Home » Posts tagged 'donjons'
Tag Archives: donjons
Guillaume Jentey

(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : les dernières news du jeu de rôles)
…and the Warlock
Once you have crossed the underground river (across the rickety bridge, by boat, or swimming in piranha and crocodile infested waters), the areas under Firetop Mountain feel… different. Where the earlier portions contained many guards, once you get past the immediate structures around the beach, the dungeons become winding, confusing, and home to wandering patrols. Many secret doors here are one-way affairs and dead-ends often have teleport traps instead of secret passages…
It is thus a great relief to stumble into the final caves, only to discover that before you even face the Warlock in order to get to his treasure, you must deal with a fierce dragon that lairs in the cavern.
Through dozens of playings of the Warlock of Firetop Mountain, I only got through the maze a few times before giving up (often because I was playing it at school during a break). You could navigate the rest of the book without a map, but if you failed to map this section, you were effectively wandering blind – doubly so if you made the mistake of triggering one of the teleportation traps.
So last month I finally sat down and navigated every bend, dead-end, secret door, nook, and cranny of the maze. In my head the maze was small – maybe 1/4 the size it appears here. But getting the corridors to fit together well ended up stretching them out significantly until the north side map was nearly as big as the (much more densely populated) south side.
The maps on Dyson’s Dodecahedron are released for free personal use thanks to the support of awesome patrons like you over on Patreon. Every month 400 patrons come together to make these releases possible. You can help too in order to keep the flow of maps coming and to improve their quality – and even get a map of your own!
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
Strongholds & Followers

(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : les dernières news du jeu de rôles)
Strongholds & Followers (D&D5 – Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition)

…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)
Firetop Mountain…
The very mountain is menacing – it seems to have been savaged by the claws of a massive beast. Not an actual volcano, the top of the mountain is covered in strange red vegetation that gives it its name.
This is the setting of the first of the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks by Steve Jackson and Ian Livingstone – The Warlock of Firetop Mountain. I got a copy of this book some time in 1982 and fell in love with the rich detailed illustrations of Russ Nicholson throughout and the mix of RPG game elements into a choose your own adventure book.
Through dozens of playthroughs, I only actually finished the adventure once – I even have an instinctive routing through the dungeons following the right-hand path to the bridge over the river – but I have thoroughly explored the passages and rooms leading up to that river. It was on the other side of the underground river that my adventures routinely went wrong.
Last month, I finally sat down with the old tattered book and gave it another run – this time marking every choice, every room, and every passage. It took me a day to complete this map of the southern half of the dungeons – everything up to the underground river.
Now I just need to map the chambers on the other side, and the maze between them and the warlock himself…
The maps on Dyson’s Dodecahedron are released for free personal use thanks to the support of awesome patrons like you over on Patreon. Every month 400 patrons come together to make these releases possible. You can help too in order to keep the flow of maps coming and to improve their quality – and even get a map of your own!
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
Core Rules Gift Set (D&D5 – Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition)

…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)
Waterdeep – Dungeon of the Mad Mage

(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : les dernières news du jeu de rôles)
Arcane Waters

This small “dungeon” is home to a circle of elementalists who focus on water magics (who call themselves the Blue Warlocks). Excavated and expanded upon from a small cave that linked to an underground river, it now serves as workshops, training and teaching space, and as the repository of a small library of elemental lore.
As the name suggests, the waters here are magical in their own right – the Blue Warlocks use these waters to both enhance their magics and potions, as well as in the research into new spells and items. One of the original Blue Warlocks linked the source of the river to the elemental plane of water as well as a trickle of energy from the positive energy plane.
This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Over 400 amazingly generous people have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.
Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make these maps free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under this commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:
Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
Dieu Putréfié & autres aventures souterraines (Le) (Dodécaèdre (Le))

…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)
Dungeons of the Prince of Clubs
Beyond the Oubliette, forgotten by most and rarely even remembered by the Prince of Clubs, is the Sanctum of the Entwined, a chapel dedicated to the conjoined twin gods of the last days who grant the prince his immortal form and awaken him from his ennui via the Archon Tamaru when they feel a nudge is needed to help push events to the brink of destruction whence they will finally be freed.
The Archon is much less aware of the puppeteers behind her partners actions and sudden bouts of activity and destruction. She remains unaware that they work through her to awaken the lust for destruction within him when needed.
The maps on Dyson’s Dodecahedron are released for free personal use thanks to the support of awesome patrons like you over on Patreon. Every month 400 patrons come together to make these releases possible. You can help too in order to keep the flow of maps coming and to improve their quality – and even get a map of your own!
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
Hebdo du 31 décembre 2018

— Oh oui, père Noël !
— Et tu as bien travaillé ?
— Oui, oui, père Noël ! Plus de soixante nouvelles gammes, plus de six-cent nouvelles fiches d’ouvrage, plus de deux-cent critiques, un peu moins d’une centaine de biographies … Il sort tellement de jeux qu’on ne sait plus où donner de la tête.
— J’ai vu tout ce dont tu parles, petit Grognaute. C’est pour ça que mes lutins t’ont préparé un beau paquet. Regarde…
—Waaaah ! Du Lex Occultum, ils sont fort ces Suédois ! Et du Cthulhu Hack, il tombe à point nommé ! Et du Champions, vous croyez qu’ils y ont ajouté les bleus ? Et du Pathfinder – Golarion, et du Delta Green, et du Loup-Garou : l’Apocalypse, et une aventure de Labyrinth Lord , et une autre de Conan ! Et du Star Wars, Et ça, c’est du Dr Who ET du Primeval ? Ils font quand même de chouettes jeux avec leurs licences des séries de la BBC. Et la 4ème édition limitée de Kult ! Et même un fac-simile de luxe des premiers Dungeons & Dragons ! ... Tu me gâtes trop père Noël ! Je n’aurai jamais le temps de ficher tout ça !
— La magie de Noël et mes lutins s’en sont déjà occupé mon petit Grognaute. En espérant que tu sois encore aussi sage en 2019 !
— Promis, et même plus !
(1334 jeux, 13500 ouvrages, 31 systèmes, 15869 critiques, 504 jeux amateurs, 1183 éditeurs, 2341 bios, 5260 utilisateurs)
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : les dernières news du jeu de rôles)
Dungeons & Dragons (Donjons et Dragons)
…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)
Hebdo du 24 décembre 2018

En Equestria, de jolis cadeaux pleins de paillettes tronent au pieds de sapins illuminés. Si on les interroge, Licornes, Pégases et Poneys vous diront que l’esprit de Noël n’est pas mort.
Dans l’Umbra profond, les Lycans rendent hommage à la Lune lors des plus longues nuits de l’année. Si on les interroge, les Loups-Garous vous diront que l’esprit de Gaïa n’est pas mort.
À Harlem, les chants gospel résonnent déjà dans les églises. Si on interroge les afro-américains, ils vous diront que l’esprit de Malcolm X et de Martin Luther King n’est pas mort.
Sur scène, Phil et ses potes comptent faire pêter les décibels. Les fans arrivent et les fûts entament une longue soirée. Si on interroge les rockers, ils vous diront qu’Elvis n’est pas mort.
Dans le donjon de Deepsyx, les aventuriers sont descendus chasser le monstre qui terrorise la région. Si on interroge le barbare, il vous dira de la fermer. Mais si on interroge le magicien, il vous chuchotera que le dragon n’est pas mort.
Dans les cryptes du Vieux Monde, les tombeaux s’ouvrent et les vampires s’apprètent à jouir encore d’une belle et longue nuit. Si on les interroge, ils vous diront que Jésus est bien mort…
…et ils partiront dans un sinistre éclat de rire en montrant la lance qui trône sur le mur.
Joyeux Noël quand même !
(1333 jeux, 13476 ouvrages, 31 systèmes, 15865 critiques, 504 jeux amateurs, 1183 éditeurs, 2341 bios, 5257 utilisateurs)
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : les dernières news du jeu de rôles)
Steve Bissette

(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : les dernières news du jeu de rôles)
9 years of maps!
I’m posting two maps from each year, one in June and one in December of that year, and focusing on dungeon maps primarily to keep the comparisons “fair”. That map at the top of 2009 was one of the very first I ever posted to the blog. It is painfully low-resolution and it turns out I can’t find the original anywhere, and don’t have any higher resolution scans of it around. I might even redraw it at some point.
Much of the end of 2009 and 2010 was spent on my “Geomorph Mapping Project” to draw at least 100 interlocking geomorphs. We closed out 2010 with Dyson’s Delve, my mini-mega-dungeon. In 2009 and 2010 I still use “pencil thin” walls – as you can see in the geomorphs and the Dyson’s Delve map. This is something I moved rapidly away from as I developed my style, and have only started sort of coming back to (using thick sharpie markers for walls) in the last year.
These two maps from 2011 showcase my work as it locks into a definite style – avoiding single-stroke walls, adding more detail, and obviously a lot more comfortable with my work. The thick black walls and heavy hatching have become very clear by this point and many of the maps from this year are among my favourites of my older work.
2012 was a bit of a rough spell for me. When I started posting to the blog I was off work on disability for nerve damage. When my workplace disability ran out and I was transferring over to the provincial disability program, I went through several months on the lowest tier of social support, and this kept me from both the internet and from doing much drawing. The maps in 2012 are much sparser and less defined than in 2011, and are a lot less frequent on the blog. But that all changed in December of 2012 with the release of Dyson’s Delves…
2013 sees my maps pick up in quality and quantity again. The feel of the 2011 maps returns, with more time spent per map and a lot of effort put into presentation and structure. This is the year where I start transitioning away from generic black gel pens for my maps and towards using archival felt-tipped pens (Mistubishi Uni Pins and Sakura Microns mostly). More and more of my maps are now being drawn with a grid base – not usually shown on the map proper, but most of the maps in this era through to the end of 2015 are drawn on graph paper, making them easier to use with traditional VTTs and similar.
2014 and 2015 exemplify the style I had developed up to this point. I stabilize to a regular release schedule of maps twice a week. The style is consistent and easy to read. The winter of 2014 includes the release of the Dyson Megadelve, a massive megadungeon project that spans over 30 maps of caverns, dungeons, mines, and the ruins of a dwarven city.
2015 sees the lines for walls gradually getting darker and heavier, making the maps that little bit easier to read.
2015 sees another big stylistic transition in my maps. First I move away from drawing on graph paper, instead drawing on white paper with a sheet of graph paper behind it as a guide. The black lines of my walls thicken yet again, and for a large number of maps I move away from a photoshopped grid to a hand-drawn one.
The hand-drawn grid goes through several styles and iterations over the next few years. Some are better than others, and quite frankly some are disappointing when I look back on them now. Towards the end of the year I also transition from releasing maps as grayscale 300dpi JPG files to black and white 1200 dpi PNGs.
My work this year included a lot of larger commercial projects in addition to my blog maps – and again my style grows and changes. I get into more fine details and in the fall of 2018 I started doing more work digitally after drawing the map in my traditional manner – I often add a bit of shade to the crosshatched areas now, and a fine shadow to help make the walls feel a bit more raised.
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
[DCC] Crypt of the Honoured Dead

The always-awesome Jürgen Mayer has posted a free DCC adventure at his Dead Cyclops blog. With a slightly modified version of the Vault of the Lapis Monk map (adding sweet mystical sigils to the floor in a few places) and art by the awesome Evlyn Moreau, this is a nice quick 2-page adventure for a night of Dungeon Crawl Classics play.
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
We must travel deeper via the third eye!
It is the expansion of the mind we explore for the clues to open the third eye. The mushroom folk who live there claim to have the secret. But they will not give it to us willingly. They misdirect and obfuscate. They speak of states of mind we are not prepared for. Only when we have killed each and every one of them are we satisfied that they do not have any secret keys to the third eye.
But we start to see things differently. As if the ichor of these mushroom “people” has infected us, transitioned us somehow. And when we return stumbling and hallucinating to the chamber of the third eye we can all see how it opens, and reveal the stairway beyond.
This map is made available to you under a free license for personal or commercial use thanks to the awesome supporters of my Patreon Campaign. Over 400 amazingly generous people have come together to fund the site and these maps, making them free for your use.
Because of the incredible generosity of my patrons, I’m able to make these maps free for commercial use also. Each month while funding is over the $300 mark, each map that achieves the $300+ funding level will be released under this free commercial license. You can use, reuse, remix and/or modify the maps that are being published under this commercial license on a royalty-free basis as long as they include attribution (“Cartography by Dyson Logos” or “Maps by Dyson Logos”). For those that want/need a Creative Commons license, it would look something like this:
Cartography by Dyson Logos is licensed
under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
(Source: Dyson’s Dodecahedron)
Malédiction de Strahd (La) (D&D5 – Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition)

…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)
Sandy Petersen’s Cthulhu Mythos (D&D5 – Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition)

…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)
Dungeon Master’s Screen Waterdeep – Dragon Heist (D&D5 – Dungeons and Dragons Fifth Edition)

…
(Source: Guide du Rôliste Galactique : le jeu de rôle, l’univers, et le reste…)