Mega dungeon maps and mapping

[Draca]

Thought id get some input from you all with a megadungeon project.

Im converting a retro clone megadungeon to 5th edition.
I have absolutely gorgeous poster maps of every level,
Problem is they have room numbers and door markers ans secret doors and traps and such marked on the map as symbols.
That alone is a problem waiting to happen , expecially the pit traps , nothing like seeing it to be a warning.
Now i am not so worried about the room numbers , and area numbers , as they are everywhere.
The secret doors can stay hidden with some creative use of the fog layer.
and the traps im guessing , i just either pop the trap before the players see the mark , or describe every corridor ect and get player input prior to uncovering the area.
Im thinking that popping the trap just before the players vision can see it will work fine in 99% of cases.

Now for the kicker....
and this one has me stumped.

Teleport triggers that the pcs are not supposed to be aware of.
such as a hallway that uses 2 teleport pads and causes the players to keep walking back and forth in the same section of non descriptive corridor.
This almost makes me think id have to let the players map their own map , but..
This seems like it would be time consuming given the drawing tools, it could be done , but just not alot of fun for the player.
The only other option is to just let the players see the port on the map and hand wave it , but then the trick of the teleporters is dead.

Another idea i had was to have a second version of the same map and switch them to it after the teleport, with nothing revealed but the landing area.
Even then they still know what happened, so still again just a time sink.

It seems the best way would be to let the players map , and then when their map goes all crazy , as far as a 300 mile hallway ect . the intrigue and curiosity is still there.
On the other hand, just using the fog layer and going with it seems a good option for ease of play, but lessens the difficulty.

Anyway, all input is greatly appreciated.

Draca

[alfarobl]

Looks like best option for that would be players had to draw their own map... there is on wishlist an option to have multiple layers maps that could work for what you want to do adding layers with new features of the map as they travel... unless you can use some kind of token that shows a long tunnel or similar? but I think they will notice that counter on the map...

Good question... guess new Unity Engine FG will support more options with mapping and help accomplish what you need.

[Draca]

Was going to try making a png token that matched the maps, would have to make one for any instances of this happening , but stacking may cause me trouble , unless i use the map layers extension.

In the end i think ill just re apply the fog layer and then move the tokens to the new spot , this way they will have no reference to the old position.
Then once they make it back to older explored areas , i could just reveal the previous areas on the new map.
Its a little wonky , but i think it may be the best option.

[BlueDrake]

I edit the maps in Paint.net (but Photoshop, GIMP or any similar program will work as well).

Creative use of a stamp tool or just basic copy and paste can remove pit traps and secret doors from a map in effect creating a player-version. The hardest part is getting the alterations to look like a natural part of the map. The more artistic the map is the more difficult this becomes, but with a little practice it can be done.

[Loucifer]

As for the teleport corridor...

Just state up front that you found some really good maps for your dungeon, but they were too big to use as a single image. So you sliced them up for ease of use, and quicker loading.

Then when they hit that corridor and you change maps on them, they wont think anything amiss. Just create a map with an extremely long corridor.... and off ya go.
(make sure you have a lot of blank space around the corridor so the map loads in more or less square instead of just a long hall shape.)

[Draca]

I tested out several options.

1.Making a token to cover symbols on the map, This worked in the layers extension, but from a pulled back view it was more obvious.
2.Editing out all of the symbols, I thought about this , and the time involved in removing 1500 + symbols ( Im too lazy for that )
3.Made a duplicate map, to switch the players to on a teleport.

So far now i am leaning towards.
1.Duplicate map. For those further off teleports, that do not stay in the same corridor, or change rooms. Simply mask the new map , open the teleport pad up and drop them on it. Once they make it back to a place they had been before, as long as they are actively mapping ( in character anyway ) I'll switch them back to the original map and unfog the ares they found on the other map. Map pins have to be setup on this map as well , but other than that , not to bad.

2.Theater of the mind. For hallways mostly, ill just leave there tokens at the entrance to the hallway , and arrange a marching order right where there at. Once they come to a room , or enter combat or a area of note ill move them then.

Any other ideas as always are greatly appreciated.

[Griogre]

I had a similar problem with Undermountain when I ran the 4E version of it. I ended up letting the players map the dungeon. I used wall tokens that I put into shared tokens and let them drop them. It also gives a very retro feel. My players were mostly positive or neutral about doing their own mapping. Here's a screen of that old game:

https://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m222/Griogre/DrawingScreenshot_zps251a9dc3.png

I made wall lengths of 5, 10, 20 and 30 feet horizontal and vertical. To make tokens like this work in FG you are going to have to turn off token scaling which means you are going to need to scale you wall sections to be the same as your monster and character tokens. If your character and monster tokens are not the same scale then scale them to your monsters since you can resize the PC tokens manually in the combat tracker to the monster scale and you only have to do that once.

Edit: Hit return too soon. :p The other option I did with Rappan Athuk was just used the map but I never revealed it. I just traced over the top of it.

https://i105.photobucket.com/albums/m222/Griogre/RAFight.png

[Draca]

How much of a problem is it if all my tokens are hogge podged together and probably all different sizes?

I like the idea of tracing over the map , that would really work well. Since ill be tracing anyway to reveal it.

How would you handle the teleport? ahh they need to map themselves. and if they screw it up , then so be it.

[Griogre]

With teleports, yeah, if you want them to figure it out themselves they have to do the mapping themselves. If I was going to run Undermountain or Dungeon Under the Mountain that's how I would do it.

It's a big deal on the tokens being different sizes - if you want to use wall sections bigger than one square. You can use all 5' lengths but that is probably more trouble than it is worth since it would be faster for the player to use the pen to draw the walls. The advantage of bigger lengths is the wall can be drag and dropped and it measures and maps at once, though my guys also drew a line over them, but after they had measured out the areas with the tokens. The other advantage with wall tokens is multiple players can build the map, but with the pen only one guy can draw at once. It's quite fast to drag and drop tokens if the player puts them on his hot keys.

I should warn you that the token drawing map took a long time to load since eventually there were thousands of tokens on it.

[Draca]

ahhh, im on satellite , so tokens would be a no go.
on another not im in the Ds right now making my own same size tokens.