Egyptian ship?

[wdmartin]

Is anyone aware of an existing battlemap depicting the deck of an ancient Egyptian ship? One of the long narrow models for plying your way up and down the Nile. I'm planning on having a group of PCs escort the soul of a long-dead Pharoah whose funerary rites were interrupted on the journey to the afterlife, conducted on an astral version of a ship from the pharaoh's tomb.

I looked on drivethrurpg and didn't find anything Egyptian. If you know of something, shoot me a link! Otherwise I'll just have to take a stab at making my own.

[madcowchef]

I don't know anything specific but they are pretty typical period galleys, so that's what I'd look for. Viking long boat also has the same basic layout and I know I've seen several maps for those.

[wdmartin]

The shape is vaguely similar, but the construction is significantly different. I've been doing research.

Maritime History Podcast ep 6: Khufu’s Solar Ship

In addition to the well-researched podcast, they provided a bunch of diagrams of how it was constructed. And then I found this:

3D model of the royal ship of Cheops

I'm tempted to buy it and just render a top-down view with some water in the background at a suitable resolution and call it done. Unfortunately the model was made for 3D Studio Max, an extremely expensive and complex program that I do not own and have never used. Pity.

[wdmartin]

Aaand here's an attempt at it.



I got the oars from an image on the Dundjinni forums.

I've left off the cabin that would ordinarily rest amidships, largely because I want the PCs to have enough unobstructed room.

I'm not especially happy with it. The ropes holding it together are ... okay, I guess. But it's not super-obvious what they are. The grid doesn't match up terribly well with the deck -- I don't think there's much to be done about that, but it grates at me. And the decking is too obviously a repeating pattern. It needs something to break it up a bit.

I guess it's okay for a night's work. I'll try and give it another pass, but time is running short if I want to get it printed properly before the session.

EDIT: It seems I've reversed the prow and the stern. The bit like a lotus blossom that jinks back towards the center of the boat is supposed to be the stern, and I have it at the prow. DOH.