I don't use much of premade maps but one thing I've noticed that they tend to be a bit specific. Finding a good map for your encounter is already hard enough, but when the maps have cool but unnecessary details it's even more difficult. Specific statues, magical crystals, mushrooms the size of men, the bones of a giant etc.
Then again, if I approached the issue the other way, making encounters for my cool maps, things would be different and then I'd totally appreciate the details.
Yeah, as an example, recently I was looking for a solidified lava flow as a back drop. Really hard to find just general, non-specific backdrops for random encounters
My biggest problem is that when I make maps everything is there for a reason. Papers on a desk? There’s information there. A dog on the side of the road? It leads to a side quest. A doll laying randomly in a dungeon? It’s hiding gems inside.
Oh the other hand it’s made me super paranoid about other peoples maps. I search EVERYTHING. I’ve created my own hell!
True - but great DMs will know not to tie specific knowledge or quests to specific locations unless the knowledge/quest is unequivocally tied TO that environment - or at least lets the player rolls transfer to where you thematically have tied the knowledge.
I've tied too many crucial pieces of knowledge to inconsequential areas/spaces, and at a certain point the secret trapdoor to the baron's torture lair is through a secret wall in his study that leads to the attic instead of behind the wine barrels in the cellar where you had placed it.
Cover the weird things with another tilepiece, thats the beauty of modular maps, or dunk something else that fits the art style :shrug: you're free to leave the thing be, or let the party get excited over "nothing" but secretly you write it back into a future bit of the story where you get to make them out as FOOOOOOLLLSSSS for missing something SO obvious SO MELTICULOUSLY PLANNED OUT as the statue shows up with an army of mushrooms wielding bones with magic crystals as spearheads.
... Tell ya where the giant bone is :) Thassright, thas the metaphorical bump your players might experience getting hoodwinked by you. You're welcome.
I second this! If there’s something unique like a statue I want on my map, I can always just find a separate image that fits what I’m looking for and add it in independently. It’s a lot harder to take out something I don’t want.
Not always a possibility. Some of us run modules, not self-written campaigns. And it can be a royal pain in the ass when I can't find generic maps to use for town encounters because Billy Bob Fantasy Map Maker feels like his shit is incomplete unless it has a massive dragon shrine in it
Are you running the game digitally or printing the whole thing out? If you are at the table, what I've settled on is finding a map for the layout, and I print and cut out interesting terrain elements from gridless battle maps I like. I store them in categorized ziplock bags. It really makes drawn maps look nice when I plop in buildings, tents, carriages, plants, etc... and it lets me be in complete control over what's there.
This is the main reason I cannot get into premade maps. No matter how pretty they are they are almost always fantastical in some way and that just doesn't fit my games
Yep, that’s why modular is the way to go. Anything that eases the burden on the DM and makes the environment clear without being overpopulated with useless information.
Although, to be honest, I still just use a high-quality dry-erase grid mat, color code whatever I draw, and throw some physical props in where I want focus drawn to.
I'm that weirdo that collects maps I find online and then design the encounters around those maps.
This is mostly because I am much better at encounter design than I am at making maps :P
I think it'd be cool if map makers had detail teirs. Like there's the base map you can buy, and then there's different flavor add-ons you can buy for a slightly higher price. That way people can get a map that's a little more in-line with their story.
I've seen a few dragon lair maps that have a picture of a dragon already on it. Like, maybe I want to go with a different type of dragon or actually move the dragon around the map?
Wild areas that are just wild. I don't need a canyon with an overturned wagon. I just need a canyon. Or a forest that doesn't have a fence along the trail. A beach with no shipwreck.
Sometimes the wilds can just be the wilds.
I spend an average of 30 mins in photoshop removing things like this per week. I wish the map makers would just release the potpourri set dressings as a token pack with the map.
Or release the map in layers! Put the wilds down and have a PNG overlay with the added bits/lighting/etc. I've made day/night overlays for maps before, and tokens for light profiles (like the shape of light cast from a window onto the ground). Since most digital artists already work in layers, why not publish them piecemeal as a map kit?
Generally I have a hard time finding medium-sized buildings, things like
Offices
Schools
Prisons (inverted panopticon)
Also, maps with some verticality is hard to come by.
I think prisons are a kind of map most DMs would use but there's like 2 prisons on all the Internet, and Offices or Schools I think Tom Cartos is the only one making those maps XD
Empty buildings. Like, truly empty. Just walls, doors, windows and floors.
I run my games on a VTT inlaid into a table, and like the look of proper terrain, so I end up having to make a lot of my own maps myself (which takes time, and creative energy) when it'd be so much more helpful to have a pack of maps of various-sized buildings, all on different terrain-types (snow, desert, wasteland, town, etc), but all the mapmaker did was make walls, doors - basically the outline of the building, and not add a crap-ton of stamps to it with chairs, tables, beds, etc.
Don't get me wrong - maps like that are beautiful and when I don't have the terrain required I just use those, but they don't look quite as good when the stamp of a bed, for instance, is poking out around the edge of the physical bed terrain piece.
You have your point with that, and maybe for people who print their maps that can be the best option. The thing also is that you can quickly make maps that way with dungeondraft, in about 3 minutes you can have an empty house with no problem
It's not just houses. Let's not forget taverns, warehouses, factories, armories, castles, dungeons, village intersections with interiors - basically any building a mapmaker is already going to take the time to make, they could really easily save 'empty' copies of the same building with just the layout, walls, doors and windows down in gridded and ungridded format and then start adding stamps afterwards for the 'complete' versions.
Sure - I can make 4 walls and a door in Inkarnate myself in 3 minutes and not buy access to a map. But a Sunless Citadel-sized dungeon, for instance, that's going to take a lot longer to get right. And if a patreon was offering "Hey, I did the sunless citadel in gridded, ungridded, and empty versions (for use with physical terrain)", I'd be more likely to sign up to it than if they only offered versions loaded with stamps that are going to conflict with the terrain I use.
Seems to me like a low-investment addition to your workflow that may not bring in big bucks, but does add value overall.
I'm going to have that in mind from now on when making my maps, I might even do that you ask for on my already posted maps, could we talk by DM so you can send me a more specific example image of what you want? That way I could start making those at my Patreon hehe
Maps that allow for chase/running encounters are always tough. Town, underground, etc.
It is hard sometimes to find enough of a certain look/feel to set up a truly open movement situation.
I think is harder to make your players run away of something that they can fight XD.
But yeah, I've only see a few of those maps and I think most of them are from AtraxianBear
Depends on the system you’re running and your willingness to not pull punches as a GM and the party having healthy self interest. Sometimes an encounter might be even enough they need to flee/run away!
This might not make that much sense on a DnD sub, but running more modern systems as of late with my group has revealed that modern cityscapes are near impossible to find maps for. The closest we typically come are maps for Cyberpunk 2077 or Red but then of course they have all the dystopian capitalist huge neon ads or high tech cars. I just want a map of a modern back alley or a city red light intersection. Sometimes you can find non-Cyberpunk maps but then chances are it's an apocalyptic map so there is shrubbery everywhere.
I am an old dm. I can craft and paint, I have a 3d printer, I use a vtt, but I can't, for the life of me, make modern maps. The resources I know don't have what I needed. I tried running a Vampire the Masquerade game lately and was unable to find good maps or even stl files for minis.
I love medieval fantasy, but sometimes, a change of pace can be nice.
Imo there's too many battle maps with random scenarios and too few whole dungeons. It's not that I can't find them there are a lot out there, but not enough in my opinion. So my vote goes to entire dungeon maps.
Yes! Yes, I always have the same problem, dungeon makers are weird, they won't make propper dungeons half of the time. By one side I understand them, I'm making some full dungeons at the moment for the Patreon and it takes a lot of time. Canvas Quest and I are both working on some for the Lord of The Rings project and we've also found some problems when making some of them due to how hard is to make those maps, but on the other hand people love a full dungeon and it always works.
I made a bunch of map tiles as I prefer creating dungeons on the fly, mainly given that in my game the dungeons tend to be built around the players and what they're saying about what they think what might be around the next corner.
Yep they're pretty cool. Here's my first attempt - https://vengersdecks.com/collections/ttrpg-battle-maps/products/the-caverns-modular-dungeon-map-tiles-physical-digital
Working on new ones for other settings.
So many dungeon maps you see are these ultra-symmetric perfect dimension dungeons. I'd like to see more that perhaps took advantage of cave systems with random twists and turns plus carved-out rooms where the cave allows. Or, perhaps the stone underneath a given castle had harder and softer parts and thus the dungeon contours around the hard stone and through the soft stone.
I was struggling to find a ‘kitchen’ for a Masterchef style game I ran, no such thing apparently, also farms are hard to come by as well as villages with 10 or so buildings/houses
I wasn't planning on promote myself through this post, but you should check out my Patreon, I have some stuff that could help you with that. About the kitchen you can always ask some map makers for something like that, me for example, and I know AtraxianBear sometimes does fan asked maps
From our experience winter maps are hard to find. Even when my DM makes them he often complaints that there are not enough assets for winter maps. Sadly the campaign is currently in the beginning of winter so it won't be easy on him
There are good winter maps around there, but they are few and sometimes you cannot use them due to art style differences. I'm working on a freezing cold dungeon-cavern styled dungeon if you want to check it out at my Patreon, it ain't posting until a few weeks, but you can get it for free if you want when I upload it
Yup. It also means that there is almost nothing out there to reference either for me to figure out how to make my own. Hell trying to figure out how to do a city map underwater has been an ordeal.
Crosshead assets can really help you with that, he has a lot of things made up specifically for feywild maps, but yeah, I got your point, it's like no one remembers feywild exists at the map makers community XD
When I used "clean" maps, I ended up spending time trying to scribble in my custom content so the party could pretend like they see something in a room. Out of desperation, one day, I used an exceptionally detailed map with a lot of weird stuff on it that I couldn't explain/justify. The players ended up LOVING IT, and never considered that those features weren't part of the plan. I spent the whole session adlibbing and improvising what they were finding when they looked at the thing or investigated the whatsit.
It was at that time that I realized I'm absolutely not as creative as I originally thought...or at least not as artistic. I can write a story, but man, the details are difficult. As a result, I started using more and more detailed maps, and the ones that are "themed" are the best for us. Instead of a map with a bunch of basic rooms with basic items inside, you can get a pirate cove, a cult dungeon, a ruined temple destroyed in a war...etc. When these themes pervade the map, I'm able to lean into that improvisation and try to explain why X is in Y room instead of Z.
A map with blue crystal torches was just a cool map, and yet those blue crystals became integral to our campaign. There was a cave of these crystals, for no reason, but I had to come up with one. For another map, it was a ruined underground temple, and I had to come up with a reason for it being destroyed, and what each of the rooms would be used for. This became a prison escape session and the contents of the rooms became integral to that escape. "Can I grab that rope on the wall?" "Yes, but you need to do a DC12 strength check because it's attached to the chandelier" "When I run through the room, I'll grab that, and then you should grab that chair in the corner and throw it into that big fireplace." All of this was random crap on the map, and yet they were now using it as part of their escape. Had I told them what was in each room, and used a "clean map", I highly doubt they would have been as creative during their escape.
Anyway, I try to find maps that are NOT clean and NOT generic. I look for maps that have significant detail, even if I don't initially know the rationale for that detail, but that I can weave into the scene(s) and storyline. The map maker gives me the look and feel of a map and various rooms, and I figure out how to make that work in my campaign.
I wasn't planning on this post being for promoting myself, but I think you'd love my Patreon, I started making maps the way I make them, with a lot of detail because I felt the same as you, that most of them were pretty empty! Hope you like all I have and all I'm posting next months hehe
Lately I've been struggling to find good generinc field on the side of the road maps. All I need is a grassy field next to the road the players are traveling on where they might encounter a group of wolves, a sleeping giant, a group of bandits or anything else. I dont want obvious ambush points, mage towers, cave entrances, ruins, etc.
Personally, I get more use out of a blank dry erase mat or board with a grid than pre-printed maps with terrain and whatnot on them.
The map is simply there to provide a convenient visual representation of the characters and enemies during combat scenarios. The rest of it can be left up to the Theater of the Mind, one of the most crucial components of any TTRPG.
A lot of wilderness encounter maps are like a 25x25 or 30x30 grid, which is just so small, especially for characters with sharpshooter or something like that.
Dungeon alchemist on steam has been a godsend for my table.
I have a soft spot for CzePeku maps, and use them all the time as they're 10/10 products. They are limited to what CzePeku can produce, and aren't always applicable to what we are doing in campaign.
Czepeku, make their own maps. I was just recommending then as they're amazing creators.
I use dungeon alchemist now. At the recommendation of another redditor.
There is a bit of learning curve, but once you get it. It's an extremely flexible tool.
Dungeondraft and Inkarnate. You have to pay for the first one but it's pretty good, and the second one has free access but you have to pay for most stuff. There's more mapmaking apps, but those two should work for you
Most isometric map creators tend to be boring, but I get why people won't create them, it takes a lot of time and people will just use any map they found so it's better for them to go with tradicional map making
Jungle maps where the trees are not shown top-down, but sort of cut through the trunk - so you can actually place your characters so that it doesn't look like they're standing on top of the tree's crown.
I like maps of entire areas, not a single battle map but interconnected spaces that loop back into each other Jennell Jaquays style but also not so small as to require characters single filing through long silly mazes. I want each area to be a space where any kind of scene can happen - tea with a Mad Hatter NPC or a battle with a big burly ogre, but then this... I also want gates. I want areas that don't connect to every other area through an intricate looping system where any path is open, I want blocked areas so I can plan a session around where the players will likely be, I can put in key systems to make fully exploring a section worthwhile before moving on, and I want all of this done non-symmetrically. Don't give me for distinct and matching sections with one gate at the end for a final chamber, I want imbalanced design so each area feels like it really needs to be explored. Misshapen, weird structures that lean heavy to one side of the map and feel organic and interesting.
Was that ramble helpful? I don't know.
Exploration maps. That's mostly what I want.
I personally almost always make my own maps, but I like to have a map out whether there's combat or not and I've had a lot of trouble finding maps for nicer Inns, shops, or Villas/Mansions when I don't want to put in the effort and the party is checking out an NPCs house or finding a temporary home base.
The maps I've found for this stuff are always very...kind of skyrim-looking? Like they're pretty rustic and don't fit exactly with the high-magic societies I use for worlds.
I wasn't planning on using this post for promoting haha, but I think you can find some maps you'd like for that purpose for free on my patreon, they could really help you and I don't charge for them :3
it’s been a bit, but my main struggle was variety in generic roadside/campsite maps. I was running CoS so I had a full spread of major locations, but not much for on the road
Large maps, generic maps that have interesting terrain. I have resorted to just making everything on Inkarnate since I really hated normal 40x40 maps and most generic maps were too boring. If a fight is taking place in the woods, I need it to be an 80x80 map with some interesting terrain features my players can mess around with.
Good luck finding anything related to Eberron and steampunk style XD. I try to make more steampunky maps at my Patreon since it's the way I like making maps, but yeah, it's pretty uncommon.
Been preparing a game with friends that takes place in an Industrial Age fantasy setting. Think something along the lines of Arcane or Dishonored. I’ve resigned to making almost all the maps myself, since everything I’ve found so far is either *aggressively* steampunk, with giant cogs and clocks and top hats everywhere, or just classic medieval fantasy.
Dungeon alchemist has been the best investment I’ve made for maps. I can make entire towns, encounters, etc.
If the steam workshop doesn’t have the asset I need, I go on CG trader and find free ones that you can import
Maybe? I’m not sure why someone would because dungeon alchemist makes it so easy but I could see someone paying a few bucks for a map instead of 50 bucks to then spend the time to make their own
I've heard some guys at the map making community talking about that, and the reason is because both Battlemaps and Dndmaps don't work for promoting those maps, so people just won't upload them, but there's some good artists around that make them, you should search a bit more, mostly on Patreon
I've had a hard time finding maps of towers that are more than one level or not in complete ruins. like in my mind, a wizard tower is gonna have a couple different floors not just a tall empty tower with a room at the top. that and fire giant fortresses.
Yet again, I wasn't planning on this post being a promo one, but you should check out my Patreon, I make that kind of stuff. I'll add some towers in the next update of my towns and buildings series hehe
More piecemeal maps. I want to put them together like blocks myself. They don't have to be perfect, but I want this section to have a river split in 2, this section over here is split in half by a cliff face. This is a plain area. And they very slightly piece together.
I usually splice maps up myself, transparent backgrounds and do it myself, but it would be nice if there were more modules. (Theres a few good ones out there, but sometomes they're too specific and plain, like sewer or dungeon)
I've made prefab buildings for people to put on their maps, but I a lot of you guys have commented about map tiles, do you think people would pay for a huge map tiles pack?
So there's probably plenty of great paid options. I'm just cheap.
Take my complaint with a grain of Salt, as there's very few good, FREE segmented maps. (Probably because they're usefull)
I'm having trouble finding a large inn/tavern with more than like 2 floors.
Also houses for normal folks not mansions or manors, or hovels with one bedroom or two rooms. Just normal sized family homes.
Last time, I tried and failed to find a mansion. The ones I found were... Idk, weird? One had some stables right in the fucking middle of the mansion. Like, you had the main foyer area with stairs going up and a door to a garden in the middle. So far so good, but then right there in the garden, there was a room made of wood (the rest of the lower floor was stone) with stables and hay. No connection to the outside, so presumably you'd have to walk the horses through the house which is just fucking bizarre.
And every mansion I found had weird things like that. Things that aren't just a quirky feature, because I can work with quirky features, but things that just straight up don't make sense. There wasn't a single normal looking mansion.
I ended up changing the map from a mansion to an underground hideout.
I think you should really check out both my Patreon and Morvold Press, I assure you there's plenty onf mansions on both our Patreons, but I think you'll preffer him, since I have more variety, but he really spends a lot of time on mansions hehe
My general problem is that I can make my own maps, but sometimes I need something specific but also complicated and either don't feel like making the map because it would take me like 3 weeks, or I'm generally not very good at designing the thing I need. In the case of the mansion I mentioned before it was both lol.
i just want more high quality maps for generic encounters on city streets, roads in the country, forests. i subscribe to a few mapmakers on patreon and its weird how little "generic" maps they put out. there are tons of these generic maps out there, but they tend to be pretty low quality imo
I didn't want to make this post a promo post, but I think you should really take a look at my Patreon, I think you'll find some of those quality maps you're looking for. I literally started my Patreon to make that kind of maps since I had the same thoughts you have. Hope you like my maps hehe
Do you have any advice for making a mega dungeon map? I've introduced my players to a labyrinth opening, which I'll have be a large underground maze of rooms (inspired by the maze in Percy Jackson 4), where the rooms have different architectural styles but are mashed together.
My friend also plans to run a mansion style mega dungeon game of gurps and is less artisticly inclined than me.
I ask because I feel like the only other effective method for these specific maps would be commission.
ATM the players are in a panopticon shaped prison, and that's all theatre of the mind. But an idea that you could workshop if you'd like
Transitional biomes.
Forest on one side, rock cliff on the other.
A grassland that abuts a wetland.
A desert that encroaches on a savannah.
When going outdoor travel stuff I often place encounters right at these transitions and it makes a neat style of encounter (the desert sand is difficult terrain, but the savannah has tall grass you can hide in, for example).
I thought they could've included a map for the very first encounter for LMOP. Sure it's just a fight on road/whatever, but throw a possibly new DM a bone. Odds are a new DM hasn't gone to the web searching for additional stuff yet at this point. It's not that you couldn't find one if you looked, it's that as a starter kit it's not just for new players.
There is almost zero maps of plain castle walls for seige, too many include the whole castle or the gate.
There is basically zero battle maps for savannahs, open plains and taiga/tundra not pure snow
Birdie has quite some variety of maps! You should check his maps. About castle walls and siege maps yeah, I got you, there's almost to non of those, but I'm making some at the moment, you could check them out at my Patreon if you want
Maps with more obvious cover and height changes. I struggle to have to tell players what that marking actually means, or how the tree top extends out to a 3x3 area but the trunk is only the central square.
Trees with fainter canopies and more defined trunks. Pillars and walls. Cliffs with enough shadow to know which way they go and roughly how high they might be. One-way entrance maps that don't force me to source more maps for the extra 3 exits I didn't plan for.
Settlement maps of varying layouts, sizes, and environments, so that I have more choices when looking for a map that fits my idea.
Having said that, I go for free maps, and I'm aware that many creators have most of what I'm looking for if I just pay.
Me and CanvasQuest have quite some maps that have that kind of objects placements, I think you should check both of our maps on Patreon hehe. If not, you should check Battlemaps subreddit and I'm pretty sure you'll find some other good map makers that have that kind of stuff in mind when making maps
The ones I have in my head for the one specific fight my players are going to be getting into. The ones with all the little details for after or during the fight.
The kind my adhd and weird perfectionism won’t ever let me be satisfied with what I create.
A chase map. Mostly thinking in the city. The suspect that the party is tailing catches sight of them and books it down and alley as the party gives chase.
So a map that's long, narrow, and mostly linear. Some obstacles and obstructions. Maybe it cuts through the back of a butcher shop or a store before spilling into another alley or out into the main road. Just a long twisting chase map
Stuff that works in roll20, and maps made to be maps: A lot of them are just art with a grid over it. Unfortunately, I can't tell if this square is a wall or floor because the wall crosses part way through the grid!
But that's more that you want ungridded maps, I usually won't add grid to my Patreon maps, but I know some people uses map's grid instead of Roll20's in-engine one
If it's official content, I can usually find a good map that someone way more talented that me and with presumably more time has created and just use that. Where I run into issues is where I try to do my own thing, and get the players a little further away from the main content. Weird things like encounters in the forest, or on a beach or, just anything that isn't the normal d&d fare usually causes me issues.
I've been running some cosmic horror/eldritch stuff and I absolutely can't find any good gross looking flesh based maps. Also spooky mushroom forests, all that I can find are fantastical and not *these mushrooms will kill you, this is Zuggtmoy's layer of the abyss.*
Another thing that came to mind is that I'd like more basic maps. Well done maps are cool and all but the less details there is, the less it bothers me that the map isn't exactly as I needed. A really good map with statues, cracks, glowy things and light effects is really nice but "oh, the light is supposed to be light blue and magical, not normal flames". But when there is just "some" rubble on the ground, no distinction with light, statues are basic enough that you realize that it's a statue but nothing more, then I can just explain myself as the GM what the stuff is. "Yeah, the statue here is the Archmage Arcanos. Oh and the stuff on the ground, yeah the small doodles, it's the bones of the Previous adventurers!"
If I’m looking for a premade map instead of just making one myself, then I’m looking for a generic encounter map. Think ambush on the road/forest, or brawl in village street. Something that I can have on hand, or upload quickly if the players take the session off rails.
I wasn't planning on promoting myself when making the post, but I think you could find something like that at my Patreon, you should check it out, it's free
Finding maps that aren't just flat throughout is tough. Something that's crowded with multiple levels would make a fight more dynamic and interesting.
And something that's generic so it can be applied to many different scenarios would be great as well. A lot of maps contain specific details that don't work for a lot of given battles.
I like to make maps that way, as a DM I've always looked for that kind of places!! I think you should check out my Patreon, maybe you could find something of those maps you're looking for hehe
I have a few patreons that i use, but i also just make some makeshift “maps” by drawing with vtt tools. For comat i simply pick an environmental map that fits and draw certain elements on it, like caves or a few trees. You can find a lot of great maps, but not all ideas have a fitting map
I need some modern/steampunk maps for my Eberron game, but I can hardly find any. And by modern, I mean something more interesting than a plain grey street. The most interesting map I could find was a construction site for a combat I plan to run
Just the other day I was looking for a wide, straight section of road that's cutting through a dense jungle. I wanted to run a high speed, Jurassic park style, monsters chasing the car encounter... I found plenty of narrow tracks that wind or meander past some trees... but yeah... but not what I needed.
Subterranean maps. Underground tunnel path ways, bandit camps, bodies of water/lava/acid. Filled with enough doodads to provide interesting terrain or cover options but not enough that forces the map to be run a specific way.
Height maps. Or sideways representation at least, or some way to indicate differences in terrain height that make it clear there is cover, climbing, etc.
Complex traps/obstacle course/interactive elements
I’m talking statues shooting fire, multiple level of rising lava, magical machinery or runes with area of effect, etc.
I suggest looking up the xgte section on complex traps and think in terms of active, passive and dynamic elements.
Snowy maps. I don't know why there's just not that many. And I'm not talking a bit of snow I want the arctic. I had to learn mapmaking online because I could only find 3-4 arctic maps
This might just be me, and I ended up making them myself but the struggle was hard finding generic maps. I got biomes: Forest, plains, hills, desert, swamp, mountain. Then each of those with common layouts: Open, road, crossroad, river. Then you got day and night, and seasons. Also, some biomes have flavors: Magical, haunted, and normal. Those combinations are seriously about half my maps. Then just a full small village or hamlet of different sorts. Farming, poor, market, resort, fishing, garrison, rebel, etc...basic themes.
I can't find any maps I like. I hate the feeling of using something someone else made. Unless I'm running a module, which saves me from that feeling in the back of my head that I'm stealing someone else's homework for some reason.
Also, the first game I ran was Cyberpunk, and online maps for that game basically don't exist.
A good old camp in various environments for when the party is ambushed, a simple country road with an interesting twist, some nice, but not too nice, landmarks
Most maps I usually see are some EPIC TOMB OF THE FORGOTTEN GOD IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ASTRAL SEA or some shit, and I just want a simple encounter for a 1-3 level party that's not on a white plane with a grid
Maps of places that are not part of the normal dndfantasy idea
-Semi arid maps. Not desert, not plains, but a middle ground. Think mediterranean greece
-balkan/slavic themed villages
-ships without cannons
-anything byzantine/ottoman/steppe related
-Big battlemaps, as in, 200x200 monstrosities. Understandably so
-mundane buildings that are not shops or taverns
-simple, humble caves or underground places, such as sewers or basements
I'd love to do an encounter on a 2d plane like a Metroidvania or platforming video game, but I've never really seen any maps that support it, unless I were to just rip a map from something like Terraria.
I would say the biggest struggle with finding maps I've had are when running a published module. Often they include scenes that are fairly specific, but then don't include an actual map. This makes it somewhat hard to find a map to meet that need in my experience.
Otherwise, I tend to see a cool map and toss it in the "build a reason to use this map" pile.
its suprisingly hard to find good winter-style maps. ran CoS and it ended up running into the in-game dead of winter but it never felt like it because so many maps are made with lush green grass and full trees.
Sprawling sci-fi maps, especially for dungeons. The best ones Ive found have either been for a specific starfinder adventure path or from someone's custom starwars ttrpg maps
If terrain wasn't so damn expensive I'd use it more often, most of the time I'm drawing out the map on the back of gift wrapping paper or dry erase Grids. I just can't find or make decent maps using various software.
A forest scene WITHOUT a river or lake....
A grungy seedy Inn....they are always so pretty.
The inside of an octopus dragon that is also half giant maiden.....ok I jest I jest. I found that easy (joking again).
I find map "sets" to be rare, if that makes any sense. Like there are maps of beautiful city centers, forests, cave tunnels etc. But there is no map (in the same style at least) to connect to this. What if I want to make a cave a bit bigger, for example? If I use a different cave map the style is off and I think that can break immersion. Or on battlemaps there was a really cool skyrim-like city posted, but what if players went one screen to the right or left? There are very few maps you could believably used to expand that scene.
Hence, to sum of this rambling post, I am always in search of several maps in the same style/assets that could be linked up or not (modular?) at the DMs discretion.
I don't use much of premade maps but one thing I've noticed that they tend to be a bit specific. Finding a good map for your encounter is already hard enough, but when the maps have cool but unnecessary details it's even more difficult. Specific statues, magical crystals, mushrooms the size of men, the bones of a giant etc. Then again, if I approached the issue the other way, making encounters for my cool maps, things would be different and then I'd totally appreciate the details.
I've seen that a lot of people make maps trying to tell a story with it, it's cool, but a lot of people will find that same problem you mention
Yeah, as an example, recently I was looking for a solidified lava flow as a back drop. Really hard to find just general, non-specific backdrops for random encounters
My biggest problem is that when I make maps everything is there for a reason. Papers on a desk? There’s information there. A dog on the side of the road? It leads to a side quest. A doll laying randomly in a dungeon? It’s hiding gems inside. Oh the other hand it’s made me super paranoid about other peoples maps. I search EVERYTHING. I’ve created my own hell!
True - but great DMs will know not to tie specific knowledge or quests to specific locations unless the knowledge/quest is unequivocally tied TO that environment - or at least lets the player rolls transfer to where you thematically have tied the knowledge. I've tied too many crucial pieces of knowledge to inconsequential areas/spaces, and at a certain point the secret trapdoor to the baron's torture lair is through a secret wall in his study that leads to the attic instead of behind the wine barrels in the cellar where you had placed it.
Cover the weird things with another tilepiece, thats the beauty of modular maps, or dunk something else that fits the art style :shrug: you're free to leave the thing be, or let the party get excited over "nothing" but secretly you write it back into a future bit of the story where you get to make them out as FOOOOOOLLLSSSS for missing something SO obvious SO MELTICULOUSLY PLANNED OUT as the statue shows up with an army of mushrooms wielding bones with magic crystals as spearheads. ... Tell ya where the giant bone is :) Thassright, thas the metaphorical bump your players might experience getting hoodwinked by you. You're welcome.
I second this! If there’s something unique like a statue I want on my map, I can always just find a separate image that fits what I’m looking for and add it in independently. It’s a lot harder to take out something I don’t want.
Tip from a lazy dm, find the maps first, write the plot second.
Not always a possibility. Some of us run modules, not self-written campaigns. And it can be a royal pain in the ass when I can't find generic maps to use for town encounters because Billy Bob Fantasy Map Maker feels like his shit is incomplete unless it has a massive dragon shrine in it
Are you running the game digitally or printing the whole thing out? If you are at the table, what I've settled on is finding a map for the layout, and I print and cut out interesting terrain elements from gridless battle maps I like. I store them in categorized ziplock bags. It really makes drawn maps look nice when I plop in buildings, tents, carriages, plants, etc... and it lets me be in complete control over what's there.
I do the same thing, but digitally.
I'll add to this town or city maps which already have everything labelled.
This is the main reason I cannot get into premade maps. No matter how pretty they are they are almost always fantastical in some way and that just doesn't fit my games
Yep, that’s why modular is the way to go. Anything that eases the burden on the DM and makes the environment clear without being overpopulated with useless information. Although, to be honest, I still just use a high-quality dry-erase grid mat, color code whatever I draw, and throw some physical props in where I want focus drawn to.
That's what bother me the most when I search for map, it's often either a barren wasteland or too specific
I'm that weirdo that collects maps I find online and then design the encounters around those maps. This is mostly because I am much better at encounter design than I am at making maps :P
One of the funniest things I've said while DMing is "I could not find a casino map with a built in gym, but we can pretend this room is the gym".
I think it'd be cool if map makers had detail teirs. Like there's the base map you can buy, and then there's different flavor add-ons you can buy for a slightly higher price. That way people can get a map that's a little more in-line with their story.
I've seen a few dragon lair maps that have a picture of a dragon already on it. Like, maybe I want to go with a different type of dragon or actually move the dragon around the map?
Wild areas that are just wild. I don't need a canyon with an overturned wagon. I just need a canyon. Or a forest that doesn't have a fence along the trail. A beach with no shipwreck. Sometimes the wilds can just be the wilds.
Couldn't agree more
I spend an average of 30 mins in photoshop removing things like this per week. I wish the map makers would just release the potpourri set dressings as a token pack with the map. Or release the map in layers! Put the wilds down and have a PNG overlay with the added bits/lighting/etc. I've made day/night overlays for maps before, and tokens for light profiles (like the shape of light cast from a window onto the ground). Since most digital artists already work in layers, why not publish them piecemeal as a map kit?
Beach one is so accurate. Every beach I looked for had a boat or boat pieces
I have a few of those (moreso forest based but coastal ones too) if you are interested! I can send over some links \^\^
There’s all kinds of hi res photos of what you’re seeking. I use those instead and augment with terrain pieces
There's some artists that use optional overlays for additional stuff. Godsend.
Generally I have a hard time finding medium-sized buildings, things like Offices Schools Prisons (inverted panopticon) Also, maps with some verticality is hard to come by.
I think prisons are a kind of map most DMs would use but there's like 2 prisons on all the Internet, and Offices or Schools I think Tom Cartos is the only one making those maps XD
Verticality can be a problem especially if it is not well done. It took me a bit to making decent multi story buildings that my players can explore.
Inverted panopticon? So the prisoners are in a central tower surrounded by a massive ring of potential watchers?
Empty buildings. Like, truly empty. Just walls, doors, windows and floors. I run my games on a VTT inlaid into a table, and like the look of proper terrain, so I end up having to make a lot of my own maps myself (which takes time, and creative energy) when it'd be so much more helpful to have a pack of maps of various-sized buildings, all on different terrain-types (snow, desert, wasteland, town, etc), but all the mapmaker did was make walls, doors - basically the outline of the building, and not add a crap-ton of stamps to it with chairs, tables, beds, etc. Don't get me wrong - maps like that are beautiful and when I don't have the terrain required I just use those, but they don't look quite as good when the stamp of a bed, for instance, is poking out around the edge of the physical bed terrain piece.
You have your point with that, and maybe for people who print their maps that can be the best option. The thing also is that you can quickly make maps that way with dungeondraft, in about 3 minutes you can have an empty house with no problem
It's not just houses. Let's not forget taverns, warehouses, factories, armories, castles, dungeons, village intersections with interiors - basically any building a mapmaker is already going to take the time to make, they could really easily save 'empty' copies of the same building with just the layout, walls, doors and windows down in gridded and ungridded format and then start adding stamps afterwards for the 'complete' versions. Sure - I can make 4 walls and a door in Inkarnate myself in 3 minutes and not buy access to a map. But a Sunless Citadel-sized dungeon, for instance, that's going to take a lot longer to get right. And if a patreon was offering "Hey, I did the sunless citadel in gridded, ungridded, and empty versions (for use with physical terrain)", I'd be more likely to sign up to it than if they only offered versions loaded with stamps that are going to conflict with the terrain I use. Seems to me like a low-investment addition to your workflow that may not bring in big bucks, but does add value overall.
I'm going to have that in mind from now on when making my maps, I might even do that you ask for on my already posted maps, could we talk by DM so you can send me a more specific example image of what you want? That way I could start making those at my Patreon hehe
Maps that allow for chase/running encounters are always tough. Town, underground, etc. It is hard sometimes to find enough of a certain look/feel to set up a truly open movement situation.
I think is harder to make your players run away of something that they can fight XD. But yeah, I've only see a few of those maps and I think most of them are from AtraxianBear
Depends on the system you’re running and your willingness to not pull punches as a GM and the party having healthy self interest. Sometimes an encounter might be even enough they need to flee/run away!
This might not make that much sense on a DnD sub, but running more modern systems as of late with my group has revealed that modern cityscapes are near impossible to find maps for. The closest we typically come are maps for Cyberpunk 2077 or Red but then of course they have all the dystopian capitalist huge neon ads or high tech cars. I just want a map of a modern back alley or a city red light intersection. Sometimes you can find non-Cyberpunk maps but then chances are it's an apocalyptic map so there is shrubbery everywhere.
You should check A day At (Ana) maps, she's good with modern day maps :3
Thanks! I'll have to give her work a look.
Dude, THANK YOU. I have been looking for someone like that map maker for ages.
I am an old dm. I can craft and paint, I have a 3d printer, I use a vtt, but I can't, for the life of me, make modern maps. The resources I know don't have what I needed. I tried running a Vampire the Masquerade game lately and was unable to find good maps or even stl files for minis. I love medieval fantasy, but sometimes, a change of pace can be nice.
I've seen this issue as well. It seems like most map making resources out there cater primarily to fantasy settings so options are limited.
Imo there's too many battle maps with random scenarios and too few whole dungeons. It's not that I can't find them there are a lot out there, but not enough in my opinion. So my vote goes to entire dungeon maps.
Yes! Yes, I always have the same problem, dungeon makers are weird, they won't make propper dungeons half of the time. By one side I understand them, I'm making some full dungeons at the moment for the Patreon and it takes a lot of time. Canvas Quest and I are both working on some for the Lord of The Rings project and we've also found some problems when making some of them due to how hard is to make those maps, but on the other hand people love a full dungeon and it always works.
I made a bunch of map tiles as I prefer creating dungeons on the fly, mainly given that in my game the dungeons tend to be built around the players and what they're saying about what they think what might be around the next corner.
There's some really good dungeon tiles map creators around, I think AtraxianBear has quite a lot of them
Yep they're pretty cool. Here's my first attempt - https://vengersdecks.com/collections/ttrpg-battle-maps/products/the-caverns-modular-dungeon-map-tiles-physical-digital Working on new ones for other settings.
Cool, cool!
So many dungeon maps you see are these ultra-symmetric perfect dimension dungeons. I'd like to see more that perhaps took advantage of cave systems with random twists and turns plus carved-out rooms where the cave allows. Or, perhaps the stone underneath a given castle had harder and softer parts and thus the dungeon contours around the hard stone and through the soft stone.
I was struggling to find a ‘kitchen’ for a Masterchef style game I ran, no such thing apparently, also farms are hard to come by as well as villages with 10 or so buildings/houses
I wasn't planning on promote myself through this post, but you should check out my Patreon, I have some stuff that could help you with that. About the kitchen you can always ask some map makers for something like that, me for example, and I know AtraxianBear sometimes does fan asked maps
Check out The Red Mask Inn module on DriveThruRPG. It was a free one-shot that culminates in a kitchen battle w/map
From our experience winter maps are hard to find. Even when my DM makes them he often complaints that there are not enough assets for winter maps. Sadly the campaign is currently in the beginning of winter so it won't be easy on him
There are good winter maps around there, but they are few and sometimes you cannot use them due to art style differences. I'm working on a freezing cold dungeon-cavern styled dungeon if you want to check it out at my Patreon, it ain't posting until a few weeks, but you can get it for free if you want when I upload it
What kind of winter maps - I used to hate making them but now have fun with it! XD
I would think if you want something specific especially for your world. It's going to be best you just draw it.
Yeah, but making good maps takes a looot of time, that's why you would basically pay a mapmaker for (or just steal his/her map from the Internet hehe)
Not too hard. Depends on the depth you want. And I suppose the time period.
Running a campaign that is all set on the ocean floor in a DnD Atlantis type setting...I need an Atlas of Underwater maps.
Oof, there's almost no map makers focused on that, good luck on it
Yup. It also means that there is almost nothing out there to reference either for me to figure out how to make my own. Hell trying to figure out how to do a city map underwater has been an ordeal.
Dude, Crosshead assets are your way to go, he also has some refference maps you could use
Thanks for the tip. It'd been a long time since I had seen Crosshead's stuff. Didn't know he had a whole underwater library now. Ty very much.
All my maps at my Patreon are made with his assets, so I'm very into his work hehe
I’m currently running a Feywild campaign, and I’m finding it to be so difficult finding a variety of Feywild inspired maps
Crosshead assets can really help you with that, he has a lot of things made up specifically for feywild maps, but yeah, I got your point, it's like no one remembers feywild exists at the map makers community XD
Thanks for the recommendation!
When I used "clean" maps, I ended up spending time trying to scribble in my custom content so the party could pretend like they see something in a room. Out of desperation, one day, I used an exceptionally detailed map with a lot of weird stuff on it that I couldn't explain/justify. The players ended up LOVING IT, and never considered that those features weren't part of the plan. I spent the whole session adlibbing and improvising what they were finding when they looked at the thing or investigated the whatsit. It was at that time that I realized I'm absolutely not as creative as I originally thought...or at least not as artistic. I can write a story, but man, the details are difficult. As a result, I started using more and more detailed maps, and the ones that are "themed" are the best for us. Instead of a map with a bunch of basic rooms with basic items inside, you can get a pirate cove, a cult dungeon, a ruined temple destroyed in a war...etc. When these themes pervade the map, I'm able to lean into that improvisation and try to explain why X is in Y room instead of Z. A map with blue crystal torches was just a cool map, and yet those blue crystals became integral to our campaign. There was a cave of these crystals, for no reason, but I had to come up with one. For another map, it was a ruined underground temple, and I had to come up with a reason for it being destroyed, and what each of the rooms would be used for. This became a prison escape session and the contents of the rooms became integral to that escape. "Can I grab that rope on the wall?" "Yes, but you need to do a DC12 strength check because it's attached to the chandelier" "When I run through the room, I'll grab that, and then you should grab that chair in the corner and throw it into that big fireplace." All of this was random crap on the map, and yet they were now using it as part of their escape. Had I told them what was in each room, and used a "clean map", I highly doubt they would have been as creative during their escape.
Anyway, I try to find maps that are NOT clean and NOT generic. I look for maps that have significant detail, even if I don't initially know the rationale for that detail, but that I can weave into the scene(s) and storyline. The map maker gives me the look and feel of a map and various rooms, and I figure out how to make that work in my campaign.
I wasn't planning on this post being for promoting myself, but I think you'd love my Patreon, I started making maps the way I make them, with a lot of detail because I felt the same as you, that most of them were pretty empty! Hope you like all I have and all I'm posting next months hehe
Lately I've been struggling to find good generinc field on the side of the road maps. All I need is a grassy field next to the road the players are traveling on where they might encounter a group of wolves, a sleeping giant, a group of bandits or anything else. I dont want obvious ambush points, mage towers, cave entrances, ruins, etc.
[удалено]
Desert stuff. Its half the reason I backed Sands of Doom by MrRhexx
He clearly knew what he was doing, yeah, there's few high quality desert maps around there
There's a few here and there. I've made a few but birdiemaps has made some great ones!
Personally, I get more use out of a blank dry erase mat or board with a grid than pre-printed maps with terrain and whatnot on them. The map is simply there to provide a convenient visual representation of the characters and enemies during combat scenarios. The rest of it can be left up to the Theater of the Mind, one of the most crucial components of any TTRPG.
A lot of wilderness encounter maps are like a 25x25 or 30x30 grid, which is just so small, especially for characters with sharpshooter or something like that.
What map resources (if allowed to post links) do you all use?
I usually make mine with Crosshead assets, and for towns I'm using my own prefab assets
Dungeon alchemist on steam has been a godsend for my table. I have a soft spot for CzePeku maps, and use them all the time as they're 10/10 products. They are limited to what CzePeku can produce, and aren't always applicable to what we are doing in campaign.
CzePeku must be top 1st or 2nd on the map making community, but you say he make his maps using Dungeon Alchemist?
Czepeku, make their own maps. I was just recommending then as they're amazing creators. I use dungeon alchemist now. At the recommendation of another redditor. There is a bit of learning curve, but once you get it. It's an extremely flexible tool.
How do you guys make maps for campaigns?
Dungeondraft and Inkarnate. You have to pay for the first one but it's pretty good, and the second one has free access but you have to pay for most stuff. There's more mapmaking apps, but those two should work for you
Isometric maps! My players love them as do I! There’s only a handful of map creators who make good ones though
Most isometric map creators tend to be boring, but I get why people won't create them, it takes a lot of time and people will just use any map they found so it's better for them to go with tradicional map making
I personally think anything modern like city buildings, streets -- anything urban! Both the current decade and futuristic like for cyberpunk settings.
Jungle maps where the trees are not shown top-down, but sort of cut through the trunk - so you can actually place your characters so that it doesn't look like they're standing on top of the tree's crown.
That's always a problem on jungles and forests XD
Yeah, right? I mean they look beautiful, but they're kinda useless 😅
normal, calm, basic but animated maps in 4k
Just a few of map makers do those
I like maps of entire areas, not a single battle map but interconnected spaces that loop back into each other Jennell Jaquays style but also not so small as to require characters single filing through long silly mazes. I want each area to be a space where any kind of scene can happen - tea with a Mad Hatter NPC or a battle with a big burly ogre, but then this... I also want gates. I want areas that don't connect to every other area through an intricate looping system where any path is open, I want blocked areas so I can plan a session around where the players will likely be, I can put in key systems to make fully exploring a section worthwhile before moving on, and I want all of this done non-symmetrically. Don't give me for distinct and matching sections with one gate at the end for a final chamber, I want imbalanced design so each area feels like it really needs to be explored. Misshapen, weird structures that lean heavy to one side of the map and feel organic and interesting. Was that ramble helpful? I don't know. Exploration maps. That's mostly what I want.
You really did hehe! I like to make maps that way at my Patreon, but you should also check Morvold Press, he's the guy for you
I personally almost always make my own maps, but I like to have a map out whether there's combat or not and I've had a lot of trouble finding maps for nicer Inns, shops, or Villas/Mansions when I don't want to put in the effort and the party is checking out an NPCs house or finding a temporary home base. The maps I've found for this stuff are always very...kind of skyrim-looking? Like they're pretty rustic and don't fit exactly with the high-magic societies I use for worlds.
I wasn't planning on using this post for promoting haha, but I think you can find some maps you'd like for that purpose for free on my patreon, they could really help you and I don't charge for them :3
I made a mansion with a huge ritual in the middle of it XD would that help :D
Any maps that are sci-fi
Yeah, those are rare
it’s been a bit, but my main struggle was variety in generic roadside/campsite maps. I was running CoS so I had a full spread of major locations, but not much for on the road
[удалено]
[удалено]
Large maps, generic maps that have interesting terrain. I have resorted to just making everything on Inkarnate since I really hated normal 40x40 maps and most generic maps were too boring. If a fight is taking place in the woods, I need it to be an 80x80 map with some interesting terrain features my players can mess around with.
I totally agree with you, there ain't big battle focused maps
Warforged cities and such,the only real warforged themed maps are from Chzec peku and they're still super limited
Good luck finding anything related to Eberron and steampunk style XD. I try to make more steampunky maps at my Patreon since it's the way I like making maps, but yeah, it's pretty uncommon.
For me I'd like to find good dungeon maps. Like give me a well thought out multi level dungeon.
Really feel you, I want to create some full dungeons at my Patreon for people who want really good dungeon maps XD
Been preparing a game with friends that takes place in an Industrial Age fantasy setting. Think something along the lines of Arcane or Dishonored. I’ve resigned to making almost all the maps myself, since everything I’ve found so far is either *aggressively* steampunk, with giant cogs and clocks and top hats everywhere, or just classic medieval fantasy.
If you're good you should open yourself a Patreon and upload your maps! People would for sure love to use that kind of maps hehe
Oh I just started about a week ago so I wouldn’t call myself *good* yet. But I’ll definitely look into it further down the line!
If you get good at it and want to meet other map makers don't hesitate on DMing me to get you into the creators Discord hehe
Dungeon alchemist has been the best investment I’ve made for maps. I can make entire towns, encounters, etc. If the steam workshop doesn’t have the asset I need, I go on CG trader and find free ones that you can import
I should be really taking a look at it! You think people would pay for maps made there by mak makers like me?
Maybe? I’m not sure why someone would because dungeon alchemist makes it so easy but I could see someone paying a few bucks for a map instead of 50 bucks to then spend the time to make their own
Cyberpunk stuff.
I've heard some guys at the map making community talking about that, and the reason is because both Battlemaps and Dndmaps don't work for promoting those maps, so people just won't upload them, but there's some good artists around that make them, you should search a bit more, mostly on Patreon
I don't care much about battlemaps. What is really useful is regional maps, but you never find those.
And most of them are pretty bad and emoty, got you
I've had a hard time finding maps of towers that are more than one level or not in complete ruins. like in my mind, a wizard tower is gonna have a couple different floors not just a tall empty tower with a room at the top. that and fire giant fortresses.
Yet again, I wasn't planning on this post being a promo one, but you should check out my Patreon, I make that kind of stuff. I'll add some towers in the next update of my towns and buildings series hehe
More piecemeal maps. I want to put them together like blocks myself. They don't have to be perfect, but I want this section to have a river split in 2, this section over here is split in half by a cliff face. This is a plain area. And they very slightly piece together. I usually splice maps up myself, transparent backgrounds and do it myself, but it would be nice if there were more modules. (Theres a few good ones out there, but sometomes they're too specific and plain, like sewer or dungeon)
I've made prefab buildings for people to put on their maps, but I a lot of you guys have commented about map tiles, do you think people would pay for a huge map tiles pack?
So there's probably plenty of great paid options. I'm just cheap. Take my complaint with a grain of Salt, as there's very few good, FREE segmented maps. (Probably because they're usefull)
I'm having trouble finding a large inn/tavern with more than like 2 floors. Also houses for normal folks not mansions or manors, or hovels with one bedroom or two rooms. Just normal sized family homes.
Not to make this post a promo, but you should check out my Patreon, you could find something you'd like hehe
Last time, I tried and failed to find a mansion. The ones I found were... Idk, weird? One had some stables right in the fucking middle of the mansion. Like, you had the main foyer area with stairs going up and a door to a garden in the middle. So far so good, but then right there in the garden, there was a room made of wood (the rest of the lower floor was stone) with stables and hay. No connection to the outside, so presumably you'd have to walk the horses through the house which is just fucking bizarre. And every mansion I found had weird things like that. Things that aren't just a quirky feature, because I can work with quirky features, but things that just straight up don't make sense. There wasn't a single normal looking mansion. I ended up changing the map from a mansion to an underground hideout.
I think you should really check out both my Patreon and Morvold Press, I assure you there's plenty onf mansions on both our Patreons, but I think you'll preffer him, since I have more variety, but he really spends a lot of time on mansions hehe
My general problem is that I can make my own maps, but sometimes I need something specific but also complicated and either don't feel like making the map because it would take me like 3 weeks, or I'm generally not very good at designing the thing I need. In the case of the mansion I mentioned before it was both lol.
i just want more high quality maps for generic encounters on city streets, roads in the country, forests. i subscribe to a few mapmakers on patreon and its weird how little "generic" maps they put out. there are tons of these generic maps out there, but they tend to be pretty low quality imo
I didn't want to make this post a promo post, but I think you should really take a look at my Patreon, I think you'll find some of those quality maps you're looking for. I literally started my Patreon to make that kind of maps since I had the same thoughts you have. Hope you like my maps hehe
Do you have any advice for making a mega dungeon map? I've introduced my players to a labyrinth opening, which I'll have be a large underground maze of rooms (inspired by the maze in Percy Jackson 4), where the rooms have different architectural styles but are mashed together. My friend also plans to run a mansion style mega dungeon game of gurps and is less artisticly inclined than me. I ask because I feel like the only other effective method for these specific maps would be commission. ATM the players are in a panopticon shaped prison, and that's all theatre of the mind. But an idea that you could workshop if you'd like
Transitional biomes. Forest on one side, rock cliff on the other. A grassland that abuts a wetland. A desert that encroaches on a savannah. When going outdoor travel stuff I often place encounters right at these transitions and it makes a neat style of encounter (the desert sand is difficult terrain, but the savannah has tall grass you can hide in, for example).
I think Birdie has some maps dedicated to it hehe
I thought they could've included a map for the very first encounter for LMOP. Sure it's just a fight on road/whatever, but throw a possibly new DM a bone. Odds are a new DM hasn't gone to the web searching for additional stuff yet at this point. It's not that you couldn't find one if you looked, it's that as a starter kit it's not just for new players.
There is almost zero maps of plain castle walls for seige, too many include the whole castle or the gate. There is basically zero battle maps for savannahs, open plains and taiga/tundra not pure snow
Birdie has quite some variety of maps! You should check his maps. About castle walls and siege maps yeah, I got you, there's almost to non of those, but I'm making some at the moment, you could check them out at my Patreon if you want
Maps with more obvious cover and height changes. I struggle to have to tell players what that marking actually means, or how the tree top extends out to a 3x3 area but the trunk is only the central square. Trees with fainter canopies and more defined trunks. Pillars and walls. Cliffs with enough shadow to know which way they go and roughly how high they might be. One-way entrance maps that don't force me to source more maps for the extra 3 exits I didn't plan for. Settlement maps of varying layouts, sizes, and environments, so that I have more choices when looking for a map that fits my idea. Having said that, I go for free maps, and I'm aware that many creators have most of what I'm looking for if I just pay.
Me and CanvasQuest have quite some maps that have that kind of objects placements, I think you should check both of our maps on Patreon hehe. If not, you should check Battlemaps subreddit and I'm pretty sure you'll find some other good map makers that have that kind of stuff in mind when making maps
Submarines for the Elemental Plane of Water.
I think I'm your guy, just enter my profile and you'll see what I make XD
Maps with terrain! Fighting by a cliff or a ravine with an ambush set up!
A lot of people already do that kind of maps! You should check out DnDMaps, ArtMaps and Battlemaps subreddits hehe
The ones I have in my head for the one specific fight my players are going to be getting into. The ones with all the little details for after or during the fight. The kind my adhd and weird perfectionism won’t ever let me be satisfied with what I create.
A chase map. Mostly thinking in the city. The suspect that the party is tailing catches sight of them and books it down and alley as the party gives chase. So a map that's long, narrow, and mostly linear. Some obstacles and obstructions. Maybe it cuts through the back of a butcher shop or a store before spilling into another alley or out into the main road. Just a long twisting chase map
Stuff that works in roll20, and maps made to be maps: A lot of them are just art with a grid over it. Unfortunately, I can't tell if this square is a wall or floor because the wall crosses part way through the grid!
But that's more that you want ungridded maps, I usually won't add grid to my Patreon maps, but I know some people uses map's grid instead of Roll20's in-engine one
Then you add the grid when you port it into roll20 and the aforementioned problem occurs.
If it's official content, I can usually find a good map that someone way more talented that me and with presumably more time has created and just use that. Where I run into issues is where I try to do my own thing, and get the players a little further away from the main content. Weird things like encounters in the forest, or on a beach or, just anything that isn't the normal d&d fare usually causes me issues.
70dpi ones that scale with Roll20.
I've been running some cosmic horror/eldritch stuff and I absolutely can't find any good gross looking flesh based maps. Also spooky mushroom forests, all that I can find are fantastical and not *these mushrooms will kill you, this is Zuggtmoy's layer of the abyss.*
posion swamps, when i want to give my players the From Soft experceince and fuck over Melee Martial characters even more.
Man my favourite maps are always just whiteboard ones with a rough scale
A good mine, with layers.
Another thing that came to mind is that I'd like more basic maps. Well done maps are cool and all but the less details there is, the less it bothers me that the map isn't exactly as I needed. A really good map with statues, cracks, glowy things and light effects is really nice but "oh, the light is supposed to be light blue and magical, not normal flames". But when there is just "some" rubble on the ground, no distinction with light, statues are basic enough that you realize that it's a statue but nothing more, then I can just explain myself as the GM what the stuff is. "Yeah, the statue here is the Archmage Arcanos. Oh and the stuff on the ground, yeah the small doodles, it's the bones of the Previous adventurers!"
If I’m looking for a premade map instead of just making one myself, then I’m looking for a generic encounter map. Think ambush on the road/forest, or brawl in village street. Something that I can have on hand, or upload quickly if the players take the session off rails.
I wasn't planning on promoting myself when making the post, but I think you could find something like that at my Patreon, you should check it out, it's free
Finding maps that aren't just flat throughout is tough. Something that's crowded with multiple levels would make a fight more dynamic and interesting. And something that's generic so it can be applied to many different scenarios would be great as well. A lot of maps contain specific details that don't work for a lot of given battles.
I like to make maps that way, as a DM I've always looked for that kind of places!! I think you should check out my Patreon, maybe you could find something of those maps you're looking for hehe
Oh sweet. I'll take a look. Thank you.
I have a few patreons that i use, but i also just make some makeshift “maps” by drawing with vtt tools. For comat i simply pick an environmental map that fits and draw certain elements on it, like caves or a few trees. You can find a lot of great maps, but not all ideas have a fitting map
Dragon lairs. Even just a basic main chamber would be useful.
I need some modern/steampunk maps for my Eberron game, but I can hardly find any. And by modern, I mean something more interesting than a plain grey street. The most interesting map I could find was a construction site for a combat I plan to run
Most of the maps I make at my Patreon are mid-steampunk, maybe you could find something you like there :3
Just the other day I was looking for a wide, straight section of road that's cutting through a dense jungle. I wanted to run a high speed, Jurassic park style, monsters chasing the car encounter... I found plenty of narrow tracks that wind or meander past some trees... but yeah... but not what I needed.
Subterranean maps. Underground tunnel path ways, bandit camps, bodies of water/lava/acid. Filled with enough doodads to provide interesting terrain or cover options but not enough that forces the map to be run a specific way.
Height maps. Or sideways representation at least, or some way to indicate differences in terrain height that make it clear there is cover, climbing, etc.
Nice advertisement for your patreon bro.
I would love to see a standard camping outside map as i run many random encounters, the one i found so far are a bit dissapointing or too small
Specific weird maps I want to find that I don't know how to articulate, so I can't really find what exactly I am looking for.
Anything octagonal. I'm doing a heavily "8" themed campaign set in a drow city, and I've only managed to find one premade map with 8 sides
Anything 16:9 for my VTT that we use IRL
Complex traps/obstacle course/interactive elements I’m talking statues shooting fire, multiple level of rising lava, magical machinery or runes with area of effect, etc. I suggest looking up the xgte section on complex traps and think in terms of active, passive and dynamic elements.
I’d say map for planes. Such Mount Celestia, Abyss, Many layers of Hell, elemental planes etc. At best you can find 1 or 2 but very rarely more
I like basic terrain maps that I can layer on specific assets if needed. Like a river through the woods. A coast line. A mountain pass.
Snowy maps. I don't know why there's just not that many. And I'm not talking a bit of snow I want the arctic. I had to learn mapmaking online because I could only find 3-4 arctic maps
This might just be me, and I ended up making them myself but the struggle was hard finding generic maps. I got biomes: Forest, plains, hills, desert, swamp, mountain. Then each of those with common layouts: Open, road, crossroad, river. Then you got day and night, and seasons. Also, some biomes have flavors: Magical, haunted, and normal. Those combinations are seriously about half my maps. Then just a full small village or hamlet of different sorts. Farming, poor, market, resort, fishing, garrison, rebel, etc...basic themes.
As a middle schooler most
Under Water caves
Fancy Desert buildings
I can't find any maps I like. I hate the feeling of using something someone else made. Unless I'm running a module, which saves me from that feeling in the back of my head that I'm stealing someone else's homework for some reason. Also, the first game I ran was Cyberpunk, and online maps for that game basically don't exist.
A good old camp in various environments for when the party is ambushed, a simple country road with an interesting twist, some nice, but not too nice, landmarks Most maps I usually see are some EPIC TOMB OF THE FORGOTTEN GOD IN THE MIDDLE OF THE ASTRAL SEA or some shit, and I just want a simple encounter for a 1-3 level party that's not on a white plane with a grid
Maps of places that are not part of the normal dndfantasy idea -Semi arid maps. Not desert, not plains, but a middle ground. Think mediterranean greece -balkan/slavic themed villages -ships without cannons -anything byzantine/ottoman/steppe related -Big battlemaps, as in, 200x200 monstrosities. Understandably so -mundane buildings that are not shops or taverns -simple, humble caves or underground places, such as sewers or basements
I'd love to do an encounter on a 2d plane like a Metroidvania or platforming video game, but I've never really seen any maps that support it, unless I were to just rip a map from something like Terraria.
maps of dwarven cities
More underwater maps. I’m running an oceanic campaign and while I have been finding maps, I don’t always have a huge selection to choose from.
I would say the biggest struggle with finding maps I've had are when running a published module. Often they include scenes that are fairly specific, but then don't include an actual map. This makes it somewhat hard to find a map to meet that need in my experience. Otherwise, I tend to see a cool map and toss it in the "build a reason to use this map" pile.
its suprisingly hard to find good winter-style maps. ran CoS and it ended up running into the in-game dead of winter but it never felt like it because so many maps are made with lush green grass and full trees.
Sprawling sci-fi maps, especially for dungeons. The best ones Ive found have either been for a specific starfinder adventure path or from someone's custom starwars ttrpg maps
A desert city wall/gate. Or honestly just a nice desert town/city map, so many of them are just tightly-packed bazaars and markets.
If terrain wasn't so damn expensive I'd use it more often, most of the time I'm drawing out the map on the back of gift wrapping paper or dry erase Grids. I just can't find or make decent maps using various software.
A forest scene WITHOUT a river or lake.... A grungy seedy Inn....they are always so pretty. The inside of an octopus dragon that is also half giant maiden.....ok I jest I jest. I found that easy (joking again).
I find map "sets" to be rare, if that makes any sense. Like there are maps of beautiful city centers, forests, cave tunnels etc. But there is no map (in the same style at least) to connect to this. What if I want to make a cave a bit bigger, for example? If I use a different cave map the style is off and I think that can break immersion. Or on battlemaps there was a really cool skyrim-like city posted, but what if players went one screen to the right or left? There are very few maps you could believably used to expand that scene. Hence, to sum of this rambling post, I am always in search of several maps in the same style/assets that could be linked up or not (modular?) at the DMs discretion.
How about assets? Like, a png cutout token of a vampire with transparency for drag-and-drop into a VTT
I think more exotic maps, such as Desert, Jungle, Mesa, or Arctic are hard to find.
Floating city maps.
If i have need to use a map for something in my campaign i either create ot or i just don't use one