My Private Jakalla - Map 1H (Patreon)

It is time to dig deep under the city streets of a yet unnamed city of Tekumel. The goal of this project (started last year) is to produce a large set of maps that interconnect to produce something akin to, but very much different in style from, the original Jakallan Underworld map that M.A.R. Barker used in his Empire of the Petal Throne games.

This is the eighth map in the set, and the blog post will bring you to the rest.

Like the last part of the undercity map, this map continues to showcase the main concepts of the undercity:

A sewer line runs through this section that started way back in 1F, flowed through 1E, 1G and now 1H and will likely wrap around in time to connect to the flow in 1B.

There are “recent” and well maintained undercity structures to the north, linking to temple & clanhouse structures back in map 1A.

There are old ruins and probably old shrines beneath the sewer level – in this case they were also found during the establishment of the sewer line, and were sealed off from the sewers in order to allow for the flow of water and detritus through this area without flooding the old structures.

And finally there are always little touches that make you question why they were built this way and come up with odd stories, theories, and pseudo-histories. Like the passage running off to the left parallel to the sewer line – there are 10 foot long, 2 foot deep recesses in the wall every twenty feet. Why are they there? Do they contain something? Maybe each one is a shallow archway showcasing a faded mosaic or painting on the back wall, reminders of a time when this was the ground floor of a palace? Or perhaps niches where the loyal dead would rest before being summoned to the defense of the temple of Sárku?

This map connects to the previous maps via the sewers between 1H and 1G, and the clanhouse understructures linking between here and map 1A. Surface access is available via a sewer access point in the upper right corner (stairs lead into a service chamber and a locked door leads to a larger open chamber with a bridge over the sewer line) as well as the clanhouse access just to the north of the map proper in map 1A.

Evidently the clan is aware of the old ruins beneath the sewer lines, as they have cut a new set of stairs down to them – howerver there is also indication that the catacombs down here are fairly dangerous, as there is a portcullis within the clanhouse substructures preventing easy access to the southern portion – a security measure put in place before they started excavating into the ruins below.

You can download the map and explore the rest of the set of maps from the blog post at http://wp.me/psUVp-2sB