mrimer
Level: Legendary Smitemaster
Rank Points: 5056
Registered: 02-04-2003
IP: Logged
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I've drawn literally hundreds of detailed level maps for several games with a DROD-like style over a period of ten years or more, so I have a bunch of experience drafting these kind of rooms. Here's what I found is most expressive, quickest, and least distracting, adapted to DROD:
Walls are pretty easy. Just outline a light perimeter around their area and put some lines at a 45 degree angle through the area to show it's closed off.
Put the 45 degree angle lines both ways (cross-hatching) to designate broken walls.
Leave the inner lines out completely for pits, just draw a line around their edge. Put some widely-spaced stalacmites or something in the pit region if that's clearer.
Draw doors the same way -- outline their area and put the letter of the color on the door (R, G, B, Y, YO -- for yellow-open). Put a separate number on each yellow door. Make a circle for each orb with a letter inside it. On the paper below the room, write a list of orb-door actions, for example:
A,B: O1, C2, T3
C: C1
signifies orbs A and B will (O)pen door 1, (C)lose door 2, and (T)oggle door 3; and orb C closes door 1. This is much nicer than having spaghetti drawn all over your pretty room.
Do a similar thing (combining symbols with letters/numbers) for other customizeable items. For example, a scroll is a roughly square sheet of paper with a number on it. Draw the scroll and number below the room with the text it has on it.
Draw potions with the letter for the type of potion inside it: M or I.
Monsters need to be simple and quick, since there's a lot of them and you don't want your hand getting tired. The idea about the eyes (circle with a line pointing the way they look) is a nice idea. For groups of monsters, just draw a dashed line around a group of squares representing a clump of them, with a letter for the monster type in the middle: R(oach), Q(ueen), W(raith wing), T(ar baby), S(pider), G(oblin), B(rain). For tar mothers, two eyes is more intuitive than a couple letters. Tar is just like walls but with large rounded corners. And snakes are just a line with a head on the front.
Hope this helps!
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Gandalf? Yes... That's what they used to call me.
Gandalf the Grey. That was my name.
I am Gandalf the White.
And I come back to you now at the turn of the tide.
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