The Cathedral of Our Lady

Server: Antonia Bayle
Homeowner: Jazabelle
City: Freeport
Address: Secluded Sanctum
Leaderboard: Massive Homes
Name: The Cathedral of Our Lady


To begin with, yes, I built a cathedral to my character. No, I'm not that conceited. However, my character sees nothing wrong with people wanting to build a cathedral to worship her. After all, in roleplay, please remember that you are not your character! I play a vampire. That doesn't mean I'm going to run around drinking human blood. By the same token, things that my character finds normal, I find really creepy. If someone built a cathedral to me, I'd be outta there! Besides, the cathedral isn't a physical place in Norrath, according to the roleplay.

Anyway, back to the cathedral.

The view from the organ loft.

Three years ago, on March 30, 2012, I posted about the cathedral I built for Dolthaic in EQ2 on the Antonia Bayle server. It's still on the Leaderboards, under the Hall of Fame, though it's drifted a few pages back.

The build was a ton of fun (and took me over a year to complete, since I paused right after starting, to wait for building blocks to come out, though it only took me 5 days to build), but there were a lot of things I'd wished I could do differently.

For one, because of load times and the zone that Dolthaic chose, the Cathedral of Innoruuk could not be any longer than it was--any longer, and visitors would have to wait for the ground around them to load.

Second, I wasn't able to put in all of the details I'd originally envisioned, because at that point, building blocks counted towards the house item count, rather than having their own item count.

Third, this was my first ever home built with building blocks. I made it up as I went along, and hadn't learned a lot of the tricks that I've since discovered or been taught.

Finally, this was a cathedral owned by someone else. It wasn't my home, so the final opinion on things went to Dolthaic. If I liked one style, and he liked another, I went with what he preferred, since I was building to his tastes.

Fast forward three years. I have three years of experience working with building blocks. We have a whole new bunch of zones to choose from to decorate in. We have three years of new items. And for the past four years, I've been roleplaying that a cathedral is beneath Jazabelle's rose bush in her garden, and have been itching to build the zone that I see in my head every time I RP it.

"Beneath" is perhaps too simple a term to describe it. Jazabelle is a vampire. She inspires lavish devotion in her household via a combination of vampiric magic and pure coercion (yes, she's a coercer). Her household's cult-like worship of her has created a sort of mass hallucination centered around the rose bush, and the supposed cathedral beneath it.

This book at the entrance describes how you got here. ...you think. Maybe.

The vestibule, with the stoup in the left corner. A very simple room. Be sure to read the book!

The Cathedral of Our Lady is the result of that mass hallucination. When members of her household "visit the Cathedral," this zone is what they see.

Of course, it isn't just a mass hallucination. There's a magical component. Because of the years Jazabelle has spent feeding this one particular rose bush a rather ...interesting... diet...

The book of readings on the lectern. Yes, they're all this creepy.

...the rose bush is now a semi-sentient entity that craves blood. Also, it has thorns. Did I mention it has thorns? Be careful around the vines in the cathedral...

Since building blocks and items now have a separate count, I figured that I could go crazy in my cathedral, satisfying my desire to build things the way I envisioned them the first time.

As I said before, Dolthaic's cathedral was limited by how far away from the entrance point of the zone the teleport pad could be. Because this cathedral was built directly in the zone of the Secluded Sanctum, I didn't have to worry about teleport pads and loading times. Plus teleport pads annoy me. I know they're useful sometimes, but if I can create a zone that doesn't need to use them, I'd rather do that.

So I chose a zone where I wouldn't have to have a teleport pad.

Lefthand aisle with climbing vines. The rose bush has influence even here!

The sound of the fireplaces that I used for the base of the windows in Dolthaic's cathedral always irritated me. However, I couldn't think of anything else to use at that time, and I liked how they looked. So I left them.

When I built my cathedral, I tried to use fireplaces. Unfortunately, while I'd used 12 in Dolthaic's cathedral, I wound up using 44 in mine. 12 was bad. 44 was enough to send me to a mental institute. So I switched 'em to something else.

View of the altar and high altar.

The window frames were a touch of genius on Iosabella's part. I commissioned her to do a baptistery for the cathedral after seeing the wonderful job she did on Dolthaic's baptistery. (In fact, I commissioned her even before she'd finished his, because I liked it so much!) She's been working on the baptistery while I've been working on the cathedral, trying to match my style of build.

I ran in to visit the baptistery while she was working on it, and saw that she'd created an awesome gold frame around the windows she was working on. That meant that I immediately ran back to the cathedral to add gold frames to all of my windows. It took 76 copies of Rallos' Blessing and 135 copies of Conquering the Wastes to make those lovely borders.

Closeup view of the high altar, with a strangely familiar icon.

When it came time to do the interior decor, from the high altar, to the lectern, to the pipe organ, I was stumped. In Dolthaic's cathedral, I'd used building blocks almost exclusively on all of those items, and they were nice, but not ornate enough for what I wanted with this cathedral. We'd had all sorts of new items added, and so many of them were ornate, I knew I could find something to build things out of!

Which is when I remembered the High Keep furniture. Two ornate chests, four bookcases, five chests, and an ornate chair later (plus an emerald stained glass window, a house actor of Jaz, a rose, six eucalyptus candle sticks, and six candles ringed by roses), I had a high altar to be proud of!

View from the altar, looking back at the choir and organ loft.

The first time I saw the High Keep Long Bench, I knew I wanted to use it in whatever cathedral I built. However, the cream seating didn't go with the predominantly red-and-stone look of the cathedral. So I covered the cushions with burgundy spuncloth throw cushions. Better!

The pipe organ and choir.

And the pipe organ. Oh, the pipe organ. I spent longer on the pipe organ than I did on any other piece in the zone. It took me 16 hours (2 8 hour days) to build the pipe organ. In contrast, it took me FIVE days to build the entire zone, and five days to fill in all the zone details. One sixth of my entire decorating time was spent on the pipe organ!

Dolthaic's cathedral took me five days total to do.

This one took me 12 days, spread out over a month.

Dolthaic's cathedral will always have a place in my heart, because it was the first cathedral I built (and possibly the first player built cathedral in EQ2, I'm not sure). However, this cathedral is uniquely mine in a way that his never was. My voice had the final say over every detail (well, and the first say, the second say, and every other say in between).

This wasn't my second cathedral build, though! I tried two other times to build the cathedral. The first time was just a few months after I finished Dolthaic's. The second time was mid-2013, and I tried to build the Crimson Cathedral. It didn't work out.

Here, have a Facebook album of all of the iterations of The Cathedral of Our Lady, starting on April 22nd, 2015.

And the full manifest of what it took to make the cathedral (minus the prestige housing portals):

a long stone corner counter	35
a repaired piano	2
Black Marble Stair	5
Black Marble Tile	28
Block of Fancy Fulginate	152
Book of Hate	1
burgundy spuncloth throw cushion	184
Candle Ringed by Red Roses	50
Captive Audience	1
Cerulean Calm Bottle	1
Chalice of the Spurned	1
Chipped Freeport Celebration Cup	1
Coin of Winning	8
Conquering the Wastes	135
Crawling Captive	3
Crimson Stained Glass Square	60
Dangling Skull Collection	5
Decorative Vines	89
Doomed Ettin Skull	10
emerald stained glass oval	1
erudin screen	78
eucalyptus candlestick	6
Golden Wash Basin	1
Half Block of Adamantine	10
Half Dozen Roses in a Smooth Vase	49
Hedge Seeds	6
Hewn Stone Counter	17
High Keep Bar Stool	2
High Keep Bookcase	3
High Keep Chest	47
High Keep Dining Chair	15
High Keep End Table	3
High Keep Long Bench	24
High Keep Long Chandelier	10
High Keep Low Bookcase	4
High Keep Ornate Chair	5
High Keep Ornate Chest	7
High Keep Settle	1
House Actor	21
Large Circular High Keep Rug	1
Long High Keep Runner	2
Magic Door to the Guild Hall	1
Narrow Divider of Fancy Fulginate	246
Navigated Travels	1
Ornate Shadowed Stone Bookcase	170
Pile of Coin Square	8
Plain Gorowyn Door	2
plain sumac tile	8
Qeynos Sign	1
Quel'ule Notebook	3
Rack of Love Potions	25
Railing of Sumac	1
Rallos' Blessing	76
Red Roses Blooming with Love	18
Sacrificial Dagger of Fear	1
Seeping Shadow	1
Shackled Elf Skeleton	1
Shackled Human Skeleton	2
Shards of the Scorned	1
Short Column of Adamantine	91
Simple Antonican-Style Guild Tapestry	2
Single Red Rose	10
Single Red Rose	37
Square Cage	1
Stair of Fancy Fulginate	3
Stair of Redwood	3
Stair of Sumac	4
Stony Lichen Square	3
Strewn Scarlet Petals	12
Tall Column of Adamantine	390
Tall Divider of Fancy Fulginate	166
Trophy: Fang of Ichor	1
Wicker Demijohn	1
Woven Reed Bowl	2
Zlandicar's Heart	1

This cathedral has been a labor of love, and something I couldn't have finished without the help of my guild mates. Thank you to everyone who stopped by to help me error check, to give me ideas when I was stuck, and to the Creepy Crew who hung around for several hours, watching me decorate (you know who you are!). Also, to Iosabella for scaring the hell out of me by logging in on top of me more than once, and for those gorgeous, gorgeous window frames. And Blazewolf, thank you for pushing me to add those final finishing touches to the choir risers. I like them 1000x better now.

Danyella of Freeport was the first person I ever saw to use the High Keep chairs as door frames. Thank you for letting me use that lovely idea. It's perfect!

Of course, this entire cathedral wouldn't exist if Dolthaic hadn't commissioned me to make the first one back in 2011. Thanks, Dolthaic!

Building blocks, building blocks, building blocks oh my! (And a cathedral!)

Those of you who've been following my Facebook have seen all of these pictures already. However, you haven't heard what I have to say to go along with it! So here it is.

Approximately one year ago, a character by the name of Dolthaic contacted me. He wanted a temple to Innoruuk constructed. I was reluctant. I am notoriously terrible at commissions. I usually have several going at once, and they always take me longer than expected. Additionally, I had some out of game things going on that made decorating take second, third, or fifth place.

But then Dolthaic mentioned the magic word. He said, "Gothic." And then he said another magic word. "Pipe organ."

You don't know this about me, but I adore the Gothic style. I love the intricacy, the arches, the stained glass, the high ceilings. I also adore organs, and pipe organs are a beautiful specimen of the organ family. I started itching for a chance to build a cathedral utilizing these objects, and I'd just been presented with the opportunity!

It might have seemed more logical for me to turn down the commission and decorate a cathedral for myself, in my own spare time. Fortunately for everyone concerned, multiple housing had just barely come out, and I wasn't used to the idea yet. Plus, what use would I have for a cathedral? So I said yes. I warned him it would take me a while, and that I would probably need to wait a few months before starting it. I needed to get my other commissions out of the way.

Instead, I started it pretty much that night. I broke out of Neriak, and used floor tiles to figure out the best place to build the cathedral. I checked for load times--I wanted the loading of the cathedral to be instant when you zoned from one teleport pad to the other, which meant that the cathedral had to be in Neriak, close to the original house structure. I also took direction into consideration. When you use a teleport pad, you appear on the new pad facing the same exact direction as you were when you stepped onto the old pad. So the cathedral had to be built with the altar directly across from the teleport pad, for maximum "wow" effect.

After I'd figured out location and direction, I built a mockup of the first window. It took me a couple of hours to get it right, but eventually I was satisfied. Dolthaic saw it, and was satisfied, too.

That first window took nine crude stone blocks to build, and looked very rough. But at the time, crude stone blocks were pretty much the only thing we had to work with that would look decent as a stone cathedral. So I churned out a bunch of blocks. Unfortunately, we didn't have crafting AAs at that point. We had a few crafting options for character development, and some crafting gear, but not the AA tree. And crafting the crude stone blocks (which use fletching) as a carpenter (who uses sculpting) was agonizingly slow. Especially since I needed probably a couple hundred of them.

So I built the west wall of the cathedral. Then I took a break to slowly begin stockpiling the stones I needed while working on other projects. Very slowly. Very very slowly. In fact, it was so slow, that even though I was playing with test ideas in another house, that one wall was all that had been done in Dolthaic's house.

Then building blocks were announced. Suddenly, it seemed like a good idea to put off entirely. Building blocks would make the cathedral so much easier. Fast forward to March 15th, 2012, when building blocks were unveiled. This was awesome, because we'd originally heard we'd be getting them in June.

It wasn't until March 26th that I managed to get in-game to craft some blocks and give rebuilding the cathedral windows a go. For the first mockup, the decision that the crude stone blocks looked better was unanimous from people I dragged in to see. Unfortunately, my heart sank at the thought of using the crude blocks, especially since I'd put crafting them on hold at the announcement of building blocks. I was determined to make the building blocks work. So I ripped down the crude stone blocks, and put up the building blocks anyway. Then, just to make sure it looked good, I tossed up a second tier of windows, and created half of the arched ceiling.

March 26th, some time in the evening--the first wall and ceiling were completed.

For those interested, I created this by creating a single panel of the window. Then I used the duplicate feature on Jesdyr's layout editor to copy the arrangement of items. Duplicate pulls items from the moving crate when used properly, so I just had to make sure I had the correct number and type of items in the moving crate.

Once I'd duplicated the location, I could move the "copied" section to its new spot beside the original section. I duplicated the first window twice, shifting each window the appropriate units North (In this case, each section is 8 units long, so I had to shift each new section 8 units North) so that they lined up in a straight line. Once I'd created the lower wall, I duplicated it and tweaked it a little to make the upper wall. Then I raised the upper wall and shifted it East, so that it hung over the lower wall a bit. Then I added some of the details, like the curved trim between the two tiers.

After the easy part was done, the hard part happened. I needed to make the vaulted ceiling. That meant either painstaking trial and error to get the angles right as I shifted things into place, or it meant engaging in a little bit of trigonometry. I chose the trigonometry, especially since there's a lovely little website that allows you to input two of whichever combination of numbers you have (and in decorating, you always have at least two of the numbers--the length of one of the sides, and the angle it's at), and it will pop out the rest of the numbers you need. Even better, since it's on the computer, I can just copy-paste the resulting numbers instead of having to type them out. It's a huge time saver over trying to do the trig by hand or Texas Instrument.

So I guess the hard part wasn't too hard after all. I used the same practice I did with the windows. I built one section, then duplicated it and shifted it North until it was in the correct spot. In less than 10 minutes, I went from having just a wall of two tiers of windows to having a wall of two tiers of windows and half a vaulted roof.

from http://www.reims-cathedral.culture.fr

But if you look at pictures of the Reims Cathedral (which is what I've been using for inspiration), the ceiling doesn't just have simple beams going across. It has what are called "ribs." It's more ornate. If this were a real building, it would also be sturdier. Luckily, this is just a game building.

That meant I had to figure out the calculations to make the columns slant in two directions while lining up at different angles, so that they followed the slant of the roof. I calculated everything perfectly, except that I forgot to take EQ2's mechanics into consideration. I had to use both the "pitch" and the "roll" options to get the columns to do what I wanted, and pitch and roll don't play nice when used together in certain combinations. Just my luck, I was using those combinations! So I scrapped my calculations and did it the good old fashioned "shift this one a tiny bit east. No, shift it back west. Shift it north. There! It's lined up. Waaaaait, no it's not. Shift it just a little to the south. I think I need to shift it down. PHEW finally!"

In the end, it was worth it. It added a lot of detail to the ceiling for a minimal amount of item count, and made it look a bit more realistic.

The ceiling after adding ribs and chandeliers.

If you look at the screenshot to the left, you'll see that it appears I also managed to build the second half of the roof. That's true! It was very simple. I just put all of the items that created the wall and ceiling together into a layout then duplicated the items. Then I selected the duplicate items, and rotated them 180 degrees around the center point. I had to do a little bit of tweaking, but it took me at most five minutes to go from having a quarter of a cathedral to having half a cathedral (not counting the time it took me to craft the necessary items).

First test top and bottom of column.
You can see the plain columns in the background.

Slowly, ideas and execution come together. I had to tweak the first tier, shifting it out a bit in order to put in the second row of columns. Then I had to figure out what to do for the capitals of the columns, and by extension, the bases.

Luckily, my first attempt worked out, and I was able to easily duplicate it for the rest of the columns along that side. Then I simply duplicated all of the columns along the east side and rotated the duplicates around the center of the cathedral again, to get the columns into place along the west wall. Duplicate and the group mod option "rotate" are real time savers!

The original dome.

Once I'd finished the side walls, I decided it was time to work on the front dome. Aside from the (not yet built) pipe organ, it's probably the piece that takes the most items. Better to get it out of the way so I could see how many items I had left to work with.

The modified dome with alternating glass colors.

But I wasn't satisfied with the dome. While the blue was fantastic, it felt a little monochromatic. The temple was drowning in blue. So I swapped out some of the blue glass for purple glass.

That was better, but there was still something off about the dome. I wanted to draw the eye to the altar, and with the huge expanse of grey wall culminating in colorful windows, the eye would be drawn up instead of down.

BOOM!

So I figured I could extend the windows down towards the floor, so that the altar would be the first thing to catch your eye. Then the windows could draw it up, much as a real cathedral's window does. I believe I've heard somewhere that the architecture does that on purpose, so that you're looking towards the heavens.

And that's what a double sized window looks like.

Before I did that, I decided that the bottom tier of windows was too short. Looking back at the reference shot of the Reims Cathedral, the first tier is very tall. So I used the layout editor to raise practically all of the cathedral 8 units higher. Of course, that involved blowing it up...

Once that was done, I could extend the walls and windows down until the met the floor again.

It's now been three days (this is the start of the fourth!), and all that's left to do is to add in the pews, finish the niche in the east wall, put in the organ loft, and build the organ.

It's almost done! Thank you Jesdyr, for your lovely layout editor. This couldn't have been done so quickly (minus a year) without you.

It's a cathedral!

For anyone interested in visiting, this is at 3 Walk of the Dead in Neriak, under Dolthaic on the Antonia Bayle server. At the moment, the homeowner has it open to the public. Stop on by, but if you do, do a /who. If you see me in the house, send a /tell so you don't scare the daylights out of me when you pop up!