Heart of Darkling – Gibberling Lake (Patreon)

As the Darkling River works its way through the underdark, it traverses the twists and turns of the Darkling Galleries, home to massive hordes of gibberlings who live around a nearby underground lake. This map connects directly to the Darkling Galleries map.

Like the Darkling Galleries, this was once home to a pair of medusae, and thus there are a number of “statues” around the lake. However, the hard treatment of the gibberlings means few remain here, and most are in much worse shape than those in the galleries. The whole area is overrun by gibberlings, a horde of a hundred or so manic pale hunched humanoids – naked except for their weapons. While many live within the halls between the lake and the galleries, many more sleep and live directly on the shore of the lake which is their primary source of food. Gibberling lake is quite deep and connects to another lake which receives a lot of nutrients from the surface making it an excellent fishing grounds for the gibberlings.

There is no great treasure nor foul beast within the deep gibberling lake – the gibberlings fear swimming in the lake because they believe a mighty predator lives deep below them, but in reality they are alone here, accompanied only by the fish and their own fierce calls.

Because of their fear of the depths of the lake, most fishing is done with spears and nets, and few are brave enough to go more than ten feet into the lake as the bottom drops out quickly afterwards. The “island” at the back of the lake is an overhang with no beach or gradual drop into the water, and only a few gibberlings have been brave enough to clumsily swim across to it – the bones of one still remain on the island, for it feared the lake too much to return.

The 1200 dpi versions of the map were drawn at a scale of 300 pixels per square and are 14,400 pixels (48 squares) wide. To use this with a VTT you would need to resize the squares to either 70 pixels (for 5′ squares) or 140 pixels (for 10′ squares) – so resizing it to either 3,360 pixels wide or 6,720 pixels wide, respectively.

https://dysonlogos.blog/2021/06/10/heart-of-darkling-gibberling-lake/