Ettin Manor

I found that I had been drawing a lot of my recent maps (particularly commissioned pieces) by roughing them out in pencil and then going to ink afterwards. However that’s not really my style. Until 2014, I basically did all my maps directly in pen and I’ve been missing that organic feel of growth that I get when I lay something down that’s immediately permanent and I have to work from it instead of being able to go back and change it as the rest of the map progresses.

So I decided I should draw a classic dungeon in my traditional style. But I got sidetracked because what kind of dungeon doesn’t have a surface level? (Well, besides most of the dungeons I’ve drawn over the years, but let’s ignore that for now.) So today I give you my direct-to-ink map of the ruins of Ettin Manor which once loomed over this cliff and small waterfall.

Of course, there are a pair of secret doors on the map, which lead into the dungeons of Ettin Manor – ancient crypts or treasure stores that may to this day be untouched by looters and treasure hunters because of well-made secret doors, excellent locks, and maybe a bit of magic and the reasonable fear of deadly traps.

This map is made available for your free use thanks to the amazing patrons of the Dodecahedron Patreon Campaign that keeps me fed and sheltered while I draw these fancy doodads for your enjoyment. Awesome people like Stacy Dellorfano (who does that epically awesome ConTessa with a group of other awesome women), Levi Kornelsen, Andy Action, Samuel Kehoe and over 300 others!

One step further – because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Again, this shouldn’t need repeating, but this only applies to the maps in this post! So enjoy! The Ruins of Ettin Manor (or whatever name you give it in your games) is yours to do with as you please, personally or commercially!

Ettin Manor Dungeons (with grid)

The overlord (now long deposed and deceased) of Ettin Manor kept his most precious of treasures down in the secret chambers underneath the manor. Further, he defended these treasure chambers with traps and intricate secret doors. While his defenses have never yet been entirely breached, some looters have broken into one treasure chamber and looted it before being stopped by a solid stone door with a lock beyond their skills. More disturbing is that one of the ancient treasures appears to have… hatched… in the interim and a series of tunnels and chambers have been dug out from one particularly secret chamber. It leaves you to wonder what sort of creature would dig through so much earth and stone and yet never dig to the surface…

Ettin Manor Dungeons (no grid)

The most difficult chambers to get to are a pair of chambers at the bottom of a seventy foot shaft in the furthest room from the entrances to the dungeon.

This map is made available for your free use thanks to the amazing patrons of the Dodecahedron Patreon Campaign that keeps me fed and sheltered while I draw these fancy doodads for your enjoyment. Awesome people like Darren Aldredge, Michael French, Sasha Bilton, Luke Niedner, and over 300 others!

One step further – because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Again, this shouldn’t need repeating, but this only applies to the maps in this post! So enjoy! The Dungeons under Ettin Manor (or whatever name you give it in your games) is yours to do with as you please, personally or commercially!

Asymmetric Temple – Topside (with grid)

Since the beginning of March I’ve been playing in an Empire of the Petal Throne campaign using the classic 1975 rules set. At one point some drawings of temples were shown, and one player pointed out that the temples to one of the death gods of the setting are typically asymmetric.

Combined with the majority of the temple being underground in our adventures in Tekumel, I started drawing up this temple which I’m finally posting today.

Asymmetric Temple – Topside (no grid)

This is the above-ground levels of “The Asymmetric Temple”. The main level is waiting rooms, conference rooms, minor shrines for sacrifices and worship and so on. Right in the front entrance, however, is a ramp leading down under the temple to where the main activities of the church take place. There are very few doors in the temple in order to encourage air flow and to get the most benefit from the cool air of the lower levels.

The upper level of the temple isn’t accessible from this area and is generally thought of as being a large ornamental chunk of rock by most who are unaware of the stairwell that leads between it and the basement of the temple. There is a small chamber here for keeping important prisoners or refugees away from the general populace of the temple, as well as a large chamber that works as a combination of shrine and library where the rarer books of the temple are kept.

These twice-weekly map posts are brought to you by awesome people like Chris Kutalik, Chuck Beaulne, Christian Klauser, and Christine Gertz who keep the site and maps coming thanks to their pledges to the Dodecahedron Patreon Campaign. If you like these maps and would like to see more of them and have the money to spare, please check out the campaign that keeps these free maps flowing to everyone.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Asymmetric Temple – Underground (with grid)

Part two of this week’s Asymmetric Temple map, these are the two underground levels of the temple where most of the actual service work of the temple takes place. At the bottom of the main ramp is the main service area on the left which is used for funerary rites and other obeisances to the death god (with the morgue just to the south of it, and the chief embalmer’s quarters on the lower left of the map just south of the temporary crypts). The right hand side of this level is mostly scribes and archives. The boring stuff that keeps a temple operational from day to day. The long 20′ wide room on the north side is a dormitory for apprentices and some guards who don’t have homes in the city next to a room used for quiet contemplation of death (and a concealed door behind the tapestries opening to the stairs that lead up to the upper level of the temple).

Asymmetric Temple – Underground (no grid)

The lowest level of the temple opens with a chapel behind which is a small store room with a small locked door that leads to another stairwell that leads up to a secret door in a small shrine just outside of the temple compound. But of course, the whole complex could be something completely different – this is just what I was picturing as I drew the various areas. Once again, this map and the others like it are presented here free for your personal use thanks to the many awesome patrons like Christopher Weeks, Conor Haines, Dan Behlings and Dan Helderman who keep the site and maps coming thanks to their pledges to the Dodecahedron Patreon Campaign. If you like these maps and would like to see more of them and have the money to spare, please check out the campaign that keeps these free maps flowing to everyone.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Some of the most “classic” maps on the blog that really defined the “Dyson style” were fairly small dungeons spread over multiple levels with a side view map to indicate how they connected.

Sparrow’s Fort (with grid)

I realized recently that it has been quite a while since I’ve drawn such a map. So I sat down with my trusty 5 square per inch graph paper and my Sakura Microns and drew up a new one, straight to pen in my classic style (no pussyfooting around with pencil roughs and drafts – let’s make a map!)

Work in Progress

I made this one a little more convoluted than my typical two-view map and had a bit of fun with it – to the point where it didn’t quite fit on the one sheet of graph paper. The only potentially confusing part, IMO, is the ruined tower basement from the side view, which is the room on the lower left with all the debris in it on map section D.

Sparrow’s Fort (no grid)

What goes on in Sparrow’s Fort now? It may look deserted and ruined, but the structure is actually carefully maintained to that appearance by Duke Thorfeld’s men in order to maintain a secret dungeon facility where they can detain and interrogate political enemies and other undesirables, as well as act as a base of operations for their clerical inquisition teams.

This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Awesome folks like Brian from www.NerdsOnEarth.com, Lorne Cooper, Kirt Dankmyer, Ron Edwards of Adept Press, and over 300 other patrons have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

I’ve been drawing the geomorphs for the Geomorph Map Contest using the Gridded Beer Coasters that I bought from Peter Regan’s Squarehex store.

At the end of May I put together a set of six geomorphs in this way that work well together –  a temple, a tomb, and a set of four catacombs & crypts geomorphs.

Here are the six geomorphs in one possible configuration:

Six Crypt Geomorphs

And here’s the six individual geomorphs in question:

And here they are again more in the style traditional to the blog – contrast enhanced until the grid background is pushed out of the picture:

A few months ago I picked up “The Works” from Squarehex. It included a lot of cool mapping papers and the one that caught my imagination are the A5 sized “MegaHex” mapping pages. Each has a big ass hex at the top half of the page (subdivided into a lot of smaller hexes), and the lower half is lined paper to write stuff about the hex in question.

So I started experimenting with the format, deciding to use each megahex as a six mile hex, making each small hex 0.4 miles across. Still a bit tight for drawing urban areas, but great for showing what can be found in a single six mile hex.

This particular hex, for instance, would appear as a single village marker on most hex maps, but here we see it detailed over the much larger hex.

6 Mile Hex – Baraloba and Environs

Baraloba is actually two mid-sized towns – New Baraloba and Upper Baraloba (at one time they were just Baraloba and New Baraloba, but New Baraloba’s trade road location has meant that it has more traffic and growth than the original town, and is well on the way to fully eclipsing it).

Upper Baraloba is a fishing and farming village that sees occasional river trade along the Hewbank river where it joins with a tributary that runs past New Baraloba after coming down from the Eagle Hills.

New Baraloba is also a farming community with a few more options for trade because of their position on the ford of the local trade road. Looming behind the town, seemingly half sunken into a farmer’s fields, is an old watch tower of immense size, built by hill giants several hundred years ago and now more a curiosity and waypoint than a fortification. It was used for years to mark where to leave the trade road to find the mines in the Eagle Hills.

Northwest of both villages is the Honeyed Forest – a forest known for the masses of bees that live within it and the giant flowers that are said to grow there a few hours walk deeper into the trees from the villages.

Today’s six mile hex connects to Tuesday’s map of Baraloba – sitting to the northwest of the Baraloba map. Again drawn as an “experiment” using the Squarehex big hex mapping paper.

6 Mile Hex – The Honeyed Forest

On a standard hex this would just be a forest hex, maybe with the road showing through it, but almost certainly not showing the smaller village here.

The village in question is Meadgrove – known for it’s apiaries and honey mead. Which should come as little surprise as the forest here is seemingly overflowing with flowers, most significantly larger than normal. As one adventures deeper into the forest the flowers continue to get bigger until sixty foot rose bushes and 80 foot lilies become the norm in what resembles a giant’s overgrown flower garden.

And of course, where there are giant flowers, there are giant bees.

Northeast of Meadgrove is a small watchtower on a lone hill. Originally this was the site where Meadgrove was expected to be built, but the farmland that was cleared from the as forestry continued into the honeyed forest proved to be excellent and the village ended up growing where the forest once stood.

On the upper left of the map is an experiment in drawing an “elven treehouse” that didn’t really work out. Which is fine with me since I don’t like my elves living in trees anyways. So this phanaton fortress sits quietly in the honeyed forest, with some of the braver phanatons having learned how to train giant bees to be used as occasional mounts to oversee the area.

A final map in my trilogy of experiments using the Squarehex mega hex mapping paper (as I write this again, I realize I have no idea what the actual name of this paper is…)

Six Mile Hex – the Slate Badlands

The badlands lurch up above the river, and show the signs of having once been lush forest and river lands themselves. Now dry and shattered, they are known to be home to a few minor tribes of goblinoids who generally war among themselves instead of bringing their trouble to Baraloba and the area. Few know that only a few miles from the river a black citadel has been built up from the slate wastelands – a marshaling point for the goblinoids under their new leadership.

On the north edge of the hex is the cave home of a small tribe of hill giants who once hunted the goblins of the area but who know work among them.

On the southern edge of the map is a small fort built into the edges of the Honeyed Forest by an enterprising knight who is working to tame both the badlands and the forest (but who is actually working for the same master as the goblinoids and who often hides goblinoid scouts and assassins within his walls).

Finally, a small hamlet continues its sleepy existence on the banks of the Golden River in a clearing in the Honeyed Forest, generally unaware of the world around it.

This hex sits above the first hex (Baraloba) and to the northeast of the second hex (the Honeyed Forest) that were posted last week. On a regular 6 mile hex it would have a badlands or hills tile marker and the thin line of the river running through it, possibly with the marker of the humanoid citadel in the midst of the badlands.

Many parts of the city are built up over the ruins of civilizations that claimed these lands in ages past. While some forget the roots of the city, others are forced to confront them on a daily basis.

Hamel’s Well

Forty feet below street level in one of the poorer districts of the city, the stairs to Hamel’s Well open up to an underground stream and pool bordered by ancient rooms made of fine stonework. Both doors out of the well room are locked at almost all times, but the southern door shows signs of frequent usage.

Hamel’s Well (no grid)

A gang of thieves (Toren’s Crew) operates out of the deeper ruins on the south side, but avoiding the natural caves down below. Both the members of Toren’s Crew and some of the townfolk who are down at the well most often have seen movement and the glitter of light from the north side structures. Most picture the northern area to be home to a lone hermit or perhaps a few shuffling undead – remnants of those who built these chambers in the shadowy past.

This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Awesome folks like Andy Action, Joe, Matt Maranda, Joe Johnston, and over 300 other patrons have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

About a month ago, Stacy Dellorfano of ConTessa (who also happens to be one of my very generous Patreon supporters) posted a set of random dungeon generation procedures that I went on to dub “The Dellorfano Protocols”.

1. Start somewhere on the page. 
2. Roll two dice (d6 & d8 in this case)
3. Whichever die lands above is the vertical line length. 
4. Whichever die lands below is the horizontal line length. 
(Or figure out your own way of picking which is which). 
5. Roll a die for each wall to see if there’s a door. 
     5a. If there’s no space for a door, don’t roll that wall. 
     5b. Create connections to other rooms when it makes sense. 
     5c. Always have a ‘no door on this wall’ option. 

In my case for this one, I rolled a d6 & d8, took which ever die landed on the table above the other as the vertical, and the remaining die as the horizontal. 

To prevent long, narrow rooms I doubled or rerolled 1s, 2s, and 3s unless it was towards the end of the page or somewhere where that made sense. 

Then, I chose each wall of the room and rolled a d6. If the number was a 5 or a 6 there was no door. Any of the other numbers indicated the number of tiles the hallway should be. 

I chose the width of the hallways and their placement on the walls on my own whim or if it made sense to connect to another room, I ignored the die roll and did that. 

Where rooms overlapped, I made one room be ‘under’ the other and added appropriate stairs down. 

For my first run with the Dellorfano ProtocolsI used a d6 and a d10, rerolling 1s and most 2s. The initial result is shown above, sketched out in pencil on an A5 pad of 7mm graph paper as I rolled the bones.

I’m going to try a few other dice sets, but I think the optimal method would instead be to use a smaller die with a bonus (so a d4+1 instead of a d6), or something similar to prevent having to reroll.

I then went through and redrew the whole thing in pen, changing the shapes of some rooms, adding details, doors, stairs and so on.

Dellorfano Protocols Dungeon 1

Now we have a dungeon that appears to be natural caves and galleries at first that progresses into worked stone structures and then back into natural and flooded) structures down below. I also included a well in one of the upper chambers that reaches down into the flooded cave below.

Dellorfano Protocols Dungeon 1 (no grid)

There has been a great rush of other maps designed using the Dellorfano Protocols since she released them in June – and she’s linked to all of them that I’m aware of in her Swords & Wizardry collection on Google+

This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Awesome folks like Leonard Pierce, James Maliszewski (of Grognardia and the Excellent Travelling Volume), Riley Vann, Kyle Maxwell, and over 300 other patrons have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Michael Curtis wrote a somewhat silly Mutant Future module for NTRPGCon and I had to get a copy. Much to my surprise I’ve been immortalized in this particular module:

The Mischievous Mystery of Marshmarsh

Since Michael was evidently poking fun at me, I present the alternate cover to the Great Stonehell Lazer Massacre

The Great Stonehell Googly Massacre

For the record, the monsters on the cover are actually from the original AD&D1e Monster Manual, and yet they are a monster that I didn’t even know existed until today – the Masher on page 65. I actually had to look at the page twice just to find them. As Michael says in the module, I’ve never seen these guys used in an adventure, EVER. So welcome back, mashers!

Built by priests of Amon-Gorloth, this dungeon was constructed and adapted from existing caverns following their dreams channeled from Amon-Gorloth itself – making them a twisted and nightmarish version of the convoluted mausoleums under the desert sands where Amon-Gorloth sleeps and dreams.

Mapper’s Challenge II – Deep Halls

This is a monster of a map – a full ledger-sized page of fairly fine graph paper (5 per inch, I think) was used to put together this map based on the look and feel of my much older Mapper’s Challenge map from 2009. At 300dpi, these images are 5 megabytes in size.

Spread out over seven different depths, these caves, chambers and twisting passages provide an immense dungeon for exploration. So immense that I haven’t even considered how I would stock it.

Mapper’s Challenge II – The Deep Halls (no grid)

Which is why I’m giving it to you.

This massive dungeon level is yours – released under a free commercial use or personal use license. Fill it up, stock it, throw adventurers at it until the floors are littered with their dead. Then do it again.

Colour-By-Depth (with grid)

To make it a bit easier to navigate, I’ve also provided a pair of colour-coded versions of the maps indicating the depth of each individual level. This is based on the excellent work of Michael Prescott who colourized a photograph of the original map before I had scanned it.

Colour-By-Depth (no grid)

This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Awesome folks like David Turner, Jesse Butler, Wayne’s Books, Judd Karlman, and over 300 other patrons have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Because Castle Amber was taken, this one is … purple.

Chateau d’Aubergine (with grid)

A small and lightly fortified castle, Chateau d’Aubergine is home of Madame d’Aubergine and her children – a clan of noble sorcerers of ancient elven blood. The matron of the family dominates all affairs at the Chateau, with her offspring rarely seen (and never heard) in the background.

A small number of servants maintain the grounds and the hedge maze garden, but are only seen outdoors at night as they are all morlocks – accordingly the garden’s flowers are an odd assortment who’s colours are far from complimentary (as they are never seen in bloom by the gardeners). Inside the castle the thin albino morlocks serve as maids, butlers, chefs and manservants for the d’Aubergine clan.

Chateau d’Aubergine (no grid)

A second floor can easily be added for more living space, and of course there MUST be a secret dungeon beneath the castle.

This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Awesome folks like E.T. Smith, Adam Tannir, Nick Daly, Jakub Hawro, and over 300 other patrons have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.

Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make this map free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under the commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:

Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

(Oh, and I would love to see what you use it in!)

For this map I felt like channeling a bit of the Caves of Chaos, combined with a few classic tombs.

Valley of the Mounds (with grid)

This stream-fed box canyon has been used as a sacred burial site of the Coalfoot Troglodyte clan for as long as they have recorded their history on their clay tablets. At the narrowest point before reaching the pool at the end of the canyon (at the south edge of the map), troglodyte mystics and young warriors are tasked with maintaining a number of small totems to ward off intruders and to mark the area as sacred tribal land.

Valley of the Mounds (no grid)

Within the box canyon are a number of burial sites (and probably many more that are lost but could be found with appropriate research and a lot of digging). The oldest is on the east wall of the canyon, a small natural cave where a small river once flowed into the canyon. These small caves have been used as crypts for the Coalfoot elders since before they began making records of their dead. The southern burial mound is very old and completely covered in grass and undergrowth. Given another few decades, the barrows within will be completely sealed off by dirt and plants and lost to time. The western burial site is the most recent of the barrows, cut into the side of the canyon proper by slave labour during the height of the era of Coalfoot supremacy over the creatures of the area. It is apparent though that this age has passed, as the structure is not well maintained and the fallen pillar in front of the entrance has not been replaced. In fact, the most current great heroes of the Coalfoot Troglodytes have not been buried in a barrow, but entombed in plain stone cairns along the bank of the pool at the bottom of the box canyon. This map is made available to you thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Awesome folks like Julianna Backer, Jamie Manley, Jean Headley, Neil, and over 300 other patrons have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your personal use.

This month really feels like it was the month of getting to know my compass. Today’s map is again very circular in flavour, even the extra details like the arcane glyphs in the experimental dome are circular.

The Mad Warlock’s Dome & Tower

This map was 100% inspired by playing Fallout: New Vegas again. I wanted an experimental area with an office that oversees what’s going on in it. So this map is of a largish dome structure where the eponymous Mad Warlock conducts (or conducted) hir arcane experiments, attached to a four-story tower that protrudes above it from one side.

The Mad Warlock’s Dome & Tower (no grid)

The ground floor is the experimental area, the oversight chamber and office, a store room in the tower, and a secret chamber where the Mad Warlock keeps hir more secret and expensive experimental equipment.

The second floor of the tower has a single chamber that is used as a sleeping area for the staff employed here.

The third floor is the home of the Mad Worlock hirself with two closets and a retractable ladder leading up to the top level of the structure. The top level is mostly open to the elements (although still roofed), with four balconies / lookouts that look over the area.

Something was really off about the elevations of Hamel’s Well – the map I posted on July 3rd. I had intended to add stairs in a few specifics, but forgot to put them in before I scanned the map and didn’t notice the mess-up until it was pointed out to me later.

So here are the revised versions of the two maps in question.

Hamel’s Well Revised

Hamel’s Well Revised (no grid)

Again, these are commercial-licensed maps as per the original post. These are just updated versions of those maps for your use.

I often feel that dungeons should be damp, deserted, half-collapsed things. Thus we have Lady White’s Ruins – an old hillside structure, long ago razed by the marching forest army, and the structures that had been cut into the stone behind the ruins.

Lady White’s Ruins (with grid)

Known as Lady White’s Ruins, the old structure and dug-in passages in the hillside have been home to several sightings of a supernatural ghostly woman nicknamed “Lady White”.

There is still a “solid enough” base of a tower standing in the old ruins, although the upper levels are long fallen and the remaining rooms (except for the entrance passage) are open to the elements.

Beyond are two entrances cut into the hillside. Both lead to half-collapsed chambers full of natural debris and ruined stonework. Warded portals lead further into the ruins from the larger of these two chambers, to a long passage where water flows from the old well down to a massive crack in the floor where the marching forest cracked the very ground of the ruins with their roots and entish might.

Lady White’s Ruins (no grid)

“Lady White” herself is rumoured to be the half-elven lady of the manor when it was crushed by the marching forest, seeking revenge against all who would defile her home. But she is actually the spectre of another woman – a foul-mouthed and unpleasant adventurer who was pushed into the massive crack where the stream now flows by her adventuring companions when they decided they didn’t want to split their treasure with her any more. If somehow pacified, she knows the locations of several other treasure troves in the region where her companions hid their loot or were unable to defeat the local guardians.

Again with the compass-derived maps this month, I bring you Tavistock Manor. A three-story manor house that seems perpetually for rent on the north side of the city.

Tavistock Manor (with grid)

Tavistock Manor is settled into a lovely huge estate for a rental property, requiring a fair staff of gardeners and groundskeepers to keep it looking decent. Thus the property seems to have waves of excellence and decrepitude, depending on finances of the owner and renters. The property as a whole is generally too big for anyone but the richest noble to purchase, and unfortunately its reputation as a rental property makes it unpalatable for most who are concerned about their long term social standing in the region.

Thus it remains a rental property for visiting nobles, adventurers and merchants on the up-and-up, and strange visitors with more money than sense.

Tavistock Manor (no grid)

Along the wide banks of the Onur River are a number of small fortifications dating back to various Kale city states that were once the backbone of trade and travel along the river and the badlands to the east.

Pregello Fortress (with grid)

Originally a trio of towers, Pregello Fortress was constructed by Ezwer the Long on the ruins of older Kale structures. Pregello is a small fortress built up around two squat towers and a single towering spire that stands out over the Onur like a spike driven into the stony riverbanks. Now the property of Ezwer the Hunter, great-granddaughter of Ezwer the Long, it is maintained but rarely home to any of her kin as she spends most of her time at her primary residence in Kalis where she attends to the politics of the new noble class with ardor and intensity.

Pregello Fortress (no grid)

But of course, a quiet fortress maintained by a skeleton staff on a river does not make for much of an adventure (unless you are seeking specific styles of furniture manufactured by the local halfling populace around 75 years ago).

Lately those local halflings have started wondering what is going on up at the fortress. Word is that Ezwer the Slight has moved in along with a few less savoury companions. Certainly the staff of the fortress have been buying a lot more food and drink in town recently. And then in the last week strange wolf-like things have been tracked in the nearby forests and occasionally through farmers’ fields… Some believe that these beasts are foul servants of Ezwer the Slight, others postulate that these creatures hunt for the young man and his companions.

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