Last Torch Maps: Thieves Rock

[Meshon]

Before anyone says that I have too many things going on at once... yeah, I'll just flat out agree with you.

Here is a glimpse at the mess and mayhem that erupts when I attempt an isometric map.

Outlines everywhere:
Thieves-Rock-mess.jpg

Surfaces:
Thieves-Rock-surfaces.jpg

What lies beneath:
Thieves-Rock-caves.jpg

I'll post whenever I make some progress.

cheers,
Meshon

[a.coldyham]

Top middle stairs. Are they in front or behind?

[Meshon]

Great catch! Those are supposed to be behind. Thanks. That probably would have confused me no end later. Or turned into some physics-bending magic zone.

cheers,
Meshon

[Neyjour]

This looks very promising! (Love the "Surfaces" in particular - that looks awesome). Are you still working on it? I love isometric maps, and there just don't seem to be very many of them, at least, not compared to the rest.

[Meshon]

So I've come to realize that this map, which I have been avoiding, is probably too complicated for my current level of practice. It's for an adventure, so I need to get it done and the main thing that's holding me back is the idea of tackling a large isometric map. I really like drawing the forced perspective, and I'll continue to work on it, but I think with something not quite so large at first.

In the meantime, I've reworked this map to a top-down view in hopes of getting it finished in the next week. And, inspired by wolram and others who post "the first sketch", here's the new version at the beginning. Red lines are high up, green in the middle, and the blue areas are at sea level. The unattached bit in the upper right corner will go into an inset at some point.

ThievesRockFlat.png

Cheers,
Meshon

[Meshon]

Here's an outline of the caves. I'm trying to figure out how to represent the bulk of the island (by the way, it's an island) while still keeping the map easy to read. So far I've just got different shades (in the previous sketch) showing the height of the external geography. There's a few spots where the caves intersect the cliff faces; a couple are cave entrances, but some of them are just fissures (good for getting some airflow and keeping the place from getting too ripe) and making that all work will be the next step.

Thieves-Rock-Caves.jpg

Sorry about the numbers, they're just there because I was working from an already-written adventure and needed to make sure I was getting all the keyed locations in.

cheers,
Meshon