Ravnica: City Of Guilds

[Sgt_Shock]

I am planning and mapping a campaign based on Magic The Gathering's "Ravnica: City Of Guilds." It's tough, but I'm hoping the idea of an ecumenopolis and the urban intrigue it holds will keep my players happy. Only half of them have experienced the MTG set block, but my intentions aren't just fan service but a good campaign all-around. So far, the "Monster Manual" of the campaign has been easy as pie (using and adapting cards to 4th edition). However, the mapping, for both the plot and the city, is a nightmare.

I loosely fancy myself as the group's master cartographer, but this is tough. An entire city, complete with another undercity beneath it is no joke. The amount of detail and effort I'm pouring into this is bordering ludicrous.

But I love it.

Anybody else try something similar? Spin your tales of success (or failure).

 

[Flipguarder]

If you can find it Dungeonscape and Cityscape would help you immensly. I made what is essentially Luthadel from the Mistborn series, and those books really got the creative juices flowin'.

 

[zierloth]

I know your are creating your own city, but see if you can get your hands on a copy of the 3.5 book "Sharn: City of Towers" it along with the two books mentioned by Flipguarder. It has alot of info on running a city only adventure.

 

[Sgt_Shock]

Thanks. I'll check em out right now.

 

[Quickleaf]

Another good reference is "Cityworks" published by FFG and written by Mike Mearls. Lots of great examples in there, such as urban event templates (e.g. how a fire or siege affects the city), city archetypes (e.g. the contested city, the outpost city, the port city, the religious city, the ruined city), power groups, etc. You'd be interested in the chapter on city construction which deals with creating city maps block by block. All in all, good stuff.

 

[Sgt_Shock]

Woot. Reading cityscape now and it is quite delicious.

 

[Flipguarder]

Woot. Reading cityscape now and it is quite delicious.

I have both the PDF and the book form and a cool thing to do with the PDF is in Adobe Acrobat, you can highlight a map you like (like a city, or a particular bar) Copy, and then paste it into a paint program. Then you got a quick and easy reference to some of your favorite things to look back on.

 

[Armadillo]

I'm really surprised that WotC hasn't done more to make its settings from Magic available for play with D&D.

I loosely fancy myself as the group's master cartographer, but this is tough. An entire city, complete with another undercity beneath it is no joke. The amount of detail and effort I'm pouring into this is bordering ludicrous.

Don't take on too much!

For my city maps, I generally sketch only the major features: walls, roads, waterways, keeps, etc. I broadly define the districts of the town and locate on the map locations that are important in the campaign, i.e. temples, mage's guild, houses of important NPCs, etc. If you need a more detailed depiction for a specific area, make another map for that area.

Since we're compiling citybook resources, here are a few more:

- Five Fingers Port of Deceit. For the Iron Kingdoms setting. The best 3.X city book that I've seen.
- Ptolus. I particularly liked the explanation for the multiple layers of the undercity.
- The Free City of Haven. From the Thieves' Guild RPG. An old one, but a very detailed depiction of a fantasy city with large format maps.
- City & Guild. For Ars Magica. A guide to life in European towns of the game's 13th Century.