D&D General Hidden Shrine of Tamoachan complaint

[Eyes of Nine]

One of my favorite modules of the early period of TSR's AD&D output. The 5e version is pretty sweet

BUT!

For who knows what reason, the map has North pointing to the left, not up. WHY? WHY? WHY? It's the dumbest thing ever. The box text all refers to the directions correctly - but boy is it confusing as I read the box text out loud, and my players are looking at the map, and culturally, we think of "up" as North.

Dumb, why not just have up be north?

Had to vent, that is all

 

[The Myopic Sniper]

How disorienting.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

How disorienting.

Totally

 

[Laurefindel]

Because Thorin’s map of the Lonely Mountain has North pointing left in The Hobbit?

Has this module anything to do with dwarves? In the prologue of the Hobbit it is said that this is usual in dwarven maps.

[edit] apparently many real medieval maps were drawn East-on-top.

 

[J.Quondam]

It's the only way to thwart a Ranger's direction sensing class feature.

 

[el-remmen]

Most of that module takes place underground or in the sealed temple, the cardinal directions shouldn't be part of descriptions! It should be left, right, far, close, etc. . .

 

[mamba]

Don’t own this, but I assume this is done to have the map fit the page (and not have to shrink it to do so). If not, then I have no idea

 

[pukunui]

Don’t own this, but I assume this is done to have the map fit the page (and not have to shrink it to do so6. If not, then I have no idea

Yes, it's a long, thin dungeon, so it very much has been done to fit the page.

 

[Bill Zebub]

Don’t get @Hussar* started. There was a heated discussion about Saltmarsh maps

*apologies if I’m misremembering who it was.

 

[Lidgar]