05/23/2025

Happy Friday and welcome back to Tabletop Thoughts!

Today, I released a new YouTube video in which I go through my process of generating a random overland hex map for Shadowdark. I use the random Overland Map tables from the core Shadowdark book with the D30 Sandbox Companion to get a better idea of natural formations. For the map-making program, I am using Tiled (www.mapeditor.org) along with a 16-bit tileset.

Below is the final map that I created during the video. I am going with 6 miles per hex, so the entire map is only 36 miles across. This would allow the players to reach any of the locations on the map, explore that location, and return to a settlement in one session. (That is key if running a West Marches style game.)

As you can see, we have the starting village in the middle of the map. There are a couple more settlements in the area (the one in the North is controlled by an evil sorcerer), a temple with a large underground tomb complex, and a kingdom of fishpeople in the ocean in the west. We also got a cave in the east that is home to an oracle (I am thinking it could be a coven of hags).

I use a different layer in the same map to add the threat level of each hex not occupied by a settlement. Since I can hide layers, it makes it a convenient tool. Here is the same map with the threat layer turned on.

I am thinking of running a Shadowdark one-shot (maybe a 3-session-long campaign) later this year if I can find the time. I may use this map as the basis. I might want to add it to the world of Eldoria, which is home to my Shadowdark campaign, Shadows of the Sundered Throne.

Look at this larger map, I might add this location as part of one of the islands that are part of the Kingdom of Aranthia in the East. It could be a new island that isn’t shown on this map, which is in the upper left side, since there are some snow-covered areas.

One of the nice features of Tiled is the unlimited map size. The map can grow as you drop down more tiles. There is no need to keep creating new maps as you explore more of the world; just drop more tiles down on the map you have. You would only have to create a new map if the scale of the map changes. (A local map compared to a Kingdom or continent map)

Below is the link to the YouTube video. It is about 45 minutes long but goes through the process to generate the maps above. I would like to do a much shorter part 2 for this video, where we name the locations and flesh out all of the other details. I should also do a video where we generate the starting village and the other 2 settlement maps in case the players decide to visit those locations.

Keep on gaming!