ETCR - Expedition to Castle Ravenloft in DD3

[Shindig]

Here are some of the areas outside of the castle itself, redone from the ‘sepia’ maps to something more usable.

I did put together a map for the town, but it is a bit large for posting and does not fill in areas other than the road, so I am not going to post it here. It was just a quick and easy map to walk the players through the town and allow them to make choices as far as direction. I did not redo the maps supplied for the street encounters as editing out the creature markers from the ETCR maps worked well enough. I did make some maps of the random areas, as well as the church, and am posting these below. These are just to replace the ‘sepia’ versions from the book and are nothing too intricate.

The following areas replace the sepia versions of the outlying areas. This brings us up to speed to where my campaign is actually at. I will be working on the Fanes next.

When I began these, I was feeling fairly confident with the program after completing the castle. I thought, sure, this is outside whereas before I had the comfort of working with a nice angular building, but it can’t be that different. I was wrong. I had to start learning completely different techniques to get the job done, so the first couple I consider learning projects. Also, I purposely did not include grids on these since they were imported to Maptool. It is MUCH easier to forego the grid at first, since they are needed in Maptool and it is annoying having to line up both grids to avoid the ‘double-lined’ effect.

Crossroads was the first. I thought that the path would be too abrupt on the edges so I added dirt and field grass along the side. I found out later that this was unnecessary as the program automatically fades in the path edge, as you can see in the second drawing, Vistani Camp. I don’t think that there was a skeleton on the gallows in the book, but I didn’t have another ‘gallows’ to choose from and it fit the ambiance of the campaign.

Vistani camp came off to much like a circus camp for me, but I was in a crunch and needed to get it done. It was my first attempt at creating a river.

I do like the way the Nymph Pool came out, though. The one thing I like the most about Campaign Cartographer is that vegetation comes out fantastic looking. It is the one aspect about overland mapping that I don’t have to work at too much, it seems like the program does enough on its own. I just have to turn the trees/plants a bit if I use the same template more than once.

[jtougas]

I am considering doing other projects next. The one that I have been eyeing up the most is the Ruins of Castle Greyhawk merged with the Expedition to Castle Greyhawk campaign. This is much more problematic, though, then Ravenloft. The main reason is that the two modules have the castle in different timeframes, so that rooms that are shown in both have far more differences than did the ones in the Ravenloft project. Also, the latter campaign refers to the unmapped portions as having to fallen to ruin rather than maintaining their earlier appearance, and much less inhabited.

That would be an amazing project. It's pretty well known around here that I am a huge fan of anything Greyhawk and would love to see the Castle done in this style

[Shindig]

That would be an amazing project. It's pretty well known around here that I am a huge fan of anything Greyhawk and would love to see the Castle done in this style

When I begin putting together an attack plan for it, I will open another thread and be sure to let you know in this thread. I am leaning towards it, I just have to read through them again and see if it is feasable.

[danielpryor]

The maps will be restored later on this month on my new site! It will launch around the same time the new MapForge software comes out!

[Shindig]

Thank you. I must say, though, that I like your version of the drawbridge better. I captures the feeling of being on a high cliff better than what I did.

We are currently in the middle of the campaign and I have found a few errors. They have come in on the first basement and things are playing out nicely! I am missing the secret room off of the north room and I have a desk in the kitchen which should be a cabinet. Ah, well...

[danielpryor]

Thank you. I must say, though, that I like your version of the drawbridge better. I captures the feeling of being on a high cliff better than what I did.

We are currently in the middle of the campaign and I have found a few errors. They have come in on the first basement and things are playing out nicely! I am missing the secret room off of the north room and I have a desk in the kitchen which should be a cabinet. Ah, well...

Thank you for the compliment, but I think you did a great job as well, we just have different styles. After seeing your stuff and my old stuff and switching software from DJ & PSP7 to DD3/CC3 and GIMP I decided to redo most or all of them. I am in the process though of learning the new software so it's going to take me awhile.

Keep up the good work, your stuff is great!

[Molbork]

Great maps! My group has just entered the keep and were looking for some nice maps, but as a smart guy, but not a graphics guy I was wondering how would one go about printing these out? Do they print as 1 inch squares?

This may end up as the nerdiest trip to Kinkos I've ever had and I had to get $6000 worth of physics lab manuals printed for my university one year lol

Any advice would be great!

[Shindig]

I use the quick and dirty method on Windows still with my deskjet printer. Yes there are programs that will divide pics over many sheets for you and you can get any type of interface that you are comfortable working with, but Paint has everything I need. You don't have to be 'exact' either, if it comes out that the squares are 1.1 inches, no one will really notice
I just remember that a sheet is 8.5 x 11. I count the squares used (you may have to check the original maps out of the book since I don't include grids on these) and divide by either 8.5 or just 8 (for margins) or 11, depending on the orientation. That gives me the amount of pages across I'll need. Then repeat for top to bottom. When you set the page setup, take the horizontal and vertical centering off, and choose 'fit to' and put in the page counts that you came up with in the first part of this. Before printing, check the print preview and look at one of the pages that is fully covered. Make sure that you can count 8 to 9 squares for width and 10 to 11 squares in length. If it is too far off, add or delete a page in the 'fit to' section of the page setup. Recheck it until you have the best ratio.
Leave a quarter inch margin, cut the tops and right sides off with a straight edge, use a light paste and it will come out fine.
That is quick and dirty. And even though it sounds a little elementary, the results are way better than you would think.
If you have access to larger printing, just count up the squares each way and that will give you the dimensions in inches you need. I have found that there is usually at least one worker at a Kinkos that has worked with maps and knows what you're trying to do. But really, just playing around a bit before actually printing it, you'll figure it out.

If you have access to a laptop and decent flat monitor (25 inch), I highly recommend setting it flat with a plexiglass cover over it and using Maptool. Download it for free at their site (google will lead you right to it), they have a great forum to learn its functions and everyone will be impressed with the results.
This castle is somewhat of a three dimensional puzzle. For example, all of the rooms on the first floor cannot be accessed easily without going up or down a floor first. Having some form of 'fog of war' that emphasizes how the pcs can lose track of where they are in the castle adds greatly to the feel of the module. Printed maps lose this edge as the players can always see whether they are in the middle of the floor, or at the North end, no matter how much 'covering up' you try to do. And, once you have the monitor ($180.00 for 25"), you stop with the costs of printing. It pays for itself very quickly if you make a lot of maps.
I hope I answered your question well enough and maybe even given you some new ideas to think about.
Happy gaming!

[johnnywiggle]

Shindig - am deeply impressed by your efforts. Have been DMing ETCR for (embarrassing pause..............) the last year and my PCs have been in the castle for the last month or so. Well, the best excuse for the lengthy game time is that we game only fortnightly and I've been running them all over the countryside first.

Anyway, the biggest hassle I've found with running the game is accurately depicting the floor plans well. I've been generally using the freely available maps on wizards.com (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ag/20061031a) and blowing them up for use on my laptop screen (17") or printing them off. The laptop screen at 17" is generally too small for most of the bigger encounters; and the resolution of the maps too poor. Am deeply impressed with your rendition of the game's maps - there are so many inconsistencies between the encounter maps and the orthogonal maps. I've just been through every stairwell to see if they should climb anti-clockwise or clockwise, for example! I love the level of detail in your renditions - knowing little facts like the middle statue in Sergei's tomb is of cruder construction for example - only things that DMs would pick up on. I'm sure you're finding the book a challenge to DM too. As much as I love it, the constant cross referencing between the adventure text and the encounter maps is a nightmare. My bugbear is that information from both those sources within the book doesn't naturally correlate. I've been DMing encounters and suddenly realised the map is wrong or incomplete in the true description of the text. I thoroughly understand and appreciate how drawing out and mapping the entire castle has expanded your knowledge of the module.

Am slightly torn at the moment. Do I use your excellent maps (with due repping, hat doffing etc) by printing and/or maptooling on a new monitor. Or do I buy CC3 and go through the cathartic experience myself..........

Cheers for your excellent work

[Drakecoinus]

I have never had the pleasure of experiencing Castle Ravenloft in any format, but I will defiantly have to look into it now
hats off and JOB WELL DONE Look forward to seeing more of your work