Do any other GMs spend a lot of time messing with purely cosmetic "maps"?

My campaign involves a lot of off-map time, so I started making a little desktop start screen with a rough overland map and a few sketches, but over time it's gotten... crowded. Still, I find it's useful for atmosphere and to personalize the PCs and the more prominent NPCs they've met, keeping them fresh in mind after time away. Anyone else have non-map maps they'd like to share?

i have no maps to show but I like the idea of this. i may make one for the campaign i am running.

All my NPCs get their own journal entry, complete with portrait and a quick description for the PCs to refer to. And maps, notes, etc are handout entries. I like your composite approach though, pretty cool looking.

I don't have a screengrab on this computer, but my GURPS Cops campaign earlier this year had a landing page that was a giant corkboard with "polaroids" of all the prominent NPCs along with post-it-notes of gathered information. Wound up being part relationship map, part recap of previous sessions, part scratch pad, but all awesome.

i just use traditional maps, and have a picture file for the people of the campaign.

This is a great idea. I do use a landing page, and had been wondering how to liven it up. Are the pictures on your layout tokens? Did you create separate tokens assigned to each character to achieve this effect?

I do frequently use my large-scale, overland campaign map as my landing page. That way, if a player were to log in during the week to update their character sheet or whatever, the can also get a geography lesson at the same time. :-)

GG, the pics are just pics created as generic tokens with visible nameplates. The lantern and candle are moveable by all players. You can assign a token to any character you want, not just the default token, if that's your thing. If you play a game where the players split up on a large scale town map you could find some lead miniature tokens and assign them to players so they can show where they're going, and when you swap to a battlemap you can just drag their default tokens in from the character sheets in the journal.

While I guess my maps would infact qualify as maps, I know I go into a depth that is really unnecessary (I have built various cities entirely at a 5 ft grid accuracy just cause I felt like it, and the PCs never even hinted they might consider staying there longer then a quick rest and restock)

Thank's for the explanation, GM Mu. I've followed your example and am setting up a similar landing page. Kristin, your rollable token approach is really clever. I hadn't understood how multi-sided tokens worked, it's very cool.

Now there's some thinking right there. Nice work GM Mu, I'll have get a similar page going for my campaigns.

That's pretty sweet Kristin. Do you manually cycle the scenery based on the PC location and who they're talking with?

Hey, GM Mu, that's a cool map you have here. I'm trying to think of a way to do something in that spirit for my Dungeon World campaign. I'm always struggling for practical ideas, so that's cool to see an example. And Kristin, how do you use those tables? I don't get what they're for. If you could give a rough answer (if it takes too long I mean), I'll look into it to get more info. I just don't know what their utility is. :) Sorry I really don't use even half of roll20's capabilities!

I love the fantasy map of Illinois! Is your game post-apocalyptic, or are you just using the map and making it fantasy?

Stephen, there are some post-apocalyptic insinuations, but they're all too far removed to make it anything like Gamma World. It's late iron age/early black powder feudalism with politics, court intrigue, inter-species tension, and histo-mythology, although in practice the player characters have some weird disadvantages (the "leader" is an oblivious klutzy nobleman who wants to be a storybook adventuring hero in a gritty world where they don't exist) so they tend to make knowingly bad assumptions and ridiculous plans and blunder their way out of peril. It's been highly entertaining.

I do this all the time for setting scenes, interactions with NPCs and skill challenges. Pretty much any time where players aren't in combat I try to have some sort of 'scene' that helps ground them and puts the relevant NPC's into play. I like your idea of expanding this however - using a 'cork board'. Will build add that and probably put my players there in between sessions. Means they can then add their own notes to the wall.

I just want to say that this thread has opened my eyes to some great ideas for player lounges / landing pages! Thanks! time to furiously construct a new page for tonight's game

Thanks Kristin for taking the time to explain! I'm definitely going to learn how to use those. By the way, nice thread :)

Kristin C. said: I have a film strip page when my group doesn't need the FATE game board. It uses a rollable token on the tabletop to switch between different locations and a second rollable token for different NPC character portraits. I really like the idea of using a rollable table token to create the background for a fill-in scene. It's far easier to change than dropping in a new image or using a handout.

I make a splash page for every scenario for inspiration and for helping with tying the characters to specific elements of the adventure. It's really helpful if you ask your players how they relate to the pictures and whatnot as it builds a lot of scenario-specific context that makes decision-making easier. I try to go for something of a movie-poster look since I like our games to be cinematic with spots for the tokens as headshots ("Starring"). Some examples: Glitterdust , an all-pixie D&D 4e adventure Apocalypse World , including the Front worksheet A Planescape adventure for D&D 4e set in Sigil and the Elemental Plane of Fire.

Those pictures are gorgeous! Thanks HHJ! Do you create the whole set in a third party program such as GIMP or Photoshop, and then upload it? Or do you uploads the separate items and then arrange them in the roll20 app? Cheers!

Thanks for the kind words! I value quick prep time so I just upload each image and arrange it quickly onto the splash page, label it with the text tool, and carry on. These take about five minutes or so once I've found the pictures I want to include.

Another advantage of splash screens is that you can drop your players back there between sessions without worrying about them moving about or messing around with the battle map. Provided their tokens are there they can then do all the admin they need between games. I often see that my players have been in, healed up (if appropriate), upgraded armour, work on their macro's etc.

It's also a good place to explain any funky stuff regarding the interface. I've started linking the standard player token to a horse token for use in mounted combat, but it can be finicky if you don't double click the merged token, so I made a little racetrack with half-sized mounted guys to explain. Better to do it on the splash than in a battle map.

I have roughly something like this. Only split into three maps. Intro Screen. The intro screen is just a fantasy picture reflecting the area they're in at the moment and a small journal entry from the NPC Dwarf that travels with the players. He small journal entry is ment to help the players remember what happened last session. A Hall of Monuments where the players can see their most heroic encounters. This one is nicely decorated with banners and pictures. Aswell as a small piece of text showing them what they did. And last, the world map. This one has been hidden in fow, but gets revealed the more they travel. Giving them way more the feeling of an unexplored world. Plus they can win maps of certain areas in dice poker games. I'd post pictures, but can't acces them at the moment. =)

I am doing the same for my games. I have a splashpage with music, images and title appropriate to the game we are going to play. We spend most of the time there. Additionally I have a Hex Campaign Map as an overview that is also FOWed and only revealed during play. I like the idea of having the splash page include portraits of important NPCs, I may adopt that.

Very nice Kristin , the rollable table idea is pretty good one! Personally, like some others, I got a couple: Staging Page - This the default page in-between sessions where I put a couple information, next meeting date as well as the PC tokens if they need to set up macros and test them. Map Page - This is hidden from players. I use it to keep track of things happening in the world, enemy movement, roaming monsters and their effect range, as well as the current location of the party. Travel Page - This is what I use when PCs are travelling somewhere on a macro-exploration level. Wilderness, long treks in cave systems, etc. I set up a varied number of map ready for the Exploration system of D&D Next (system we use) and try to find images that instantly give the "feel" of the area they are going through. (If others use Next and want to use them, feel free, I store them over HERE ) Battle Pages - Tons of these, some for random encounters, some for specific situations but overall, for battle. Dungeoneering Pages - That's the micro-level exploration pages where PCs go through cave systems, ruins, etc. I keep a numbering system on the hidden layer so I can match rooms and area to my own notes on this one.