DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 11, 2014 22:54:42 GMT
Hello everybody. I am currently working on my biggest dungeon tile to date. It is an octangular room with 8 doors leading into it. We play gridless, but if we were to use a grid, it would be a 12x12 size room. The way I do floors is that I glue small 5x5mm tiles cut out from cereal boxes on to the base. That means I will have to glue on approximately 2000 tiles on the floor. Gluing that many tiles on the floor is mind numbing. Being that big a room it will also look pretty boring to the players. So I want to do something interesting with the floor. I want to make a relief in the floor by raising some of the tiles 0.5 or 1 mm. I don’t know what relief to make in the floor. It should be a generic motif, so that I can use the room in different settings. There are some obvious choices like a skull, a pentagram, a star, a map or a compass. But I cannot decide which one to go with. I would like to hear suggestions, comments etc. I am relatively new to DM’img, so I don’t know that many adventures. Are there any iconic or classic DnD adventures that features an octangular room? If so, does it have any decoration on the floor? Once I have the right motif, I plan on transferring it the floor by printing it out, gluing it on a cereal box, then cutting it out and gluing on it on the floor. Maybe repeat the process for extra raised areas. Then glue on the tiles on top of this. Once it have been painted I will the highlight the raised areas for extra effect. I have uploaded pictures to my flickr account that shows the room in its present state and a sample dungeon using the room. DungeonRoom
|
|
|
Post by Admin on Jul 11, 2014 23:34:34 GMT
Instead of making 100's of small tiles try using an embossing tool. You can score lines into cardboard to make it look like tiles. imageshack.com/i/ndxxg4oj
|
|
|
Post by Cyan Wisp on Jul 12, 2014 1:48:10 GMT
Check out (i.e. Google) some flagstone patterns. One or two might take your fancy.
Find some good shapes that tessellate and cut much bigger tiles than 5mm.
Ever considered just painting your floors - no tiles needed.
|
|
|
Post by rane on Jul 12, 2014 2:00:18 GMT
maybe also consider some smaller fine details such as cracks or imperfections in the floor too - to spice it up a bit.
|
|
|
Post by Pagemistress on Jul 12, 2014 2:40:34 GMT
Perhaps you could try a central mosaic of your small bits, similar to Roman mosaic floors. Paint the cardboard bits different colors before gluing them. The space between the bits will look like grout. It doesn't have to be an actual picture, it can be an octagonal pattern to echo the shape of the room.
|
|
|
Post by Cyan Wisp on Jul 12, 2014 2:42:24 GMT
I've seen an octagram (an eight-pointed star) used to represent elemental fire in D&D. It is a good-looking star. Look up "octagram" in google images, there are many interesting examples and designs. I second rane's advice about weathering your stone work. Check out DMGInfo Advanced Stone Work. It looks amazing and will save you heaps of time. .
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 12, 2014 15:00:07 GMT
Instead of making 100's of small tiles try using an embossing tool. You can score lines into cardboard to make it look like tiles. imageshack.com/i/ndxxg4ojEarly on I experimented with different ways of making tile floors. Back then I tried to score different materials using my mini drill. It took a long time, and was quiet messy, so I abandoned the idea. Recently I purchased a more powerful machine. Using this machine it is possible to do it, but it still takes a long time, longer than gluing the tiles down. I use MDF for the bases of these dungeon modules, and this particular piece is quiet hard.
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 12, 2014 15:23:40 GMT
Check out (i.e. Google) some flagstone patterns. One or two might take your fancy. Find some good shapes that tessellate and cut much bigger tiles than 5mm. Ever considered just painting your floors - no tiles needed. Didn’t find any flagstone patterns to my liking. Good thinking though. No, I have not considered just painting the floor. I think it might look out of place, considering that all the rest of my tiles have these particular 5mm tile floor. I have considered using and alternative texturing technique though, like flocking it with sand or making a big dais using polystyrene. The polystyrene could then be scored. I have also considered just printing out the floor, and gluing the print to the base, but this would also look out of place.
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 12, 2014 15:28:55 GMT
maybe also consider some smaller fine details such as cracks or imperfections in the floor too - to spice it up a bit. When the tiles are that small (5x5mm), I don't think that cracks would do much good. I might try it on a miniature base, for either a monster or a NPC, just to check it out.
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 12, 2014 15:36:07 GMT
Perhaps you could try a central mosaic of your small bits, similar to Roman mosaic floors. Paint the cardboard bits different colors before gluing them. The space between the bits will look like grout. It doesn't have to be an actual picture, it can be an octagonal pattern to echo the shape of the room. This is what I am going for. Because the room is so big, I can make an actual picture. But what should it be? ... BTW I actually used real grout mixed with acrylic paint and white glue for texturing of the walls in the room.
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 12, 2014 16:04:56 GMT
I've seen an octagram (an eight-pointed star) used to represent elemental fire in D&D. It is a good-looking star. Look up "octagram" in google images, there are many interesting examples and designs. I second rane's advice about weathering your stone work. Check out DMGInfo Advanced Stone Work. It looks amazing and will save you heaps of time. . Unless I change my mind this is what I will be going for: I will make an octagram on the floor. In the centre of the octagram, I will make a circle where the tiles raised. Inside the circle I'll make an eye. This will freak out the players, especially if one of them detects traces of divination magic on the eye itself. Because the inner circle has raised tiles I can swap in another motif, much the way that DM Scotty did in his Necromancer's Ritual spell video (The DM's Craft #85). I could then make a hole in the floor, an acid pool, a fountain of blood, a summoning circle or whatever I need in that particular dungeon. Thanks!
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 12, 2014 17:06:09 GMT
In the second Conan movie (of the original set, starring Arnold) there was a classic scene which featured his battle with a master of illusions and a room full of mirror doors. Oh, there it is, thanks YouTube!
That encounter is just perfect for a large octagonal room with lots of doorways, plus... Conan inspired!
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 12, 2014 18:35:06 GMT
The Conan movie was one of my inspirations for making this room. The other one was one of "The Mummy" movies. For a few frames you will see a map of Hamunaptra. This map features a central junction with 9 corridors, (but 8 is close enough). So I have long been thinking, "this could be a cool room".
So when one of my RPG groups was heading for Belcrams fall in Undermountain, which features a lot of octagonal rooms I started crafting.
|
|
|
Post by Cyan Wisp on Jul 12, 2014 19:11:32 GMT
Make sure that you show us the end results!
|
|
|
Post by kokigami on Jul 13, 2014 3:44:43 GMT
wow, forgot how bad that movie was..
|
|
|
Post by Deleted on Jul 13, 2014 7:04:46 GMT
|
|
|
Post by ReliantLion on Jul 13, 2014 14:17:33 GMT
I would try to make it modular. I remember a while ago someone posted a small room which they then made many discs for, which each changed the theme of the room dramatically. If you spent that much time building the room, I would make one octagonal 'plate' that fits in the room specific to your games needs. If you need to re-use the room in the future, you only need to make a new one of these 'plates'.
EDIT: I just re-read your post and you basically decided to do that. lol
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 13, 2014 20:29:46 GMT
I would try to make it modular. I remember a while ago someone posted a small room which they then made many discs for, which each changed the theme of the room dramatically. If you spent that much time building the room, I would make one octagonal 'plate' that fits in the room specific to your games needs. If you need to re-use the room in the future, you only need to make a new one of these 'plates'. EDIT: I just re-read your post and you basically decided to do that. lol You are probably right about the modular thing. But it is too late now for that. The texturing on the walls will tear the expanded polystyrene if I was to cut it up now, and it will take a lot of repair work to undo that damage. There are both pros and cons for making it modular. If I were to make it modular I would go for 9 modules, four identical corner modules, four identical edge modules and a centre module. The pros are I would then have the option of setting up just the corner modules or the corner modules and two edge modules. Such modules would take up less storage room. And I would later on be able to make alternate corner modules. The cons are I already have modules that allow me to set up a room almost identical to such a room (without the floor pattern though). It would be more work. The pattern would be spread out across more modules, and you would probably need to fiddle around with it, when you set up the room to make the pattern align right.
|
|
DM Michael
Paint Manipulator
Preparing for 'In the spider's web' part of LMOP
Posts: 169
|
Post by DM Michael on Jul 13, 2014 21:52:55 GMT
Here is an update. I have glued most of the tiles to the base. (Today was a rainy day in Denmark). I discovered a few things: 1 White glue is white! Meaning that when you apply the glue you cannot see the drawings on the base that well, which makes it harder to make the lines straight. 2 I already added 4 rows of tiles all the way around the room, so that I could make the texturing on the walls without worrying about spilling texturing on the floor. If the texturing gets on the floor before you glue on the tiles, the tiles become uneven and don't stick that good on the base. I should have waited with the texturing and the outer rows. If I had made outer circle first, it would have been easier to integrate the outer rows. 3 It is not enough to decide what overall pattern to use; you also need to figure out how to fill the "negative space". Concentric circles around the whole room or just between the lines: 4: You need to be careful when you weave the lines between each other: (It is hard to correct your mistakes. The tiles really stick. I discovered that the hard way.) This will be my piece number 94 using this technique for floors. However the previous 93 don't have any patterns on the floor. In retrospective, I should probably have made a smaller room first to try out the pattern making first. - I have thinking about making a small circular room for some time now. That would have been perfect. My scissors broke. My 22 years old trusted Penol pair of crafting scissors fell from the table and broke! And I am al most out of tiles. I don't think that I will do the raised tiles after all. I traced my paperboard tubes on the base and they won't be able to fit inside a circle of raised tiles. A lot of things I would place inside the circle would probably be made from these tubes. I don't really need the raised tiles. I have a feeling that my players most of time would deliberately stay away from the centre. So whatever is in the centre won’t disturbed and slide around. I have also started thinking about what colours to paint the tiles. Red or black? What colour should the eye-colour be of the eye in the circle? Blue, green, brown, red, yellow?
|
|
|
Post by Cyan Wisp on Jul 13, 2014 21:57:53 GMT
That is some serious dedication!
|
|