Heart of Darkling – Darklingtown North (Patreon)

The Darkling River works its way through the underdark beneath the grey hills to depths unknown. Darklingtown is a trading community built into a series of claustrophobically low-ceilinged caverns on the banks of the Darkling and a number of its tributaries. Darklingtown (which in turn will be made of 9+ maps) is the seventeenth mapped location (and this the 20th map total) along the Darkling River and the Darkling Sea beyond.

Darklingtown North is the first part of Darklingtown that most people will encounter if travelling along the Darkling River itself. Within this low-ceilinged cavern the Darkling takes a long meandering S course breaking this part of town into a number of very small neighbourhoods of four to a dozen buildings in each. The dampness of Darklingtown is ever-present and thus most inhabitants have built themselves houses within the caverns in order to keep their possessions dry and their homes comfortable. A number of drawbridges that lift from both sides have been built over the river to allow for traffic to flow from Northgate down to the more populous caverns of the town.

Northgate is always barred and guarded. It is a primary trade corridor between Darklingtown and the nearest drow metropolis which in turn is key to the town’s existence as a trading hub. Essentially this whole district is an extension of the rest of Darklingtown, built up around the bridges needed by the caravans. This makes the businesses and residents here a bit more rugged than those in the heart of town. The biggest structures here are on the central section of the district – the Rotten Mandrake Tavern and the fortified structure of the House of Melrahel cut into the cavern walls themselves. Qualnnilee Melrahel is the head of the House of Melrahel – a small mercantile clan exiled from the drow metropolis for being on the wrong side of a political tug of war some 60 years ago.

Exits from this district (clockwise from Northgate)

Northgate – this leads into a series of long passages and caverns and eventually to the nearest drow metropolis.

The Darkling River – the river flows into Darklingtown from this point.

The Dunflow – a small tributary of the Darkling with pale cloudy waters.

Darklingtown Passage – leads to Darklingtown South District

The Darkling River – the river flows between Darklingtown North and Darklingtown South via this cavern. On the banks are a small cave that is home to a number of the “homeless” of Darklingtown – those who have been kicked out of the main caves for not having a place to stay but who refuse to leave the immediate safety of the enclave.

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/2021/11/06/heart-of-darkling-darklingtown-north/