Castle Greyhawk Four New Dungeon Level Maps Revealed

 CZ Act 1 "Alpha Preview" Map

TLG published a Castle Zagyg "Alpha Preview" to CZ1 backers on 2 April 2026, showing one-quarter of The Cellars, level 2 of Castle Zagyg:

Castle Zagyg Preview Map of
Level 2, The Cellars

Included along with the map were 12 pages of keyed encounters, all again labelled as an "Alpha Preview" so that we're ready for any and all typos and other errors in the text and map.  I may review the encounter keys later sometime---the map is all that caught my eye in the content thus far.  

Zach Howard of Zenopus Archives fame began a thread on 12 April 2026 to discuss the map and key details in Dragonsfoot's Gary Gygax's World of Greyhawk forum:   Castle Greyhawk Dungeon Level 2 [possible spoilers].  Trent Smith (of Mystical Trash Heap fame, and his Storm Fetish Productions rules and adventure designs are brilliantly Gygaxian) and other DF members have begun delving into the analysis, including me.

CZ Act 2 Backerkit Launch Map

The new Backerkit Castle Zagyg campaign preview launched on 7 April 2026 and revealed the complete map for the second level of Castle Zagyg, its full title revealed as Level 2 The Deep Cellars:

Castle Zagyg Level 2 Map,  
The Deep Cellars

The lower-left portion of the map is same one from the CZ preview sent out to backers from the first campaign, but with further changes made.  

The other three maps are all new to me, and I don't recognize them from my Castle Greyhawk or El Raja Key research thus far.  I'll be doing some additional digging to see what (if anything) I find in my archives, but for the moment each of the other quadrants appear to be newly-revealed-to-the-public level maps, which is of course a wonderful thing!

CZ Act 2 Lower-Left Map

Here's a zoomed in version:

Zoomed-In Map Version of
Castle Zagyg Level 2 The Deep Cellars

Many differences exist between this map and the Alpha Preview version from earlier in the month, which I plan to review in depth alongside all three versions of the map.

Three versions, you ask?

TSR Version by Eric Shook

A much earlier version of same the lower-left corner of the CZ2 preview map was rendered by Eric Shook for the early 1980s Greyhawk revival at TSR, and was later sold at auction in the mid-2000s by Paul Stormberg of Legends of Role-Playing and The Collector's Trove fame:

Eric Shook's Castle Greyhawk rendering
from TSR c. 1982

This map was one of six different levels auctioned at that time, four others from Castle Greyhawk's dungeon levels.  The auction also included one of my favorite level designs of all time, which Shook designed for Steve Marsh's Starstrands planar project that was, alas, never published by TSR.  That map was quite radical for its time!:

Eric Shook's unpublished Starstrands map c. 1982,
original photo by Paul Stormberg

Side-by-Side Analysis - Added 16 April 2026

I've completed my initial comparison of the three maps, and here's an image of them together, with changes highlighted in yellow and green:

All 3 maps compared
by grodog

Changes Logged Across the Three Versions

At a high level, the changes made are most prominent working from the 1980s Shook version of the map (on the left side in the above picture) compared to the initial preview released on 2 April 2026, in the middle in the above picture.  The changes from the Alpha Preview version (middle) to the Backerkit launch image (right side) are more-minimal, and mostly involve changing doors back to secret doors, which in fact help to correct and realign the movement and flow of the map to be closer to the original 1980s map than the Alpha Preview version.

It is also worthwhile to note that the Shook Map wasn't completed:  some areas on it are drawn without any access points, and there are no secret doors shown on the map at all.  (Presumably those would have been added in the next step of revisions and updates to it).  So, some of the changes introduced in the later revisions to the map may have been present on the original, and simply not completed at the time of Shook's draftings.  

1980s Shook Map Changes

The changes from this map to the Alpha Preview version are significant and run across the entire level.  They include: 

• Changes to fit the level into its new configuration as part of a larger, combined level spanning four separate original levels of one sheet each
• modifying the corridors along the north and east edges of the sheet to be 20' wide---which is a change I like, since I'm a fan of large corridors in general!
• adding entry points due north of 295 on the top edge of the map, and in the NE corner of the 20' wide corridor, along with another door on the eastern wall just north of 284
• simplifying several corridors by straightening them out, in particular in the SE quadrant of the level, but also in the NW quadrant's corridor north of 2-100
• Moving some corridor intersections and/or chamber walls:
• the huge NE chamber accessed by the long, winding corridors is 10' narrower (288 in the later versions)
• the chamber immediately south is also narrower by 10' (287 in the later maps)
• Removing most of the stairwells and pits, and the ramps/slides:
• stairs gone in the later versions include those that flank 2-108, east of 293 in the top-center, west of 285, 
• ramps and/or slides at 2-101 and 289 are changed to stairwells; when first seeing this level, my speculation was that one of these was the slide to China at the bottom of Gary's original Castle Greyhawk
• Altering the flow of the loops Gary built that connect sub-sections of the level to each other, and simplifying access to previously-less-accessible areas:
• 285 now has 2 doors that enter it vs. just one 
• the 2nd B to the right of 294 has two doors entering, instead of just one on the N wall, and either a false door on the S wall or a one-way door (this is the only door drawn as such on the level, so it's hard to know which the symbol might represent; it's possible the western-wall door leading into the 2-101 slide in Shook's map may also be another partially-drawn one-way door, which may edge the symbol closer to that function vs. false door)
• the archway into 284 is opened up, which creates a second entry point into that room 
• the corridor west of 284 no longer intersects as a four-way east of 286, which squeezes out one of the rooms in the stacked room maze due south of 286; the "S" corridor leading to the removed pillar west of 285 also provided another route into 284 and 285, but in the later versions only one path leads to those keys now
• Simplifying corridor and room flourishes:
• removing the rounded niche in the N wall of 296
• squaring off the rounded edges of 2-105 and 2-106
• removing the pillar west of 285
• removing most of the "end cap" square pillars on long hallways like east of 2-105, west of 2-103, east of 2-101 (south of the added doors/secret doors)

Some new features were added in the Alpha Preview map too:

• A covered pit appears in the eastern corridor leading into 2-105
• A well is added at 2-102
• Pillars are added to 288 and 296
• A door is added to the 290 stairwell, which is also moved deeper into the corridor vs. Shook's original placement
  
  

Changes from Alpha Preview to BK Launch Map

The revisions to the later version of the map largely focus on secret doors, more-specifically changing standard doors into secret doors:

• The standard doors entering these key #s all became secret doors:  O by 295, 2-103, 2-105, 2-108, 285, the offset series of secret doors that lead into 288 from the east, 291
• The dead-end corridor/corner south of 292 was added, which provides another entry point into the SE sub-section of the level
• The inaccessible dead-end east of 2-108 is opened up on its eastern wall in the BK Launch map, with what looks like might be an archway

In general, these changes restore some of the difficulty in finding and accessing areas that had been made more open in the Alpha Preview map, by making the chambers harder to find, or less-accessible in terms of obviously-open paths leading to them (while still adding the secret doors as further possible entry points).  For example, in the Shook Map, 2-103 was only accessible from stairs down from its flanking chambers, which led to a seeming dead-end corridor, that seemed to have a trapdoor leading up into the center room.  

Continuing Review

I updated this post on 16 April 2026 with all of the text between this section and the Side-by-Side Analysis section above, along with the Starstrands map and comments.

More to come! :D

Allan.

Mega-Dungeon Monday - The Recessive Gallery Level

This is a presently-unfinished map that I designed primarily during the pre-COVID era:

The Recessive Gallery Level - 
map by Allan Grohe (grodog)

The map is drawn on 8 spi graph paper, so it represents a fairly large level environment---880' east-west by 640' north-south.  That places it solidly among the largest of my dungeon levels, and it's comparable in width to my original design for the first level of my Castle Greyhawk (which has been significantly enlarged more-recently, along with my second level).  

Unlike many of my maps, I didn't sign and date this one, so I'm not sure offhand when I created it during the past decade-ish, but I worked on it last in November 2019, probably as prep for running it as a convention game, but I didn’t get quite that far with the keying. 

As usual with my unfinished maps, various rooms are orphaned until I determine whether access to them will be via doors, archways, secret doors, or other more-esoteric means of entry.  

Some interesting (to me, anyway!) features to note:

• Entrances are via the 60’ circular shaft just right-of-center, ramps on the right side, a 20' wide corridor to the south, and a 20’ wide secret corridor on the far left
• The area just above the entry shaft is the levels titular Recessive Gallery---a recessed artwork gallery.  I haven’t decided exactly what type of art is represented in its exhibits, but I’m leaning toward statues and other physical/magical art emplacements (similar in style but not necessarily subject matter to those in my drowic sage of demonology's home in Erelhei Cinlu)
• You’ll notice some triangular doors drawn on the level, and they are in fact triangular in shape and placed in triangularly-shaped corridors, which complicate movement (the triangles are oriented with the point downward)
• A few of the rooms are moving, although only one is marked on this version of hte map:  the lower-right 40x40’ room
• Two multi-level complexes exist:  an octagonally-shaped one in the lower-ish left, and a square-ish shaped one in the lower middle right.  These extend upward and downward from the baseline elevation of the level, and may reach into other adjacent levels (I haven't determined that yet).
• The large skull/lightbulb-shaped room is likely a temple, perhaps to a god of death---perhaps Nerull or Wee Jas or a previously-slain god of death (two of my players' PCs are interested in the god of death:  one is from the Horned Society and has been actively worshipping Nerull, while another is a fey bard from another plane and is enamored with an aspect of the god of death from that plane, who may or may not also existing within the portfolio of one of Greyhawk's death gods)
• I placed a few repeating room-door mazes in the level, in the tradition of early Gygaxian and Kuntzian map designs
• At least two of the large rooms are inhabited by dragons!

More to come as I continue to work through older draft posts and as inspiration strikes! :)

Allan. 

More Greyhawk News to Cheer your Sunsebb!

Darlene's Greyhawk Map with Hex Coordinates 

Zach Henderson's Map

We got discussing module hex coordinates in the Flanaess Geographical Society group on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/groups/ghmaps/posts/5868854479844570/ (building in part on some September discussion at https://www.facebook.com/groups/ghmaps/permalink/5621068317956522/, where I was looking for a map-based mechanism to ID hex locations on Darlene's map), and Zach Henderson created this fabulous map:

 

Zach Henderson at work
on Darlene's map

You can download Zach's full map file freely at https://www.dropbox.com/s/xjogcd7xltwqv4c/WoG_Map_Coordinates_v2.jpg.

Thanks Zach!  

Paul Stormberg's Module Hex Coordinates

During that same discussion about TSR module locations, Paul Stormberg of The Collector's Trove, Legends of Wargaming, and Legends of Roleplaying fame, shared the list of known hex coordinates for classic-era TSR modules set in Greyhawk. Paul's list draws in part on the module locations as defined in the Glassography to the World of Greyhawk booklet (1983 boxed set, page 30), but expands upon it as well:

In any case here is the "official" World of Greyhawk Glossography locales and another set done in Polyhedron 10. Both have some problems with their locations and likely have some "windage" applied to them by fans over the years to mark "better" locations:

 

• A1 A4-101 (Poly #10: A4-101)
• A2 A4-102 (Poly #10: B4-103)
• A3 A4-104 (Poly #10: Z3-103)
• A4 A4-104 (Poly #10: Z3-103)
• C1 A4-137 (Poly #10: Y3-135)
• C2 A4-92 (Poly #10: Z3-91)
• D1 M5-138 (Poly #10: M5-141)
• D2 M5-138 (Poly #10: M5-141)
• D3 N5-138 (Poly #10: M5-141)
• Q1 N5-138 (Poly #10: M5-141)
• EX1 D4-86
• EX2 D4-86
• G1 P5-129 (Poly #10: N5-126)
• G2 S5-134 (Poly #10: V5-128)
• G3 M5-138 (Poly #10: N5-139)
• I1 Y-109
• L1 B-78
• L2 (Module: "18 miles south[-east]" of B-78
• L3 (Module: "18 miles south[-east]" of B-78) 
  
• N1 K5-113/H5-112
• S1 K2-97 (Poly #10: L2-100)
• S2 T3-70 (Poly #10: U3-69)
• S3 A6-119 (Poly #10: Z5-118)
• S4 E5-88 (Poly #10: M5-141)
• T1 O4-98 (Poly #10: N4-95)
• U1 (Poly #10: U4-123)
• U2 (Module: V4-124) 
• U3 (Module: W4-125)
• UK1 (Poly #10: O4-124)
• UK2 (Module: E5/137 and F5/138) 
• UK3 (Module: E5/137 and F5/138) 
• WG4 F5-88
• WG5 (Module: X3-86) 
• WG6 D4-86 (Greyhawk Castle Locale)
  

 

Compiled module locations are also shows on the Canonfire! map at http://www.canonfire.com/cf/ghadventures.php (but you don't get hex coordinates with them too).

 

Lenard Lakofka GenCon "AD&D Open" Tournament Adventures Newly Re-Discovered!

Tentatively identified as rounds 1, 5, and 6 of the 1982 GenCon Open tourney:

Recently sold by Michael Cox of The DragonsTrove:

• 4001 The Guildmaster's Museum by Mark Shoemaker at https://www.ebay.com/itm/275539255792
  
• 4005 A Minor Threat by Lenard Lakofka at https://www.ebay.com/itm/234778960945
  
• 4006 Threat from Nowhere - The Gift at https://www.ebay.com/itm/234778960944
  

I'll pull the details from the auctions and add them to my Greyhawk Tourney History page, if applicable (I don't immediately see any Greyhawk content in them, but will dig some more).  I've also been in touch with Matt Shoemaker, who maintains the GenCon Events Database at http://www.best50yearsingaming.com/.

Lenard was a fan of The Companions' hex grid maps, which helped me to ID the last round of the tourney as possibly also created by him. 

I also recently confirmed that Lenard co-wrote  "The Great Deck" (by LL and Wm. John Wheeler), "Cards of Minor Power" (by Wm. John Wheeler, with LL and Peter L. Rice), and Magical Treasures (by Wm. John Wheeler and Peter L. Rice, with LL and others) in The Companions' Treasure Trove I: Cards of Power 1982 generic D&D supplement.  

I'll add these details to my Lenard Lakofka Index over the holidays.

grodog's GaryCon XV Events Submitted and Approved

I also submitted two events to run at GaryCon XV in March 2023.  Both have been approved but not scheduled formally yet, so take the date/times below with a grain of salt for the moment:

• LEGIO V—Gary Gygax's Castle Greyhawk Level Keyed by grodog     
• Queued for Scheduling     
• Thursday at 19:00     
• 5 hours      
• LEGIO V—Gary Gygax's Castle Greyhawk Level Keyed by grodog     
• Queued for Scheduling     
• Saturday at 19:00     
• 5 hours
  

 Here's the event's long description text:

Explore grodog's version of one of Gary Gygax's unpublished Castle Greyhawk dungeon levels. The Chessboard level existed in either the Original or Expanded Castle Greyhawk. grodog has a copy of the original map, but not the original key.  So, you're playing Gary's (slightly modified) map with grodog's key.

Bring your graph paper, dice, and a healthy dose of paranoid courage! 6th-8th level charcaters provided.

==

The Lake Geneva Legio V began as a handful of gamers who have attended Gary Con since its inception. We have grown over the past few years to include like-minded individuals united by a respect of Gary Gygax and his legacy. We are the dedicated attendees who love Gary Con for the camaraderie it establishes, the Game Masters who run games from across the decades, and the committed gamers who spend these four days in a fervor of dice rolling and old-school good times.

Although events run as LEGIO V Presents will use a variety of rule systems, our focus is on games authored by Gary and his contemporaries as well as those systems whose designers pay homage to these pioneers.

 

On Friday night, I will also help DM one of the rounds for Paul Stormberg "Legends of Roleplaying" AD&D Open tourney.  That's usually at 6pm. 

grodog Interviewed Twice in One Week!

October was a rare month with two interviews for me:

Shane Plays

Shane Stacks of Shane Plays interviewed me on Sunday afternoon 9 October 2022, and it just went live last night:

OSRIC & The OSR with Allan T. Grohe Jr. - Episode 264- 11/30/2022

RPG developer and publisher Allan T. Grohe Jr. (aka "grodog") joins to talk AD&D retroclone OSRIC, the OSR, Black Blade Publishing, John Eric Holmes, and RPG goodness in general. Allan LOVES him some Greyhawk. The skills he learned tracking down early information on Greyhawk helped lead to his main non-RPG career. How active is the current AD&D 1E and/or OSRIC scene? What is Allan’s definition of OSR, and does he feel it’s important? The legal importance of OSRIC to the OSR community. ‘zines are often lauded, but at one time Dragon magazine was a sort of “D&D website” in its day as well. Watching an RPG project happen behind the scenes. Shane offers a mild defense of rules lawyers. “Vanilla” fantasy is not a derogatory term. Cthulhu and Delta Green. Look, just hit Cthulhu with a boat. Shane has figured out Lovecraft’s indescribable color. Thunderdome match: Strongheart versus Warduke.

You can listen at https://shaneplays.com/osric-osr-rpg-allan-grohe-podcast/ and on YouTube or your podcast platform of choice (see the main link).   

 

College of Wooster Gaming Research

Within the same week, on Thursday evening, 13 October 2022, Laura Jentes---who is working on a gaming history MA thesis at the College of Wooster (in Ohio)---interviewed me about my experience gaming in the later 1970s through to the present.  

This is part of her research on the oral history of gaming (she also wrote a bio on Gary Gygax as part of a class she took last year).  All of the content and research will be shared later in the spring once her work has concluded, and I'll share the news when it becomes available.

I'm off to Philly to visit my family and friends in South Jersey on Friday, and I may perhaps try to drop in on PAX Unplugged, too.  We'll see how the timing shakes out.

And that's all the news that's fit to print, for the moment, anyway ;)

Allan.

Greyhawk Happenings in the News

New Settings from WotC Announced

They include both Spelljammer and Dragonlance, but no Greyhawk---none of which are big surprises, really.

Perhaps I'll have more to say on this front later, but for now, that's sufficient.  

Virtual Greyhawk Con #3 - 30 Sept to 2 Oct 2022

It's that time of year again, and Jay Scott has organized another Virtual Greyhawk Con!  Event registration began today at Noon CDT, and event submission closes on 26 September; see https://tabletop.events/conventions/virtual-greyhawk-con-2022 for details.

My events this year will be:

1.  Carlos Lising's _G2 The Witch Queen's Lament_ on Fri Sep 30 at 8:00 pm (4 hours) at https://tabletop.events/conventions/virtual-greyhawk-con-2022/schedule/62
   
   
2. Rob Kuntz's _Maure Castle and Mordenkainen's Fantastic Adventure_ on Sat Oct 1 at 7:00 pm (5 hours) at https://tabletop.events/conventions/virtual-greyhawk-con-2022/schedule/63
   
   
3. Erik Mona's _COR1-03 River of Blood_ on Sun Oct 2 at 2:00 pm (4 hours) at https://tabletop.events/conventions/virtual-greyhawk-con-2022/schedule/64

All are set in the World of Greyhawk (of course!) and will be run using AD&D 1st edition rules (of course!).  
 
In addition to my events (all of which still have seats open as of this posting), numerous other Greyhawk fans are running events spanning OD&D to 5e, all set in Oerth.  I'm playing in three other events, and will take part in the closing Greyhawk panel discussion too:

1. "Citadel by the Sea" from Dragon Magazine, and run by Jay Hafner in 5e; I've never played with Jay before, but am looking forward to testing out this classic adventure in my first 5e game (PC levels 1-3)
   
   
2. "The Broken Stone Alliance" a 1e scenario for PC levels 7-9, DM'd by Michael Mossbarger.  Also my first time playing with Michael.
   
   
3. "The Ravages of the Mind" by Lenard Lakofka, his final adventure:  journey into Ratik's Timberway to root out a growing malignancy. AD&D PC levels 3-5, DM'd by Joss Popp.  This'll be my first time playing with Josh DM'ing, although we've previously played in online games together.
   

Registration to play is just $5 and events are free:  https://tabletop.events/conventions/virtual-greyhawk-con-2022

 

Oerth Journal

Oerth Journal #36 (Spring 2022 issue) released in May at https://greyhawkonline.com/download/16145/ 

It's themes is around the "Festivals of Greyhawk" and the table of contents is:

• Father Tabor's Guide to Richfest - by Thomas Kell
• Richfest in Chathold - by Sam "DMSam" Dillon 
• Beers of Greyhawk - by James A. S. Muldowney III, M.D.
• Erkill's Skullsplitter - by Mark Allen 
• Saltmarsh Festival of Spirts - by Nathan Doyle
• The Desportium of Magick - by Kristoph Nolen 
• Never the Heroes, pt2 - by Mark Allen 
• Fistful of Baubles, pt3 - by David Leonard 
• The Sheltering Ancestors - by Les Reno 
• Accursed Fishhooks - by Zach Houghton 
• Alvynn Bannocksburn—gnomish merchant - by Paul Jurdeczka 
• Seaton - by Case Brown
• The Best festival of all—GARYCON XI !!!! 
  

Issue #37 focuses on on "Magick of the Flanaess" and should be releasing soon.  Kristoph has shared a few previews from it in the Oerth Journal discord channel of Greyhawk Online:   https://discord.gg/DaajjgWU (I think that the OJ channel is for patrons only, so you can check-in at the main GHO channel if you're curious).  I believe that my article about a new and enigmatic magical tome may be in that issue; we'll see.

 

Mapping Happenings in the Flanaess

• This spring (March 2022), Denis Tetreault updated his City of Greyhawk map!   See http://melkot.com/locations/cogh/cogh.html
  
  
• Anna Meyer (and sometimes Allysa Fayden too!) are running a new livestream mapping channel in Twitch; see https://www.twitch.tv/anna_b_meyer
• Anna's web site at https://www.annabmeyer.com/ got a semi-recent facelift (and thankfully https://www.ghmaps.net/ still redirects, since it's muscle-memory embedded in my fingers!)
  
• On 4 August 2022, Anna published a general update on her Greyhawk and related mapping work
  
• On 1 August 2022, Anna released her updated preview for the Amedio Jungle and Hepmonaland sub-continent map
• On 25 June 2022, Anna published an updated 576 CY map for the Flanaess, including Hepmonaland
  
  
• Stoink: A Wasp's Nest news:  Long-time Greyhawk fan Ed Courtroul passed away nearly two years ago now, on 15 November 2020, and is still missed.  Through the kind graces of our mutual friend Mike Badolato (Badmike to those in the know, who co-founded the North Texas RPG Con), I am now in possession of some of Ed's original Greyhawk campaign materials, including his research materials about the long-lost-and-partially-recovered Stoink manuscript. 
  
  Ed's materials shed a little further light on the map and the three and a half pages of manuscript notes that match the map as potential key headings.  These seem to be all that remains of the original manuscript, so far as I can tell, at this point. 
  
  I'll spend some time detailing this in a long-overdue second entry in my "From the Vaults" post series (if you can still call a follow-up to a nearly-three-year old post a series ;) ).  

 

More to Come, including Campaign Updates

Some of my AD&D 1e Greyhawk campaigns continue to live on, even through COVID:

1. The virtual Castle Greyhawk campaign that began in 2020 with the cancellation of GaryCon is mostly-thriving.  The PCs (levels 1-3) have been on a mission into the Astral Plane for the high priests of Celestian, and should be returning from Anthony Huso's Zjelwyin Fall soon....

2. The solo aquatic campaign that I'm running for Henry also continues, and his PCs are about to enter the city of Irongate in Greyhawk.  I've been cooking up some new "special" options for aquatic random encounters, and while rolling up the hoards of two different dragon turtles, made a perhaps-campaign-changing die roll....
   
   Henry is also running a solo campaign for me, set in his version of the south-eastern end of Ahlissa in the South Province, between the Rieuwood and the Greyflood.  We'll likely return to play there soon, too.
   

3. The third, in-person campaign set in the northern bight of the Gnarley Forest near Safeton, and exploring the DMG monastery dungeons, unfortunately succumbed to COVID, and has not returned to the land of the living.

 

And that's all for now!

Allan.

Mega-Dungeon Map Design Sprints with Henry

Update - 13 June 2022 at 7:18pm:  Well, just like my lost big posts during Kellri's Module Challenge, blogger crapped out and I lost this huge post detailing the fun mapping work Henry and I were doing.  I was uploading pictures from my phone, and perhaps it got too be too much.  Who knows. 

Here's what I'm able to recover by manually retyping it from the preview window on my phone.  *sigh*

Lesson re-learned:  a) type the blog post in Word, and b) eventually move to another platform if I’m going to keep the blog ;)

==

We drove six hours (one-way!) to Dallas for the NTRPGCon and all we got was this Lousy Coronavirus....

Somewhere along the way to/from, or while attending the North Texas RPGCon (NTX as I affectionately dub it) over the end of last week/weekend, my 14-year-old son Henry and I caught COVID.

This is not that story (or convention report, for that matter; that will follow soon-after!).

Neither is this the story of Henry’s excellent learners-permit drive through the Oklahoma City leg of our return journey on Sunday later afternoon for about 90 minutes (this will also be included in the convention report!---sneak peek:  he did great :D ).

This is, however, the story of some of the fun we had while passing the time in our post-infection bubblehuts.

Playing Games in COVID-land

While Henry and I have been isolating from Heather and Ethan (who have tested thankfully negative since our return), we’ve been playing games and hanging out together in general.  Our symptoms haven’t been too bad, all-in-all; I’ve continued to work all week long, although Henry had to drop out of his summer PE class, which is a bummer.

We played several games over the past week, including:

·         Noita:  easily my favorite computer/online game; I’ll have to post our explorations map, too---we began drawing it several months ago, after many more months of playing and exploring its levels in general)

·         Henry introduced me to a new game he likes called Inscryption (the game has spoilers, so you may not want to read the linked Wiki article?); I’m not enthralled yet---it has a bit of a 7th Guest meets Twin Peaks meets Fargo meets Magic: the Gathering vibe thus far, so we’ll see if it sticks or not

·         We also played several rounds of the now-working-again Dungeon Robber (yay!) too

Well, on Friday night after dinner, we shook things up a bit.

Mapping Sprints?—What’s That?

I had mentioned a recent dream to Henry earlier in the week, in which we were designing a big map together, and Henry got the idea to make that dream real, with a twist:  we would design the map in alternating segments, working off of each others’most-recent drawings in regular rotation.

Our process went like this:

1.      After some noodling, we settled on a 6 spi grid size for the dungeon level, and taped together two 11”x17” sheets of Black Blade Publishing graph paper.

2.      We each began to draw/design in opposite corners of the combined 17”x22” sheet.

3.      We ran timed, 10-minute design sprints, drawing and mapping the dungeon environment.  After 10 minutes, we pivoted the map to work on the area the other had just been building.  The two 10-minute “turns” complete one sprint.

4.      We captured one picture of each of our respective work on the map during each sprint, and a single shot of the whole map, too, as we slowly grew it out over about five hours or so. 

This is the setup in our spare bedroom; we borrowed the card table from Heather’s folks so that Henry and I can eat meals in here without getting crumbs all over the bed:

 

Our tools:  pencils and papers,
table and templates

 

Pictures follow in chronological order, broken down by sprint number; times are from the photos, which were captured at the end of each mapping sprint.  

(Some of the pictures look partially erased in places, but that's apparently the glare from the room's light). 

Mapping Sprints 1 and 2---10 June 2022 8:29pm CDT

Since we were just starting out, I didn’t think to capture pictures of our first sprint, so these first three pictures show our work after we’d completed Sprint 1, then swapped once and completed Sprint 2 as well:

 

Sprint1+2 – Allan’s starter environ,
with Henry additions

I began my initial dungeon environ with a 20’-wide stairwell entering the level, with large 20’x20’ landings at the turning corners, too.  That lead into what I intended to be a gated/controlled entry checkpoints area where guards would be above the entry corridor in a kill zone controlled by portcullises. 

Henry then expanded each of the controlling corridors, and began the routing of their directional possibilities.

 

Sprint1+2 – Henry’s starter environ,
with Allan additions

 

Henry’s starting area began with a cluster of small rooms connected with 10’-wide passages, all branching out from the 30’x30’ entry chamber.

To those, I added the outer-layer of 20’-wide edge corridors, and started to rough-in the oval chambers. I also added the hemispherical chamber off of Henry’s smaller original warren of rooms, and the pointy, squid-like chamber with several corridors branching off.

And here we end Sprints 1 and 2 with the full map:

 

Sprint1+2 – Full map view

 

Mapping Sprint 3 -- 10 June 2022 8:49pm CDT

In Sprint 3, for the first time, we both began to respond to each other’s additions to our original mapping areas.

Sprint 3 – Allan’s first return
to his starter environ

I added the portcullises I’d pictured as part of the access control mechanisms into the level design, and then began expanding upon the eastern corridors that Henry had added to the south.  I was envisioning a large, open area with side sections off of it (like an open-air market or bazaar), but such was not meant to be ;)

 

Sprint 3 – Henry’s first return
to his starter environ

 

Henry began to add the first doors to the map within his original warren, as well as to build the larger chamber with a central area accessible via stairs.  He also started to define the zone to the south of the oval chambers.

I didn’t capture a full-map picture for Sprint 3.  Still working on those consistent quality control processes ;)

Mapping Sprint 4 -- 10 June 2022 9:05pm CDT

In Sprint 4, Henry continues to build upon the corridor he introduced to my map, and turns my planned open area into another length of 20’-wide corridor…:

 

 Sprint 4 – Allan’s original environment,
with Henry’s new additions

…while I start to lengthen and expand upon the corridors I’d added to his map, including a 40’ wide corridor with columns* (directly inspired by our recent Dungeon Robber Games, which were, of course, inspired by Gary Gygax’s random dungeon generation tables in Appendix A of the 1e DMG):

 

Sprint 4 – Henry’s original environment,
with Allan’s new additions

And we conclude the sprint properly, with the full-map view, this time!

It doesn’t really look like we’ll ever meet in the middle, does it?

 

Sprint 4 – Full map view

Full map view, attained!

* see also:  https://www.knights-n-knaves.com/phpbb3/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=13328

 

Mapping Sprint 5 -- 10 June 2022 9:19pm CDT

Sprint 5 sees my start on the large temple complex at the bottom of the map…:

 

Sprint 5 – Allan’s original environment,
with Allan’s newest additions

 

…while Henry does more development in the middle of the upper area…:

 

Sprint 5 – Henry’s original environment,
with Henry’s new additions

 

 …and the resulting full map:

 

Sprint 5 – Full map view

==

And there was quite a bit more of that back-and-forth Wimbledon-like commentary for each sprint, and many more pictures taken, but I’m not going to recreate the rest of the posts from my phone preview, except to note that:

We concluded our Friday late-night sprints on Saturday morning with Sprint 16 -- 11 June 2022 12:57am CDT, after which we went to bed.

Then on Saturday night, we ran Sprint 17 at 9:27pm, Sprint 18 at 9:51pm, and Sprint 19 at 10:09pm before turning in a bit earlier that night ;)

 

Sprint 19 – Full map view

 The End!

And that’s where we wrapped up for now.

The process was a lot of fun, and we may try to do a similar effort to key the level when it’s complete, too.

We’ll keep you posted!

Allan.