By Gamewyrd RPG Reviews (repost from GameWyrd.com), August 26, 2002.
This is my third review of a Darkfuries floorplan set - and it’s not a redundant
review. Each of these floorplans have evolved significantly from the one before.
Previously I started by pointing out that although these are electronic floorplans
that they are not packed as PDF documents. The floorplans come as a zipped up package
of html files. There are pros can cons with this, as noted in the Inn and Tavern
Floorplans review an important pro is that you only need to open up the image with
interests you rather than having to open up a many megabyte spanning document. This
becomes even more important for Mansions and Manors because this product introduces
colour floorplans. However, as noted in the Temples and Shrines Floorplans review a
niggling con is that its harder to print the whole product out. This becomes rather
more annoying for Mansions and Manors since the level of detail increases significantly,
adding NPCs as well as separate player and GM copies of maps. Although, having said that,
in the author’s notes at the introductory page of the product there is a mention of a
freeware printer utility available from a download link and perhaps that’s capable of the feat.
This set of floorplans carry the d20 logo. The reason for this is that the NPCs
associated with the various mansions and Manors are detailed in d20 mechanics. For
each floorplan set there is a small number of NPCs, ranging from just the Lord or
Lady of the manner and one servant to a group of about half a dozen. The NPC races
are taken from Darkfuries’ Maelstrom Fantasy Campaign setting. That’s fine with me.
I don’t have the Maelstrom setting at hand and so the resulting effect is access to
some quick NPCs, along with pictures for the important ones, an imaginative background
and stats only slightly different from any given core race. The stats are close enough
to keep unaltered if I find myself using these NPCs on the fly as a response to
unexpected player actions (you know the sort - every second action they take). The
backgrounds to the people are handy though; ne’er-do-wells tend to have mansions and
Manors with secret passages and all sorts of hidden hideaways and I like the way that
ties together cleanly even if the players never meet the NPCs or I choose not to use
them. That latter point is worth singling out. You don’t need to use the NPCs to get
an amazing amount of use out of the floorplans. In fact, given that the product just
costs a couple of bucks, I think you only need to use one floorplan one time and you’ve
had value for your money.
Colour floorplans are great. They look so much better than black and white ones.
You need to print these floorplans out though and the chances are that you don’t
have a colour printer at hand (or if you do it’s currently out of red ink). No
problem. This product provides black and white copies of every single floorplan.
The black and white copies aren’t just coloured ones turned to a greyscale that
blurs everything. The black and white copies are crisp and clean. I’ve tried
flicking back and forth between the black and white and the colour copies of the
same floorplan, looking to see whether a table or a doorway is fractionally out
of place between the two and I can’t see any discrepancies.
There are discrepancies in some of the floorplans though. The players’ copies of
those florplans with hidden features are intentionally distorted to hide hidden
features where it’s necessary. More often, though, the players’ copy of the floorplan
can get away with simply omitting the hidden area. I love this. I doubt it would be
economical to produce two copies of cardboard floorplans but here it just costs a
couple of cents at the most, it just depends on how much a single print out costs
you. Since these floorplans can be printed out again and again you are free to let
your players scribble on their copy of the floorplan. If they want to mark in the
secret area they’ve found or whether they want to try and workout where a secret
area might be then they can and it shouldn’t be a problem.
In case you’re wondering the colour and black and white versions extend to both the
player and GM copies. That means, in some cases, you have four different versions
for one floorplan. Thankfully it’s easy to navigate around all of this since there
are a set of gallery pages at the top of the index that present collections of large
thumbnails of the different plans all on one page. There is a gallery for each of the
Manors and mansions.
There are a total of seven buildings in the product. Even the smallest manor has at
least three levels and every single building has an underground area. Some of the
floorplans are rather large but this is because a deliberate effort has been made to
keep them all on the same scale. I see the dilemma there, especially when the ground
area is so large that it no longer fits entirely on my 1024x768 screen, but I think
the right choice has been made. I’d much rather the game ran smoothly by ensuring
there was no confusion then and there in exchange for some minor inconveniences when
I’m reviewing the maps on the computer.
I’m continually impressed by the quality of these floorplans. I’m not the only one
either, a quick peek at the best sellers list at RPGNow pretty much guarantees the
presence of one of these Darkfuries products.
GameWyrd
The original post can be found
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