkar!

I should say that in both cases, the comments are just as interesting as Tenkar's initial thoughts.

The State of Modern Fantasy

2011-02-17T12:40:00.000-06:00

Thank you to the Silver Key for this post wherein he links to this.

Lots to think about there. I need some time...

Game Design Wisdom (Not from Me)

2011-02-16T22:14:00.000-06:00

Jeff Vogel, over at the Bottom Feeder, writes this about game design. He isn't a pen-and-paper rpg guy but an indie computer rpg designer. I've linked to him before, because I think his insights are pertinent to our corner of the gaming world as well as his own.

As I think about his post more, I realize that his point is relevant to a 4E D&D experience moreso than it is to any old school fun. 4E has minions, monsters that will perish with one hit. Is there a place in old school gaming for such a concept? I think that there might be.

...

Interesting (to me at least) is the fact that one of the posts wherein I did link to him (this one, if you are interested) happens to have the most page views of any post in the history of this blog--almost double the number of page views of the number two post. I wonder why that is...

Campaign Concept: "Seven"

2011-02-12T19:11:00.000-06:00

I find inspiration for gaming just about everywhere I turn.

You might think that I am proposing a campaign concept from the movie "Seven" starring Brad Pitt and Morgan Freeman, which is, of course, based on the concept of the Seven Deadly Sins. I suppose that there is a campaign idea in there somewhere, but that's not where this comes from.

Take a read of the following. I think that there is plenty here for inspiration.

And I saw an angel come down unto me
In her hand she holds the very key
Words of compassion, words of peace
And in the distance an army's marching feet
But behold, we will watch them fall

And we lay down on the sand of the sea
And before us animosity will stand and decree
That we speak not of love only blasphemy
And in the distance, six others will curse me

And we will see a plague and a river of blood
And every evil soul will surely die in spite of
Their seven tears, but do not fear
for in the distance, twelve souls from now
You and me will still be here - we will still be here

There will be a new city with streets of gold
The young so educated they never grow old
And a, there will be no death for with every breath
The voice of many colors sings a song
That's so bold
Sing it while we watch them fall

All seven and we'll watch them fall
They stand in the way of love
And we will smoke them all
With an intellect and a savoir-faire
No one in the whole universe
Will ever compare
I am yours now and you are mine
And together we'll love through
All space and time, so don't cry
One day all seven will die

More than likely, you recognize that the above are lyrics to a song, even if you do not particularly care for it or the artist. But that really doesn't matter, because there is plenty here for a campaign.

Angels carrying keys, armies, blasphemy, plague, rivers of blood, a new city with streets of gold, young so educated they never grow old. Who or what are the Seven? Are they good? Are they evil?

And whether or not you like the song or video apart from the lyrics, I find both also to be inspirational. The tone is generally Middle Eastern to me, with a little horror thrown in (background music), and his outfit is something that I can imagine a desert mystic assassin wearing as he approaches his quarry before silently slitting its throat.

Maybe I should just stick to maps, but, to me, this song drips with inspiration.

Real Life's Twists

2011-02-11T15:39:00.000-06:00

There are a few people with whom I spent the majority of my gaming time with. One is my older brother, who I have written about before.

Another is my childhood best friend. I haven't seen him in years, but we do keep in sporadic contact. And that is a shame, because when I think of D&D, I think of him. Well, a little over two years ago, he, a very physically fit guy in his mid-thirties, had a heart attack and almost died.

It's strange to me to even write the above sentence.

He has come through it and is doing well. Yes, there are a variety of minor and not-so-minor complications, but he is working, living, and getting on.

Why do I write about this, today? A lot of people at various blogs have posted about the "forefathers" of gaming, the men whose writing inspired the hobby that we all love, and how the world would be a very different place were it not for them. That is obviously all true, and we owe a debt of gratitude to those authors, early gamers, etc. But we also owe a debt to those who brought us individually into the hobby, who make up large portions of our personal gaming histories, and who continue to inspire us in simple and sometimes profound ways.

My friend started a blog awhile ago, that he occassionally posts to. I only recently became aware of it. If you have a moment, go check it out. Help me thank him for the hours of joy that gaming with him gave me.

He Did It Just Like He Said He Would

2011-02-10T17:59:00.008-06:00

I wrote a little about treasure junks (gigantic, wooden-hulled Chinese ships) back here. In the comments of that post, Joe Browning mentioned an adventure that he was putting out that took place on what is basically a treasure junk. That adventure, entitled The Frozen Wave Satsuma, can be found here for sale at RPGNow.

I haven't purchased it yet, but I will be.

Away

2011-02-09T22:54:00.000-06:00

I've been away for the past week or so. Not away away, but not having the time to post here. A couple of things have jogged me back:

1. Got a nice email from my best friend from the olden days that reminded me just how much fun we had playing D&D when we were younger. Ah, memories.

2. There's this little thing about "three-hour islands" that I've heard about. As a lover of maritime campaigns, this really speaks to me. I need to draw one up! But not today...

One of the reasons that I haven't found the time to post is that the results of the big sporting event that occurred this past Sunday evening were not to my liking. Not one bit. I'm still trying to come to grips with it all. But let's face it: Life must go on. There are an ever expanding number of maps that need to be perused. I better get on it (in addition to drawing an island).

Fantasy Mapping from outside of Our Little Corner

2011-01-31T15:07:00.000-06:00

I was recently pointed to a site that contains a multitude of really nice cartography--of a certain style. It reminds me a lot of Tony Dowler's work.

As far as I can tell, the artist has no connection to D&D whatsoever, which in my mind makes it even cooler.

It is called the The Interimaginational Institute for Fantastical Exploration and Cartography. A bit long-winded, I suppose, but who cares? Enjoy!

Awesome Cave

2011-01-30T09:31:00.000-06:00

As several other (real world) projects are taking up my time right now, I might have to back off of my Map Roundups for a few weeks. That probably upsets me more than it does you, but taking the time to wander far and wide over the blogosphere looking for map-related posts does take a little more time than I have available right now.

But I did come across a nice post this morning that I HAD to link to. Thanks to Trey over at The Sorcerer's Skull for posting this about some caves in Viet Nam and Mexico.

Campaign Concept: Afloat in the Fleet (Part 1)

2011-01-23T16:33:00.000-06:00

Back here and continuing here, I wrote about Chinese treasure junks, massive ships from the fifteenth century (Good article here.), and how their existence gave me some ideas for roleplaying. Another good article is here, but I’ll just include the relevant portion:

Expedition of Zheng He

The largest junks ever built were possibly those of Admiral Zheng He, for his expeditions in the Indian Ocean. According to Chinese sources, the fleet for He's 1405 expedition comprised nearly 30,000 sailors and over 300 ships at its height.

The dimensions of Zheng He's ships according to ancient Chinese chronicles are disputed by modern scholars (see below):

• "Treasure ships", used by the commander of the fleet and his deputies (Nine-masted junks, claimed by the Ming Shi to be about 420 feet long and 180 feet wide).

• "Horse ships", carrying tribute goods and repair material for the fleet (Eight-masted junks, about 340 feet long and 140 feet wide)

• "Supply ships", containing food-staple for the crew (Seven-masted junks, about 260 feet long and 115 feet wide).

• "Troop transports" (Six-masted junks, about 220 feet long and 83 feet wide).

• "Fuchuan warships" (Five-masted junks, about 165 feet long).

• "Patrol boats" (Eight-oared, about 120 feet long).

• "Water tankers", with 1 month's supply of fresh water.

Some recent research suggests that the actual length of the biggest treasure ships may have been between 390–408 feet (119–124 m) long and 160–166 feet (49–51 m) width, while others estimate them to be 200–250 feet (61–76 m) in length.

When I read the above, numerous ideas spring to mind. Just to simplify, say that you have a fleet of large ships, two to three hundred of them with a total manpower of twenty to thirty thousand people. What could you do with that? Here are a bunch of possibilities that come to my mind.

One possibility is that the fleet of ships is controlled by a maritime power in your world in order to (pick the goal). Perhaps it is conquest of surrounding dominions or perhaps it is exploration. Regardless, the fleet is military in nature. The PCs are mercenaries in the employ of the government, either in possession of their own ship or based on one of the many barracks ships that are accompanying the expedition. Or maybe they are spies of a competing power, trying to thwart the aims of the fleet. This idea could work for any level of PCs. Low level PCs could interact with the common soldiers (or marines--seaborne infantry), the masters of the smaller ships, and the daily "normal" happenings throughout the fleet. High level PCs could interact with the Admirals in charge of the fleet and the governing council.

Adventures could be event-based based upon the politics and situations that the PCs find themselves in as part of this massive fleet. Adventures could also be location-based as the fleet visits various strange locales and the PCs have to explore the lands or islands that the fleet encounters.

Another possibility is that the fleet of ships is not attached to any land power, but is, in fact, its own political entity. A literal floating city made up of numerous ships, housing all of the normal functions of a city, but in a collection of moving vessels whose position changes relative to all of the others over time and whose makeup changes as some ships (or groups of ships) leave the main body and others return to it over time. It would obviously include (much) smaller vessels that taxi passengers between the larger ones.

If one accepts the literal floating city as a campaign idea, what is the nature of that city's voyages? What are their origins?
- Perhaps it just voyages from place to place with no discernable rhyme or reason (at least to the commoner aboard one of its many vessels). The PCs would just be along for the ride, and their adventures are determined merely upon the circumstances of the cruise.
- Perhaps the leadership of the city are searching for a particular place, object, or person. The PCs are actively involved in the search, whether as mercenaries or otherwise. Or perhaps they don't give a hoot about the overall reasons for the voyage and are out for themselves.
- Perhaps the city voyages to discover its past. How many science-fictions stories are about humans in space trying to find the mythical 'Earth'? Translate that idea to fantasy and an ocean voyage, and it works as well.

I'm sure there are other ways that this basic idea could be used in a campaign. If you can think of any, I'd love to hear of them.

Map Roundup - 21 January

2011-01-21T18:05:00.000-06:00

If there is one thing that doing these roundups continually proves to me it is that there are so many blogs out there doing interesting, and often amazing, things. One of the things that I love most about the blogosphere is that I can click on a link and then from there follow another one and then another one and then find myself someplace that I've never been before and reading or looking at something that I never otherwise would have.

I have a lot of fun putting these things together; I hope that you enjoy reading them.

Axe & Hammer, 17 Jan: In our last map roundup we had several 'one-hour dungeon' posts. This one is a half-hour dungeon post.

Axe & Hammer, 18 Jan: This is that same dungeon starting to be turned into a 'one-shot' adventure.

Axe & Hammer, 19 Jan: The one-shot commenced above taken a little further...

Quickly, Quietly, Carefully, 19 Jan: Another take on the 'one-hour' dungeon.

Quickly, Quietly, Carefully, 20 Jan: Another one hour dungeon. I like this one better than his first above.

Aeons & Augauries, 20 Jan: A hand drawn dungeon map.

Sickly Purple Death Ray, 19 Jan: A map of caves. I love maps. Of caves. I love this cave.

Sickly Purple Death Ray, 05 Jan: A map of a sunken temple. Nice old school look to it as well.

And then I take a look at the archives at SPDR and realize that there are a whole lot of maps there that I absolutely dig. Which really shouldn't be a surprise considering who it is that writes the SPDR blog. So now I'm going to have to delve into them. BUT I don't have time to link to them all here; perhaps I'll do that in a future roundup.

Sorcerer Under Mountain, 20 Dec: A nice little hand drawn map of a continent, The Continent of Terror!

Gnumerous Gnomes, 31 Dec : A tiny write-up of a city, Sparrowton, but placed on a nice looking hex map. This is a new blog to me, but I've come across several map-related posts. Here goes:

Gnumerous Gnomes, 05 Dec: A write-up of the nation of Anders, and a nice hex map to illustrate.

Gnumerous Gnomes, 05 Dec (#2): A write-up of the nation of the Steampine Dwarves, and the obligatory hex map.

Tower of the Archmage, 21 Jan: Another one-hour map, hand drawn. Everybody's doing it.

A character for every game, 21 Jan: Hand drawn map of The Lost Crypts. This guy can map!

A character for every game, 14 Jan: Hand drawn map of Peridane's Tomb.

The Alexandrian, 19 Jan: A really nice post containing a map (linked) and a detailed discussion of playing in a megadungeon and his thoughts on DMing it. A new blog to me, but if the quality of the posts continues to be at this level, I can see myself spending a lot of time here.

The Alexandrian, Halls of the Mad Mage: A one-page pdf detailing a relatively small dungeon. I've linked to it, because I like the clean, simple look of the included map.

Greyhawk Grognard, 06 Sep (2010): I don't know if I've linked to this post before or not--I can't remember and haven't taken the time to research it. Anyway, a poster sized map of the Castle of the Mad Archmage--in old school cyan blue!

Telecanter's Receding Rules, 21 Jan: A map in this post, but the main draw is not the map--it is the content. Telecanter expresses the desire for a "How to Host an Empire" similar to Tony Dowler's "How to Host a Dungeon" that would serve as "an abstract, generative system for developing world history". This is actually a FABULOUS idea and something that my older brother and I have often considered. Our original idea grew from the tables in AD&D's Oriental Adventures to determine events in a realm over time. It is something that I would love to work on. Perhaps some day...

Forgotten Runes, 15 Jan: Mapping the world in hexes. Good post. And I really dig the background on this blog.

I'll take a stab at it

2011-01-20T17:48:00.000-06:00

So lot's of people have been posting 'One-Hour' Dungeons. Dungeons that they sat down and drew in one hour.

And I decided that I would take a stab at it. After all, I love maps, right?

So I gathered all of my supplies: a black Pilot G-1 0.7mm gel pen, a Fine Point black Sharpie, a straight edge, and a sheet of graph paper. I had (so I thought) set aside one hour of time in which to draw. Conditions were perfect.

Conditions were perfect. (Inside joke--anyone know 'Flight of the Concordes'?)

That is, except for the sleeping baby in the other room. But she was going to sleep for a lot longer than the one hour that I needed, right?

I sat down to start and this is what I came up with in 43 minutes.

(Why did I stop at 43 minutes? Well, the sleeping baby woke up and started to cry. Stop, calm the baby, scan the above picture, and put it away. I put it away, because I felt that it would be inappropriate to look at it until I was ready to finish it. (It's a one-hour dungeon isn't it?) Several hours later, I pull it out and draw for the last 17 minutes.)

Here is the finished dungeon:

Overall, I gotta say that I am happy with it. I really like how it looks visually--aesthetically. It's also a lot better than I thought that it would turn out considering it is all in ink--no way to make changes, erase, or revise. Definitely not the normal way to draw a dungeon. From a dungeon design standpoint, however, I don't really think that it is that good. I don't particularly like the layout of it all that much. And frankly, I think that the ample use of caverns was a cop-out. They are much easier (for me) to draw when hurrying.

One last thought. In this case, I didn't really have an idea of a 'backstory' for the dungeon. I just sat down and started drawing, stream of consciousness. I wonder if it would have turned out any differently if I had any ideas about it before I started. Something to think about for in the future.

Map Roundup - 19 January

2011-01-19T00:15:00.000-06:00

Time for another roundup.

Aeons & Augauries, 13 Jan: A hex map in 3D. Pretty nifty.

Aeons & Augauries, 14 Jan: More cool 3D hex mapping.

Planet Algol, 16 Jan: A dungeon map in one hour. Really nice idea, and some thing that I'll have to try sometime soon.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Jan: A one-hour dungeon map inspired by the above post, this one using Adobe Illustrator.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Jan (#2): Another one-hour dungeon, this time build with geomorphs.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Jan (#3): Yet another one-hour dungeon, this time hand drawn.

I See Lead People, 15 Jan : Three "quick and dirty" city-section maps. I like these for their simple style. They're nice to look at.

And now I'll delve into the map archives at I See Lead People as I don't believe that I've linked to this blog before:

I See Lead People, 09 Nov (2010): A really nice hand-drawn, black and white, hex map of a large region. I really like this map. It's of a place called Elwyren.

I See Lead People, 23 May (2010): Some fantastic maps from the old Imagine Magazine. A castle, dwarven complex, an inn, and a temple.

I See Lead People, 22 May (2010): More of the above from Imagine.

I See Lead People, 22 May (2010) (Again): Still more.

Old 4 Eyes Den, 10 Jan: I love wandering across new blogs for the first time. Here's a new one (to me). The post has a map of a little dungeon called "The Training Dungeon" and a playing session recap.

Old School Heretic, 15 Jan: No maps visible in this post, but about maps nonetheless. Node maps, even.

The Mule Abides, 18 Jan: A cool map of NYC, and the announcement of an art show in NY about fantasy mapping.

The Mule Abides, 11 Jan: A post entitled "The Post Where I Give You Awesome Map Graphics." And IT ROCKS! Especially if you like trying to create outdoor regional maps on your computer.

The Mule Abides, 21 Dec: This is actually part 5 of a series of posts on creating a sandbox campaign map. Parts 1 - 4 were posted on Dec 8, 10, 14, and 16 and can be found here.

The Mule Abides, 25 Dec: Part 6 of the series mentioned just above. Really nice work here.

Fantastic Maps, 15 Jan: A nice color map from Jon Roberts, cartographer extraordinaire.

Indie eBook Publishing

2011-01-15T23:49:00.000-06:00

Yeah, what he said.

Map Roundup -- 13 January

2011-01-13T20:30:00.000-06:00

I know that I missed a bunch of map-related posts over the holidays. I'm also continuing to realize just how many great gaming blogs there are out there. Anyway, here is the first map roundup of the new year. Enjoy.

Havards Blackmoor Blog, 10 Jan: A post containing a map of Castle Blackmoor and links to a nifty little project--for those of you who dig Blackmoor.

Of course, old Havard has many map-related posts in his archives, so I'll link to them here (in chronological order):

Havards Blackmoor Blog, Oct 06 (2009): A B&W map whose style I enjoy and a link to an interesting theory regarding the history of Blackmoor maps.

Havards Blackmoor Blog, 21 Dec (2009): A very nice map of Blackmoor during the Age of the Wolf, which, if you are fan of Blackmoor, you will understand.

Havards Blackmoor Blog, 05 Apr (2010): A color hex map of a region of Blackmoor by one Dave L.

Havards Blackmoor Blog, 08 Apr (2010): More Blackmoor maps by Dave L.

The Tao of D&D, 20 Dec: I know that Alexis over at Tao has been working a wiki based on his campaign world and including maps and such. I have been remiss in not linking to any of his stuff before now, but here goes. He talks a little about and links to some of those maps in this post.

The Tao of D&D, 03 Jan: A really old real-world map and some maps from Alexis' world.

The Tao of D&D, 10 Jan: Maps from the 3rd updated a bit.

Lost Papers of Tsojcanth, 10 Jan : A link to some town maps and a link to some of Dyson's maps.

Aeons & Augauries, 10 Jan: A sketched campaign map in black and white.

Dreams in the Lich house, 12 Jan: A nice hex map of a Gothic Greyhawk. But even better, I like the idea that he proposes in this post. It is something that closely matches some of my own thinking. I definitely see the topic for a post of my own here.

The Book of Worlds, 03 Jan: Harald, the writer of this blog, complimented me in the comments section to one of my posts recently, which led me to jump over to his blog. Some really great stuff in it, and I've only read those posts visible from the front page. This post includes a map of New York City, but even better, it links to an article and pictures about urban spelunking. Awesome topic!

The Book of Worlds, 28 Oct (2010): I'm doing a little digging into Harald's past posts, looking at his Realms of Argos. What I like about his blog is that he uses photos of real world things to depict gaming locales and objects. His descriptions are also fantastic. This is a handdrawn map of his island of Cora.

The Book of Worlds, 22 Oct (2010) : Another high quality post. This regards the Kingdom of Pendrell.

The Book of Worlds, Atlas of Argos: Harald also has a flickr page where he houses some of his maps. Nice.

The Book of Worlds, 06 July (2010): No maps in this post, but a Metaphysical Topography of his world. (Basically, a map in words.)

Tower of the Archmage, 09 Jan: The title of this post is 'Megadungeon Map - Level 3.' It REQUIRES that I link to it. And it's a sweet looking map as well.

Tower of the Archmage, 12 Jan: Maps of outerspace are cool. Especially when they look as nice as this one.

Argh! OGRE!

2011-01-12T17:11:00.000-06:00

I have been scratching my head for about five weeks now, trying to remember the name of the armored warfare game where one side is played by many small units in battle against a single, large tank. Turns out--it's name is OGRE. Thanks to James M for posting about it.

My cousins owned it when I was a wee lad, and we played it several times. I really enjoyed that game.

Recently, when it popped into my head, I immediately thought of a game idea that, to me at least, is very similar. My idea is a small, hex based game where one player plays an assortment of footmen, soldiers, archers, etc. and heroes (slightly stronger versions of the previous) [the conventional vehicles, artillery, and troops of OGRE] and the other player plays a single dragon [the gigantic, artificially intelligent tanks in OGRE].

It would be a point-buy game where the one player can "purchase" whatever assortment of combatants he chooses while the dragon character purchases abilities for the dragon or characteristics of his lair (terrain obstacles that benefit him). Combat then goes down, and the winner wins.

(For all I know, this idea has already been done. I don't know of it if it has, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least. So if there is such a game in existence already, would someone please tell me?)

Assuming it hasn't been done, it is an idea that I would pursue if only I had the time to devote to it...

A Terrible Admission

2011-01-11T20:00:00.000-06:00

This post is going to be an admission, but before I get to that, I have two points to make.

First, I typically don’t get too worked up by what I read in the blogosphere. You occasionally come across vitriol and bitterness in flame-wars and such, and my response is to usually laugh at that stuff. Yes, hurtful things occasionally get said. Yes, some people reveal themselves to be total pricks. But most of it just rolls off—at least for me personally.

Secondly, I know that some people really DO NOT like what he has to say. There is a vocal minority that seems to really resent his opinions and believes that he is a pompous A-hole. I am NOT one of those people. Typically, I am in agreement with James M on what he says; Grognardia is a site that I visit without fail. But his point here is one that I do not agree with.

So here it is:

My Terrible Admission

Currently, I am not playing any rpgs. In fact, I haven’t played any in years.

There, I said it.

...

I don’t have the time. With a career, three small children, and a wife who has interests of her own, I cannot support the time expenditure required. Does that mean that I should just hang up this blogging thing?

For me, I blog (and try to be involved in this online community) specifically because I don’t have time to play. Of the two, blogging takes up less time than playing would. If I made the decision to play, I certainly couldn’t play and blog at the same time. It would be impossible.

I am envious of those of you who play—more envious of you who write amazing blogs and still have time to play. But that is just not going to be me anytime soon.

Needless to say, I disagree with James’ assertion that people who write about playing should be playing as a prerequisite to writing about it.

To Win Boriscalion

2011-01-10T20:17:00.000-06:00

Back in the late eighties and early nineties, I was trying to get myself published in Dungeon magazine. I sent them several query letters, most of which were politely declined with their standard rejection letter. Then, finally, after six or eight attempts, they sent me the "your idea sounds intriguing, why don't you send us a completed manuscript" letter.

The adventure was called "To Win Boriscalion". It was a single player vs. DM adventure for a 1st - 3rd level fighter. A fairly straightforward dungeon crawl, the fighter was to enter an abandoned keep and search for any treasure he might find. The big treasure was "Boriscalion", a magical sword with orc-slaying powers. The idea was that it would be the first magical sword the PC would obtain. Basic concept I know, but I thought that it worked.

I thought that until I received the rejection letter from Dungeon--signed by none other than Wolfgang Baur. The points that they raise are valid, although with a little tweaking they could be fixed. The reason that I didn't fix them is that, at the time, Dungeon was no longer looking for AD&D adventures.

For posterity's sake, here is the rejection letter that they sent me:

And since this is a blog mainly about mapping, here are the maps that I submitted with the manuscript.

Perhaps I'll take the time to rewrite "To Win Boriscalion" and offer it as a free download--or maybe even as a product for sale. Yet one more example of "If I only had more time..."

One Year

2011-01-09T23:46:00.000-06:00

So 2011 is off to a slow start--for this blog. But I can at least say that it is now One Year Old!!

A year and a day or two. It all started here.

Mmmmm...

What is it about people that makes us want to commemorate essentially pointless dates?

"Our EPT?"

2011-01-07T16:48:00.000-06:00

Interesting post from the Windy City Wiz, but I'm wondering if I agree with him.

I think that there are new and original things being done that haven't been done before. The Wiz claims that Raggi is an ass but respects him for what he is doing with his products.

How about Al's Warriors of the Red Planet? (Yes, I know I linked to the blog, but, in case you are not aware, that blog is supporting a game that Al will be releasing (hopefully) this spring.)

I know that there are others out there, and a few are mentioned in the comments following the Wiz's post.

My feeling is that there is a lot of stuff going on that is interesting.

2011!

2011-01-04T13:29:00.000-06:00

Yes, it has been for several days now. Crazy, how that works.

But since the last time that I posted (over a week ago), Christmas came and went, New Years came and went, and my latest birthday came and went. Yup, a year older.

During that time, I checked out of the blogosphere almost completely. Not only that, I was on my computer only a little bit each day. AND there were days when I didn't check my email at all.

Usually, when I sit down to write a post, I do so after reading throughout the blogosphere. I get good ideas; I get inspired; I find good maps. I haven't done that today. I'm assuming that there were a lot of 'resolutions' posts from various bloggers about the new year, so I'm going to offer some of my own:

- The Fantasy Cartographic will release at least two new products this year for sale.

- I'm going to jump on the geomorph bandwagon and begin posting geomorphs here on the blog in the same format as Dyson Logos, Risus Monkey, and Stonewerks.

- I'm going to work on updating 'My Daily Read' (which you'll find if you look to your right) so that it actually again matches the blogs that I follow on a daily basis--and includes ones that actualy post with some regularity.

- I'm going to work on a few other writing projects, that have been sitting on the backburner for WAY too long.

And that wraps up my first post of 2011. A few more days will mark the One Year Anniversary of this place. Perhaps some sort of retrospective is in order. Then again, perhaps not.

D&D in the Spotlight

2010-12-25T23:07:00.000-06:00

For a lot of people living in the UK, Jonathan Ross is kinda (great word, eh?) a big deal. Television and radio personality, famous, wealthy, etc, etc.

His name is attached to a recent poll that was conducted in the UK regarding the 100 greatest 'toys' of all time. Check out what made #3 on the list. Nice.

Oh, and by the way, Merry Christmas!

Three Warriors

2010-12-23T19:24:00.000-06:00

The second installment of my gaming archive. Today, I thought that I would include three drawings. When I drew them, the idea was that they were going to be carvings on a stone wall or engravings on metallic objects (either a shield, breastplate, or something else).

I don't remember if these were to depict specific people or what, but I do like how they look. Hopefully, a few of you might as well.

Caped Viking.

Roman Centurion.

The Brute

And the last is my favorite. I think that it was the last one that I drew.

My Gaming Archive - 21 December

2010-12-21T15:00:00.000-06:00

Jim Pacek over at Carjacked Seraphim (which by the way is one of my favorite blog names in all of the blogosphere--did he just make that up or did he steal if from somewhere?) recently posted about a Time Capsule of sorts, a drawer in a filing cabinet of his that contains years and years of gaming materials.

I think most of us can relate.

Anyway, I'm in the process of going through all of my old stuff, trying to sort the wheat from the chaff, and trying to decide what I really want and what can be gotten rid of. In the process, of course, I am coming across all sorts of treasures of my own. I'm going to start posting about them, and this is the first such post.

I have for you here a simple dungeon map (of course--how else would I start a new regulare feature?). I drew it on some engineering graph paper--do you know the kind? The front side is blank and the grid is on the back--a handy invention indeed. Never used it for anything, and now that I've looked at it a bit, I realize that it isn't even finished. Oh well.

I drew it in college during a time when I wasn't even gaming.

Map Roundup - xx December

2010-12-21T00:21:00.000-06:00

Yet another map roundup.

Jeff's Gameblog, 17 Dec: Some hex maps from the campaign of the Rients.

The Nine and Thirty Kingdoms, 17 Dec: A geomorph--everybody's doing it.

The Nine and Thirty Kingdoms, 17 Dec (#2): Two geomorphs--one of them fixed?

The Nine and Thirty Kingdoms, 18 Dec: The geomorph kick continues (False Well 2).

The Nine and Thirty Kingdoms, 19 Dec: A geomorph and a punch in the face!

Greyhawk Grognard, 18 Dec: World of Greyhawk maps done in Hexographer. And since I was here, I figured that I research GG's archives. Came up with the following two posts:

Greyhawk Grognard, 05 Jun: A Verbobonc wilderness map.

Greyhawk Grognard, 04 Jun: A Greyhawk wilderness map.

Carjacked Seraphim, 11 Dec - xx Dec: The Seraphim continues his series about his dungeon, The Evil Temple of Fraz-Urb'Luu. The posts are here: 11 Dec. 12 Dec. 12 Dec (#2). 13 Dec. 15 Dec. 15 Dec (#2).

JoetheLawyer's Wondrous Imaginings, 19 Dec: The title of this post is 'Hundreds of Free Authentic Maps of England, Scotland, and Wales, From the Middle Ages to the Present.' Yeah, that pretty much explains it.

A character for every game, Maps: WOW! Let me repeat that, in case you didn't hear me the first time: WOW! Thirty-five maps PLUS links to others, all hand-drawn, all beautiful.  THIS link is the reason that I do these map roundups. So I don't have to link to every one of them, Dyson posted all of his maps in one post. (Okay, his doing it didn't really have anything to do with me--but I can pretend it does, can't I?)

Planet Algol, 19 Dec : The title to this post is 'Megadungeon Maps (Spoilers!)' How can I not link to it? But then I realize that I haven't dug into the Algol archives for maps yet, so I do so, and that leads me to the following:

Planet Algol, 26 Aug: A cave map and some other things.

Planet Algol, 08 Aug: You know, this one looks familiar to me. I might have linked to it in the past. Anyway, a dungeon map.

Planet Algol, 03 Aug: Another dungeon map--this one does NOT look familiar to me.

Planet Algol, 14 Jul: There is actually no map in this post--but it talks about keying a hex map. (Probably not the same as keying your car.)

Planet Algol, 01 May: Shrine of the Lavender Cocoon.

Planet Algol, 01 May (#2): Black Smoke Razor Labyrinth.

Planet Algol, 28 Mar: A dungeon in thirds.

Aeons & Augauries, 18 Dec: Hexagonal cave geomorphs, part 5.

Aeons & Augauries, 18 Dec (#2): Hexagonal cave geomorphs,  part 6.

Aeons & Augauries, 19 Dec (#1): Hexagonal cave geomorphs,     part 7.

Aeons & Augauries, 19 Dec (#2): Hexagonal cave geomorphs,   part 8.

Aeons & Augauries, 20 Dec: This man can make geomorphs. Caves, part 9.

Aeons & Augauries, 20 Dec (#2): Here comes part 10, right at ya!

Portfolio: Small Dungeon

2010-12-19T22:20:00.000-06:00

Here is another dungeon map, a small one with some more and different features. Like some of my previous pieces, this actually came from somewhere in the blogosphere. I just fixed it up and made it look at little better.

Hottest Blogs

2010-12-19T08:00:00.000-06:00

Thank you to Cyclopeatron for his continued ranking of blogs.

I suppose that I am luke-warm? Better than being cold.

Map Roundup - 18 December

2010-12-18T04:00:00.000-06:00

(Do I need to make any comment before I start listing posts? Or should I just shut up and get on with it? Yeah, how about I do that.)
Aeons & Augauries, 08 Dec: Geomorphs built into hexes. JD does not quit!

Aeons & Augauries, 08 Dec: Hex geomorphs, part deux.

Aeons & Augauries, 09 Dec: And if you needed it, some handy thoughts on using geomorphs yourself.

Aeons & Augauries, 16 Dec: Hexagonal cave geomorphs, part 1.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Dec: Hexagonal cave geomorphs, part 2.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Dec (#2): A dungeon-stocking challenge (in cave geomorph) with a tesseract.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Dec (#3): Hexagonal cave geomorphs, part 3.

Aeons & Augauries, 17 Dec (#4): Hexagonal cave geomorphs, part 4

Forgotten Runes, 27 Nov: A 'concept sketch' of a city. With dragons.

Forgotten Runes, 05 Dec: Plan of a longhouse. Good for instilling a little historical accuracy in your game.

Forgotten Runes, 11 Dec: A map of a city above a dungeon.

Forgotten Runes, 11 Dec: Another map of a the city above the dungeon.
And there are other posts at Forgotten Runes. I will link to them at some point...

Forgotten Runes, 17 Dec: A wilderness hex map at five miles per hex.

Forgotten Runes, 17 Dec (#2): It's almost like a map roundup of Forgotten Runes maps.

The Mule Abides, 08 Dec: Creating a sandbox on the fly, and some decent maps and talk of maps.

The Mule Abides, 10 Dec: A vast world, in watercolor.

The Mule Abides, 14 Dec: Wherein we continue from the prebious post by zooming in a bit.

The Mule Abides, 16 Dec: Finer and finer detail in a continuation from above. Adding villages, castles, ruins, etc.

The Mule Abides, 18 Dec: A little advertisement for a little dungeon art show--and it's from one of My Daily Read.
Huge Ruined Pile, 10 Dec: Here's a post about Risk Godstorm, a variant of one of my all-time favorite board games. I've never actually played this variant, but the map looks cool.

Dungeons and Digressions, 10 Dec: The gnoll lair map from Keep on the Borderlands in notecard format.

In Places Deep, 10 Dec: A really good post about mapping. Contains some good little advice for greating wilderness maps.

Carjacked Seraphim, 03 Dec - 10 Dec: The Seraphim ran a series of posts about a dungeon called The Evil Temple of Fraz-Urb'Luu that he created many moons ago. Obviously, the temple map is what initially caught my eye about these posts, but I really enjoyed his recollections of actually running the adventure and his thoughts on dungeon design. Here are the links in chronological order: 03 Dec. 04 Dec. 05 Dec. 06 Dec. 10 Dec.

Bugbears for Breakfast, Anytime: As long as his top banner is that sweet hex map, this (new to me) blog will always have a place in a map roundup.

BigDungeon, 05 Dec: This post shows five levels of a dungeon stacked on top of each other, first in 2D, and then in 3D. Fantastic.

BigDungeon, 08 Dec: Dungeon mapping symbols. Always useful.

And... I'm spent. See you next time.

Portfolio: Two Houses (And a Contest)

2010-12-17T13:14:00.000-06:00

Continuing with a portfolio of my maps, here are two more that I made. As before, both of these maps may be familiar to people who inhabit our little corner of the blogosphere. Also as before, PLEASE, PLEASE do NOT comment where either of these came from--part of the deal is that their identity remain a secret. Also, I do have the permission of the original map owners to post them here.

We have, first, a big house:

And now we have a slightly smaller house:

To be quite honest, the first map is a bit more obscure than the second (at least to my mind, you may disagree with me). So to make things interesting, I shall propose a small contest. If anyone can tell me IN AN EMAIL, NOT IN THE COMMENTS where the first map (top map, the big house) came from, I will give you a free copy of any two of the products on sale at my RPGNow store--you get to pick 'em! My email address is fantasy.cartographic@gmail.com. This contest shall remain open until midnight, Eastern Standard Time, Sunday night, December 19th. I will read all emails that I receive with the subject line 'Map Contest' and the first person to correctly state where that map was originally found will win. I will then contact that person by email on Monday to arrange prize delivery.

Portfolio: A Dungeon Map

2010-12-16T00:10:00.000-06:00

In this post, I am going to do what I did as a youngster that would always annoy my older brother: I am going to post an image of someone else's map.

Actually, it isn't quite someone else's map, it is actually my reproduction of a map that, in my opinion, is more aesthetically pleasing than the original. I am posting it to show people what I can do. Call it an entry in my cartographic portfolio, if you will.

This map is one that may be familiar to some people in our little corner of the hobby. If you recognize it, please, PLEASE do not name it or where it came from. I don't want to give anything away. Lest anyone get their panties in a wad, I do have the permission of the original map's owner to post my version here.

It is, as I said above, a dungeon map:

Encouragement for rpg Blogging

2010-12-13T23:03:00.000-06:00

Most of us had one: That person who introduced us to rpg's back when we were younger. For me, that person was my older brother. He owned the LBBs; he owned the AD&D books; he owned a bunch of modules; he owned a bunch of miniatures. He taught me to play at a very young age--or maybe not, seven or eight I think.

Anyway, we were typing back and forth the other day at each other. The conversations went basically like this:

Me: You said that you were looking at some old notes and got excited again. Anything good? How about you type up some of your old notes into a formal adventure, I draw the map, and we publish it? The Fantasy Cartographic could use some new products...

Him: hhmm.... what say we publish a setting? We had started one several years ago.

Me: Couple of thoughts:
- Settings are a dime a dozen. Unless it is a small area nicely detailed (a single island, single kingdom, single city), or a large area (typically nowadays mapped on a hex map) with numerous specific locations detailed in the text.
(Advantage of the small area is that it can easily be dropped into someone's existing campaign. Advantage of the large area is that any one of the specific locations that you choose to detail can, by itself, be dropped into an existing campaign.)
- Why not start with some thing easier--aka an adventure? (Easier in terms of length, complexity, just about everything I can think of.)
- How about start slow and (eventually) build up to a setting?

Him: LOL... only because my mind doesn't work that way! I'll try to come up with an adventure, but don't expect anything soon... in a few weeks, though, I'll suddenly "remember" an adventure, along with an entire world. The difficulty isn't in the ideas, it's in the editing and pruning process.

When it comes to me, it's truly like remembering, bits and pieces, then whole swaths, then worlds. I've never written a novel, because it would come out more like an encyclopedia. Perhaps I could write a travelogue and have you map it... but I know that was done in Dragon years ago.

Me: Well, if that's the case, why don't you start writing a blog with each post being about some aspect of one of the worlds? There are a great many such blogs with people just detailing their campaigns, and all the cool shit in them. They get widely read, too.

The advantage of that is that once you establish yourself in the blogosphere, you can THEN prune it into a nice, easily-digestible format and sell the setting. Since you're already known by your blog, you drastically up the sales that you will receive.

And if you don't want to start your own blog, you can guest-post on my blog.

Him: I'd have to read some others to see how they're set up... any recommendations?

At which point I pointed him in the direction of some of the many blogs that lots of us enjoy that discuss all sorts of goodness.

But I would really like him to start a blog. It could be incredible. Anyone want to leave a comment for him to encourage him or otherwise comment on the blogging experience? That would be nice.

Locales Redux

2010-12-09T23:36:00.000-06:00

One of my intents in starting this blog was as a place to post maps that I had worked on. I now realize that this blog is all about maps, but contains very few maps of its own--very few maps of my own.

I'm going to try to remedy that, and this will be the first post to do so.

What follows is a short bit of flavor text and then a series of maps. This is something that I created about two years ago. The text and maps describe the Rock at Morgus Cray, a location in my campaign world. The Rock is a rocky peninsula that juts out from a coastline; it is surrounded by columns of stone that are slowly breaking off from the peninsula and crumbling into the sea due to the action of the surf. A light house sits at its peak.

“The Rock at Morgus Cray was not remarkable in any way; it was like a dozen other peninsulas along the treacherous Iron Coast. But it was midway between Sempus Delve to the north and the wealthy port cities of the Sarsiss to the south.

I was a Mate to Shezzar KiNeel of the Strong Runner, when, on our fourth journey past the rock, we strayed too close. The Runner’s back was broken on the rocks, and she was sinking fast. Although not yet fully confident in the ways of the sea, I was smart, and observant. I made my way to KiNeel’s cabin as he was fighting to save his ship. There, I stole two rings. One, a Ring of the Scaly Deep, granted me waterbreath. The second afforded me protection against the cold waters. Old KiNeel at some point realized that he was going to loose his ship. He found me in his cabin, caught red-handed as it were, but he was too late. The rigors and cold water had taken their toll on him. As the Runner disintegrated on the rocks, I was the only to survive.

While the water and cold could not have killed me, the battering waves would have, if it weren’t for the existence of something that none of us were aware of--something that could not be seen from seaward. There was a channel through the rocks! I followed it, and it was then that I found it. The cavern!

I stayed there for three days, for I was afraid of the power of the waves. It was only hunger that drove me—drove me to explore the inner reaches of the cavern. In the darkness, I could only find my way by touch; I could make no fire. So I probed and climbed, and found a way out, up to the tower on the Rock.

The Seafarer’s Guild had built the string of lighted towers up and down the Iron Coast. The automaton left there should have been able to provide me with some food and water. And it did, as well as dutifully recording my presence in its log. But the tower had not been provisioned in many months, and the automaton did not have much to help me. It was then that I understood the waning power of the Seafarer’s Guild. And a plan began to form in my mind…”

-- Basid Wavern to a group of new “recruits”
-- Overheard and recorded by Amshir Dysa and later presented to the Council at Skror Ferry

Within days of making this report to the Council, Amshir Dysa was presented with the Black Sigil and thereafter slain. Several members of the Council attribute the veracity of the tale to the fact that Dysa was marked and then killed in Wavern’s typical style. Others, however, do not believe Wavern to be so strategically naïve as to blatantly order a revenge killing based on a report that would be difficult at the time, if not impossible, to verify.

The first map is of the entire peninsula including the lighthouse and surround ocean. The ocean colors indicate depth contours while the lines on land indicate height contours above the water line.

The black and white version of the above.

Focused on the end of the peninsula.

View of the cavern at sea level. This map also shows that some of the columns have been hollowed out and are linked to the main cave by treacherous rope-and-plank bridges.

The second level of the sea caves.

So there you have it. I would love for people to use this location in their own games. If you do, please drop me a comment.

Map Roundup - 07 December

2010-12-08T00:25:00.000-06:00

Here we go again.

Aeons & Augauries, 04 Dec: A hex map of No Man's Land in the Great War.

Aeons & Augauries, 05 Dec: A continuation of the above--I feel bad for Paris. (The city, not the character from mythology.)

Aeons & Augauries, 07 Dec: The geomorph train continues, this time with triangles sure to upset your mapping players.

Axe & Hammer, 05 Dec: Grendelwulf continues his series on Greyhawk with some beauties--world maps of various Greyhawks. Really nice.

Robin D. Laws, 19 Nov: Sure, I've heard of Robin D. Laws, but I didn't know that he had a blog. I've certainly never visited it before now. But, I'm there for five minutes, and I come across this post. Lo-tech map that I really like. Go figure.

Dungeons and Digressions, 06 Dec: Continuing the disection of the Caves of Chaos, ze bulette brings us the shunned cavern and minotaur caves.

Dungeons and Digressions, 07 Dec: Take some Caves of Chaos, mix them with Sketchup, and crank out a 3D view of the canyon.

A Palidin in Citadel, 06 Dec: A nice little location map--I really like its style.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 22 Oct: I know that I've come across this blog before, but I'm not sure if I've referenced it in my map roundups before. If not, shame on me! I've found a wealth of mapping goodness and so I'm going to share it with you. This post is about geography or not. The following are in reverse chronological order:

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 23 Aug: Dungeons in America; this one in L.A.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 20 Aug: A 'map' of the anatomy of a monster. I really like this post, because I have often contemplated an adventure wherein the PCs are shrunken down to microscopic size and sent into a dragon, a la Fantastic Voyage. I've drawn several sketches of dragon anatomy, but never got around to writing the actual adventure.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 12 Aug: Fantasy maps in comics. Nice.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 25 Jun: Real world dungeon environments and maps. While the maps are key here, the best thing about this post is that it shows that dungeons can be 'realistic' as an adventure setting. I thumb my nose at all of those people who say dungeons are unrealistic!

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 20 Jun: A castle in America, and it is mapped!

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 26 May: I don't know Skartaris, but I sure like the map of it.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 24 May: Another comic fantasy map.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 21 May: Another American dungeon. Not a great map, but definitely an interesting location.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 16 May: More castleage in America.

From the Sorcerer's Skull, 02 May: A hand drawn D&D dungeon map from a long time ago. It's always interesting to compare others' maps with my own from the early days so these types of posts are really enjoyable.

Some King's Kent, 07 Dec: A continued look at the megadungeon that made him famous. This time it is two pits.

For those of you who are unfamiliar, the Knights & Knaves Alehouse is a handy place to hang around. Their forums are home to many interesting discussions on all sorts of topics. Although, if I am going to be honest, I most enjoy their Megadungeons! subforum. These people are experts when it comes to megadungeons, both in discussion and in mapping: Here is a map of the first level of a megadungeon. And then glance, for instance, at this nice picture of a megadungeon map (level two of the previous). To me, this is what 'mega' should mean when referring to a megadungeon.

So that's all for this edition. I'm going to have to catalog all of the posts that I am linking to in these roundups, if only to ensure that I don't repeat in the future. At the same time, I plan on going back to my earlier roundups and putting them into this format, if only to make my life easier when looking for things.

Questions of Legality and Recourse

2010-12-05T23:49:00.000-06:00

So by no means do I fancy The Fantasy Cartographic anything more than a hobbyist venture. As much as I would love to devote more time to my little rpg publishing experiment, family and career ensure that it will remain something to do on the side, something that, since I began, has made me only enough money to basically partake of this hobby for free. For the foreseeable future, that will remain the case.

With that being said, I was over at RPGNow.com the other day, and I ran across this. For those of you who choose not to click, the link leads to a product page at RPGNow for a Pathfinder rpg supplement detailing a new character class called 'The Martialist Base Class' from a company called Little Red Goblin Games.

This caused me to raise my eyebrows a little bit, as I put out a product back in the summer of 2009 for 4E (which I realize most readers around here do not play) called Fantasy Class: Martialist and, before that, a free preview, called Fantasy Class Preview: The Martialist Heroic. I was extremely proud of these products; not only do I believe that they are visually on par with a lot of the 'professional' products being produced, it was the one product to this day that I had an art budget for. (For the record, I highly recommend VShane for your illustration needs.)

The Martialist class that I had developed was an unarmed fighter that was not a monk. There is no mysticism or Eastern philosophy in its conception.

Anyway, I know that 'martialist' is not a common title. Frankly, if the nice people at Little Red Goblin Games had read some of the reviews of my product, they might have chosen a different name for the class, as it wasn't much appreciated. But what is the chance that those little goblins came up with the name on their own and also attached it to an unarmed combatant class?

So the questions are this: Is there anything to do? Should I just let it go? Am I being a buffoon for even getting upset about this?

I think that the answers to these questions may be 'No', 'Yes', and 'Possibly', but I'm interested in hearing what others think.

Map Roundup - 04 December

2010-12-04T23:23:00.000-06:00

It's that time again.

Axe & Hammer, 02 Dec: Greyhawk City, in multiple maps of varying quality. If you like fantasy city maps, you should like this post.

Axe & Hammer, 28 Nov: Dungeons and E. Gary Gygax, and some nice maps, too.

Roles, Rules, and Rolls, 27 Nov: In which Roger discusses mapping woes, and asks about what type of mapping software to use.

In Like Flynn, 24 Nov: This post doesn't contain a map but it talks about maps. And megadungeons. But mainly I'm linking to it here, because I agree with his views on these subjects. I, too, believe that a megadungeon, played in the right way, can very easily be an enjoyably experience for 'modern' gamers who like a more cinematic experience in their gaming.

In Like Flynn, 28 Nov: A hex-based world map. I really like this map, because it looks more 'realistic' than many world maps I see. The geography, the order of the continents spread over the ocean, etc. all really speak to me.

Being an Online Dungeon Master, 03 Dec: This is a blog that I probably wouldn't have come across in my normal wanderings as it is mostly about 4E (which I have little interest in these days) but it contains some nice map-related posts, so I found myself poking around. Following are some links to other posts from the blog.

Being an Online Dungeon Master, 02 Dec: A decent encounter map in a wilderness area.

Being an Online Dungeon Master, 28 Jun: The old manila folder with the hand drawn map!

Being an Online Dungeon Master, 'Maps' Category: This is a link to all of the blog's map posts. Most have to do with online and computer mapping using specific software (Maptool), which really doesn't interest me. Although it might interest you.

Book of Worlds, Argos Atlas: This link leads to a collection of hand drawn maps on Flickr posted by the author of The Book of Worlds, a new (to me) blog that I recently came across. This blog is also going to appear in another post that I am working on.

Coutdown to Game Time: No, I haven't found any map-related posts on this new (again, to me) blog, but I found that Carto Cacography is listed on his 'Gratuitous Linkage' list and thought that that was pretty cool. So I'm including a link to it here as a way of saying thanks.

The Hopeless Gamer, 03 Dec: A map of an adventure in 3D. Something that I could never pull off...

I see Lead People, 03 Dec: Maybe I'm stretching a bit by including this link, but it kinda looks like a map. And it's about a Navy...sorta.

Beyond the Black Gate: Lands of Lyrion Campaign Setting. A 2 page pdf detailing a campaign setting and including a campaign map in hex.

Beyond the Black Gate: Lands of Lyrion Fan Map. A very nice looking campaign map.

Another thing that I occassionally spend time doing is looking at the latest map-related offerings at RPGNow.com (outside of my own). Quite often, publishers will make available nice maps as part of their free previews (especially the free downloadable pdf previews). From time to time, I will include links to those products that have a decent free maps associated with it. Here is one I came across a few days ago:

Headless Hydra Games, Barrowdelve Map Pack. I really like the map of the dungeon complex here. I might steal it for my own gaming use.

"New" Product for Release

2010-12-03T09:13:00.000-06:00

Several months ago, I wrote a post about three products that I have for sale at RPGNow.com. The punchline of that post was me telling you not to purchase any of them. And I was serious. (Seriously. Go read that post if you don't believe me.)

Basically, as discussed in an even earlier post, I feel that the price-to-quality ratio of those products is poor at their current price. If you were to ask me today, I would still tell you not to purchase them.

In that same post, I explained why I felt that way, and then went on to tell you about a compilation of those three products, to be called Basic Maps. The idea behind Basic Maps was to take the maps in those three products, make them a little prettier, then combine them into a single document, and put them back on sale at a much reduced price. (At the same time, I will discontinue the sale of the original products.)

This post is to announce that I have finally completed that project. Basic Maps is now on sale at RPGNow for $2.30. It contains 39 maps that I feel are pretty spiffy. (Or, at least spiffy enough to charge you just under six cents per map, which was the point of the earlier post.) Hopefully, some of you will feel the same way. Please go check it out.

Sales Figures - For Another

2010-12-01T23:41:00.000-06:00

My density knows no bounds. I only just a few days ago realized that John Stater over at Land of Nod is pursuing the publishing thing in a big way. Yes, I've come across his blog a few times, but for whatever reason have never spent much time there (Sorry, John!). That's not to say that I wasn't impressed with his stuff--it's just that I always had other things to be reading.

Anyway, just a little while ago, he posted this. (In case you didn't follow that link, it was a November Sales Report for his material.) As someone who dabbles in the publishing side of things, I really appreciate his willingness to put out these numbers. In my opinion, it would be fantastic if everyone who is putting out material, from those who are one step above amateurs to those who are one step below professionals, would publish their sales results.

A lot of the blogs that we are all familiar with are written by people who are also publishing material--seems to me they could all be making posts like this. Obviously, there is nothing that says that they have to do so, and I understand that people value their privacy, etc, etc. But I can't, for the life of me, come up with a good reason not to put out that information.

So, John, thanks for doing that.

If anyone is interested, here are his Sales Reports from the beginning:

June.

July.

August.

September.

October.

...

I figured that I would also post my historical sales figures--if only to demonstrate how well John is doing for himself.

I posted the first of my own Sales Reports back in January. You can read it here.

But it now seems that how ever dense I thought I was before completely missed the mark: I posted an updated Sales Report in July. You can read it here. If you want to understand embarassment, read the first sentence of the July Sales Report, then read this current post again.

Um, yeah. Sorry, John.

Map Roundup - 01 December

2010-11-30T22:23:00.000-06:00

The latest installment of my map roundups. I continue to be amazed at the brilliant mapping that is going on out there--from all over the blogosphere. And I continue to find new blogs that excite and inspire me. Enjoy.

In a Dark Cell, 10 Nov: A post about world (planetary) mapping with a hex map.

In a Dark Cell, 20 Nov: A continuation from the post above.

Some King's Kent, 25 Nov: Another look at his gigantic cavern system with MANY images.

Henchman Abuse, 16 Nov: A new blog (or at least new to me) with a conversion from a paper drawn map to a CC2 map.

Henchman Abuse, 20 Nov: The same map started in the previous post but with more work done to it.

Henchman Abuse, 25 Nov: Level 1 of a megadungeon map in the same style as the previous posts. Can I say that I REALLY like the look of this map? The layout is inspiring and, in my opinion, much better than a lot of maps that I've seen out there. Really nice.

Henchman Abuse, 03 Oct: Somewhat out of chronological order, but this post contains the handdrawn map that became the megadungeon map in the previous post. I really enjoy watching the progression of maps from initial design to completion so this was a fun one.

Henchman Abuse, 14 Sep: The first handdrawn map of the beginnings of a megadungeon project.

Fantastic Maps, 29 Nov: I am terribly frustrated that I only came across this blog recently. It is the personal blog of Jon Roberts, whose work I first became acquainted with back when I had the time to spend hours at the Cartographer's Guild. Jon is a class act and his cartography is amazing.

Sword & Shield, 27 Nov: Geomorphs seem to be all the rage these days. This post is a little geomorphing action combined with a nice little format to create a small dungeon experience.

Forgotten Runes, 27 Nov: Rough, hand drawn, but evocative. Lots of map posts on this blog. I'll need to spend more time here...

Old School Heretic, 30 Nov: A nice collection of links to mapping related things.

BigDungeon, 7 July: Another blog that I just came across--this one sounds like it will be right up my alley. It's initial post says this, "BigDungeon is going to be an ongoing development of a Big Dungeon (what the kids are calling a "MegaDungeon" lately) with maps and keys and all the assorted goodies..." Anyway, the post that I've linked to has the startings of a dungeon map made with a hex map instead of the normal grid map.

BigDungeon, 1 Sept: Another post from BigDungeon--the style that he intends to use for all of his mapping. Unfortunately, this is the most recent post, so I hope that this project is still going. (Quick aside: Wouldn't 'BigDungeon' be a great name for a professional wrestler?)

Aeons & Augauries, 28 Nov: A nice how-to regarding his geomorphs, if you need that sort of thing. This post is also handy because it includes links to all of the other blogs who are creating similar (and compatible) geomorphs.

Aeons & Aurgauries, 30 Nov: Link to a google doc that contains all of the (literally hundreds) of geomorphs that he has created over the last few weeks. Can I say that JDJarvis is a dungeon geomorphing maniac? I do want to add that I was going to include links to all of his posts, but when I saw this document that includes all of that good stuff, I decided not to.

I have to admit that I am starting to find keeping up with this stuff difficult. I know that there are posts out there that I missed in this roundup. I know that because I read them, and now can't find them. Shame on me for not keeping better notes.

Map Roundup - 24 November

2010-11-24T22:25:00.000-06:00

I'm not sure what is going on... Perhaps there are more fish in the sea; perhaps I am just casting my net further; perhaps the fish just want to be caught. Whatever it is, the last ten days have been amazing for mapping related posts throughout the blogosphere. This is the biggest map roundup to date, and these are all quality posts.

Enjoy!

Dungeons and Digressions, 11 Nov: Caves of Chaos, minidungeons, and index cards. A nice little post with a good downloadable resource.

Dungeons and Digressions, 12 Nov: The orc lairs from the Caves of Chaos, similar to the post above.

Dungeons and Digressions, 18 Nov: The kobold lair from the Caves of Chaos.

Dungeons and Digressions, 20 Nov: The bugbear lair from the Caves of Chaos.

Jeff's Gameblog, 09 Nov: Maps of Britain--gaming maps that is.

Some King's Kent, 20 Nov: The title of this post is "PDF Zoomable-Scrollable Megadungeon Maps". That pretty much fully explains it.

A Character For Every Game, 19 Nov: A Friday map posting...

Risus Monkey, 19 Nov: Number 99 in a long series of geomorphs.

In Like Flynn, 20 Nov: A campaign world map in hex. Also, includes a link to an image of a 'real' world map from ages past.

Stonewerks, 19 Nov: A new blog that I only (just now!) stumbled across. This is the most recent post, but just about everything at this blog is maptastic. I've only just begun perusing his older offerings. Much to do...

A Palidin in Citadel, 21 Nov: Maps of medieval castles and links to others.

Greyhawk Grognard, 21 Nov: The City of Greyhawk, in map form.

Telecanter's Receding Rules, 24 Nov: Musings on the map of an island. Contains both an old nautical chart of a real island and then the Google Earth image.

Beyond the Black Gate, 24 Nov: A very useful collection of links for mapping. Might as well save this to your favorites--great post.

Aeons & Augauries, 24 Nov: 55 dungeon geomorphs plus links to other places.
Aeons & Augauries, 24 Nov: Another 55 dungeon geomorphs.

Aeons & Augauries, 24 Nov: If the first 110 geomorphs were not enough, here are an additional 44.

Typically, these map roundups contain maps from the blogosphere, although I'm thinking of expanding that to include any good fantasy maps that I come across. Here you will find some little maps of a fictional town called Adelfarn. Also from that page, you will find lots of interesting material detailing that little town. If you like little towns, it might be worth a read.

That's all for now. Until next time, good mapping!

Duh.

2010-11-24T14:00:00.000-06:00

So my post here proves that sometimes I can be completely oblivious. Because, as a matter of fact, Cyclopeatron already updated the listing of OSR blogs in not one post but TWO.

This one shows the latest rankings, by follower, of the OSR blogs. (Yes... see his post for some caveats on that.)

This one shows the rankings as a delta of followers from one month to the next. Nice.

Forty

2010-11-23T22:42:00.000-06:00

Sometimes it's the little things that bring a smile to your face. Today, I received my 40th follower. Thanks, imredave, for being that guy.

Of course, what this really means is that I have become a Thinker. That's a good thing, right? Too bad there isn't a title for doodler or random-little-map-drawer--because that is probably more appropriate than 'Thinker'.

All of which reminds me of this nice post from Cyclopeatron from back in September. I wonder how that list would look if redone today? It doesn't really make a hill of beans, but it is interesting to watch trends and changes over time.

The Hidden Way

2010-11-23T14:00:00.000-06:00

The Hidden Way seems like it is an interesting collection of links and other material for use by rpg'ers. I recommend that you take a look at it.

Especially handy is the link under Settings, entitled World Building. Lot of useful stuff there.

Calific? You better believe it!

2010-11-22T19:37:00.000-06:00

This seems like an exciting development. As a fan of the science-fantasy genre, I am really looking forward to see how all this turns out. Good luck to them!

And Russ Nicholson is one of my favorite artists from the early days. He alone is worth whatever price they're going to charge. (Well, within reason...)

Magazines for Give-Away

2010-11-20T19:52:00.000-06:00

As a member of the US Armed Forces, I am expected to pick up everything and move myself every two to three years. With one exception, I have not lived anywhere for longer than three years in the last fourteen, and in some cases, I lived someplace for as little as three months.

I enjoy this lifestyle. I get to move alot; I get to see new places; I get to experience new people and things. Luckily, my wife also enjoys the lifestyle. Just as important, my kids seem okay with it.

One aspect of this lifestyle is that I get to sort through all of my belongings every few years. (For someone with packrat tendencies, this is a good thing.) To be honest, nothing forces me to look through my stuff, but when you watch a mountain of boxes being packed onto a moving truck and then unpacked a few weeks (or months) later every few years, you get the idea that that mountain should occasionally be downsized.

Today, as I was looking through boxes, I came across a stash of Dragon magazines that I completely forget that I owned. In the same box, I also came across some classic Golden Age D&D modules. Ka-ching!

But now we get to the meat of this post: I also came across a vast quantity of old magazines that I have no desire to own anymore. Having had subscriptions to many, I am now at a loss for what to do with them. Frankly, just chucking them in the trash (or recycling bin) seems like a colossal waste. In some cases, I've been holding on to them and carrything them around for 20+ years.

I have a fairly large collection of OMNI magazine, described on its wikipedia page as follows: "OMNI was launched by Kathy Keeton, long-time companion and later wife of Penthouse magazine publisher Bob Guccione, who described the magazine in its first issue as "an original if not controversial mixture of science fact, fiction, fantasy and the paranormal."

I also have a large collections of Family Computing magazine (and its later incarnations, "Family & Home Office Computing" and "Home Office Computing"). If you were into computers in the 1980's, you might remember this little gem.

(Not really science fiction, fantasy, or geek related, but I also have a massive collection of Boy's Life magazine, if anyone is interested. Any Boy Scouts out there feeling a bit nostalgic? Huh?)

All of the issues that I have are from the late 1970's through the early 1990's.

So, here is the question: What should I do with these?

I have some ideas, but here is my offer: I will give them away to anyone who wants them from me, for free. The only thing that you'll have to pay for is the postage. If anyone is interested in them, please let me know. Also, for those of you who have blogs of your own, please throw up a quick post and advertise this. I don't want to dump them in the trash, but that is where they will end up sometime before Christmas.

If anyone is interested, please drop a comment below, or send me an email at fantasy.cartographic@gmail.com.

Treasure Junk (Part 2)

2010-11-18T17:45:00.000-06:00

Here, I introduced you to the Chinese treasure junk, massive ships that existed in the 15th century AD. This post is a continuation of that one.

One of the reasons that I like the idea of a big ship is that it makes a bigger location to explore. I like location based adventures: I am a fan of dungeons; I am a fan of megadungeons. While no ship could be a megadungeon, it could make a very nice sized dungeon.

Previously, with my belief that the biggest ships of the day were perhaps 100x35 ft (and with 2-3 decks (levels) at most), I didn’t feel that there was enough room for exploration. Even when some of my PCs bought a ship for nautical exploration, and I was able to draw a floor plan for it, I was underwhelmed by the result.

BUT, when you have a ship that is 450x175 ft (and with 4-5 decks), you are looking at a large area to explore, as big if not bigger than the largest ‘published’ dungeons out there.

Here are some other possibilities for adventuring in such massive ships.

What if the ship moved while the PCs were exploring it? Say, for instance, a large, seemingly-abandoned ship appears on the coast of the realm where the PCs are based. The PCs find themselves sent out to explore it (pick your hook). They sail out (or fly out, or row out) and enter the vessel. After some exploration, they decide that they need to return to their home base for resupply, healing, etc. But as they exit the ship, they realize that it is no longer located where they entered it: Perhaps it has only moved some distance down the coast that they are familiar with; perhaps it is sitting off a coast that they do not recognize; perhaps it is in the open ocean with no means for the PCs to return home. [While the last might be a form of railroading, at least it is more believable than some other methods of doing so.]

Let’s say that you are not a fan of location-based adventures. Use it as you would a small town or a fort, where the social interactions, the conducting of daily business, etc become the fodder for interesting adventures. A ship of the size that I am referring to could quite possibly be larger than the smaller villages that occur in many of our games. All of those “village life” adventures could occur on a location that moves, en mass, from place to place.

And I will probably develop that idea further in the next post…

Treasure Junk

2010-11-17T23:54:00.000-06:00

Have you ever heard of these? Even better, go watch the 1-2 minute video to be found here. Wow--that blows my mind. Can you even imagine that?

So why are those ships a big deal? I've spoken earlier of my interest in naval campaigns, i.e. whole campaigns centered around exploration of seas and oceans. (A fantastic Greek Isles would make an amazing campaign--obviously!) But I've always felt that such a campaign would seem 'small' in some way--typically as a result of the small size of the vessels of the day.

Most D&D campaigns that I know of exist in that pseudo-historical period between 1000 and 1450 AD or so. And to my knowledge, before coming across the above, most common sea going vessels were shorter than 100 feet long and 30-35 feet wide. While I could easily imagine larger and even much larger ships in my fantasy settings, they didn't seem realistic (used in the loosest sense of the word) enough to warrant existence.

I realize that the entire above paragraph might rub some people the wrong way. (It's fantasy for goodness sake!) But I have always felt that some level of reality or at least verisimilitude was appropriate. Now that I know that wooden ships as long as 450 feet and almost 180 feet wide actually existed in the world in that time frame, I feel freed to include them in a campaign. Of course, the possibilities are endless.

But that is a topic for another time...

Map Roundup - 14 November

2010-11-14T00:16:00.000-06:00

Another map roundup. This one covers ground stretching back quite a ways. As I find it, I will catalog it.

Aeons & Augauries, 10 Nov: As long as JD Jarvis is going to keep posting maps from his playing past, I'm going to keep linking to them in these roundups. Especially when they are as awesome as this little, hand-drawn castle map.

Swords & Dorkery, 04 Nov: This post proves that sometimes you really have to work to get to the map. This is a post that includes the write-up for a small dungeon that it links to. The map, which is actually located on a Dragonsfoot forum posting, is of a small copper mine. It is hand drawn and has a nice 3D layout. Not a traditional "gridded" map, but a very nice one.

Some King's Kent, 14 Nov: A blog of which I've only just become aware. I'm linking to this post first, because it was the first that I came across, but I'm going to include others following in their chronological order. This one is about maps and megadungeons. What more can you ask for?

Some King's Kent, 19 Dec 2009: I like these cavern systems mainly because they look more "natural" than what one typically finds in gaming today. I also like the brief history of the caverns.

Some King's Kent, 18 Feb: It is Europe, but then, it really isn't. It might be better! And I really dig the black map with colored features. Bravo!

Wheel of Samsara, 07 October: A nice meditation on mapping in games and possible different styles than what we (here in D&D land) might be used to. It even includes an image of that awesome boardgame from TSR.

Wheel of Samsara, 07 October: As a three-year resident of London, I enjoyed this post. And it makes some good points, too.

Savage Swords of Athanor, 11 October: Taking the challenge offered up at the Wheel, here comes an original map in the style discussed just above.

Wheel of Samsara, 12 Nov: Lanhkmar and geomorphs. Amen.

Mertwig's Maze

2010-11-11T00:20:00.000-06:00

Does anybody (besides myself) remember this game?

Now I realize that no serious gamer would have played this little gem when there was real D&D to be played, but I have to admit that I wasn't always a very serious gamer.

I didn't even own it; my cousins from Michigan owned it. I only saw them once a year or so, so there was a period of 2-3 years when I hoped that they would bring it each time that they came to my place--in addition to all of the normal gaming material.

Cheesy? Yes. Corny? Yes. Childish? More than a little. But I LOVED it.

Frankly, sadly, I don't even remember that much about the game, other than that you had to travel around and overcome a bunch of different obstacles in order to win.

It was always good for an hour or so of light hearted enjoyment. And it is the perfect game to play with some little ones.

Map Roundup - 07 November

2010-11-07T19:23:00.000-06:00

I am going to continue doing these little map roundups, because I found them to be pretty useful to me. I like looking at maps, reading about maps, seeing things related to maps, etc. so I started doing them as a way to keep track of things that I saw that I liked. Unfortunately, I'm not so happy with how they are working out.

When I first started, I would write a small blurb, sometimes just a single sentence that cryptically explained the link. Over time, the amount of "commentary" that I attached to the posts increased, because the bare-bones approach just wasn't working for me. Afterall, if these are going to be useful (at least to me) by allowing me to review old roundups looking for something, I needed to include more information.

I have now come to the conclusion that they still lack enough detail. So from now on, I am going to include the name of the blog and its posting date for each entry on these roundups. What good are they if I can't quickly look at a post and find what I am looking for?

So, in the new format:

Aeons & Augauries, 04 Nov: An old, hand-drawn map and accompanying adventure by JD Jarvis. I love looking at older homegrown material. Perhaps I need to pull out some of my own then scan and post it.

Huge Ruined Pile, 04 Nov: Some maps of Scott's (I believe borrowed) game world of Thool, and lot's of good information from his previous campaigns.

Newbie DM, 06 Nov: A home-made map by the Newbie, it is his personal world. Also nice because he links to the Cartographer's Guild--one of my favorite websites of all time.

Rather short, I know. Hopefully, the next one will be more substantial.

Gods, Demigods, or Godlings

2010-11-05T00:35:00.000-05:00

Over the past few days, there have been some posts about gods in gaming worlds. Here Scott listed descriptions for a bunch of gods in his game world. On the same day, that guy over at Planet Algol had this to say on the subject.

Turns out that Planet Algol was the last blog that I read on my trip through the blogosphere last night, so as I lay down to my night's rest, my mind immediately started racing with ideas for "little" gods for a game world. Then I started thinking, maybe I could write up a little project like that...

Anyway, I present one of them for you here, with others to follow in the coming days:

Chadek-Hadek
(Also known as He Who Bleeds)
(Also known as Rent-by-Daggers)

Chadek-Hadek always appears as a man, seemingly pummeled by a long and harsh existence. He walks with a limp; his cheeks, covered with salt-and-pepper stubble, are scarred from countless battles; his right arm shows the remains of several tattoos that appear as if he has tried to remove them--they are no longer legible as anything other than smears and random lines. He wears trousers and a thick woolen cloak. Beneath his cloak, he wears no shirt, and his chest and stomach are (except when he makes the effort to hide them) bare. Most shockingly, three daggers, buried to their hilts, penetrate his chest and abdomen; the wounds ooze and bleed, and thick and dark scabs surround them.

Chadek-Hadek is often prayed to by those who have suffered great wounds but who are too poor seek the assistance of the local temple or healers or, for whatever reason, are desperate for help. They would have to be, because the help that he offers is often exactly the opposite. If he appears to one who prays to him, he will typically examine the wounded individual and pass judgment. No one knows (or at least, no one is telling, and he certainly does not) the scale by which he judges someone, but upon making his decision, he pulls one of the three daggers from his body and strikes the wounded supplicant. The act of pulling the dagger from his own body is obviously agonizing, as he grits his teeth, shudders at the pain, and typically does not handle it well.

Depending on the dagger that he draws, the effect of his attack varies:

The dagger that is buried just above his left hip will cause 1d6 hp of damage to the individual. (Obviously, quite possibly enough to kill the average 0-level person.) If the individual survives the strike, they will sink into a coma for 1d20 hours. When they awake, they will be completely healed of all damage, however, their hit point total will permanently decrease by one. (If the individual had only one to begin with, the drop will not occur.)

The dagger that is buried in his abdomen just beneath his right rib cage will cause 1d6 hp of damage to the individual. If the individual survives the strike, they will sink into a coma for 1d10 hours. When they awake, they will be completely healed of all damage, and their hit point total will permanently increase by 1d4+1 hit points.

The dagger that is buried between two ribs on his left side will inflict one hp damage. If the individual survives the strike, they will sink into a coma for 1d4 days. When they awake, they will experience a change described as follows. To determine the effect, the DM shall roll 2d6. The first die will determine which character attribute is affected (STR, INT, CON, WIS, DEX, CHA). The second die will determine how that attribute is permanently changed (+3, +2, +1, -1, -2, -3).

Chadek-Hadek will only "treat" someone one time in that person's life. If he is prayed to in order to benefit someone that he has already treated and he chooses to appear, his reaction is often violent and random, quite often including attacks against whomever else is around. Of course, if the person is lucky, He Who Bleeds just won't appear.

If he is encountered when he was not prayed-to, he will typically appear impatient and anxious to be on his way to somewhere. If combat with him should ensue, he will attack with only his fists--thick fingered and with bulbous knuckles. He can strike twice each round, and his fists do 1d4 damage each.

...

During a break from typing that, I came across this post from James over at Grognardia. Sounds like his little project is going to be pretty nice.

And it also sounds like he has beaten me to the punch. Perhaps my little project will go by the wayside, and I could contribute to his.

Map Roundup - 03 November

2010-11-03T23:43:00.000-05:00

There were times in the past where it would take me days to find enough map-related posts to actually post a map roundup. Well, the below crop of mapping goodness comes to you from one single foray into the blogosphere. At first I thought that was a good thing. Now all I think it means is that I've missed a lot of good stuff floating out there.

This post would deserve mention in a map roundup merely because it contains an image of a map. But it is a map of one of the best kinds--that taken from an adventure: an old D&D module, and one of my faves. Lots of good things can be said about the module, but this post says them so I'll not belabor the point. Enjoy!

Not a post about maps per se, but when I look at the first image, I see what could be a map. It is a map that depicts a place that I would definitely enjoy adventuring in. How could that place not be fun to explore?!

Here are two posts from the abiding mule that really got my juices flowing. The first mainly because it contains a map that I really dig. But it is actually the second that I found very interesting. The discussion was interesting between the various 'participants.' Even better were some of the links that led to other nice mappy things.

This post contains a map made pre-D&D, by the author's father no less. How awesome is that?

Until next time.

Now THAT'S a Vampire

2010-10-27T00:42:00.000-05:00

In addition to enjoying rpgs, I'm also a big movie fan. More than that, I like reading about them. One of my favorite internet sites is Ain't It Cool News.

I was about to turn off the computer when I came across this little gem. Ignore all of the commentary if you choose, but take a look at that picture. SURELY, there is some roleplaying inspiration in that photo!

Map Roundup - 27 October 2010

2010-10-27T00:33:00.000-05:00

It has been a LONG while since I've done one of these, and I know that I have missed a lot of wonderful map-related posts out their in the blogosphere. I am going to try to rectify that.

First, let's start with a post from the Greyhawk Grognard about some City of Greyhawk maps. I really like the look of these. Simple, black and white line drawn--right up my alley. And here, he talks about a game called Tactics II, which I admit to having never heard of. BUT the post does include numerous photos of a map of that game.

Zak S is working on a new project and has started doing maps for them. Here are two posts with some nice maps included: One and Two. Better yet, he then goes on, in this post, to describe why he thinks maps like these are useful. He doesn't say anything that hasn't been said before elsewhere, but his points remain valid.

A decent map will show the relationships (whether spacial or temporal) between locations in an adventure. A better map will describe the relationships between locations. The best maps will show those relationships as a baseline and include other information to make using them even easier!

Grognardia has a post about maps, specifically maps that may or may not have been created by Dr. J. Eric Holmes. My only wish is that the maps be larger for actual viewing. Oh well...

...

And now for something completely NOT about maps. This really great blog has just come across my radar screen, and I really dig it. I think that I'll be spending some time there, perusing the images. Really cool!

High Level Adventures

2010-10-23T08:12:00.000-05:00

As seems often to be the case these days (and for very good reasons) Grognardia posted a question about the existence of high level modules (within a review of a low-level module) which led to posts and discussions all over this corner of the blogosphere.

Two posts which really interested me came from The Nine and Thirty Kingdoms. The first is his brief reply to the Grognardia post. The second, which is more interesting to me, discusses the idea of creating "modular modules for deeper level dungeons"--basically a dungeon level or sublevel that you could stick in your own dungeon. I only saw this post thing morning, but it struck me because that very idea occupied my final gaming thoughts of last evening.

I really think that there is a lot of merit to this idea, especially for people who play in megadungeons. If it truly is a megadungeon, then it stands to reason that there are areas that only get stumbed across recently--even if the players have traversed a certain area many times before.

I see a lot of advantages to this for the high level module designer:

1. There needn't be a plot hook of any kind other than, "And at the end of the passageway, you see a low archway surrounding by glowing runes in the ancient Glybdenarion script." Or something like that...

2. If that is too simplistic, there could be a plot hook that draws characters into a region of the dungeon where they have not ventured before or a region that they thought had already been cleared of "interesting" things. (In my personal opinion, a well-run megadungeon would never get cleared, as new monsters would move in to replace those vanquished, but it does make sense to me that the characters might believe that the 'cool stuff' had all been looted.)

3. Such a high level adventure benefits from all of the widely-acknowledged design benefits of dungeons--they limit choice (to some extent) and provide a self-contained playing environment where (most) of the variables can easily be controlled.

I think that this third advantage is the idea's biggest. As has been commented about many times, high level adventures are difficult to do well, because many campaigns reach a point where politics play a role or events leading to a possible 'endgame' are occuring. Inserting a random quest into a smoothly running plot can be jarring or perhaps just not interesting to the characters or the DM. But inserting a dungeon level into a dungeon that is actively being explored is seamless.

Last night, I found myself thinking about dungeon levels that would be unique or interesting to high level characters that could easily be inserted into an existing dungeon. Lots of ideas... Now if I could just carve out some time and write one or two of them.

Sweet Art

2010-10-22T20:06:00.000-05:00

Thank you to Thomas Denmark of OEF for highlighting this little treat. I have never heard of Down in the Dungeon before, but the art is fantastic. Everyone who plays the older editions needs to see this work.

I Can List Them with the Best of 'Em!

2010-10-20T23:09:00.000-05:00

Is there any point to discussing this phenomena? I think that there is, but just can't seem to get my thoughts in order enough to do so.

I think somewhere it started with computer games, then someone decided to try it with boardgames, someone else said rpgs, then someone said games--of any kind. Well, I'm going to expand the reach of mine, to not only include specific titles but more general games. If that doesn't explain it adequately, you'll see what I mean when you look below.

Yes, you know what I am talking about: 15 Games in 15 Minutes. Everybody and their Grandmother has done this now. Well, now everybody and their grandmother and ME!

I'm listing these in the order that they come to me. Theoretically, that implies some level of importance in my life, or gaming existence. Or perhaps all that it really implies is some strange train of associations. Let's see where it takes us, shall we?

1. AD&D - It's basically required, isn't it?
2. Risk - Almost another requirement.
3. Monopoly
4. Atari 2600: Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark - I never got into Adventure, but this one had some puzzles, some task resolution, and a bit of a plot. I gotta say that I was damn proud the first time that I uncovered that Ark.
5. Atari 2600: Yar's Revenge - A CLASSIC!
6. Atari 2600: Demon Attack - A better and more advanced version of Space Invaders.
7. Atari 5200: Space Dungeon - Come on--a megadungeon in space! And I never got close to completing all 99 levels.
8. Atari 5200: Dreadnaught Factor - A single fighter against massive starships bristling with weaponry. Nice!
9. X-Wing (For PC) - This game single-handedly destroyed any chance of success at my finals first semester of my freshman year in college.
10. Axis & Allies - Wasn't introduced to it until college, but came to love it.
11. Payday, the boardgame - The thing that I remember most is its funky art, but I played a lot of it.
12. Life, the boardgame - Blue peg in a green little car.
13. Spades - Cause of many academic problems later in college.
14. Blackjack - Sit me at a table with a pile of plastic in front of me and time ceases to have meaning.
15. Pictionary - Say what you will about this one, but I've had tons of great fun with this.

After having typed that, I'm not sure how one led to the next, necessarily. But at the very least, this little exercise has prompted all sorts of great memories.

Wierd Fantasy and Bards

2010-10-14T14:05:00.000-05:00

So I received in the mail a few weeks ago my (two, ha ha ha) copies of James Raggi's Wierd Fantasy Roleplaying. I'm not going to provide you with a review of it, because, frankly there are a ton of them out there already. I'm fairly certain that googling it would yield you a bunch of results. Suffice it to say that I agree with most of the 'good' reviews that you have probably read of it. (I may get around to posting more thoughts on it at some point, but none of my thoughts strike me today as so original that I need to type them.)

But what I have realized is that I want to produce gaming material for this game. Of course, compatibility would be there, but his game has enough of its own personality that trying to write material for it would be a fun and interesting challenge. Some of the material has been bubbling in my consciousness for quite some time and hasn't been inspired directly by his work, but other material is a direct result of reading WF.

Case in point: I commented here that I would love to write a bard class for his game. Reading the majority of the other comments to that post indicate that most people don't care for the bard. I don't really care for the AD&D bard (the version with which I am most familiar) but surely a class that relies on charisma can be of value in the 'wierd' world.

But how do you make the new class distinctive enough and wierd enough to fit into that game? If you own the game, you understand that James worked very hard to make each class unique/useful/interesting (from a game mechanic perspective) in its own way: Only fighters get better at fighting. Halflings have great saving throws. Magic-users cast spells. Etc. What aspect of the bard do you formalize in a game mechanic to make it worth existing as a class?

Someone in the comments to that post said that, in their game, they added a few skills to the specialist skills list that matched their conception of the 'bard', thereby making the bard merely a specialist who allocated his points toward those skills. That is one way to do it. I had actually been thinking of also making the bard similar to the specialist, but instead coming up with several different skills that only the bard has access to. Problem with that is you might then introduce new rules to account for or make use of those skills. Not necessarily a big deal, but I don't want to start writing new rules for WF.

Perhaps a combination of spell-like abilities governed by a skill system similiar to the specialists'? Or is that more of what I just said I didn't want to do?

Back to the earlier question of what does the class do in the game: Perhaps he makes his allies better and his enemies weaker, during combat or elsewhere, through wit, song, special abilities. Does there need to be a wierd twist? Not sure.

(Apologies for the stream of consciousness writing--sometimes I have to follow it to where it takes me.)

Case in point #2: I like so-called 'Vancian magic' as much as the next old time D&D player, but how can it be made (beyond interesting spell descriptions) wierder? And if not wierd for the DM, at least for the players. I have some ideas.

There are other cases. Things that have been sitting on the shelf waiting for a reason to make an appearance. Perhaps WF provides the catalyst to get them rolling.

Two Takes

2010-10-13T14:05:00.000-05:00

So, as I commented earlier, I am going to try to get back to posting a little more often.

I wanted to start by linking to two blogs, both of whom appear on My Daily Read, who have interestingly divergent views on a third blog article from several weeks ago. It is fairly common for people in our little niche to comment on similar things, but I don't think I've ever seen a case before where two blogs that I follow but who do NOT exist in our little niche comment on something.

So for me, that was pretty cool.

Okay, so you can read this to see what people are taking about. Then you can go here to see what James Raggi has to say about it. Okay, he didn't say much, but his point is pretty clear. Then you can go here to see what Jeff Vogel (of Spiderweb Software) thought about it as well.

For me personally, I'm not sure which side I fall out on. I think my views are closer to Vogel's. Of course, in the case of both blogs, there is great wisdom to be found in the comments following.

After considering it for awhile, I have come to this conclusion: Ultimately, the kids like things that are similiar to what they are familiar with--at least in terms of what they are or are not able to do in a certain situation, i.e. a kid will like computer games that generally give them the amount of personal choice and options (or more) that they are used to. If personal choice and options are less than what they are used to, other factors in play have to be amazing enough to overcome this.

Followers?

2010-10-12T10:54:00.000-05:00

This whole blogging thing...

...

Nice thought, eh? SO much could be said to finish that sentence. Excitement, misery, rejection, acceptance--all sorts of good things.

But for now, a mystery: You see, it has been my common belief that a blog attracts followers over time by regularly posting interesting articles, opinions, views, etc. 'Interesting' is subjective, but it has to be interesting to someone. My thinking went that, if you don't post, you don't attract followers.

But for some strange reason, the last several that have signed up have done so during what has been my slowest posting period since this blog was started. I've posted very little recently, and yet a few people have still wandered in. Don't get me wrong: I am thankful and flattered but also a bit flummoxed.

Of course, the whole 'followers' aspect of blogging is a strange beast in and of itself. I mean, what does it really mean anyway?

And now to change topics entirely. I apologize for not posting more often. Life has been extremely hectic recently. I find that when I enter the blogosphere, I spend the vast majority of my time reading what is going on out there. There are so many good blogs these days. And so many interesting topics to comment on. So by the time I finish reading all of my favorites, my limited 'me' time is up, and I don't have time to post anything of mine. I am going to try to rectify that--wish me luck.

Now THIS is the way to start a campaign!

2010-09-14T22:49:00.000-05:00

Go read this. THAT is the way to start a campaign!!

Don't like science-fantasy? Who cares? Take that general mold and fit it into the style of campaign that you want to run.

For instance:

You want to run a modern-day rpg? Have the characters wake up in an overturned SUV, injured all to hell, not remembering who they are or how they got there. Have several ambulances arrive to treat them OR have another identical SUV arrive with people in it offering to help them if they move quickly. (Are the people in the SUV friends, foes, or something else?)

You want to run a superheroes rpg? Have the characters wake up scattered in the destroyed remains of your campaign's version of the 'Hall of Justice'. They don't remember what their powers are; they don't remember anything about themselves. (Are they all good guys or are some of them villains? Who did this? Why?)

You want to run a standard fantasy rpg? Have the characters wake up in a room, each in a bed, with no memories and with various physical injuries. A man enters the room who seems suspicious. He tells them that he found them in the (woods, ravine, dungeon corridor, etc) lying amidst a dead group of (pick your monster--but perhaps he doesn't tell them) and that he brought them back to his abode. (All sorts of good question possibilities.)

You want to run a straight sci-fi rpg? Frankly, very little to do differently.

You could follow steps 1-3 of that article exactly. The rest will have to be altered as necessary to match your theme, but you need to use the attribute checks, some major combat encounter, and the clues that point to 'another one'. Who is that other one and what is the connection to the player's party? Those questions may never be answered or they might be the point of it all. But THE POINT of all of this is that the players will start this campaign feeling the way that we all did the first time that we played an rpg.

This was probably the best blog post that I've read in the past week, and I just had to write something to complement it.

...

Although I have to be completely honest: Tonight has been a most fruitful blog reading evening. Two other posts that I have to highlight are this one and this one. The first talks a little about the megadungeon in your campaign; the second talks about something that most people who run wilderness campaigns probably never think of. Both posts are excellent! Hopefully, when I have time, I'll write a little something to go with each of those as well.

One Map Dungeon Contest?

2010-09-12T23:12:00.000-05:00

I'm sure that most of the readers here have heard of the One Page Dungeon Contest, wherein a nice template for outlining a dungeon on one page was used as the basis for designing dungeons. It started off as an idea (Sorry--I can't remember whose idea it originally was.) to free the DM from overly-detailed settings and the prep time necessary and to force a different experience in gaming. The concept then grew into a contest in 2009 and then a second one in 2010.

Brilliant idea, and a lot of people executed it brilliantly.

I'm wondering if there is any interest in a slightly different kind of contest? As the title implies, I am talking about a One Map Dungeon Contest. How would it work? Basically, I would draw a map of a dungeon--you know, some passageways, some doors, perhaps some rooms and caverns and some other stuff. Then, YOU the reader would write the text for it to turn it into an actual dungeon. (Obviously, the map would have to be really good to inspire people to write something for it. THAT burden would be on me.)

Everybody would have the exact same map to work with. I'd have to think of some other criteria for the text--either a word or page limit. Or not--maybe it's best to leave it completely wide open. Also, I'd have to decide if any modifications would be allowed to be made to the map.

Similar to the original concept, I'd gather some people together to judge all of the entries and then we could announce the winners, etc, etc.

This idea came to me as I was thinking back on my gaming experiences. I've purchased many modules in my day. There were quite a few times when I was more inspired by the map included in the module than the written adventure itself. Am I the only person that that has happened to?

Anyway, what do you think? Is this an idea worth pursuing?

Dungeon Compilations

2010-09-11T17:34:00.000-05:00

Awhile back, I commented that I was doing a little work with Tony Dowler, of How to Host a Dungeon and Year of the Dungeon fame.

If you aren't familiar with YotD, go take a look at it immediately. His "mini-dungeons" are really cool and are great sources of inspiration.

Anyway, I've been doing a little layout work for him--basically taking his dungeons and gathering them together in monthly compilations in pdf form. (The layout is very basic, but he is happy with it.) They are all for free at the site; if you go there, they are all available down the right column under 'my games and stuff'. If you are not familiar with his work, I highly recommend it.

The Business Side of Gaming

2010-09-10T14:00:00.000-05:00

I seem to come back to it occasionally. I just can't help it. I enjoy reading about it, I enjoy trying my hand at it, I just enjoy it.

I recently came across a blog that I find very interesting: 20th Level Marketing. I really like the post here about pricing products and sales. I agree with him completely regarding his thoughts on pricing digital products. Now if only more people (in the OSR) actually bought them...

F-22

2010-09-09T22:54:00.000-05:00

No--not a 22nd level fighter. Depending on which version you are playing, that could be fun, stupid, or just plain impossible. I'm actually referring to the US Air Force's newest fighter jet.

Why? Well, if you were to glance below and to the right, you would see that I have a soft spot for Concept Ships. I just dig strange and creative aircraft and spacecraft. If you follow this link, you will find yourself looking at a gallery of photos of the F-22 that are incredible and just dripping with awesomtivity. Some of them would fit right at home on Concept Ships.

The other reason that I like this collection of photos is that IMHO some of the styling on the fighter would look fantastic on a suit of armor. In general, I just think that the fighter is badass. I have for a long time, and these photos prove it.

Map Roundup - 08 August

2010-08-08T22:38:00.000-05:00

As I have been away from the blog for quite some time, it has been awhile since my last Map Roundup.

The first two links that I have for you are sactually a few months old. Take a look:

Who doesn't occasionally do this?

Forgotten Realms: a post about the Forgotten Realms and maps ...

Now for some posts that are a little more recent:

Here is a Treasure Map that its creator constructed from bits and pieces of illustrated manuscripts.

Here is a nice post about maps and the ways that they can be made better.

And here is a map [with a very distinct (and useful) style] of an underground river.

Take a look at these two dungeon maps from the science-fantasist over at Planet Algol: here and here.

And while this post has nothing to do with maps, it does include an illustration that, to my mind, is one of the iconic 'maps' of D&D.

That's all for today. Now that I am back in the swing, these Map Roundups should become more common again.

If you happen to see posts regarding maps anywhere in the blogosphere, please email them to me, if I have missed them. My Roundups will get better if you readers help me with them. Cheers!

Darth Schwarzenegger

2010-08-07T15:11:00.000-05:00

So this post will have absolutely NOTHING to do with maps, or fantasy, or even rpgs at all.

In my younger days, in addition to being a player of D&D, I was also a Star Wars fanatic and a huge Schwarzenegger fan. I suppose that I remain all of those things to this day.

Someone created a video of Darth Vader in Episode IV 'voice-overed' by Arnold. (To those of you who are offended by the 'verbing' of nouns, I apologize.) I just had to link to it.

Beware: The language in the video is definitely R-rated. Watch it here.

Maps for Sale

2010-08-07T00:42:00.000-05:00

So this is going to be a bit of a strange post.

You see, I'm going to tell you about three of my products that are for sale at RPGNow.com. I'm going to give you links to the product pages so that you could, if you so desired, purchase them. But then, as you approach the end of this post, I'm going to tell you NOT to purchase any of them.

I don't want you to purchase them at this point. For reasons that I discussed a long time ago here, I don't think that these products are worth your money. Okay, you say--if they're not worth my money, drop the price to make them worth it or remove them from the website or do something other than write a post about them. Actually I am, but more on that in a moment. First, the products:

Hand Drawn Maps, Volume 1. A simple product containing 10 maps of various fantasy locations--a few dungeons, a keep, and a small town. It contains only maps--no text, no description, nothing but the maps themselves. It first went on sale in January 2008 for $1.50 and has remained that price ever since. Unlike Locales, Volume 1, which was my first product, HDMV1 did not include any work of my own but was the work of a cartographer who hung out at the Cartographer's Guild who held the moniker Terrainmonkey. It was my small attempt to highlight the great things that were going on over at the Guild.

Caverns, Tunnels, and Caves: Volume 1. Another simple product containing 16 maps of--you guessed it--caverns, tunnels, and caves. No keys, no descriptions, just 16 maps, black and white with a grid. It first went on sale in February 2008. Initially on sale for $1.90, it is now selling for $1.25. What I wanted to do with CTCV1 was include maps of underground areas that looked more 'natural' than typical D&D maps. As someone who enjoys looking at maps and has done a little bit of caving, I realized that most maps of cavern and cave systems in D&D weren't very realistic. I was hoping that this would fill a niche in the market.

Caverns, Tunnels, and Caves: Volume 2. Identical to the first, this time containing 15 maps. It first went on sale in September 2008. Initially on sale for $1.75, it is now selling for $1.25. Same idea as CTCV1. I am ashamed to admit it, but at the time I wanted to put something out and couldn't find the motivation to do what I should have done, which was work on Locales, Volume 2--something I still haven't done.

So those are the three products. If you were to purchase all three of them, you would spend $4.00, and for that money, you would receive 41 maps of gameable locations. What you wouldn't get is any text or description, beyond the titles of the maps in HDMV1. Worth it? That depends on you, but I would say probably not. (Although there are a large number of gamers out there who can be inspired by a decent map and find great utility in standalone maps, why would you spend money for them when there are so many free maps floating around?) Looking back now, it certainly was not worth it when, instead of $4.00, those products cost you $5.15.

Since I do not feel that these products are worth the $4.00 that I am asking for them, I recommend that you DO NOT purchase them.

What is my point in all of this? Let me tell you: I am going to do some things to, hopefully, make them a little more worth your hard-earned money. I am going to take these 41 maps, spruce them up a bit, combine them into a single document, and put them up for sale. I'm not sure what price I'm going to charge, but it is going to be something less than $3.00. Further, I am going to discontinue the sale of the three original products at that same time. Are those maps worth the small money that I am soon going to charge? Again, that depends on you, but I think that they just might be.

Last thing. The new product will be called Basic Maps, and its cover will look like this:

A Third Post?!

2010-08-05T20:04:00.000-05:00

Yes, I'm going to make a third post -- the third in a row -- that includes a link to the Bottom Feeder.

Today, Jeff Vogel wrote a good design post for his next computer game project, Avadon. I am linking to it, because I think that it contains lots of good ideas for adventure/campaign design.

In the broad spectrum of ways to design a campaign, some people think about and decide every detail in advance, down to the Nth degree. Others, like James leans toward the other end of the spectrum and, in fact, prefers to learn about his campaign world through play. Regardless of where on that spectrum an individual DM falls, the post that I link to above has some good thoughts. I recommend it.

And I'll try to post about something else next time.

I am not the only one...

2010-08-05T19:46:00.000-05:00

...who has noticed Jeff Vogel of Spiderweb Design, auther of the Bottom Feeder blog, of which I am a regular reader.

Indeed, apparently ChicagoWiz recently posted about him as well. Nice.

Thoughts on Business from the Spiderweb

2010-08-02T23:41:00.000-05:00

I've linked to Jeff Vogel before, his blog is firmly on My Daily Read, and his most recent post proves that he and I share sensibilities. In case you aren't familiar, he is the owner/lead-designer for Spiderweb Software, an indie computer gaming company that specializes in one person rpg games.

In his most recent post, he discusses piracy in computer gaming. It is a very interesting read. While the parallels are not perfect, I think that there is enough overlap to be of interest to those who play and/or write for the paper rpg hobby--especially people who consume or produce (as I do) pdf products. Not only is his article interesting, but the comments (167 as of this moment) demonstrate the full spectrum of opinion on the issue.

Not directly related to his post, but something that came up in the comments was a discussion of pricing for computer games. I believe that the points raised on software pricing are equally applicable to pdf pricing--that, in general, for a product that costs the same to produce one copy as it does to produce a million copies (anything digital)--a lower price will equate to higher sales, which should lead to more income for the creator.

While that sentence is a gross oversimplification and the topic deserves a lot more indepth discussion, I think that it mostly holds true. I've been thinking about it a lot over the last several months, and will post a longer explanation of why I believe this to be the case in the coming days. If anyone has thoughts one way or another, I'm all ears (for the time being).

Sales Reports

2010-07-31T23:08:00.000-05:00

I wanted to thank John over at the Land of Nod for posting this sales report. I think that it is always interesting to see how people are doing on the 'business' end of our little hobby, and I wish that more people would post numbers like this.

Of course, after saying that, I probably should post my numbers. I previously posted sales numbers here, which included sales from 2007 through the end of 2009. Sales since then are as follows:

Locales, Vol One: 8
Hand Drawn Maps, Vol One: 8
Caverns, Tunnels, and Caves (CTC), Vol One: 4
Caverns, Tunnels, and Caves, Vol Two: 2
CTC: Battlemaps One: 2
CTC: Battlemaps Two: 2
CTC: Battlemaps Three: 2
Power Cards: Secrets of Necromancy: 1
Fantasy Class Preview: Martialist Heroic: 67 (Free download)
Fantasy Class: Martialist: 4

This then brings my grand total numbers up to:

Locales, Vol One: 69
Hand Drawn Maps, Vol One: 41
Caverns, Tunnels, and Caves (CTC), Vol One: 44
Caverns, Tunnels, and Caves, Vol Two: 26
CTC: Battlemaps One: 12
CTC: Battlemaps Two: 11
CTC: Battlemaps Three: 11
Power Cards: Secrets of Necromancy: 15
Fantasy Class Preview: Martialist Heroic: 382 (Free download)
Fantasy Class: Martialist: 21

Something that I have not done before is provide my gross and net profits. (I've told you the numbers; I may as well tell you the dollars.) As I distribrute only through RPGNow, they get an immediate 30% cut of my gross.

My profits by year are as follows:

Year        Gross           Net
2007      $027.50    $019.25
2008      $337.23    $236.07
2009      $343.95    $240.79
2010      $076.36    $053.45

Of course, even that is an oversimplification of the truth. That 'Net' is not true net, as it does not include my costs to collaborators on Locales, Volume One nor does it include fees for the art included in the Martialist products.

So there you go. You have now read The Fantasy Cartographic's extremely (over)simplified financial report for the first half of 2010.