Tag: Top-down map

A place where cosmic insanity becomes reality, where the stars whisper, and horrible secrets are just itching to be revealed.

Magic, sorcery and witchcraft is at best frowned upon, but will more likely earn you a death sentence. None but the most power hungry or insane (or both) will tap into what lures beyond the veil of reality, and those who do keep it a secret in hidden chambers and deep dungeons. This is an example of such a place, where a mad sorcerer studies the cosmos and beyond.

Click here for a larger version of the map

Explore more fantastic locations:

• Hand-drawn scrolls and banners for fantasy map-makers
• Free dungeon map – the Malign Marathon
• Angel’s spit inn and alehouse
• Isometric hex map – the ruins at Boulderwood Crags
• The Bogpike Tower – isometric fantasy tower map

Of all the tropes of fantasy, the Underdark of Dungeons & Dragons campaign setting Forgotten Realms is probably one of my favorites. It is a concept I often borrow for my own world building.

My own, loosly defined, fantasy world has an extensive underdark filled with both wonder and horror – a world beneath the world, usually referred to as “The Underside”. While large parts of the Underside is a pitch black, mostly lifeless labyrinthine wasteland, there exists also beacons of life and (to some degree) civilization. It is a vast, dark cosmos in which subterranean societies thrive beneath the feet of an unsuspecting world.

To the people of the above, this place is alien and terrifying and very dangerous.

The underside of the world has it’s own sprawling network of connections, much like the roads of the “surface”. Tunnels stretch for thousands of miles, and are used for trade and travel between the different creatures and settlements of the inky blackness.

One such “road” is the endless tunnels of the Stygian Trail, and to use it means paying tribute to whoever currently occupies the ancient toll houses. It is contested territory – bitter wars and countless skirmishes has been fought over the Stygian Trail and its fortified tollhouses. This map shows one of those toll houses, with enough room to house a small band of humanoid guards and plenty of storage for tribute.

Getting past the small fortress will not be cheap, and the toll master might not settle with gold coins – there are more valuable resources in the dark.

Click here for a full sized-version of the image.

Oh, and if I’ve inspired you to run underdark adventures of your own, make sure you pick up a copy of Veins of the Earth by Patrick Stuart – it’s by far the best module I’ve ever read on the subject!

More like this? These are my latest posts:

• Hand-drawn scrolls and banners for fantasy map-makers
• Free dungeon map – the Malign Marathon
• Angel’s spit inn and alehouse
• Isometric hex map – the ruins at Boulderwood Crags
• The Bogpike Tower – isometric fantasy tower map

I’m working on a project describing a cult of snake worshipping knights – the Ordo Vipera. Thought I’d share the map of their chapter house, should anyone want to use it for their own campaign in the meantime. There’s much love and labour behind the map, so I hope you’ll enjoy it!

Click here for a larger image.

This is (one of the levels of) the underground chapter house of the Ordo Vipera – the Knights Viper. The Knights Viper are one of several knightly orders in my world, and quite likely the one that is viewed upon with most suspicion.

While not necessarily “evil”, the Knights Viper are secretive, non-transparent (more so than other orders) and has many hidden agendas. They rarely intervene openly with politics or the general struggle for power but tend instead to keep a watchful eye from the shadows. They do not have the martial striking capacity of some of the other knightly orders, but knowledge is power, and they use it well. The serpent knights know secrets that could potentially topple kings and queens should they be revealed.

Snakes, especially vipers, are revered by the Ordo Vipera. The inner sanctum of the chapter house is the lair of a large female viper referred to simply as “mother”. Mother is very old and very intelligent. She whispers advice to the knight-brothers, and her offspring forms tight bonds with them. Mother shares her venom with the knights, and they are considered to be the most proficient alchemists in the realm (some would rather call them poisoners, but that is not the full truth).

At any given time there are nine brothers of the Knights Viper (each filling a specific role, such as Master Librarian, Keeper of the arms, Apothecary, etc.) and nine squire-acolytes. Ruling them is the chapter master – the Lord of Scales. The order commands a host of two hundred men-at-arms.