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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs $1.00
Average Rating:5.0 / 5
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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs
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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs
Publisher: Crooked Staff Publishing
by Alexander L. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 03/13/2012 10:03:07

Originally Published at: http://diehardgamefan.com/2012/03/13/tabletop-review-the-little-book-of-dungeons-geomorphs/

As a GM, anytime I can get some resources to help me save time when prepping for a game is good. I’ve had Crooked Staff Production’s website bookmarked for over a year now because they’ve had some great little GM aids available for download. On their site they have, free for download, a set of 30 dungeon geomorphs. Each geomorph has been gathered into a single PDF usable as a GM map. This PDF is not secured, allowing the GM to extract pages as needed, and is a 5.42 MB download. Each map page of the PDF is additionally available as an individual download. These individual downloads start with the same GM map as before, but subsequent pages break the GM map into smaller sections sized to print out for miniature use with the almost standard 1” = 5’.

All these maps are black & white, and not optimized for printing, but are absolutely free.

This $1 offering is similarly black & white and not optimized for printing, but the similarity to the superior free product ends there. Instead of one geomorph per page, this product has six per page at a small scale, and a few larger geomorphs. The last couple of pages have some examples of use and several dungeon entrances. The PDF is rather large at 20.2 MB, and contains some security. The only apparent use for this PDF is to print out the geomorphs and then cut them out to create small maps for GM use. With 63 individual geomorphs, including the 30 that were available for free online, it can easily be worth $1.

If the maps were optimized for black & printing and/or full color, along with being made available for use with miniatures, I’d pay a premium to be able to print up a random dungeon for my table. Being able to also use them in my Maptools game would make me ecstatic. In this current format, their usage is severely limited, and the $1 download seems more a donation or a thanks to Crooked Staff Productions for their freely available products.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs
Publisher: Crooked Staff Publishing
by Dennis S. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 01/18/2012 21:06:25

A simple and cheap collection of room tiles for dungeon maps, with some very quirky shapes. Put together (a good example is the cover of the book) they can make for some interesting layouts. The use of curves and non-square shapes is much appreciated and gives the dungeons a more organic and charming look than just a bunch of straight line walls would have done. The tiles vary greatly in size, with multiple-room tiles, single-room tiles, connecting hallway tiles, entrances and exits to higher or lower floors, and an overall great variety. Well recommended if you're into dungeon tiles.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs
Publisher: Crooked Staff Publishing
by Luca L. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 01/13/2012 12:16:52

An excellent collection of geomorphs, with a good greyscale simple layout. This product features a really large selection of rooms, and a good variety of them, handily the best I've seen so far. While most geomorphs tend to make the same dungeons over and over again - or at least to produce a very recognizable scheme in the overall map - these "room chunks" are so finely laid out that even in a small (or in a very large) combination, the resulting map will seem quite natural and not some simple drawing algorythm result.

Recommended.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs
Publisher: Crooked Staff Publishing
by Billiam B. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 12/28/2011 15:37:12

Simply: sublimely awesome.

12 of the 15 pages of this pack are dedicated to geomorphic map tiles of varying size at a small enough scale to be practical to a dungeon master assembling a large level at speed (i.e. maps for reference, but not cumbersome tiles for minis).

Currently at $1, this is a marvellously fun resource of a quality I have come to expect from CSP, which I believe, in terms of grey-scale black and white printing, rivals products by larger publishers, like WotC and Paizo.

Simple single shade geomorphs used to be a traditional staple of fantasy gaming, but these, by contrast, have a high modern production standard in terms of design, texture, shadow and believable solid dungeon structure, whilst also being free of smaller details - allowing for a creative DM to decorate and populate the dungeon to match their campaign.

Excellent. :)

Billiam B (http://bit.ly/rpgblog)



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The Little Book of Dungeons: Geomorphs
Publisher: Crooked Staff Publishing
by Megan R. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 12/26/2011 10:39:07

Inspired by author/artist's Kristian Richard's "Map-a-Monday" weekly map project on his blog, this is a compilation of a year's worth of neat grey-scale dungeon maps... but even if you have been a dedicated follower and collector of these, it is more than a mere collection of them all in one handy package (useful as that may be). There are some extras, chiefly being several long corridors and assorted 'dead ends' - after all, even a geomorphic dungeon has to end somewhere!

All the maps - and these are genuine maps, not miniatures-oriented tiles - are done in a uniform crisp greyscale, with clever use of darker and lighter areas to allow for different levels, e.g. a flight of steps down (or up) to an area lower or higher than the main part. Being designed on a geomorphic basis, you can clip these out and arrange them however you want seamlessly, certain that you will not have to fold, mutilate or spindle any element to ensure that corridors and doorways will join up. A uniform grid, designed for the conventional 'one square = five feet' scale, is laid over all floors. Whilst fairly grid-like, there is a vast diversity of shapes and sizes of chambers and connecting passages: whatever you have in mind you ought to be able to find something to suit, be it a mammoth underground complex for your Big Bad Evil Guy, a training dungeon in your Adventurers' Academy facility or whatever. If you are minded to a small underground area, this may not be the most appropriate set, even so you ought to be able to find what you're after.

There are plenty of features: colonnaded halls, or a dias, perhaps... not just rooms and corridors. Some rooms are oddly-shaped, some have anterooms or side-rooms accessible from the main one. Areas might be cell blocks or living quarters, chapels, training rooms or chambers constructed for ritual purposes. Useful if you do not draw well, lack spatial imagination or are pressed for time, or just want everything laid out neatly. Let your imagination run riot, this product gives ample scope for somewhere in which it may thus scamper around!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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