# Mapmaking Discussion & Philosophy (WIP/Critique) > Dungeon/Subterranean Mapping >  Heavy Metal Dungeons

## Lukc

All contain stout bearded men (dwarves) and a lot of heavy metal (iron golems).  :Razz:  Anyway, joking around, I felt inspired by some of the maps here, so I've set about making a dungeon map for my gaming group. We run rules lite, death heavy games without miniatures and all that new-fangled junk ... which is why I used hexes, so nobody would get the idea that they have to be very "precise" about the dimensions of various rooms and such.

All comments welcome ...



Happy October everyone!  :Smile:

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## arsheesh

Looks really good so far Lukc.  Haven't really messed with dungeon maps yet myself so can't offer much in the way of constructive feedback, but I do like the simplicity, clean lines and colors of the map.

Cheers,
-Arsheesh

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## anstett

I like the style and side comments.

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## Lukc

Hehe, the side comments are there just to let me and you know what I still have to do ... but you're right, hand-written notes are quite charming. I'm tempted to hand-write all the map labels, in fact. Maybe in my poor minuscule, even.

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## Lukc

Here it is, pretty much finished off (I've left off the deep mines and such ... not enough room on this kind of scale). I haven't included doors and the likes, I prefer to make them up pretty much as we go along, since I'm a very "wing it" kind of DM. And here's a little song to get the players in the right mood while they're hacking and slashing: Children of Bodom: Are You Dead Yet?  :Wink:

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## Ascension

Very cool and a simple style that many find hard to achieve, including me.  Good stuff.

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## tilt

looks great.. began on a dwarves dungeon for a challenge once, never gotten around to finish it though...  I like the clean and crisp look of it  :Smile:

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## Lukc

I'll see if it works when I print it out ... otherwise I might just use it onscreen.  :Wink:

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## CannonMagnet

Good work. I really dig the old-school-ness and the overall design. The ancient ruins hinting at alien shapes is pretty cool.

Small issue: The callouts (text label areas) don't seem to be working with the rest of it for me. I think it is the clean white vs. all the yellows and browns of the map itself. 
Are you going to show a player version, and a DM/GM version? If so the labels are not such a big deal as I expect they are for your eyes only...

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## Lukc

I'm thinking of leaving it as just a DM/GM version, but I agree with the callouts ... fiddled around quite a bit, but ... maybe I should just make all the text white and use a fatter font. Maybe go with a bold for all of the texts. I'll give it a try and post it after ...

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## Lukc

Ok, here's a little challenge I set myself (and failed) - make a dungeon vaguely (very vaguely) inspired by an album. Anyway, here it is:



Comments welcome.

(new version with fixed typo - another 5-10 minutes.)

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## Lukc

Well ... it's Saturday and winter seems to have arrived. Yesterday I ended up driving through a light snowfall in summer tyres, which was great fun. Now I might get through my next dungeon ... I'm practicing the perspective thing again, but a bit more involved and based on Deep Purple.

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## Lukc

I got to it later than expected ... and barely in time for the sept/oct lite challenge. 20 minutes to spare, I think. Anyway, here it is again:



Basically, while listening to Deep Purple I had the weird idea ... what would a dungeon excavated inside a petrified gargantuan purple worm look like? So I started work on it in illustrator ... but then fell back on my manual drawing skills.

Also: how do I thumbnail the same image twice? I feel silly uploading them twice ...

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## tilt

really cool dungeon - and what a great concept  :Smile:

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## Lukc

Thanks  :Smile:  I hope to have a chance to spring it on some players this week, or maybe next week ... they're probably to lazy to check my blog, so they won't know what's waiting for them  :Very Happy: .

Edit: they weren't too lazy to check. O.O

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## Lukc

My next little project ... a multi-level perspective "dungeon" map based on this, as yet unfinished, bit of castlebuilding based on a few pencil sketches:



Likelihood of finishing: I have no frikkin' idea!  :Very Happy:

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## Piscivorous

Purpley Worm Death. Back in the late 70s I put my players through what today would be described as a Gargantuan Scorpion that was still alive, but no threat to the players. Think germs upon any of us.

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## Lukc

:Smile:  that sounds perfect. Players should be made to remember they're germs, compared to the DM!  :Smile:

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## ravells

These are fantastic, Lukc! The purple worm is stupendous! How do you go about drawing something like that?

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## Akerbeltz

The Purple Worm is awesome. Makes me want to break out the old AD&D books.

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## Lukc

> These are fantastic, Lukc! The purple worm is stupendous! How do you go about drawing something like that?


I started with a sketch of a purple worm bursting out of the ground, then did a few rough cross-sections in 2D of how the floors would look and work, then I broke out another sheet of paper, hand-lined an isometric grid on it, drew the whole thing in pencil, went over it with three thicknesses of letraset pens, erased most of the pencilwork, scanned the thing, added the text, added a paper texture and ... there you have it.  :Smile: 

I actually cheated on the isometric bit, since I started at the top, I just fitted in lower levels as I could  :Smile:  Oh, and I did the outside staircase first.

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## ravells

Thanks! I just love cutaways with lots of busy scenes!

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## Lukc

Me too, but they're horrible to draw!  :Very Happy:

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## mathuwm

the big dwarf thing does look familiar

Nice Job!

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## Lukc

Really? Where from? As far as I recall, I drew it without looking at any references ... I'm going to have to draw a new one anyway, since my players have been naughty and gone through all my dungeons. Grumble grumble.

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## mathuwm

http://www.cartographersguild.com/at...3&d=1194040950

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## Lukc

Hahaha, oh, incredible. You're right, it *is* similar. The gorge, the enveloping mountains, the little lake, etc.

No, I've never seen *that* map before!  :Smile:  I just fired up Illustrator and started playing around, trying some stuff and trying to see what I could get out of it!  :Smile:

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## mathuwm

made me laugh a little

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## Lukc

Sometimes you're just pressed for time ... well, I am anyway. So ... I set myself 1 hour to prepare all the dungeons I'm going to use for today's D&D session. I really should have listened to speed metal for this, but, well, I used this instead: Ayreon's album Actual Fantasy. The result: a bunch of quick and rough dungeons designed for adding pencil and pen notes.





I would add more notes, but I have to run and walk the dog, then off to a meeting. Will comment more later.  :Smile:

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