Shaded Dockside Exchange
Shaded Dockside Exchange is a cramped wooden platform wedged over dark water, lit by a few warm lanterns that leave most corners in soft shadow.
Weathered planks creak underfoot, and the space is cluttered with stacked crates, barrels, coiled rope, and hanging nets that sway with every passing wake. A small worktable and makeshift storage nooks suggest this isn’t a public pier—it’s a meeting place built for quiet transactions, quick handoffs, and plausible deniability.
The layout makes its intentions clear: tight lanes, limited exits, and water on three sides for anyone who needs to vanish fast. The lantern light is just bright enough to read a face, not bright enough to guarantee what you’re seeing is the truth. In combat, the dock becomes a brutal little arena where movement is constrained, cover is everywhere until it isn’t, and a single shove can turn a duel into a drowning. Whether the party arrives to buy, threaten, steal, or spy, the Exchange is designed to turn any deal into a trap.
Intended Use:
This map shines as a social-to-combat pivot point: clandestine negotiations, black-market pickups, hostage swaps, or tense interrogations that erupt the moment someone lies—or someone arrives late. The tight platform encourages close-quarters play: grapples, shoves, flanking around crates, and the constant pressure of water-edge positioning. It’s ideal for factions that fight smart and fast—dock thugs, smugglers, assassins, or marsh raiders—who can strike, disengage, and retreat into skiffs or shadows before the party can stabilize.
