Battlemaps: Divine Alligator’s Temple

Game: Battlemaps: Divine Alligator’s Temple
Publisher: 0one Roleplaying Games
Series: d20 / generic
Reviewer: Wyrdmaster
Review Dated: 8th, June 2004
Reviewer’s Rating: 7/10   [ Good ]
Total Score: 7
Average Score: 7.00

There’s no doubt; 0one Roleplaying Games’ Battlemap series are jolly good. If you’ve found the cash to buy your way through the expanding collection you will have a decent set.

In my last review of a Battlemap I was debating the cons of having very specific battlemaps – maps which can only be used in fairly exclusive circumstances. Ready for an exclusive circumstance? Here’s one: Divine Alligator Temple.

Ah. Okay. That would have been more of a shock if GameWyrd hadn’t just reviewed 0one Roleplaying Games’ Master Adventure “The Divine Alligator“.

For the sake of avoiding spoilers, I’m not going to talk about the adventure except to say that it doesn’t have to be in the default swamp location and it doesn’t have to have an Alligator (though it works best with both). If you want to tie that flexibility in with these official maps then you’ll get away with not having the swamp.

The outside tiles are green so if you’ve moved the temple to a desert then you’ll also have to have an oasis. It actually suits a desert given the pyramid shape of the temple. And yes; it is unusual to have outside Battlemaps – I suppose that makes this edition of the series something of a collector’s piece.

You don’t need an alligator but so much of the temple is built around a large reptilian icon so you’ll need an NPC to match.

The two outside areas are the Circles of Reptiles – with these fantastic stone statues – and the Obelisks – with, yup, obelisks.

The rest of the temple is as you might expect; Chambers of Worship, Sancta Sanctorum, Priest’s Quarters – common and not – a Dining Hall, Kitchen and Store Room. Oh, there’s also a treasure room.

It’s possible that you’ll buy this PDF because you’ve bought or will buy The Divine Alligator. The sheer quality of cartography is likely to impress. The full-colour maps have the sort of quality you would expect from a blockbuster computer game. If you don’t have a printer to do map like these justice or don’t fancy selling your soul to the printer ink company then 0one Roleplaying Games are your friends. You have a greyscale version of each map. You have a wireframe rendering of each map too.

If you have seen a Battlemap before then there are some new touches here. Not only are their outside tiles but there’s an outside overall view in a style we’ve not seen before.

We have an angled view of the reptile statues, the obelisks and the temple so you get the titles in the right order and get the size perspective right. I actually think it would be quite fun to have the players creep cautiously through the statues (they look like animation targets to me!), then carefully between the obelisks (what do they do?) and then to give them a peek at this small image. Showing how the temple dwarves the two locations which just worried them so much is likely to get them nicely paranoid about what they might expect to find in the temple.

The Divine Alligator Temple is a welcome addition to the Divine Alligator adventure.

If you’ve got the cash then buy this PDF too. If you’re tempted to start collecting the Battlemap series then the Divine Alligator might just be the in you’re looking for; buying an adventure and the adventure specific battlemap supplement.

If you’re buying the Battlemaps to complete and extend to your collection the Divine Alligator Temple is more of a debate. This set of battlemaps certainly is of the usual quality but just how many times are your players going to explore an alligator themed temple? Hmm. Depends.