@ Katto The city is very big. 50% Dwarves, 40% Human, 10% Gnome population. The city has already been introduced in the campaign, so I am not going to be able to change the layout too much or move it to a mountain side.
The shapes are meant to represent city blocks, rather than individual buildings. With that in mind I have de-cluttered the busier blocks. The walls are 100 feet thick in some places, but there are many rooms and passages inside them. The main gates are so massive that the are very rarely opened. People gain access through the many smaller gates in the side. The small side gates are 20-40 feet off the ground and the access ramps and elevators would be withdrawn if there was a serious attack. The city straddles a 300' deep canyon. Ocean capable steam ships dock on the river banks 300' below the city and giant elevators operate night and day to carry goods up and down the cliffs. Much of the power for the dock machines in generated by piping river water into underground chambers where specially placed heat emitting minerals create steam.
I imagined that there would also be an undercity and mines below that. I imagined the buildings to be quite tall and also have several floors below ground as well. There would be a lot of steam release points in alleys and on rooftops. So as you travel on the ground level it would be noisy and smoggy. Visibility would be quite low in winter, making for interesting adventure opportunities. Rich folk get about in air balloons, and ornithopters or rotocopters.
I am going to put in an underground rail system that will also run across the canyon through the center of the bridges. The ground level map will just show where the station access ramps and travellators are located.
As cool as it would be to draw all the marvels of the city, there is no way I could reasonably represent them on a single map. So I am going for usability.
@Crayons. Thanks, I did not know that about the Hebrew base. But it is already long established in my campaign world that these folk sound German. Still I can use your advice ..I guess I will google 'phonetic free web translator' and see what comes up.
I have however decided to make this a diplomats map which has been translated and has a few clumsy turns of phrase and spelling.
Latest wip is attached. Hopefully this more clearly displays what I am trying to achieve.
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