How do you do maps?

[gurgleflep]

While I personally like having self-drawn maps for cities and dungeons, I'm unable to draw up as many as I need before my campaign starts up due to holiday stuff getting in the way (parties, meals, shopping, decorating, etc.) and I'm currently in need of some help. Where do you go when you're a bit pressed for time and need to get some maps made out?

I use square grids, play 3.5, and am broke due to all the gifting I've done, so free sites and such would be very appreciated Thank you everybody.

[Buddha's_Cookie]

I actually found a few PDFs of the cut out dungeon tile books for D&D, which lets you reprint and screw ups or have more copies. I can post a link if you like?

[gurgleflep]

I actually found a few PDFs of the cut out dungeon tile books for D&D, which lets you reprint and screw ups or have more copies. I can post a link if you like?

I would appreciate the link, so please and thank you

[Buddha's_Cookie]

Now that I say I can find the link I have trouble finding the link. This is the only one I could find so far.
http://www.4shared.com/office/2hgCqV...les_Set_1.html

This will help with small maps and encounters.

Important: Use the smaller of the Download buttons.

Edit: Here is a link to the search for the rest that I have found.
http://search.4shared.com/q/1/Dungeo...%20set?view=ls

[Rhynn]

donjon's dungeon generators. I mostly use them for caves, myself, because there is no way I'm drawing one of those in Dungeonographer; for actual dungeons, I prefer a hands-on approach, but I'm fine with random natural caves.

Also, Paratime Design has a ton of completely awesome handcrafted dungeon maps under Creative Commons license. I freaking love them, especially the old school D&D module feel of them.

[Mastikator]

donjon's dungeon generators. I mostly use them for caves, myself, because there is no way I'm drawing one of those in Dungeonographer; for actual dungeons, I prefer a hands-on approach, but I'm fine with random natural caves.

Also, Paratime Design has a ton of completely awesome handcrafted dungeon maps under Creative Commons license. I freaking love them, especially the old school D&D module feel of them.

Oh god this is good stuff.

[Rhynn]

Oh god this is good stuff.

That was my initial reaction. I originally found Paratime maps on a RPG cartography forum, and now I have a folder of 229 Paratime maps (including, admittedly, "classic blue," black-and-white, and color versions of many maps).

I never actually use the dungeon-filling features on the donjon generator, just the maps, but those alone are awesome - and especially the graphical options. The functional black-and-white, the AD&D 1E module blue, the "hand-drawn" crosshatching, graph paper, 1E FR style parchment...

[valadil]

I draw out my battlemaps. On the rare occasion that I use a dungeon, I only draw the active room and improvise the connections between rooms. Cities, estates, castles, etc come from google. I get more mileage out of those than homemade ones. For instance I'd never think to put a music room in a castle, but when the players find it I have to use it.

[gurgleflep]

Donjon and Paratime are both pretty danged awesome, thanks for the links
And sorry for the late reply, with five people sharing one computer schedules are a tad bit mucked up.

[Brookshw]

Recently I've been finding myth-weavers very helpful when in a time crunch though you might need to change a few hallways. One benefit is it'll do traps, secret doors, encounters and loot though admittedly I end up rewriting most encounters and probably loot.

[Isamu Dyson]

I very rarely use maps . My focus tends to be more on descriptions and drama.

[SassyQuatch]

I go with hex, 'cause squares are for squares, man.

[WbtE]

You should be able to find a few gems in the Map-a-Week archive. They usually don't have a grid on them, but that's pretty easy to add with most image manipulation software.

[gurgleflep]

Recently I've been finding myth-weavers very helpful when in a time crunch though you might need to change a few hallways. One benefit is it'll do traps, secret doors, encounters and loot though admittedly I end up rewriting most encounters and probably loot.

That's a pretty handy link, thanks
Also sorry for the late reply, you posted a fair while ago.

I very rarely use maps . My focus tends to be more on descriptions and drama.

I'm pretty awful at describing things, so if you have any tips for doing so please help me

I go with hex, 'cause squares are for squares, man.

I've never used hexes, nor have my players (all relatively new to the game), so I'd rather not confuse them or myself.

You should be able to find a few gems in the Map-a-Week archive. They usually don't have a grid on them, but that's pretty easy to add with most image manipulation software.

Yowzers, that's a lot of maps Thanks for the link.

[Brookshw]

You should be able to find a few gems in the Map-a-Week archive. They usually don't have a grid on them, but that's pretty easy to add with most image manipulation software.

Cool link, I'm shocked they only have the maps for Castle Ravenloft's town and environ zones, the maps from inside the castle can be a pain to read.

[WbtE]

Cool link, I'm shocked they only have the maps for Castle Ravenloft's town and environ zones, the maps from inside the castle can be a pain to read.

I suspect that maps from inside Castle Ravenloft were considered a more valuable IP. There are a lot of treasures on the old WotC site, though.

[incandescent]

Always a good time to plug Dawn of Worlds! Turn world map making into a game. I know it isn't cities and dungeons, but it may come in useful to you some day.

[falloutimperial]

Always a good time to plug Dawn of Worlds! Turn world map making into a game. I know it isn't cities and dungeons, but it may come in useful to you some day.

As a matter of fact, this is a great way to make interesting world maps that every player will actually be familiar with. The tropes of convenient geography and petty gods are both inherent to the system.

[Brookshw]

I suspect that maps from inside Castle Ravenloft were considered a more valuable IP. There are a lot of treasures on the old WotC site, though.

Well, you certainly convinced me to go digging, and what do you know, they're posted elsewhere

Shame though, I'd love to see a bit better map of the first and second floor, I always have to **** my head to try and read them (look at the 2nd floor map. at the top, how does a hallway lead to stairs up that lead to a room that leads to a hallway that leads back to the original hallway? I'm blaming Escher). Ah well.

[nedz]

I have a large set of old style floorplans. I arrange them on the table to show the map, sliding them around as the PCs move about. It's a lot more flexible than the battlemap especially for encounters which feature movement.

[BWR]

If I need maps, I have a lot. Many of the gaming products I use have maps, and if I need something more detailed I'll steal a map from somewhere else and refluff it.
Also, Rob Lazaretti and Pazio publish map sets for adventure paths, with all sorts of goodies - small villages, large towns, big cities, wilderness areas, sewers, etc. I like maps so I buy them. If I need personalized maps I'll rough sketch something and try to use Hexographer (because overland maps simply must be hex if at all possible)