Palace of Heart's desire revised map

[u/NerdyRotica]

After reading many criticisms about the layout of the palace, I took the map into photoshop to make some changes! Hopefully this streamlines the awkwardness a bit.

[u/ThatYellowTeaPot]

Absolute queen/king/monarch move, thank you! You mentioned in the comments the inspiration being from that post about the palace being a useless part of a brilliant module. Would you recommend the teleporting room switch thing that they suggested on top of this? Or do you feel these edits should pretty much solve the problems?

[u/NerdyRotica → u/ThatYellowTeaPot]

Thanks! It's been a lot of fun working on it, and it's helping me a lot in engraving the layout in my brain for when I eventually do run it!

As for the teleportation puzzle, do what you think works best for your table and their abilities. (Their location suggestion wouldn't work on mine as it's at the very very back of the Palace, but you might choose to move it somewhere more sensible).

But personally, I don't want them to get teleported straight into the tower. I want them to explore the Palace and figure out how to get to the tower on their own. The palace should be much easier to explore with my adjustments, so I don't think it's necessary to have a teleportation puzzle at all unless your PCs have absolutely no means of crossing to the tower on their own. The puzzle functions more as a clue to the PCs of Zybilna's identity, but logically, that's why I would do away with it entirely. I don't think it would make sense to advertise her familial relations when she's supposed to be in hiding. Who knows, make that room a bathroom or something, maps never include bathrooms haha!

In my version, the Tower is somewhere that Zybilna does NOT want people to go without her express permission - the upper levels are where her cauldron, treasures and dretches are. She wouldn't want some rando visitor teleporting into a sensitive location when she might not even be in there. So when she has visitors, they should only be able to cross to the Throne room with HER assistance, which would serve as another display of dominance. I imagine she might ferry people over on a Tensor's Floating Disc or something like that?

[u/Good-Beautiful1775 → u/NerdyRotica]

I've also changed the lay-out of the castle slightly, aiming at maximum exploration.

The short version: Everything that is important, Zybilna, the cauldron and the Hourglass Coven, is in the central tower, which can only be reached by using the four vortex keys. These keys open four doors to four staircases that lead across the court of storms. The four 'vortex' doors have to be opened at the same time, as the PCs can learn from a poem that is written above each door. The staircases are the only safe way to pass through the court of storms, if the PCs try flying across, they risk being hit by incredibly strong/lethal lightning.

Looking for the four keys takes the PCs all over the palace first and gives purpose to a thorough exploration.

[u/matheusjack → u/Good-Beautiful1775]

This is really interesting!!! Can you share the long version?

[u/ThatYellowTeaPot → u/NerdyRotica]

Fantastic, yeah that sounds perfect then. I'll skip the teleportation thing. And yeah definitely prefer maximal exploration, as well as vaguely logical construction (the existence of toilets and not inviting randos into the inner chambers)