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I want to really simple layout to serve as a training simulation. The idea is that I think people will find it easier to learn combat if they can role play, but in world they're in a simulation.
I also wanted to try making a map fast. In the past it's been a long, slow process. This is a partially built trolley in a factory that players can use to trying out tactics.
I wonder what the quickest map maker would be - I know you tend to use public records and architecture diagrams and draw over them, and I think that's my favorite for realism, but I wonder if there's an architecture program, or videogame tilemap painter, or other program that we could point to for quickly populating maps. All the architectureal programs I've used before have either killed their free trials, or are pretty unintuitive.
I do like that you're posting them here, it's great that we're getting a start on a communal resource pool for GMs. Do we have an archive some of the existing assets in a public Google or Mega drive? It'd be interesting to see what new DMs remix out of existing materials
I totally agree that I think it can make the game far easier to use and contribute to if we build out a repository of content, including user content.
I'm not sure how to make map-making easier, though I think if i share SVGs of just the grids, that might be a good start.
I know tabletop map making is its own artform, which I unfortunately am but a novice at.
Also I really like the idea of doing a training in a simulator, and of the design. The grey scale color coding might be tripping me up a little
Regarding the training simulation: this has been something I've been meaning to do for a while. I think people need to be able to try the combat to understand it, but even if you say, "We're playing this combat encounter, but don't worry, it's just for practice," it seems to me that the story is still potentially distracting. I think having an in-game story where you're pretending helps let people try out tactics in a way where the character's experience is essentially the same as the player's, so there's no disconnection there.
Regarding colors: I'm still trying to figure out how to manage this. What I'm trying to do is communicate a difference between barriers like walls and barriers like tables. The objects around the trolley are supposed to be robot arms and tool carts and such, and the gray interior of the trolley is supposed to represent the trolley deck. I guess I could remove this and make it white, but in my head you should have to expend one movement to hop up onto the floor of the half-built trolley (although not down onto the floor).
Do you think colors would help? Like blue instead of gray?
I was mostly thinking of the difference between types of barriers. The light grey blends in a bit, I wasn't sure it belonged in the scene or came from the source image.
The different shades of grey does have one advantage - it should work fine for colorblind people. I was thinking maybe dashed lines might be a good way to delineate soft or incomplete cover.
It sounds like I should darken the light grey so it's clear that it's distinct from the background.
The heavy grey are major barriers, light grey is stuff is mid-height objects you can cover behind or climb on.