Trying to create Dragonlance Battlemats

[crapdaddy]

Hi Gang,

I was wondering if anyone here would be able to offer some advice about a little problem I'm having.

Long story short: I'm running the old Dragonlance modules for my group. With all of the depth and complexity contained in the mods, it seems a shame to draw out the dungeons on a plain vinyl battle mat. Almost like it's not doing them justice.

Can any of you recommend a map making app that I might be able to use to create some decent 3D battlemats of these classic dungeons?

Thanks in advance for any help you may be able to provide!

-Shelly

PS. I love the site! I was hooked as soon as I saw it!

[crapdaddy]

Sorry guys.

It looks like I may have posted this on the wrong part of the forums.

I apologize!

-Shelly

[Ascension]

Dunjinni and Campaign Cartographer 3 (with the Dungeon Designer 3 add on) can do a pretty nice job of quasi 3d, more of a top down but still pretty nice. If it were me I'd go with Dunjinni as there are tons of awesome user creations on their forums and the masters over there can make some near photo realistic stuff. That's my 2 cents and I'm sure others will be along to add in theirs as well.

[RobA]

(Moved to dungeon mapping - hope that is OK...)

Are you considering something like these papercraft models?:
http://mandytonks.co.uk/mandyspaperc...rns/index.html

-Rob A>

[Redrobes]

I have a pretty complex & technical tip and I hope there is an easier way. You can build some 3D models in Blender or import them in from some other easier tool.

One nice feature of Blender tho is that it has a model unwrap feature so that you get a 2D flat representation of the 3D model which you use for texturing. If however, you take that and grab it as a screen shot or export it somehow then you can use that as a template to cut out of card.

So color and texture the image keeping the outlines intact, print it, cut it out and fold it back along the polygon edges to get your 3D model. Getting the shape in 2D is probably the hardest part. Building a model is not too hard and texturing it is as hard as you are artistic.

If your looking for a virtual 3D environment then at least you dont need to unwrap the model any more. If your looking for a 2D battle mat that looks 3D then there are plenty more options.

[MadCartographer]

Try this: (it's the Dragons of Despair Module)

http://www.cartographersguild.com/sh...Map-Old-School