Craefort - barbarian hill-fort/village

[Gamerprinter]

I get cold just looking at that map.

I'm sure that half the inspiration in these encounter maps is looking out the window and see snow falling on top of ice on top of snow - ick!!

OK, I mentioned I wanted to work on a Broch Tower next, so did it!

Broch Towers are the coolest thing, a roughly 40 foot tall round tower built by Iron Age Picts over 2000 years ago. Mousa Broch on the Shetlands is nearly intact, though I love Dun Carloway Broch which though partially collapsed shows the unique structural aspects of a broch tower best.

Imagine two stone towers, one built inside the other. The internal tower is not quite as stout or sturdy as the outer tower, but is stable because of long flat rocks that connect the outer tower to the inner tower. These connecting stones are such that they are used as a stairway to walk between the tower walls upward to the higher floors. The outer tower is up to 18' thick at the base and just a few feet thick at the top.

As in my map, the ground floor was reserved for the fireplace in the center, sometimes firewood, and dry stores were kept in this level as well. Going up the "stairs" the first floor (above the ground floor) serves as the Great Hall. The next level up the sleeping quarters, while the top floor is usually reserved for storage and servants quarters.

The tower would be topped by a conical thatched roof. There is no chimney however, as the smoke would seep through the thatch and escape at the roof, which meant the both the second and third floors were always smokey.

The first photo below is for reference showing Dun Carloway Broch as a reference to the kind of structure I'm trying to recreate. I know my stairway is wider, but that's for playability rather than accuracy.

Then its my four floors of Donal Broch, of Clan Donal, a powerful Great Clan which will have a clan feud with the Crae's of Craefort. In the Donal treasury is an ancestral sword of Clan Crae, stolen during the last Winter War. The PCs will be trying to regain this item that belongs to their clan.

Even though Clan Donal is a more powerful clan than the Crae clan, their extended families reside in longhouses and roundhouses surrounding the base of this broch tower, outside its walls, but within its own stockade and gate.

Next I want to start working on my Crannog lake house - but I think I'd better finish up my December Challenge entry tomorrow, just to get that out of the way...

GP