Matt Jackson’s DMBoC
A couple of blogposts ago, I briefly mentioned Dungeon Master’s Book of Cartography (DMBoC hereafter), which is available over at Amazon for $7.99. Matt Jackson is a talented fantasy map-maker. I’ve used several of his maps, most recently this past Sunday as part of the 5E D&D game I’m DMing.
DMBoC includes several maps, each one facing a lined page on which notes about the map can be written. The maps include a variety of dungeon and wilderness locations. None of the locations are particularly large, making them suitable for short, site-based adventures. As always with Matt, the maps are clean and clear, and they have character. These are not cookie-cutter, computer-generated maps. The last several pages of DMBoC are mapless, featuring a sheet of graph paper with a facing page for notes, encouraging me to add my own cartographical efforts to the collection.
All in all, I’m digging DMBoC. It’s a fine addition to my collection of gaming books, and I’m looking forward to Volume Two, which I assume must be in the works since DMBoC is subtitled as “volume one”. I know the maps in DMBoC will get used, even though I doubt I’ll ever write in the book. Maybe I’ll add some maps of my own on those graph paper pages, but filling in the lines with dungeon details? Probably not. I work better with a word processor than with a pen.
Good job, Matt! Now get volume two done.
