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I've been re-watching the show Fringe, via IMDb TV, via Amazon Prime. The villainous ZFT organization, Zerstörung durch Fortschritte der Technologie
(which apparently means "Destruction Through Technological Progress") got me thinking.
What if there was a cult dedicated to the destruction of the world through magical mishap. So they go around trying to sabotage magical experiments, or even destroying magical artifacts in such a way as they cause mass death. Kind of like deliberately breaking a Staff of the Magi.
Could be cool.
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Sooooo....Apparently, combining re-watching the TV series Fringe with a troubled night of sleep leads me down weird math/engineering/geek paths.
I had previously made a map of a Clockwork City, but decided to do a new one with even more geek/math stuff.
The road layouts show two Fibonacci Spirals, two symbolic representations of robot joints, a basic structure of a feedback control system, a (kind of) typical joint space trajectory, and at least one style of gear system. The scale of the map is decently large (something like 3000' x 2400', so the buildings are also pretty big. I figured small buildings go more with privacy and individualism, which would not necessarily be a construct trait.
Despite being a former engineer, my math is not as strong as I'd like it to be, or I'd have probably put in more obscure graphical math s$@+.
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Here's a link I discovered a month or three ago...
Amazing Maps of Medieval Cities
I can see from some of these where some RPG cartographers had been inspired.
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Awhile back I had created a map of a canal city. Venice was certainly one of the inspirations for that. However, I knew there were plenty of other canal cities out their, and my research did not disappoint.
Anyway, fast forward a bit, and I decided to redo the map to add in more of an ancient Greece flavor. I've added in on big acropolis, plus a few smaller ones. And I've tried to make the building layouts and roof styles more like something you might have found back then.
It's slow going doing the map, though. I'm a bit burned out on it.
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Anyway, after I completed that map, I did a follow-on detailing the layout of one of the big villas. This one belongs to someone I call Stavros the Pawnbroker. I used an image from Wikipedia as the basis - an example layout of an ancient Greek house with a central courtyard.
I think it came out pretty decent.
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I'm very proud of myself. My newest map takes inspiration from Sirmione, Italy (a very pretty place). To get the peninsula "just right", I got off my ass (so to speak), put a little effort into it, and figured out how to insert a snipped image of the peninsula into the CC3+ program. Then I just traced over it.
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That new city map is still slow-going. I think, however, I've hit on a path forward that I like.
In my mind this was a decent sized city, but still one that was subservient to a larger, Carthage-inspired city-state. The problem was, the scale on the new map was much larger than the one for that city-state, which had the by-product of me making this city larger. That didn't work for me.
So, I cut out an entire district of this city, reducing it to a large fortress instead. And I'm going to reduce the size of the city outside the main walls. That should take care of the problem.
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Speaking of that city-state.....
In looking at that particular map again, I realized it doesn't quite work with the way the region has evolved over time. The main thrust of this city-state, and the region it controls, is agriculture. From what I've been reading, it seems more logical that the wealthy and powerful would actually have estates outside the city, surrounded huge tracts of farm land they own.
With this being the case, the area of the city where I have all the noble estates and manors is too big. So I think I'm probably going to revise it, by deleting many of these estates (reducing them to large houses instead), and then further reducing the number of actual manor houses in the city.
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The other day, I realized I had developed maps for lairs of four out of five dark naga crime lords (it's a theme thing). So then I had this brilliant idea to have the fifth one living on a ship.
The first map I did was a caravel, with the overall structure being inspired by an old Spelljammer ship. Later, after I posted that map to my Facebook map page, I left it with the comment that I might rethink the map as more pleasure barge than sailing ship.
So, today I finished up the barge version. This one was inspired by the ship used by the villain Zenobia in Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger. I even gave it a bunch of oars, with the note that the rowers are all clockwork crew.
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At one point in the recent past, I had been rather consistently rewatching the old 60s Dark Shadows (thanks Amazon Prime). I left off watching for awhile, but picked it back up Halloween night. The episodes I watched inspired me towards two new maps.
The first was a haunted country manor, kind of like Collinwood, but with a healthy dose of Bly Manor (from the Netflix show). I had done a gothic manor before, but I think this one turned out much better.
The second map was a small temple/monastery dedicated to the worship of a phoenix. It even had a giant pillar where the bird could nest (and occasionally self-immolate). I thought it turned out rather well, and now I might peruse the other Bestiaries I own to see what other mythical creatures I can create shrines/temples for.
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I don't think I mentioned it, but recently I created a map for a Necromancer's Guild. The first level, which is on the surface, is basically a small cemetery.
Not long after, I had started the city where I intended to locate this guild. I started by recreating the cemetery surface. Finished that today. It's not 100% accurate, but it'll do.
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And the other day I did a Hive Fortress. In my own mind, this would be part of an insect empire. The primary inhabitants of this empire are partly inspired by Starship Troopers (the book, not the crapfest movie), and partly inspired by Frank Herbert's book The Green Brain. They would be brain bugs who control swarms. So some swarms would be similar to the Collective Creature found in the Tome of Horrors Complete, while other swarms would be similar to a Worm That Walks (bugs instead of worms, and maybe some with skills of other classes).
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Last night I was watching one of the three Hammer Horror Karnstein trilogy movies. They kept showing exterior distance shots of "Castle Karnstein", it being up on a hilltop, with fortifications and road going up the hill. I thought it was really neat, and started considering how one would go about creating a map in CC3 for a similar location.
Turns out, that castle is a real place - Hochosterwitz Castle, in Austria. The google map image isn't all that great, but it was sufficient to give me a decent overhead view I could take measurements from.
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I did my map inspired by Hammer’s Castle Karnstein. This was an overall map, showing the castle, the hill it sits on, and the accompanying fortifications. Later on, I may go ahead and do the interior of the castle.
I was having trouble, however, converting the map to a picture format so I could load it to my Facebook map page. The bitmap fills kept coming out all messed up. Finally, a hit on the idea of using the Microsoft Snip tool. Worked like a charm. Damn that is one useful application.
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I finished a new city map the other day. This one was inspired by both the Freeport setting and the city of Madripoor from Marvel comics. I think it came out rather well. I included about four other maps as locations in this city, including a gambling/entertainment hall, a Necromancer's Guild, sphinx's lair (the main location in the city), and the palace-barge of a dark naga crime lord.
One thing I'm particularly proud of with this map is that I avoided (as much as possible) straight roads. That's been a problem with previous maps, as I always found them easier when it came to laying out buildings and such. This time I did mostly curved, and made extensive use of CC3's street tool, which lets you drag along a chosen street and lay out houses. Combining that with putting down individual buildings worked pretty well.
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I bought a new software package to enhance CC3+. This one was the complete 2020 annual. The prime reason I bought it was because they had some updates allowing for pretty decent looking cliffs, something I'd been looking for.
That allowed me to do an updated version of the city of Khemri, which I first developed years ago as part of that website some fellow Paizo Messageboard Folk had developed. It was part of my island realm of Shandura. Khemri had been originally designed as a coastal city, built on and around a kind of shelf in the cliffs. The original map was in Power Point. The new CC3+ map is...far superior.
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With that in mind, I'm also going back and redoing an older (but only by a few months) map of a city I called Mykros. It's a Venice-influenced canal city, but with a kind of Greek culture and architecture.
For the last version (rev 5), I had added an Acropolis style geographical feature, using the "bevel" command. Now, with rev 7, I'm redoing the acropolis with the cliff symbols I picked up, as well as redoing much of the rest of the city to make it less...straight lined.
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Back in the halcyon days of my youth, there was a book series called Wizards, Warriors, and You. It was similar to the Choose Your Own Adventure series, or the Endless Quest. For these, you could choose to either be the Warrior or the Wizard, then move through the story making decisions when presented.
Anyway, I was in my closet the other day, and noticed the one with the kidnapped princess. That particular book had a map of the king's castle (not a very good one).
So I decided to do a castle map based on that one. I thought it turned out rather well.
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I followed that one up with a sort of temple dedicated to psionics. In my mind, the old (and awesome) 2E psionics, not the stuff Paizo came up with (which I thought was "meh" at best).
That map came out pretty decent as well, I thought. I might go back in the future and make a larger one, with a slightly different layout.
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That, of course, got me thinking about psi powers in the game. I still think the 2E rules were the best. I don't recall as much about the 3E rules, but I do recall not liking it as much. I never knew what the 4E rules were. The Pathfinder rules were, as I stated previously, kind of "meh". Apparently, they're currently playtesting some rules for 5E (as far as I could tell). What I saw of it didn't impress me all that much.
I hadn't really been gaming over the last few years, so the lack of actual good rules for one of my favorite styles of character didn't bother me all that much. Now, however, I'm back doing a 5E game with my old Philly crew via Roll20, and I kind of miss the old psi characters. In this new game, I'm playing a dwarf ranger. He's pretty cool. And from what little I've seen of 5E (I only have the PHB), they've done some cool stuff with other classes.
Still, I miss the good psi stuff.
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My newest map idea, which popped in my head this morning, is an island where the super wealthy can go on vacation.
The idea would be it had been a quiet little island with a single native village being attacked by some monster or monsters. Heroic adventurers came along, killed the problem and saved the village. In return, the villagers allowed the heroes to take over one part of the island. They retired, and built up their part into this sort of playground for the wealthy.
I'm considering doing a snip of a Pacific island from Google Maps and using that as the basis for the island. Just haven't found one that "sings" to me yet.
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After the previous most, I kind of fell off that idea. Instead, I created a map for The Forge of the Cyclops, inspired by the old myth of Hephaestus having cyclops assistants.
A few days later, to take a break from Kingmaker on the PS4, I did a map of a small town. It was inspired by Collinsport, from the old Dark Shadows TV show.
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Following the Couatl thing, I revisited an old map of a city I called Duhket. Mostly because I'm never really satisfied with my work.
Anyway, this revision used a different style for the hills. As well, the buildings were primarily from the two different symbol sets for "Middle East buildings, plus the house making tool. Because I have yet to master the tools that allow for placement of multiple symbols at once, the work was...tedious. Redoing the whole map took about 9 days. It was worth it, though. It looks much better now, and I've even got room to add to it, if I want the city to grow.
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Just today, I finished and posted a map for a fortified hobgoblin city. I even developed a background for it, inspired by the Sardaukar from Frank Herbert's Dune series.
The ancestors of these hobgoblins were recruited by an evil emperor, trained, outfitted, and turned into his elite troops. He used them to conquer new lands and quell and rebellions. Eventually he built them their own fortresses, at different locations in his empire. When the empire eventually fell, two of those fortresses were destroyed.
The surviving hobgoblins retreated to this last remaining fortress, Castle Maul, and turned it into their new city.
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Oddly enough, after I made the previous post, my block was cured. I did a new version of a previous map. The original and new one were both inspired by The Woman in Black film, starring Daniel Radcliffe. It's a pretty decent flick, with some very cool locations (which is what inspired the map).
As a bonus, Woman in Black is one of several films of the past decade+ that were put out as part of the revival of Hammer Horror.
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I finished my Constantinople-inspired map, and posted it to my FB page. I think it turned out rather well. I used a much simpler style this time, which made it a lot easier to do all the houses and other buildings.
Not sure what do next. I might redo the Library Dark Naga Lair map from awhile back. That one was in the city I just reimagined, and I changed it's look on the city map. So now I may go back and redo the actual library map to match.
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As a kind of honor-the-memory-of my recently deceased grandmother, I've been re-reading The Hobbit (she gave me my first copy of the four book set). I was at the part with Beorn the werebear, and it inspired me to do a new-ish map.
I combined two previous maps - Basilisk Island and The Isle of the Cyclops - into one map. I also did a redesign of both islands, based on a Google Map screen shot of some real world islands.
The old version of Basilisk Island didn't have any settlements on it, so I added some this time, and gave them Old English names. I might go back and delete all but one, however. It would fit the island's theme better.
As I see it, Basilisk Island is home to either a bunch of werebears, or normal folk ruled over by a bunch of powerful druids. Most of the island is wilderness. The people there are constantly having to protect their island from the depredations of the cyclops from the more southerly island.
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Continuing my Hobbit inspiration...
Thanks to Tolkien, I've long had a great love for elves. However, despite Tolkien, I've also had a great (and possibly greater) love of dwarves. I think it's that they most resemble engineers, which I used to be.
In that light, I have conceived of a new "dungeon" map. This would be a multi-level dwarven stronghold, in the vein of The Lonely Mountain or Khazad-dûm. I like the idea of this, since I can work on one level at a time, breaking off if I come up with something else (or just to take a break). Kind of like reading a short story collection.
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When I create maps, I like to imagine the entire world they exist in. I think it helps to have an larger narrative. For my most current world, one of the recent additions is the Kingdom of the Daemon Blossom.
The name itself, and the theme behind it, were inspired by the Clark Ashton Smith story the Demon of the Flower. The kingdom I had in mind, which doesn't have a map (yet), was once a powerful, but tyrannical, empire. It occupied a fairly large island continent between my Central Lands (I don't have a better name for them yet) and the land of Shandura. Anyway, this empire, in its lust for power, unleashed an ancient, power that consumed the entire realm. So, no one goes their anymore, and no one travels from their anymore. Which is one reason I'm not in a hurry to make a map for it.
I did recently decide that some of the citizens of that empire managed to escape its destruction. Some of them are scattered throughout Shandura. Others came to the Central Lands and established Tainang: City of Exiles on one of the Storm Guard Islands. I might do a map for that one. Not sure.
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I've done two maps now for my Halls of the Dwarven King concept. The first map was kind of half-assed - a small level where the king and his family live, with a private throne room where he meets with his councilors, as well as the king's private treasury.
The second map was Level 1a of what I call High Gate. It's a fortified gate level. This map helped me firmly fix the structure of the entire complex in my head.
Basically - there are two mountain ranges running roughly north to south. Between them is a hilly plateau. The Halls exist under the western-most range. There are three fortress-cities, one on the east side, two on the west side. These fortress-cities will be multilevel affairs, with numerous halls, barracks, forges, armories, etc., and they're all connected by at least one large, underground road. They're the gates to the Halls. I may put a third fortress-city, somewhere in the middle. Not sure Yet.
The High Gate is on the eastern side, opening onto the plateau. The dwarves have a lot of mines scattered throughout the area, and they bring metals and gems in through this gate.