dysonlogos

Dripstone Deep

Nestled in the depths of the Underdark, the tiny settlement of Dripstone Deep radiates an aura of unease and secrecy. The air is heavy with moisture, and the faint, rhythmic sound of water dripping from the ceiling seems to carry further than it should.

At the heart of the cavern lies the pool, its surface eerily smooth and glasslike. Fed by a constant drip from above, the water carries an unnatural clarity, though one might hesitate to test its purity. In the pool’s center stands an ...

The Forsaken Grotto

Kaelith Marrowshade has gone missing. It isn’t that unusual for a ranger to wander off for a few months, but it has been two seasons now since they were last seen. Kaelith was known for their uncanny ability to navigate treacherous terrain and sense danger before it struck. Their last letter to the group before disappearing was pretty cryptic: “The shadows in the caves move… and they watch.”

Digging through Kaelith’s favourite haunts turns up a ranger trail map of the region w...

Longboat Mountain – Figurehead House

At the top of the trail leading up Longboat Mountain to the valley travellers get their first view of the longboat itself – an impossibly big wooden boat made from trees that must have been 100 feet across and miles high. Perched over the head of the trail is the rotted prow of the boat, and at the very end of the prow a small house has been built, over a hundred feet above the trail proper.

To get to the house proper, one must walk past it to the ruins of the boat and then climb the ...

Building 13 – Netmaker

Back to the shops along the intersection of Market & Random. Based on a Patreon request from Mark Clover, I’m drawing up individual floor plans for shops, stores, vendors, and businesses along a single market block. As I draw these, I also have the overhead views drawn out on a map of the city block as I go, so when the series is complete you can use them on their own, or as a fully mapped out block of shops.

This is our thirteenth shop on the street, an oddball to find in the cor...

Under Eastmeadow Manor

Two months ago we explored Eastmeadow Manor – a three-story stone manor house outside of town. The manor is home to the Lindwyne family and their three servants.

There are three levels of basements beneath the manor- centred on the structure of the stone tower as the three upper levels of the manor are.

The first basement spans the entire footprint of Eastmeadow Manor. It serves as a general-purpose area for the household’s operations. A spacious central chamber (with a low ce...

The deeps far below “The Finger”

This is the last of the maps of “The Finger” and the dungeons beneath it. Last month we introduced the location as part of the Autumn Lands and then did three maps of the location itself (the surface structures, the immediate sublevels, and the deeper sublevels). We are now well below the sections of the structure used by the followers of the “Somnolent One” – these levels were never found by their strange cult and still show their origins as some sort of underdark warehouse or stor...

The Autumn Lands – The Final Map

The Autumn Lands lie to the south of the Midsummer Lands. This map sits to the east of map I from last month and to the south of Map B and is the final map in the set. The goal of the Autumn Lands was to produce a series of commercial-use hexmaps that can be used in their entirety or just one map for a specific adventure. There’s no set scale for these maps, and the items on the maps are not to scale with each other so we can see points of interest like towers, cities, and caves. If you rea...

Backstage Pass - April 2025

This month's Backstage Pass is here! This zip file contains all ten maps to be released this month on the blog. The only thing missing (because I have to make it still, and then send it to Redbubble to see how it comes out as a poster) is the Autumn Lands collected map that assembles all nine of the hexmaps into one big poster-sized monstrosity.

Once again, thank you for your support. You make ...

RELEASE THE KRAKEN!

Alright, we are finally getting back on track!

This month's selection for the Kraken re-releases are Zath Gor Bastion and the dungeons that go with the ruined temple we had in the January Kraken bundle.

Since the Zath Gor Bastion also has associated dungeons beneath it, I'll make sure to include them as one of the options in next month's poll.

Since 2024, the Kraken releases have be...

March 2025 Cartography Collection

Here we are, the compiled works of Dyson Logos for the month of March. Thank you so much for your continued support - you make these maps possible.

March Kraken Poll

I've been remiss on the Kraken polls lately (things have been a little hectic here dealing with health & family stuff). So this here's our March poll - I'll leave it up through the weekend and post the chosen maps under a Patron-exclusive commercial use license on Monday.

I've listed ten maps from the archives, the two receiving the most votes will get the commercial re-release.

Here'...

Scavengers’ Deep – Map 17

The Scavengers’ Deep is a reminder of the amount of work that went into underground structures during the great war. Generally, the elves only built underground when hiding their breeding and research facilities, whereas the forces of the kingdoms, assisted by the dwarves, were constantly building underground as the elves were unrelenting and would completely raze any surface defences that they defeated.

But the structures now known as the Scavengers’ Deep are atypical, an elven com...

The Whispers from the Abyss

Centuries ago, a secret temple was constructed to revere Xal’keth, a God of Shadows and Secrets. The clandestine cult obsessed with unraveling forbidden truths and harnessing the power of shadows to manipulate reality quietly constructed it deep under the City of Cries. Their belief was simple – all knowledge, no matter how dangerous, must be unveiled, no matter the cost.

Many strange rituals were performed here over the years in utter darkness. However, the cult’s hunger for forb...

Graxworm Map 16 – Corpsegaard

The Graxworm is a massive dead dragon of mythic scale, several miles long and large enough to contain a town in the mouth. Creatures have set up here to “mine” the massive corpse for its valuable materials – leather, scales, ichor, tendons, and more. Practically every bit has some value to someone, and in the long term the expectation is that nothing will remain, not even the massive bones. In the very heart of the corpse (well, technically all AROUND the heart of the corpse) is the “...

The Labyrinth of Avarice

This small extradimensional space was crafted by Zitharion the Thaumaturge – obsessed with capturing the very essence of greed. He believed that greed was more than a mortal flaw, even more than one of the defining natures that change people into dragons, but a living, sentient force that feeds on the desires of the avaricious. This structure was one of many attempts to capture that entity.

Entry to the Labyrinth is available magically from Zitharion’s old workshop – a golden plat...

Black Star Gaol

Beneath the ruins of the Iron Maw is the Black Star Gaol – the citadel’s small and very well-organized dungeons. Designed to hold four dozen prisoners at any time, the gaol has been abandoned since the fall of the Iron Maw.

The Black Star Gaol was commissioned by the lord of Kaelrendir, who feared otherworldly incursions from the Kale empire. The Fractured Order, a group of eccentric scholars and jailers, designed the prison not only as a holding facility but as a “fortress of res...

Building 12 – General Goods Store

Back to the shops along the intersection of Market & Random. Based on a Patreon request from Mark Clover, I’m drawing up individual floor plans for shops, stores, vendors, and businesses along a single market block. As I draw these, I also have the overhead views drawn out on a map of the city block as I go, so when the series is complete you can use them on their own, or as a fully mapped out block of shops.

This is our twelfth shop on the street, a true anachronism for medieval ...

Deeper Beneath the Finger

Now deep beneath “The Finger” these substructures were used as tombs by the followers of the “Somnolent One”. But on these levels the weird lights in the walls fade away and the stonework appears much older. The map on the top half of the page is the third level beneath the surface structure, and the lower half is the fourth level – but it is not connected to the third by any traditional means (passages, stairs, ladders, etc).

The upper of these two levels was repurposed from ...

Beneath the Finger

The structure above these dungeons (The Finger, see Monday’s post) is believed by its residents to be a remnant of “Somnolent One,” some vast, dreamlike entity between the folds of reality. These lower chambers still thrum with half-remembered consciousness – and while the glowing stonework of the upper chambers is much rarer down here, the colours of those areas seem stronger, and the light brighter (still not as bright as a freshly cracked glowstick). These lower chambers are restri...

"The Finger"

In the upper right corner of the latest hexmap (The Autumn Lands, Map H) is a strange stone outcropping (requested by a patron) that looks like a finger pointing to the sky. This freakish natural rock formation has been chiseled away at over the years, hollowed out and turned into a structure by weird cultists using magics that slowly shifted the rock to look more and more like a finger, while shifting the interior to a design they could use.

According to locals in the region, “The Fi...

The Autumn Lands - Hex Map H

The Autumn Lands lie to the south of the Midsummer Lands. This map sits to the east of map G from last month and to the south of the original map A – next month’s Map I will be to the east of this map and will complete the 9 map set of the Autumn Lands. The goal of the Autumn Lands is to produce a series of commercial-use hexmaps that can be used in their entirety or just one map for a specific adventure. There’s no set scale for these maps, and the items on the maps are not to scale wi...

The Backstage Pass, Boss, The Backstage Pass!

Here's the ten maps that will be going up on the blog this month. Thank you again for your support, you make these possible.

Scavengers' Deep - Map 16

The Scavengers’ Deep is a reminder of the amount of work that went into underground structures during the great war. Generally, the elves only built underground when hiding their breeding and research facilities, whereas the forces of the kingdoms, assisted by the dwarves, were constantly building underground as the elves were unrelenting and would completely raze any surface defences that they defeated.

But the structures now known as the Scavengers’ Deep are atypical, an elven com...

February Cartography Collection

With the end of the month falling on a Friday, I need to get out February's last map and cartography collection today. So here goes! (Map to follow in the next post)

This month's collection of ten maps is here. This is an exclusive release for you, my patrons, and will be released for sale in 6 months to a year (depending on how far behind I am on uploading projects to DTRPG).

2025-02-28 14:57:05 +0000 UTC View Post

The Tower of Vodores

An oddly shaped “tower”, the Tower of Vodores is a brutalist structure standing alone in the Plains of Stone (the badlands to the west of the kingdom, a huge natural boundary between the kingdom and its nearest western neighbours). The structure consists of a large upper section resting atop six fifty foot tall towers or “legs” – producing something much like a stone table of immense size with space beneath that never sees the full light of the sun.

Vodores was a goblin warlor...

Fortress Thiasau

Fortress Thiasau was built centuries ago by the knights known as the Order of the Crimson Heart. The order operated as paladins but actually worshipped a malevolent deity of chaos and destruction dedicated to despoiling other religions and foiling their plans.

The fortification is built in tiers, from the lower tier at the east entrance and the upper tiers to the north culminating in the bridge gate that connects to a stone bridge that crosses a small valley. There is a stagnant pool in...

The Palace of Moliades

On the island of Thalares is the palace of the hero Moliades – a charismatic and ambitious young prince turned adventurer. Born into royalty, he inherited a small but strategically important palace nestled on the lush and picturesque island. Thalares is a place of vibrant flora, crystal-clear waters, and hidden coves.

Moliades is renowned for his sharp intellect and tactical prowess. He is well-versed in the arts of diplomacy and warfare, often employing clever strategies to maintain ...

The Kingdom of Kestral

The Kingdom of Kestral is the baked-in setting for the Six-Hack RPG by James Hargrove.

I drew this map based on the description of the Kingdom in the game, making sure to include all the locations mentioned in the “Lay of the Land” portion of the book (pages 13 through 15). There’s obviously more to the setting, but large swathes of the map are left basically free for the game master to do with as they will.

Like many fantasy kingdoms, Kestral is bound by geography more than...

Gref’s Sinkhole

The sinkhole on old man Gref’s farm connects to a number of caves including one that takes the overflow of the muddy waters from the pool and descends deep below (areas 9 & 10). These caves, in turn, connect to the remnants of an ancient temple that was long ago buried in some calamity or cataclysm.

The edge of the sinkhole (areas 1 & 2) descend steeply to the pool of water (area 3). The pool collects water from the water table as well as rainwater from above, and is dark and ...

A Dungeon In Two Parts

The shadow crypts are marked on many a scholar’s maps – a complex of long halls of decaying stonework that date back to unknown times. The crypts are decorated with strange glyphs, but the style of work makes it obvious that these sigils were cut into the stone long after they were set. The glyphs are stories of heroes and villains, seeming to be the founding myths of some unknown tribe. They are in an unknown language, but have been translated with the aid of magic and a book of the tale...