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Thread: May/June 2013 Lite Challenge - Floating City of Khuramunz

  1. #1

    Default May/June 2013 Lite Challenge - Floating City of Khuramunz

    This month's challenge theme actually dovetails nicely with my Troglodyte lair from last month. There, the PCs got thrown into a cavern which turned out to be a secret entry point for smuggled cargo. So, for this month's challenge, I thought I'd map the smuggler's off-shore hideout.

    "The Floating City of Khuramunz" - Home of the Plundering Horde...Basic idea is that a smuggler's/pirate's guild of sorts has set up a floating base of operations a few dozen miles off shore. This is where territory is divided up, inter-guild quarrels are settled, and ships can safely off load/seek repairs in the absence of a friendly port.

    In many ways, the city will be a mix between "Waterworld" (Really bad Kevin Costner movie from the 90s) and the Ancient Aztec City of Tenochtitlan. Small city kept afloat by millions of empty barrels strung together and anchored to the sea floor. The city is protected by a ring of ships tethered together and with rope bridges connecting each ship to the city. The "city" itself is quite small and mostly consists of taverns/whorehouses/gambling halls, etc. At the center is the guild house which will be a multi-story building capped by a light tower.

    I just started thinking about this and sketching things out today...so really open to suggestions. I'm also trying to figure out whether I want to try to map it with CC3 (which i'm much more comfortable and competent with) or photoshop...

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    *Most of my Maps can be seen in full resolution on my blog*

    *I've made some of my maps into full adventures available for download at DriveThruRPG.com or Paizo.com

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  2. #2
    Community Leader Guild Sponsor - Max -'s Avatar
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    Seems an interesting setting/concept. Looking forward to see how it will go

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    Community Leader Bogie's Avatar
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    Cool Idea!

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    Guild Adept foremost's Avatar
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    This looks awesome for a draft! I am looking forward to seeing how this comes out. How big are you planning this floating-city to be? I'd imagine it would have to be circled by 50 ships in order to support a complete and self-supporting population. Fishing might play a big role here?
    The best maps are the ones we like the most after looking at the longest.

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    Guild Expert Guild Supporter Lingon's Avatar
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    This should be really cool, I love the concept of floating cities. If you are going for that rough, improvised, piratey look, maybe it should have a less regular shape? Either way, looking forward to updates!

  6. #6

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    Yar...Took Lingon's advice and resketched my floating city to have a less regular shape. Figured that it should develop the way any other city would (i.e. from the old city outwards.) So, the this little city began with the "Captain's Quarter" which was nothing more than a floating hideout for a ambitious band of pirates. After consolidating some of their power, they needed to expand the city to accommodate more and more pirate gangs that affiliated with their organization. The original outer wall became the Captain's Quarter (home to the best brothels and rum in whatever fantasy world this belongs in) while new sections have been added from time to time (ultimately getting to its current shape - which is walled in as well.)

    @Foremost - My use of the word "city" is deceptive...I envision this to be more of a floating village that probably only 600' x 600'. (Assuming that each square in my sketch is about 20' - which may change...) Its primary function is to serve as a well defended meeting place for this pirate gang to coordinate their activities/make repairs/unload cargo when friendly ports can't be found. Because there is always ships coming in and out with supplies, it doesn't need to be entirely self-sustaining. So, I'm thinking that it probably would have anywhere between 10-30 ships at any point.

    Here's another sketch - probably will try to start working on this in earnest this week. Suggestions and Criticisms are welcomed!

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    *Most of my Maps can be seen in full resolution on my blog*

    *I've made some of my maps into full adventures available for download at DriveThruRPG.com or Paizo.com

    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License unless stated otherwise in the thread.

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    Guild Expert Guild Supporter Lingon's Avatar
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    Yup, that looks like it's grown in a more organic way. Nice! One thing I noticed: the brothels and blacksmiths seem to share buildings I also imagine a floating city would, even if lots of supplies are coming in on ships, have many more fisheries as those who live there would do what they can to make money, and everyone needs food and fishing is rather easy to pick up. Of course, they might be selling their catch on town squares instead, so maybe a pointless point

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    Community Leader Bogie's Avatar
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    Coming along good AC! Nice changes.

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    Thanks....good call on the Bs...changed my key for Brothels to "BR" (in the map the big B building was supposed to be a brothel). And yes, I imagine there will be quite a few fisheries and little docks surrounding the city (just haven't gotten around to populating the whole thing yet)

    Other buildings I think I need: A general supply type store (for restocking), a smuggler's trading market (for regulated exchange of plunder), perhaps a gambling house, a few shacks for peasant type workers, a few nicer dwellings for the captains in that quarter... Anything else you guys can think of?

    My plan is to map it out on paper a little further before trying to commit it to the computer.
    *Most of my Maps can be seen in full resolution on my blog*

    *I've made some of my maps into full adventures available for download at DriveThruRPG.com or Paizo.com

    This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License unless stated otherwise in the thread.

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    Community Leader Bogie's Avatar
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    Slave / prisoner holding area.

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