A lot of folks have done some wonderful crazy shit with sketchup. I'm not one of them. At present, I'm using it only to do easy mapping for 3D dungeons. But to followup, I have links to show what cool things others are doing and a few tools so that you could at least use sketchup for the simpler mapping I'm doing.

Here are some examples of cool things that folks have done with sketchup:
Outdoor map of the Temple of Elemental Evil
Collection of 3D dungeon pieces.
A whole DDC dungeon done up with sketchup. This one shows the full potential of sketchup, with cut views and the like.

But before you could ever create anything like the examples above, here are some essential tools. These are tools to get after you've watched and played with the instructional videos.
The Ruby Library Depot Ruby scripts are macros (and more) that will automate some of the drawing process. The other links are some of the tools I found useful.
Numb E. This macro numbers rooms sequentially at the click of a mouse. How else did I number 246 rooms of that dwarven mine?
Work Plane. This sets up a grid just like graph paper to ease pointing and clicking for map creation.
2-d tools. Most 2-d problems are solved with a work plane, but there are nifty tools here, especially the hatching texture. If you want a cool old school-looking printout of a level, you can do that with this.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Pondering: Getting to the Good Parts in a Megadungeon

Image
Thinking out loud:  suppose you’ve got an episodic megadungeon campaign.     Each session, the group picks a location in the megadungeon to explore.   Sometimes these locations are already deep within the dungeon.   Now, a well-designed megadungeon has multiple entrances, some of which provide ready access to deeper parts.   But what if those entrances haven’t been found yet?   Reality impedes our gaming quite enough – how much time do we spend just “getting to the good parts”?    I'm pondering a game mechanic - whether a random roll, skill check or something more or less involved that can shorten that process.  I haven't made one yet, but I'm putting this out here for feedback. Some groups may spend precious game time working through the map (newly restocked as a megadungeon should) attempting to avoid encounters.   Other games or groups may just hand wave away this difficulty and start play deep within the dungeon. ...
Read more

Faction Connections in a Megadungeon

Image
Yes, I do indeed have a blog and have content to post! I spend more time running games and playing them than I do blogging and commenting, though I have wasted time on that recently. To make amends, I offer something constructive to the blogosphere: a blatant rip of Zak's NPC connection diagram from his excellent Vornheim the Complete City Kit . It's a common trope that the population of megadungeons are divided into factions involved in a byzantine web of interconnected rivalries and alliances. This is necessary since otherwise the megadungeon inhabitants would react to the external threat of the PCs with united force, and there would be no rational for open by-ways allowing freedom of movement necessary for player choice. The PCs explore the megadungeon and are primed to take advantage of the splits to divide and conquer. Giving these relations substance allows for roleplaying and negotiation as a player choice. The tribes in Caverns of Thracia, the factions w...
Read more

A Traveller Campaign: DM ADD

The sandbox co-DMed Castles and Crusades game continues.  With school I'm not there every week, but the game goes on.  I'm also playing in a bi-weekly Hackmaster game, thankfully not DMing on that one. But a buddy bugged me about running a Traveller game.  What the hell?  Why would he do that to me?  Not that I've never done that to him (twice, for the record).  But then I couldn't get it out of my head until I'd written 3 pages on it. Here's the first, the overall setting "What has the Galaxy gone up to now?"  If I get around to it, I've got campaign assumptions, and a page on initial location and characters and a bit on some initial hooks. The big question: does this make you want to get out 2d6 and a sheet of paper and roll for survival?  Or yawn at all the tropes? * The Directorate is over.   It’s done.   Its fuel tanks are empty and its lost and adrift.   Ain’t no refueling this sucker. It wasn’t the Free Fed...
Read more