Cultist Lair, Adept & Expert (Patreon)

Howdy folks, I've got another map for you! Your alternate version this week is a handy propless version of the Cultist Lair. No longer will you be restricted by a bunch of props you didn't necessarily want, because you can fill this space with whatever you need! Also, I made a small change to my PSD this time, and it should be a little easier to toggle between props and propless now, just a small quality of life upgrade.

Anyway, let's talk about the map!

1. When I made the rough sketch of this week's map I had a few ideas in mind. I wanted it to be half cave and half dungeon and somewhat cramped, though with enough mid-sized spaces to get into serious combats. I also needed to make the dungeon cult themed, though I wasn't too sure how I would do that. In the end, I did so with a handful of arcane circles, blood splatters, and a torturer's chamber, though I'm sure there were a couple other easy props I didn't think of that could have added a lot. 

After a couple rough sketches I decided to make the map somewhat more linear than my typical dungeon, with most areas having only 1 entrance. This changes the flow of the map in an interesting way I think, and I suspect it will promote creative solutions for players who need to get past obstacles (like a patrolling guard or traps). Another nice little bonus is that you can make a pretty good guess at the path your players will take, so you can plan a little more thoroughly (if that's how you do things).

2. I'm glad I got over my issue with drawing caves. After my first attempt at a cave map (Infested Caves) I was put off by how my style seemingly didn't translate well at all. Of course I just needed to practice, and good thing too because the cave portion here is looking pretty nice I think. The biggest change from then to now is the way I draw the rock walls. Letting the lines trail off has turned out to be a nice way to get a simple idea across (that the rock walls reach up and connect with the 'ceiling') without unnecessary lines confusing the eye. 

Inside the dungeon, an extremely careful observer will notice several bits and pieces from a couple of other maps. The tile floor is a touched-up version of Flooded Dungeon's ground (altered to look less repeated), the walls are also taken from Flooded Dungeon but with some small details adjusted, the sarcophagi are taken from Desert Tomb, and the crates, barrels, and bags are taken from Town Market. I think that some people would feel iffy about cutting corners on this kind of thing, but the time it saves is massive, and honestly why would I draw the same brick walls or tile floors again if I'd already done the work a couple weeks ago? 

3. The palette I decided to use here is a mix of a couple that I've been developing: the dungeon/cave palette from Flooded Dungeon and the arid/cave palette from Desert Tomb. I think the colors cut the difference pretty closely, and perhaps this map can be used in conjunction with either of those two maps. 

Otherwise, I think this one turned out a little more subdued than I typically like. If I had time to re-color it from scratch I think it would be tinted more blue than yellow, with sharper and more defined shadows. Actually, I could see coming back to this map someday and redoing it with a more verdant style, perhaps with a waterfall or with large mushrooms or something. As it is though, I think it's just fine and is a perfectly acceptable map, and notably it is the 6th ruins/dungeons map I needed to put up another map pack on Roll20.