Building Dol Amroth!

[Grissum1]

I have written accounts of my journey building Dol Amroth on our sister server! This will be updated daily and contain personal yap thoughts.

In The Lord of the Rings, Dol Amroth is a city and fiefdom in the region of Western Gondor. It's a vast fortress built on cliffs, surrounded by mountains, and with only one suitable landing point.

History:

• The first known settlers were Sindar refugees from Beleriand in the late first age.
• In the second age, it was settled by Galadriel and Celeborn, along with their company of elves from Lórinand.
• A faithful Númenórean house settled in Belfalas before the downfall and built a stronghold on the promontory. Elendil gave their ruler the title of prince and his realm is known as Dor-en-Ernil.
• The promontory was named after Amroth, the former king of Lórien, who was lost in the Bay of Belfalas.
  

Government:

• The princedom is ruled by a prince
• The Sea-Ward Tower, or Tirith Aear is the epicenter of Dol Amroth's government, military, and history

Military:

• Dol Amroth has the greatest cavalry in Middle-Earth, rivaling the Rohirrim.
• The Knights of the Silver Swan are an elite group of cavalry.
• The men-at-arms of Dol Amroth are elite group of infrantry.

Population:

• The first settlers were Nandor. They were followed by the Sindar from Beleriand, who was also followed by Silvan elves of Lothlórien.
• The faithful of Númenor came after the elves. The elves left in TA 1981.
• The people today are still Númenórean and are reowned harp players. They spoke Sindarin regularly.

Symbol:

• The symbol of Dol Amroth is commonly described as the "Silver Swan"

Source:

• I made it the fuck up.
  

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Day 1 of building Dol Amroth )

 

[Grissum1]

Day 2 of Building Dol Amroth:

Nothing major. Establishing exterior decoration style and finishing up the tavern. Still need the rooms.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 3 of building Dol Amroth:
I was originally going to make this part a whole guild house here, but I decided to make this a gated community with a bit more freedom than American ones. Idk if they have gated communities in Europe, let alone high medieval Europe, but I thought I'd make one nevertheless. It is fantasy after all. I completed 7 houses nonetheless; it turns out doing purely exterior structures for an hour is a lot quicker than doing 1 house with decoration at a time.

I eventually got bored and needed cool screenshots so I did some street decoration. I changed the wool flooring to a street pattern. I am not entirely sure if it is finalized, but I want a stone-like street to display the modernization. The wheat is there because Dol Amroth is a horse culture like Rohan. I'd imagine the difference is Dol Amroth fields heavier cavalry with their knights than Rohan does.

The feel I originally planned was patriotic and advanced society. And then someone said it was depressing. Originally, I figured Depression seems to be the result of modern society. Now, I am starting to think the meaning is deeper than it originally is. I believe it is because there are no elves anymore. It has lost Tolkien's magic when they left.

I do not think it will be like this all the time. Near the middle or end, I am planning a a knight's tourney and a beautiful castle with pointy roofs like the ones at Disney castle. But then again, we have more access to entertainment in the modern world, yet everything seems depressing compared to my travels in 3rd world countries.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 4 of building Dol Amroth:

While I was up late, I stayed up for 30 minutes to do this interior decoration for the local alchemist. Her room has a more home-like vibe to it.

One thing I did forget is her bathroom. So, I made one outside! And to protect her dignity, I use the houses and the walls with bar designs I had to cover up. It is well hidden! It felt more lively and the build feels less creepy once there is more life to it. It originally started out creepy due to the blue and white feeling that made me uneasy.

Later afternoon, I did 4 houses this time. The last one on the right will be a weaponsmith and he will have an entrance to a backroom business. Sometimes, this build style feels almost modded sometimes; I'm using a lot of newer blocks like deepslate and vault blocks instead of the classic stone bricks.

Plot location:/plot visit Battle_Hippie donorplots 5

 

[Grissum1]

Day 5 of building Dol Amroth:This became one of those days where I'm too fatigued to build right now. I did only some of the weaponsmith interior and some planning instead. They are going to be normal houses, probably. Maybe mix in a few traders in there. Idk, for the most part I have been building without a plan. I'm more of a guy who likes to build whatever he wants. That said, it is within limits. This build style. Tomorrow, I expect a much more significant progress than this. I am still just as excited to finish this; My motivation is still high. That is one of the perks of writing your progress; you self reflect and commit. It also shows the mistakes I made, and the need to correct them. Not every build will turn out in your favor. I still have that big house I never completed. I am indecisive about its exterior. I think I may restart it for the better. While it is diagonal, it lacks shape. I do not want that for an essential building.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 6 of building Dol Amroth:
I did a layout of this house and decided to do some sort of noble house. I did not build anything else today. I did more research on medieval history regarded noble houses. I want this to be a knights house

 

[LimeeFox]

Very ambitious, but the vibe is already cool! You can feel the passion when walking the streets

 

[Grissum1]

Very ambitious, but the vibe is already cool! You can feel the passion when walking the streets

Thank you! Hoping to show the patriotism of the princedom

 

[Grissum1]

Day 7 of building Dol Amroth:

Good day to you fellow knights of the Silver Swan! Since the very first day, I had trouble with building this massive building. The issue with this building is even though it was diagonal, it was in many ways, still square in nature. That is okay for small builds, but massive buildings will be difficult to do. I am sure I can add extra stuff on the roofs and sides, but at this point it's just bland for a massive building, at least for me. So I moved on to other houses, and behold (look at the 2nd picture to the last picture)


I had another large building to make and it was in a weird shape layout when I made it. It might sound like a disadvantage, but instead, it gave me a huge advantage. It made me figure out instead of having one massive roof, I did double roofs at the top to scale with the actual build. That was one of my main problems with the first picture: the roof does not scale well for me. This building is much more interesting to me. There is this good feeling about finding a solution to a majority of your problems. I would like to apply this to some of the small builds also.




I am still not done with this building, but my skills with this build style received a massive glow up. This will be super important for when I make Dol Amroth's castle and its tower, Tirith Aear. This next build session tomorrow will finish this up and finally start to work on the guild house I have been having trouble on since the start. I must say, I would love to live in my build and its prince now, more than ever.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 8 of building Dol Amroth:

It is Sunday! Break from the build today! Will continue tomorrow.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 9 of building Dol Amroth:

Took a long break instead. But I will continue this. On the second and third picture, I was doing interior structures. Then I messed it up so I moved on to making the structure in the first picture. I planned to have a tower on it. It will define the build style of towers in the future. I also plan to connect this building to the other building through bridge. I must say, it's good to be back on this. Though sometimes, I feel there is something missing in these streets. Idk what but I will find out.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 10 of building Dol Amroth: I was finalizing on roof designs. Nothing new built. But I didn't like the plants that are on top of the roof. It is a bit too much. So I'll removed that and the candles.

Also there's a new update to this server, we get pale oak wood planks and resin bricks. We also get a new armor stand plugin that's a lot easier than the last one. It will help a lot with this.

I built a royal carriage for the prince (aka meee <3 ) but his ride turned out to be too big to fit in the city. However, it comes with a kitchen with food and even a cookie jar. It also have shelves and a couch to nap in. So, it's so worth it.

 

[LimeeFox]

wow haha, nice carriage xD

 

[Grissum1]

Day 11 of building Dol Amroth:

On the first-third picture, this is the black market I mentioned (I think). It is not finished at all yet but so far, there is a turtle poacher ( @Starship requested it). Illegal poaching in medieval times does exist though! There is also a fence (seller of stolen goods) that's still wip. Otherwise, I did move the carriage to the location with the lowest elevation. That will be where the knight's tourney will be hosted. Swan Knights from all over Dor-en-Ernil participate in knightly jousting and their melee combat in longsword, sword and shield, hammer and shield, hunting sword and shield, and axe and shield (It's not in the lore. I made it the fuck up). I might start on this sooner to make sure the tourney will fit in the donor plot given by Battle Hippie.

On the building that requires the tower, I only finished the tower part. I lacked motivation for it at the moment but I think I know what I want for that one. That would be a guild house instead of the original house I was struggling with because it is too big. The original will be a bank instead.

I did some work on finishing up the gated community. On the right side of the last picture will be a bathhouse. In real life medieval times, most people would go to the bathhouse to wash their clothes and get a bath. It is often associated with prostitution, and it rarely not offers it. In this build plot, considering this is Tolkien, there will be no prostitution. Not in this Christian Minecraft server!

 

[Grissum1]

Day 12 of building Dol Amroth:

I am enjoying the pale oak wood. It gives that gondor vibe to the wood that no other wood has given me. The door especially is important as pale oak. I did some basic interior decoration on the stablemaster's house (The market is for his girlfriend, who sells his horse stuff here while the stablemaster goes to the stables to sell horses. They live together). I will add a bit more later and then move on to the next house needing decoration. I also completed some houses before I work on an official EQ project that I won't spoil this will def be bigger than my personal project lol

 

[Grissum1]

Day 13 of building Dol Amroth:

I did some interior decoration on the knight's errant house at the gated community. His story is he is a degenerate who likes looking at paintings of women and while he is a fine warrior, he only stayed inside his entire life until his parents kicked him out of the noble household and gave him a quest to touch grass. Unfortunately, he is too socially anxious to interact with the guards at the gates of Dol Amroth, and there is no grass inside the city. So instead, he spent his days in full armor competing for the tourney (he usually wins a lot of money to support himself or walking around the city enjoying the local women (since he no longer has the paintings). In some days, he will work as a bartender in the gated community's inn (which I plan to fully build soon). The inn will give free drinks to those living in the gated community. Anyways you will find his diary in the lectern.

Believe it or not, when I decorate (or build in general for that matter, but this mostly happens when I decorate since it is most important there), I think about the people occupying the house I am decorating. For example, in the residential house, I think about how this person wakes up every morning, how he eats, how he gets dressed; to put it in simple terms, how this person interacts with objects in the surrounding area. That is why I put a lot of stuff into decorating. Each decoration will have a purpose. So, I plan to write more about the people who live in these houses. It helps give a more realistic estimation of the city's status and population.

Other than that, I did build the exterior structure of the community's inn and made an apartment complex next to the noble house.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 14 of building Dol Amroth:
I did not do much today! I only finished the baby mama and her 2 kid's houses! I have not given who the real father is, nor will I reveal it later on. It did remind me just now; What of schools? Now, in the Middle Ages, generally, the nobility had access to education, and the rest just learned their parent's trade. And it is the boys that get an education while girls only get a little. It is a shame; I thought it will be cool to have a striving single parent family, but I gave this family such a higher handicap than I thought. It is like I was playing God, as I shape their lives to become this. I sometimes feel bad. So I came up with the headcanon that the stablemaster couple and the degenerate knight-errant next door helped them the best way they could. The stablemaster couple would offer food like apples and wheat while the knight-errant educates the girl with his books and even lets her use his. I'd imagine the reason the degenerate knight helped her is because in some ways, the family reminds him of what he once had before he got kicked out of the house: a family. Maybe he will fall in love with the mom and quit being a degenerate.

Other than this, I started the outline for the castle but I am not even close to finishing it. It will be a large castle with a school for the nobility. Maybe I will be able to come up with something for the non-nobility. I am not sure.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 15 of building Dol Amroth:
I did not do a lot, but I notice, while I was spending the hour outlining the castle, our newest project member, SamRed5, cooked some good trebuchets. Also saw someone (likely Sam) built 2 houses. I'll put the trebuchets to good use. We can have a siege workshop somewhere.

Otherwise, yes we do accept peeps, even traveller ranks, in this project. let Fox know if you want in It is a good way to show off what you can do for builder application in EpicQuestz

 

[Grissum1]

Day 16 of building Dol Amroth:
So, I finished the house of the male accountant that is across the stablemaster. He works for the bank that is across Bardhouse. He is clueless of the black market schemes that is behind his house (I also finish up on the black market). He is not interested in checking as he is not interested. He is obsessed with money when working for the bank and makes decent amount with the hope one day he will have a good house and family.

I also made the interior decorations of the general tools blacksmith. I used the new resin chunks to make burning ashes near the fire places and where the hammer strikes the hot tools. I also use it to display ores and ingots. It's a more useful block than I'd imagine. Anyways, this blacksmith is just starting out with her own shop, providing tools and weapons for both the common people and nobility.

 

[Grissum1]

Day 17 of building Dol Amroth:

I made @Starship 's house. Since she asked me to make turtle smuggling, she shall have her own house. It comes with a rat on her bed cuz she likes calling people rats so much. And since she does that, I put a rat on a plate on the table. The trident and bow is generally how I see her in EW. She also keeps turtles in her basement. Other than that, I am very fatigued from building this project. I will take a small break using the jobs posted on EQ but I'll make small increments of progress on this.