Cartogaphy

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  • #2387

    Hi,

    I will take your word that I have M4D skills…but I don’t think I do. I assume you mean Mad 4 Destruction??? I need to look more into what you are talking about to speak coherently.

    Actually the maps are done in Campaign Cartographer which is a vector based cartography program designed for traditional RPGs etc. It does the maps as vectors and then you basically export it to an image at a particular resolution.

    The maps were started a long time ago with their base fantasy set at the time. Newer versions have cooler icons, but I didn’t have time to figure out how to translate all of them to newer stuff/redo.

    So anyway, the true original images are vector diagrams. I can generate a giant jpg at any resolution if you can do something with them…or you if you had a way of dealing with the vector images or something it exports to, I have no problem giving that out.

    Jerry

    #1127
    eugene2k
    Member
    #2386
    eugene2k
    Member

    I’ve noticed you have M4D cartography skillz, so I was thinking maybe I should try to make some better maps for the setting you’ve created. The quality of the jpegs on the site, however, is pretty awful. If you have the original images it would be awesome if I can get my grubby hands on them. So. Can I pweeaze have the originals so I could try to create some nice fan art to support the nice book?

    P.S. I have no idea how to categorize this post, so I hope I’m posting in the right place.

    #2388
    eugene2k
    Member

    [quote=jerry;143]Hi,

    I will take your word that I have M4D skills…but I don’t think I do. I assume you mean Mad 4 Destruction??? I need to look more into what you are talking about to speak coherently.

    Actually the maps are done in Campaign Cartographer which is a vector based cartography program designed for traditional RPGs etc. It does the maps as vectors and then you basically export it to an image at a particular resolution.

    The maps were started a long time ago with their base fantasy set at the time. Newer versions have cooler icons, but I didn’t have time to figure out how to translate all of them to newer stuff/redo.

    So anyway, the true original images are vector diagrams. I can generate a giant jpg at any resolution if you can do something with them…or you if you had a way of dealing with the vector images or something it exports to, I have no problem giving that out.

    Jerry[/quote]

    Vectors are fine with me. In fact they’re the best in my opinion.

    P.S. M4D = Meant 4 Diddling 😀

    #2389
    Tizzy
    Member

    Cool let me check out the M4D…there may be some good overlap…I am at a “day job” at the moment so can’t do much with the maps until tonight.

    #2390

    Cool, I will check out M4D tonight and see if there is some easy crossover/export/import stuff and see about getting you stuff.

    #2391
    Maou
    Member

    I was curious as to where some of the other races lived and what happens if their might be overlapping boundaries, say the dwarves or elves were in an area and some humans laid claim to what was around it? Also are all races territorial to the extent that they set boundaries or do some just think I’m here you’re not so this is my land? Different groups typically have different ideas on boundaries and I know some people like clear cut definitive boundaries, while other groups have some overlapping of boundaries so I wanted to know if that would play a role on the map.

    #2392
    eugene2k
    Member

    I’m looking at your world map and I’m trying to figure out why the known land ends so abruptly. Most maps are of continents and the water designates the end of known land. Sometimes known land is separated from unknown lands by mountains and sometimes the unknown land is shaped roughly resembling the ideas of the cartographer (I remember looking at one of the maps drawn by ancient greeks designating the part of Europe that belongs to France and Germany and beyond as Hyperborea. However that doesn’t seem to be applicable in the case of a fantasy setting where magicians can travel on flying carpets. Even mountains might not be able to stop explorers armed with magic. So it’s either gotta be some Great Desert or some Great Ocean that’s added to the map.

    #2393
    Tizzy
    Member

    Well, to be honest the map making follows more the “fantasy novel” approach to what’s shown and not shown.

    It’s also because these continents are BIG…(see Oorstemoth example below)

    In books, the details on maps tend to fade off at the edges and then in volume 3 or 4 the map magically gets bigger, even though what was in the blank lands was “known” to people.

    Although I point out, as you said the “Here there be dragons” quality of real medieval maps where the cartographer just sort of made things up because they didn’t know what was in a region.

    The only real, truly, blank regions are down near the bottom (and I notice a bit in the far North East.

    And that’s really the style of fantasy novels that don’t expand the map until the story extends.

    I didn’t put much down in the South East because it’s going to get covered up by the legend, and the story doesn’t go there yet. The bottom edge in the Southwest is purposefully left blank, because there is stuff down there that most people don’t know about and won’t until Book II when that region actually gets people visiting it. It’s also in “dramatic flux” cities might move for plot development and I don’t want to nail them down quite yet.

    —Now, as for “wilderness” regions that have plants but no cities??

    Those are literally what they appear, there are no “human majority” cities there. There are members of the body politic in those regions, and they have maps of trails/roads/cities, but they generally don’t share them outside their community.

    Also this map is not all that detailed, and the cities you see, even the small ones, are actually very good sized. There are lots of villages and hamlets you don’t see. Each square is basically 100 miles on a side, or 10,000 square miles (about the size of New Hampshire)

    So Oorstemoth is about 700 miles N/S and 600 miles E/W, so 420,000 square miles. Which gives Oorstemoth a total land area bigger than Texas, but smaller than Alaska.

    Maou asked about where the non-human races are, so I’ll answer that here:

    1) The Mogradin Association, north of The Council States is about 80%+ made up of Modgriensofarthgonosefren (Dwarves)

    2) On Eton, the Vizenheim Empire was also dwarven and was in the Eastern mountain range, Vizenheim mountain is straight south along the coast from Gizzor Del. Gone now, but there are some Modgriensofarthgonosefren villages in the area, but aren’t on the map.

    3) The Modgriensofarthgonosefren also have several mountain strongholds between the Council States and Oorstemoth (anywhere near volcanoes is a good bet)

    4) Gnomes also have several mountain strongholds, as do Goblins and Ogres and some Giants. Some Orcs as well…although there are Orcs all over the place, including nomads on the plains. The Aetos arealso in the mountainous regions. Particularly on the mountain islands between the continents.

    5) In the South west, in that very weird swampy region? Lots of I’iskatha

    6) Elves are most often found in the woods, or mountain regions in areas without a lot of human cities.

    7) Centaurs are in wooded and plains…actually more the plains.

    8) There are Satyrs in several different forest regions, generally not near Elves. (who find the Satyrs boorish and primitive barbarians) I note that the pub that Elrose and Trisfelt meet is near a good sized Satyr village/grove.

    9) Several desert regions also have I’iskatha

    The Gleg’ren are thought to mainly be in the shallower regions of the ocean, the Sea Elves have numerous small islands that are too small for this map.

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