Posts Tagged by Steffenhold
| June 6, 2012 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
The journey to transform a useful, but uninspiring hex map into a fantasy map worthy of sharing with the other players at the table is nearing an end. At last, the map is beginning to take shape. Step 8: Pesky trees and swamps A starting point for color, greens and blues. At this point, my creation process becomes less rigid. In fact, I’m bouncing back and forth from ink to colored pencil as the details in the map emerge. As you can see from this…
| May 30, 2012 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
In this third installment on my series of creating a fantasy-style map for the lands north of my homebrew campaign city of Steffenhold, I find myself on the verge of putting ink on paper — which is a sort of no turning back now moment. Part 6: Aren’t you forgetting something? Before adding ink, I better make sure everything is in pencil. Oh, yeah, I forgot to add the forests, and to dress up other areas of the map. The thing about fantasy maps is…
| May 24, 2012 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
In the first part of this series I explained the various sources that served to inspire me to create a map of the lands north of Steffenhold — the fantasy setting for my homebrew campaign. After grabbing my base hex map and selecting the paper I would use for the map, I was ready to begin tracing in pencil. Step 3: Rivers, lakes and roads, oh my The first lines of pencil on paper. With pencil, I began to lightly trace those elements I believe…
| May 16, 2012 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
I have a hex map detailing the lands north of Steffenhold — the barony town that serves as the central point of my home campaign. The map is perfectly serviceable. The main geographic feature of each 10-mile hex is shown by a mapping symbol. There are lakes, rivers, roads and dots for towns. Hex map of the lands north of Steffenhold. Should the players wish their characters to go exploring, I could tell you that hex 0314 contains the imposing stone-gray castle of the…
| July 20, 2010 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
During a break at the Saturday Gaming Group’s last session, I brought up the notion of doing a steampunk campaign when the current Steffenhold campaign reached a natural stopping point.* Save for one other member of the table, I got a round of quizzical expressions. “Steampunk? What’s that?” I was surprised. I really thought the genre of brass goggle-wearing adventurers and steam-chugging flying contraptions was more widely understood. No matter, it was an excellent chance to share with them, by example, what steampunk can be.**…
| November 5, 2009 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
There’s a fox in the henhouse over at Open Design, Wolfgang Baur’s design project that produces d20 OGL and 4E materials for its patrons. This particular fox is games designer John Wick, who was the principal designer for 7th Sea and Legend of the Five Rings rpgs and has recently released Houses of the Blooded through his Wicked Dead Brewing Co. Wick’s been taking aim at some d20 sacred cows, such as re-envisioning core races for Kobold Quarterly, and in the Wicked Fantasy segment of…
| September 22, 2009 | Posted by Troy E. Taylor |
Ryan and Jay, those d20-rolling enthusiasts over at 3.5 Private Sanctuary, devoted Episode 87 of their podcast to the subject of divinity and the role of gods in a campaign world. And at one point, Ryan and Jay make a solid case for always using default pantheon — the Greyhawk-lite list of gods and goddesses from the Player’s Handbook — for every campaign. Basically, their argument boils back to the very purpose Pelor, Kord and Wee Jas and their deific fellows were provided in the…
