Old video game maps for current D&D campaigns

[MerakSpielman]

This is a great site, and I'm definately putting it somewhere in my campaign.

A complete map of Egypt's Valley of Kings (click on the Valley of Kings Atlas picture), including specific and detailed schematics (including flavor text for wall decorations of each room and passage) of each and every of several dozen tombs. Some tombs are small, and some are huge. The entire valley can be inserted wholesale into a D&D campaign.

The Atlas of the Thebian Necropolis is cool, too.

I know it's not a video game, but it's still too cool a mapping resource to not mention, if you're looking for ones you can find online.

 

[Ranes]

I like Torm's suggestion. Using maps taken from text adventures, especially those of Infocom's pedigree, is a neat idea I wonder why I'd never had.

If you want dungeons, why not try Dungeon Master Java? That FTL game had great dungeon design (for a CRPG) and the Java release comes free with a level editor.

I have great memories of playing that game. In fact, I played it with an old gamer friend. We took shifts at the keyboard, with the other handling cartography and navigation.

One day, as my friend was driving, the party found itself beset by

Spoiler

purple worms

. They were

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trapped in a room

. The

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corridor

beyond was completely

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congested

by these

Spoiler

purple worms

. The

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party

would

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open

the

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door

and

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fight through the doorway

, hacking, bashing, shooting, casting,

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wave upon wave

of the

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inexorable invertibrates

, until they had to

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close it again

, in one of the brief moments of calm that punctuated the relentless rythmn of the carnage, and take refuge.

My friend was handling the fight with the utmost efficiency. The

Spoiler

door

, which

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slid up and down at the press of the button

, was being fully exploited vis-a-vis its suitability for

Spoiler

smacking worms on the head

. We thought we were really maximising our combat potential, until

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it

broke, as in the

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door

completely

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shattered

. No longer was it suitable for

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smacking worms on the head

. Nor would it

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close

, any more. It was now

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open

.

Coming perilously close to its end in the process, the party hacked its way out, one step at a time. That was when we maximised our combat potential.

Accurate navigation proved to be critical to our escape, too.

 

[Darth Shoju]

I'm currently DM'ing the adventure based on Pool of Radiance (the original from the 80s), called Ruins of Adventure. The maps in there are probably taken 1:1 from the computer game. At least they look like that.

Bye
Thanee

Heh I played almost all those old "gold box" games and I think I still have the maps I drew too. Trouble is they were all made in 16x16 squares. They would probably work pretty well though. Also the Eye of the Beholder games would be cool too.

 

[hong]

I'm currently DM'ing the adventure based on Pool of Radiance (the original from the 80s), called Ruins of Adventure. The maps in there are probably taken 1:1 from the computer game. At least they look like that.

Bye
Thanee

Oh mang, I remember playing in that. What a surreal experience, especially the thieves' guild. It was like every room had multiple traps, which were there for no reason except to hose PCs. Going to the toilet at night in that place must have been an experience like no other.


Hong "especially since there were no toilets either" Ooi

 

[Thanee]

Sure you are talking about the same thing?

I don't think there is any thieves' guild, really. Or it is very well hidden.

There is also another adventure called Pool of Radiance which has nothing to do with the one I mean. It's set somewhere around Myth Drannor, I think, while the one I DM is in Phlan and is based on the plot from the "gold box game" Pool of Radiance.

Bye
Thanee

 

[hong]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's the one. It has the cemetery crawling with undead, and

Spoiler

Tyranthraxus as the BBEG at the end

, right? I can't remember if it was an actual guild as such, but there was a location that was basically crawling with thieves and traps.

 

[Thanee]

Ah, then I think I know what you mean, yeah.

And yes, that's the one.

Bye
Thanee

 

[Breakdaddy]

Yeah when the Fire Knives thieves guild gets pissed off at you and comes a callin', if I recollect. I miss the gold box games, they were damned fun.

 

[scourger]

That's awesome. Thanks for posting it, MerakSpielman.

 

[Album Cover X]

I used a level from Goldeneye for a Spycraft game once...

A player did recognize it near the end of the session... so it was worth it to me on multiple levels so to speak...