Hacks for Making D&D Maps Better | D&D Module B9 Castle Caldwell

This video provides a simple two step hack to improving any dungeon adventure. No matter how hopeless you find one of your maps or a module you have bought, this is guarantied to bring satisfaction to both you and your players.
The Avern Fantasy monster cards for this adventure can be downloaded as a pdf at:
www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/jlnqw9...
Dungeon Scrawl files used in this video are found here:
www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/pf060f...
Additional Avern Fantasy rules will become available in the future videos of this channel.
Rules for character creation, ability scores, races, classes, and combat can be found in the descriptions of the latest videos.
If you like the content of the videos or appreciate the content of the free downloads, you can support my work on www.buymeacoffee.com/dwinterborg
00:00 - Intro
00:44 - Castle Caldwell - A quick overview
03:19 - The Two Step Approach - to revamping
03:49 - Castle Caldwell - Re-imagined
05:28 - Castle Caldwell - New & Improved
17:14 - The Takeaway
Art by: Clyde Caldwell, Keith Parkinson.
And art available from Wizards of the Coast LLC.
Additional arts from "The Dungeons & Dragons" cartoon and the Dungeons & Dragons film "Honor Among Thieves".
If you find that any particular artist needs to be credited for other art in this video please leave a comment.

[@aaronmontague623]

Excellent improvement! The entire environment now makes ecological sense. I like the fact that you kept everything from the original, yet made substantial improvements to the map in the same stroke of the pen. Keep up the good work.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thank you. I will do that 😉

[@jonathanfrost8767]

I wish there were more levels. At least one more along one of the sides and more levels to the towers. This was a great look at how to refurbish a dungeon map. Thank you.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Yes. Castle Caldwell is a rather modest dungeon. There is a basement level though, and I am planing to do something with that as well. Very soon 😄

[@NegatveSpace]

I think at least an accessible area on the roof of the towers and would connect to the battlements would be an easy improvement or inclusion for the one building it. Sometimes the inner keep would have a vaulted roof instead of a flat one with crenelations.

[@dane3038]

Castle Greyhawk has a similar feel and may be a good source to mine stuff to add to castle caldewell.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

@@dane3038 Thanks Dane. I a not familiar with that module 😊

[@dane3038]

@@TheGrandfathersCave It's in the AD&D/Greyhawk line. It's actually a "Mega Dungeon". I think it was written by Gygax. Like CC, it doesn't get much love today I think because of it's sometimes campy feel. But I'll never forget the goblins who threw a party for Asmodius, complete with clowns and pointed birthday hats. He actually shows up. Things get real after that. At least for them.

[@Shamefulroleplay]

Love this. Great ideas. I also got "In search of adventure" myself. Lovely ideas.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

I would like to use the entire Module and update a handful of those adventures 😊 What has your experience been with B1-9?

[@anarionelendili8961]

Very nice. I ended up redrawing the entire map, and made it into Skarda's (fortified) Villa, with the new buyer being Fortunato Vorloi, thus connecting it to X12 Skarda's Mirror and B6 The Veiled Society. Since the adventurers burned Skarda's home down, I made it into an originally two story building, but only the stone walls were left: the wooden 2nd floor and the ceiling had been burned away, with some charred beams and stuff still littering the place.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Sounds really cool. I do not know Skarda’s Mirror, though 😊 But I can see how you tie that to B6!

[@anarionelendili8961]

@@TheGrandfathersCave Yep, I basically had the bandits and the merchants be part of the Iron Ring, which I then used to substitute the titular Veiled Society as the main baddies in B6. Just to have that campaign continuity and letting the PCs really learn to hate the Iron Ring.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

@@anarionelendili8961 Good idea!

[@Wraithing]

Really enjoyed your changes to this map and adventure (I first ran this for some friends at school back in 1985 when it was new!). Ten years ago I revisited it as a basis for the Threshold start of a Karameikos (and beyond) campaign, but I ripped the whole middle out of it to turn it into something more like a real castle; even though it's a bit small to be much more than a folly. In this case I turned it into Caldwell's vanity project. Because, as written, it's not the greatest adventure, it does make quite a good start for a doer-up project. Your map is far truer to the original, but with sensible reasons for the dungeon denizens, which is absolutely brilliant. It would make a really good one or two sessions - maybe another if you add in the lower level. Thanks so much for sharing. Happy Holidays!

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thank you! It was really fun working out the kinks in this one. And tomorrow I start editing the next video, which is about that lower level you mention 😉👍🏻

[@dallassukerkin6878]

Very much enjoyed this - took me back to the 80's and 90's when I used to design adventures in my home-brew campaign setting :) Getting the ecology/economy/social-structure of a location sorted *really* helps make things work a lot better :thumbs up: I used to start from the very basic premise of what everything in the 'dungeon' was going to eat and grow the population from there.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

So true, and that is exactly the point about relationship in the video. How do the pieces of the puzzle fit together. I hope other GM/DMs will be inspired to think about the politics and ecology of an adventure, and can see how applying that to some of the more rough adventures out there really can improve game experience 😊

[@Acroyear4]

Impressive redesign! You have a real talent there, bud.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thank you very much! I hope you have a merry Christmas and a happy New Year 😊

[@AvantNovis]

Thank you

[@yellowbellytabletop]

Great work. Fantastic idea for a video.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thank you kindly 😊

[@drivers99]

Coincidentally I was looking at reviews for B1-9 combined version (In Search of Adventure) and it has apparently left out (abridged) a lot of what was in those modules as they were published separately.

[@danpettersson4671]

Before I say anything else, I like this. Thank you! When you were describing the inhabitants of the rooms start I felt the thin coloured lines outlining the rooms was drowned out by the black walls. I really liked the setup of your version and both the descriptions of the rooms and what small modifications you made to the map. You sound Danish, are you? "None of your buisiness" is a perfectly acceptable answer, if you answer at all.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thank you 😊 Yes, I am Danish. I have been told before, that I have a very obvious accent 😅

[@danpettersson4671]

@@TheGrandfathersCave It's hard for us to hide, as a Swede I sound like a Swede speaking English :)

[@NegatveSpace]

Cool ideas, I like videos like this and coming up with fun ideas. I have a few ideas on this map that could make it more interesting also. Change the rooms next to the entrance to guard rooms with murder holes and put a second portcullis at the end of the hallway in the entry. Make a second entrance. I was thinking if the cleric has been there the longest, maybe the cleric picked one of the towers to live in. Also in case the cleric needed to escape, they broke out some of the bricks in one of the arrow slits then boarded it up. That way if someone is on the outside they could get in that way though it would be noisy and have to break the boards from the outside. I think it would also be a good idea if the cleric picked a room that had a lock on it but then I wondered how did the cleric find the key? Maybe if the game master wanted the key could have been left there when the place was abandoned and the cleric found it. That way the cleric would feel safer about leaving and coming back as his or her things would be safer that way. Last idea I have for now is to make a servants quarters and kitchen. Maybe they could be right next to each other and the servant's quarters would be narrow rooms with a bunk in it. Space in a castle is limited after all and the bigger the castle is, the more people that are also needed to defend it.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thanks for the ideas! If you want the place to be more organized and more easily defended those are really good ideas 😊 I also think the towers would be the most defensible and best places to have an escape route. But they would likely make the worst quarters, as they are poorly isolated and are more difficult to heat due to their size. If there were more occupants in the castle, I thing the rooms around the atrium would make a great HQ. When I ran it, my player’s discovered the shrew’s entrance and iniltrated the castle through the privy. They eventually struck a deal with the “traders” to vacate the castle, and were helped by the cleric to defeat the spiser (which I had given a little boost, to spice things up) 😉 Next week I plan on making a video about the castle’s dungeons; keep an eyes out for it 😁

[@NegatveSpace]

@@TheGrandfathersCave That sounds cool, looking forward to it! Another thing I thought about is it would be nice to have its own well or some type of its own water source. Maybe that could also be in the basement. :)

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

@@NegatveSpace 😁

[@AnalystPrime]

A fine quick redesign. The original scenario was very badly written, the neutral traders and cleric staying next door to hostile goblins, wolves, bandits and monsters while apparently everyone is ignoring and possibly unaware of each other made no sense at all. IIRC I tried to explain things so the traders had stopped overnight but the goblins had came for shelter from rain and neither had any idea that the place was a bandit lair; I had to relocate the wolves though and it made no sense for the traders to be in different rooms with all the danger around.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

I really like adventures that are light hearted and throw a bunch of different challenges together, but it is important to me to maintain some verisinilitude. Otherwise immersion becomes hard to maintain and the game becomes less fun for me 😊

[@timothygutierrez]

I really enjoyed the redesign. Thanks for making the video. Keep evangelizing?

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

I will! I hope the next videos are just as compelling as I venture deeper into the module! 😉 I think I have come up with a couple of cool ideas, but there is no accounting for taste, as my gf says 😅

[@timothygutierrez]

@@TheGrandfathersCave Fantastic. I wanted to see more.

[@mythrilsentinel1]

This castle was begging for some improvements. Story lines back when this module was first published gave no consideration to intrigues or plot lines or even story. It was all focused around combat, and that was it. I will have to consider some improvements of my own design, as I have been within a functioning castle, and there are no actual resemblances to a castle in this for me. Many people mistake the castle as some giant singular building with everything contained under a fortified roof. It was not just a barracks, but a micro village in addition to all the bells and whistles to make it a self-sufficient bastion in times of siege. The Castle referred to the entire set up as a whole: * The Curtain Wall (that's the one with all those towers, turrets and so forth); * A bustling micro-settlement of shops and businesses essential to the comfort and convenience of the ruling house (why leave the grounds when you can have your shops brought to you in a safe zone, right?) Many of those buildings butted up against the castle walls, plus, there was usually a market square, chapel, livery, smithy, chandler, apiary and so forth; * And, finally the KEEP which was usually kept separate from the curtain wall. The KEEP was a big @$$ building suited for use as not just a seat of power, but also a fortified Home; not a "Castle" as many seem to think. Towers were relegated to the Castle's Curtain Walls, but there were obvious exceptions based upon the acetic tastes of the owner. It was the biggest home on the block that also served as a town hall and government services building. The ruling house could literally work from home. Think of it as a small, high-end, posh apartment building, but the only tenants were usually the royal household. None of their personal security service, the snooty front desk clerk running interference, the cleaning and maintenance servants, and miscellaneous staff actually lived there; when their jobs were over for the day, they went home (albeit most likely to servants quarters along the inside of the castle walls... with the exception of the Gong-Farmer who was encouraged to live OUT-side the Curtain Wall and preferably down wind.)

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

That is correct, in that context Castle Caldwell would barely qualify as a keep. I hope it was clear that the building in this adventure is purely a fantasy construction without parallel in European medieval history. Even while all castles were not near as elaborate as the one you describe, even the most modest medieval fortifications were quite different from Castle Caldwell😊 Thanks for your insights! 👍🏻

[@AnalystPrime]

The way the place is designed it barely qualifies as a fortified manor, let alone a castle. Of course it is quite large compared to modern houses: the lot my parent's house is on is 100' wide and 180' deep while Castle Caldwell is about 190' by 210' counting the towers and the thickness of walls; covering two lots and the road next to them it would definitely count as a small fort or castle if it was designed like one. But in this floor plan the biggest rooms that would be reserved for the lord and his family and most important servants to live in are on the outer edge while the protected inner rooms are tiny. Room 30 is located and sized so it is likely supposed to be a grand dining hall, but the more I look at the map the more it looks like the best place for prison. If 30 is an inner yard open to the sky it makes little more sense to have two "airlock" rooms be the only access, but what would the four rooms only accessible from there be for then? Can't be stables for flying mounts, the place is too small for their wings... The main issue is being only one floor high, though given it is in a fantasy world I have seen arguments like tall buildings attract flying monsters and are too easy targets for destructive spells, while invading armies that can be deterred by high walls with archers are rare, and that is why everyone builds dungeons instead. Also, rogues could scale the walls or wizards and dragons can fly above walls and Fireball any troops in the yard if the whole thing wasn't covered by a roof. This is why rooms 27-31 cannot be the lord's quarters if 30 is open to the air, any monster or assassin might climb or fly in there. The plan makes much more sense if the rooms along the outer walls are actually buildings and all of them only extend 10 to 15 instead of 30 feet from the wall so there is proper space between the defensive wall and the inner keep it is supposed to protect. Connect some of them and remove others, for example combine 7&8 to make a chapel, 9 is open space, possibly a garden or graveyard, 10 is kitchen and 11 servant's quarters. On the other side make 21&22 a small pasture and 23-25 into stables, with stablehands living in the loft. The two rooms beside the gate should be merged into a gatehouse with barracks, defensive systems and weapons storage, while the northern side would house the smithy, a storehouse and possibly more living areas for higher rank guards and servants. Now make the inner keep 10' larger on the north and west sides so there is more room and add a second floor, possibly a third, and the place starts resembling a real castle.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

@@AnalystPrime As you guessed room 30 is an inner atrium. I like the idea of making the inner rooms a keep and having the central ring corridor be open to the air with the outer rooms bein g small buildings. That would actually make it resemble an actual castle. However, the entire structure should probably be one and a half or double its current size.

[@AnalystPrime]

@@TheGrandfathersCave I think I figured out an explanation for the inner area that makes sense: 30 is an inner atrium with a system for catching rain as a backup water source in case the well dries out. Aside from that the area holds a tiny herb garden and some other plants so the people living in the castle can be "outside" without leaving the walls, which gets very important when the castle doesn't seem to have many windows and anyone going outside has to roll for random monster encounters. Assuming the castle is in the northern hemisphere the north side would be getting some sunlight during the day. The rooms on that end likely have as large windows as possible for illumination on days when it is not possible to just stay in the atrium. Whether the atrium and rooms are reserved for the ladies of the castle or used by any servants doing chores that require good light depends on attitudes in their culture. Any young children living in the castle would likely spend their days there to keep them out of the way of adults. Given the castle has a feeling of a military fort(despite being obviously lacking in proper defenses) there might be rules about women staying in the inner area and any unmarried men being banned from entering. Other possible rooms include a cistern and the cold storage for foodstuffs, assuming those are not in the cellars, a bath and laundry area and possibly a sauna. It would also make sense for the kitchen to be located next to the water source; it is probably the southern middle room so food supplies can be brought in directly from the front door. The corner rooms hold servant's quarters and mess hall, separate from the soldiers. Assume those rooms have either bunk beds or wooden walls sectioning them to smaller rooms. 20 by 20 feet area might look small on the map where it is only four squares, but while it would be on the smaller side for a modern apartment it is huge for a single room for servants to live in. Whole commoner families lived in houses smaller than that, and like the modern apartments those had to fit in their own kitchens and other stuff a single room in a castle does not have.

[@dvldogg187]

This is great. Where can I get a copy of this map?

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

I have a ds. file for Dungeon Scrawl, that I can upload to Dropbox later this evening. Thanks for the comment 😉

[@walterroche8192]

The most problematic thing is that every situation & locale require a unique design. I find the module is easy to adapt, something that most brought modules are hated for. Good points & adjustments. 👍

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Thank you 😊 And if you have suggestions for other modules that need a make over let me know 😉👍🏻

[@randyping6036]

Save vs Bladder or you really need to find a latrine.

[@TheGrandfathersCave]

Gives me inspiration for a new monster 😄

[@randyping6036]

@@TheGrandfathersCave ah, but every full round gives you a -1 to the save....😆