This is my rendition of the City of Cauldron. This is the city that the Paizo Publishing campaign of Shackled City takes place.
So far I have completed a walkable section of the North area of the city. The other areas are to follow while I'm soliciting feedback on this one to see what I can take and apply to building of the other areas.
Feel free to download this area and use it if you want to populate it for your own needs. As is customary, I would at least appreciate being credited for it though. I have one favor, if/when anyone uses this area (and the upcoming adjacent areas) and adds quests, etc to it, I would love to see what you've done with it. I intend to make interiors and NPCs (especially the important ones to the campaign), and would love to see or collaborate with others on what can and has been added.
For those unfamiliar with Cauldron: The city is built in a circle. It is built within the caldera of a long-dead volcano. Cauldron is placed in tropical mountainous region overlooking vast rain forests. The city is a cosmopolitan place of about 5,000 population, ruled by wealthy nobles. Each street is a concentric ring around the center which is a bright blue lake. The streets closest to the lake and the docks are are where the poorest and destitute people live. As one travels outward, each subsequent concentric street becomes more and more lavish...and more lit (the docks and side streets can get awfully dark and dangerous at night). The nobles and estates dwell on the outer ring - then a wall surrounds the city. As the city is inside a volcano, imagine the city sitting in the shape of a bowl - so each thoroughfare outwards is not only bigger but higher - the nobles literally look down on the rest of the city. When visiting the docks you're literally looking up at the city.
The city has cobblestone streets made from dark volcanic rock and is built on the reddish earth of the dead volcano.
I divided the city up into four quadrants - each the shape of a wedge of watermelon. I have only completed the North. Eventually there will be transitions available on each street at each end that will then take you to the adjacent quadrant. Theoretcially you can eventually walk in a circle around the whole city.
Currently there are no interiors done, no NPCs, scripting, encounters or conversations. The doors are currently unlocked, but dont lead anywhere, so ultimately I am posting this for people to peruse and just walk through it.
This is only the second area I have ever built; the first one was just a small outdoor field for practice. I am doing this for two reasons: 1) I would like feedback to see if I'm on the right track towards accomplishing something great. 2) I would like to make it great - with the intention of hopefully attracting the attention of persons who can script etc so that I could team up with them and make the city as a backdrop for a number of quests (as I have no scripting knowledge whatsoever but really want to learn and really want to use this city for quests).
Those interested in learning more about the Pen and Paper version of Shackled City - as it pertains to my campaign that I'm running (as my campaign is set in a homebrew world and so my version of Cauldron does have slight differences than the actual released product) can use the following link to my message board that I maintain for my players' use.
I found two buildings that were floating a bit. One was outside the occlusion grid area. I corrected them both. I added a bit a dirt textures that made it look like the walls crumbled and spilled some dirt out onto the path of the cobblestone street.
I still dont know how to do the shadow thing. I'll work on the walk-mesh a bit - I'm not 100% sure what the issue is and why its a problem, but I'll take a look and see what the problem might be and what I can do about it.
Thank you for taking the time to post some comments. I'll look for the floating houses and fix that and the jagged walkmesh.
By breaking up the perfect cobblestone, you mean to add some "dirt" textures in splotches here and there on the cobblestones? Hmmm, perhaps a bit along the lower streets as its a poorer section, but I've always read Cauldron - at least the upper rings and nobles area - to be quite wealthy and well-maintained.
As for the changing day/night cycle shadows; I have no idea how to do this. I agree that I always thought that the shadow was a bit over-bearing - just never knew what I could do about it.
Thanks
Robert
Posted by SGK73 at 2007-09-21 05:46:14 Voted 8.50 on 09/21/07
Had a chance to look at it now. Really good work. Good texturing and use of terrain. Hope you finish all of the maps it would be a great addition for modulebuilders.
The few things that needs improvement.
A few floating houses you should fix, saw two in the NW section.
The walkmesh is a bit jagged on the diagonal roads, tweak this a bit.
The day/night cycle needs a bit of tweaking perhaps not so deep shadows a shadow intensity of about .3 to .35 or so at daytime.
A bit more texture blending. A bit of dirt or something to break up the "perfect" cobblestones.
Hello Sir Kicley, I think you have done an excellent job recreating the north side of Cauldron. I was actually going to recreate this module myself but was running into issues in creating the city. I like what you have done. I wish I had known that you were doing this a month ago as I would jump on the chance to continue with the recreation of the module however I have committed to developing a new module already but that is not to say I can't work on this one a little bit here and there.
So if you continue making the different districts of Cauldron I will work on them in my spare time to start adding in the meat behind it.
@Jaz
You're right about the boats. Yes there's lots of fishing there. I thought the same as you about the boats and size etc; but I have to admit, I just really liked the way they looked! And I'm a sucker for the whole ships and rigging and docks and the sounds of creaking and bells and such to pass it up. But you can easily remove them if/when you ever want to utilize the area.
Here's hoping I never grow out of my fascination with pirates! :-)
When you say "go for it" What exactly are you encouraging? Posting the module?
It looks pretty cool. I say go for it and I will certainly find a use for it. I actually wanted to create a lost city in a volcano for a campaign.
The only thing I would probably change is the boats. I'm not sure the big one would make much sense. As it is a lake the water would not be used for transportation on anything but a small scale and boats would probably be for fishing. Then again, I'm not to familiar with this setting. ;)
I failed to notice that the standard submission form for the module only allows 25MB - mine was slightly larger (25.8MB). I had to email the site administrator to find out how to proceed in getting the file to him.
In the meantime - I made sure to put plenty of screenshots on here to hopefully garner some interest and wet the whistle a bit as they say. Hopefully I'll get the file on here real soon!
Robert
Posted by SGK73 at 2007-09-13 23:36:52 Voted 8.50 on 09/21/07
From the screens I'd say it's nice and detailed.
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