Terrain Tuesday! Bridging the Gap!

Our terrific Troll Bridge encounter is nearly complete but not without the perfect bridge to set the scene. Let’s see what satisfying piece of scatter terrain our 3D printer spit out this time!

Don’t forget about those smaller, hobbyist creators out there. Their passion for the hobby is often evident in their work. And best of all, they usually offer a lot of their snazzy STLs for free (our favorite price tag). This time, we have Bill Reaser to thank for this great rope bridge print! His STL file fit snuggly on our Prusa MK4 and it came out aces.

So much great detail here, right? The long wood beams, the metal bindings, the rickety ropes and posts – just so darn good! We wanted to convey our Troll Brdige is certainly sturdy enough for travelers, horses, and carts to cross but one better grab onto those rope handrails if there’s an incident.

And of course, a rope bridge is always gonna tug at our hearts because of that epic Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom “OMG” scene.

Here’s an overhead shot of the planned encounter gameboard. We’re not going for a crazy distance (although each “d20 square” will count at 10 ft. of movement rather than the usual DnD 5e of 5 ft. DM Ben has also placed numerous skeleton piles to illustrate to would-be crossers to tread lightly. The goal here is to remind the players that negotiating the toll with this hired Troll Hunter guardian is muuuuch better move than trying to fight past him.

In terms of the height of the bridge, DM Ben set it at 30 ft-ish (as anything over 60 ft+ can be lethal). We want any inadvertent falling damage (1d6 per 10 ft) to just sting a bit. Plus, our Troll needs to get under the bridge in one round of movement if need be.

As we’ve described in earlier posts, our Troll Terry requires particular objects as a two-way, free pass. It could be anything with a double letter including a left bOOT, a kiSS, a dEEr carcass, a coPPER piece, etc. That’s his quirk. 😉

DM Ben was perusing his terrain library for some accent pieces and found a couple more subtle hints:

• a mushrOOm (for his soup)
• a buFFalo hide (to keep him warm)
• a wagon whEEL (to play with)
• a horseshoe from their hOOf (for good luck)

Our mighty bridge sentry requires a fee from each player so there needs to be lots of apparent options once they figure out the reward riddle here.

We had to ensure the gameboard made it clear that there was no real easy way to sneak around the bridge itself. The natural terrain is simply too dense. The thick forest barbs, murky swamp water, and rocky terrain would just be too brutal to try and traverse. Even the wildlife doesn’t have an easy route to take…things aren’t looking good for our reindEEr either.

Lastly, DM Ben dropped a little treasure chest on the troll’s end of the bridge. This is just a tease to the party for any future interactions or trickery attempts. The funny part is all that chest contains are copper pieces, silly trinkets, and lots of old left boots (for the potential “Cobbler Cahoots” sidequest).

Now who is going to try and cross first? The Paladin, the Barbarian, the Rogue, the Wizard, Brave Sir Robin?