my new campaign: the Western Shore

[Joshua Randall]

I want to play in Eric's campaign.

 

[Toric_Arthendain]

Interesting that you should note the FR connection -- I actually took a map from the FR Atlas (CC2) and replaced a lot of names. The map started life as part of Zakhara (the land of the Al-Qadim setting).

Yeah, it seemed to have the Forgotten Realms look. I'd love to be able to make a map like that from scratch but my CC2/CC3 skills are lacking...

 

[Pbartender]

Neat.

This whole idea reminds me of a campaign I ran a few years back. I converted a whole bunch of old classic AD&D and OD&D modules I had, and cobbled the locations together into a small campaign setting... The Wild Coast.

I didn't have any of the DCCs available at the time, but it sounds like your basic campaign model follows what I had planned out pretty closely.

I can't wait to hear more about how this turns out. I know my players had a blast with this sort of campaign... I think yours will as well.

Good Luck.

 

[2WS-Steve]

Nice map, Pb!

 

[Pbartender]

Nice map, Pb!

It was my first in that style, and is admittedly not one of my best... But thanks.

It was really interesting trying to put the together the puzzle pieces of the descriptions of the various adventure locations... Some of them made specific or vague references to other nearby landmarks, towns or geography, and I tried to stay as true as I could to those references.

The neat thing is, last fall, my wife dug up the notes I had for this campaign setting, moved the timeline ahead a hundred years or so, asked me to expand the map just a little bit, and plopped Elsir Vale down west of the Barrier Peaks -- just past Breakstone Pass and the Keep on the Borderlands -- so we could play the Red Hand of Doom in the same setting.

Pretty cool.

 

[EricNoah]

Nice map, Pb!

Agreed, that's just great!

 

[Toric_Arthendain]

It was my first in that style, and is admittedly not one of my best... But thanks.

Not one of your best? I'd love to see something you consider better. This one is excellent!

Elsir Vale plays a huge part in my current campaign as we started the campaign a little over a year ago and that adventure was the first one we played. The PCs are well-established there now so it continues to figure into my homebrew.

 

[Pbartender]

Agreed, that's just great!

Thanks, Eric.

Oh, and a word of advice... If you're planning on using old AD&D and OD&D adventures for this campaign, be careful. Due to the differences between editions, a straight conversion will often give encounters with wildly varying CRs and ELs. Or, you often end up with an adventure pr even a single encounter that's appropriate for a much higher average party level than what it was originally intended for.

On several occasions, my players found themselves in situations were they in way over their heads, and were forced to come up with unusual tactics to survive and win.

Not one of your best? I'd love to see something you consider better. This one is excellent!

Nope, I've since gotten better at labeling, blending the cut & pastes, borders and such. My technique's gotten a lot better, and I've been experimenting with a few other styles as well.

My second map, which I made for the home-brew campaign my wife ran last year, before she started RHoD.

This is the atlas for my current Iron Heroes campaign, beginning with the Dark Harbor and Blood Storm adventure modules... I'm especially fond of how the "wood-cut" maps turned out, but might retrofit them a bit, since I learned a new trick or two since.

This is the map I'd submitted for the recent War of the Burning Sky map contest.

This is a player's map for a 1920's-1930's Pulp Adventure D20 Modern Play by Post version of Isle of Dread. I'd found the base map -- the woodgrain background, parchment paper and island outline -- during a google search, and filled in the mountains, jungle, swamps, and labeling.

The two main problems that I'm still working through are: 1) Due to resizing particular elements that were scanned from original renaissance maps, not all parts of the map have the same "focus". Often, the labels, shorelines and rivers look very crisp, but the cities, mountains and forests look all blurry. 2) I've got an old monitor at home that doesn't always display very true colors. A color that looks the way I want it to on my home 'puter, often has a very different shade on another monitor.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

Cool campaign idea. Cool map, too, Pb.

If you're going with the minotaur, and some orcs ... why not throw in some linkes to Keep on the Borderlands? With all those humanoid tribes ... lots of possibilities for intersecting story lines.

 

[mhensley]

On several occasions, my players found themselves in situations were they in way over their heads, and were forced to come up with unusual tactics to survive and win.

Wouldn't this be a good thing?