Old School Dwarves Encounter Old School Jelly

One of my Favorite Cartographers has Grown a Beard and Joined the Team

Jul 13, 2022

I’m delighted to announce that Old School Jelly will be doing the cartography for our upcoming book BY THIS AXE: The Cyclopedia of Dwarven Civilization.

Old School Jelly previously did the design and cartography on the ACKS module AX6 Sepulcher of the Sorceress Queen and is also doing the cartography for the upcoming Capital City Casefiles adventure modules for Ascendant. Here’s some work-in-progress for BY THIS AXE, wherein he’s illustrated the layout of a typical dwarven craft-temple.

One of the biggest challenges in publishing RPG books comes when the wordsmiths have to hand their words over to the artists and cartographers to illustrate. OSJ captured the idea behind my words and then improved on it. I love the little touches - the way the layout resembles a hammer with the inlaid tile walkways forming the grip, the colossal statue atop the reliquary, the alcoves of great ancestors along the narthex of the temple. I can’t wait to see him architect some large-scale dwarven structures.

This is, of course, just one of the maps that will be in the book. The total number will depend on whether or not we unlock the Dwarven Cartography stretch goal. Even if we do not, at a minimum the book will include a typical dwarven domain, dwarven vault, dwarven mine, and dwarven temple.

If you haven’t already backed BY THIS AXE, the time is at hand! Do it now before the campaign ends. And don’t forget to check out Old School Jelly’s Patreon for more great maps.

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