D&D 5E Wave Echo Cave map

[Jeff Carlsen]

I ended up using a rollout battle map, but I only mapped the area around the Black Spider's room, using Theater of the Mind for the rest.. Looking at the map, I quickly realized that the actual "mine" portion was absurdly small, and decided to treat the map as only a vague representation of the actual cave.

That said, I also own the digital version of the map. Roll20 is a solid option.

 

[doctorhook]

Now that's an interesting take. I know some guys who've used it for online play for years and swear how good it is. I have a few reservations, well, A) I'm fortunate to have 3 players local, and B) I have thousands of dollars invested in miniatures and maps already, and i really love miniatures. C) I'm not in the market right now to buy a screen just for gaming, I need a new laptop more than anything and the Macbook Pro is calling my name and it is &#$%*#$ expensive!!!

And the physical maps are fast and with the pre-made Paizo erase maps they're brimming with as much detail as a VTT.

But, all that said, I do want to upgrade eventually to a more integrated electronic approach.

I can appreciate all of that. For me, I got out of the minis-collecting game about 2009, because I realized it was starting to cost me hundreds of dollars that I couldn't justify for myself. I still loved those minis, but no matter how many I had, it was never enough. I switched to tokens for a while, because they're cheaper and easier to customize than minis, but even that was more labour-intensive than digital. Digital always promised to be cheaper and easier (if albeit intangible) compared to physical gaming, but in my opinion Roll20 is the first platform that's user-friendly enough to actually making digital tabletops workable.

...I can praise Roll20 more, but eventually I'm gonna start repeating myself. If it sounds like it could work for you, check it out!

 

[Nebulous]

Eventually it could work out, but for now i'm going with the old school paper 'n plastic route

 

[Nebulous]

I'm nearly at the point there I just don't need or want any more miniatures. I got some of the last Pathfinder sets, not nearly all of them, but the quality of the plastic was sorta weak compared to the DDM line. I've actually snapped a couple PF minis just by dropping them.

 

[Nebulous]

Lol, i said old school there. Plastic minis are definitely new school, not old! Unless 10 years is old? Maybe it is old by now....:/

 

[aramis erak]

Lol, i said old school there. Plastic minis are definitely new school, not old! Unless 10 years is old? Maybe it is old by now....:/

Plastic Minis were available in the late 1980's for certain lines. 89/90 for warhammer and WH40K, and also for Blood Bowl.

 

[jimmifett]

I bought the map, ran it through posterazor, scaled it correctly to 5' (60.25 dpi i think it was) and was looking at 90 sheets borderless. Way too expensive ink wise. Instead, i'm hand drawing it on the last of my Gaming Paper, much cheaper. Still, can't be beat for digital games. Speaking of ink, formatted and printed all the 5e spells on 3x5 index cards. Took about 362-ish cards, but infinitely better and has complete text. only 24 are double sides. ran out of black ink on the last sentence of the last card

 

[Nebulous]

I bought the map, ran it through posterazor, scaled it correctly to 5' (60.25 dpi i think it was) and was looking at 90 sheets borderless. Way too expensive ink wise. Instead, i'm hand drawing it on the last of my Gaming Paper, much cheaper. Still, can't be beat for digital games.

90, wow. I'm going to stick with my 25 pages at 10' scale and see how it goes.

 

[Gilladian]

I just don't think there's enough of the caves that need to have maps to print the whole thing. I ended up drawing the middle cave with the raised ends, the water-wheel/forge cave, and the rift/temple cave at various points; I use a giant battle-mat and dry erase markers with some 3d props that I make myself from polymer clay. Works better than any other method, and is infinitely cheaper than printing 90 pages!

 

[Nebulous]

I think I'm going to make the Black Spider more of a presence in the mine before the PCs inevitably show up in the final room and just kill him. Or get killed by him, which is likely too. I thought about giving Spider a magical escape route to the Seven Pillar Hall, a portal he jumps through and the PCs will be able to follow. I just want to stretch the endgame out to at most 6th level. After that i was thinking of running Ravenloft I6 with the 5e conversion. .