Map of my Campaign World

[AslanC]

So the reason I am working on a hack of D&D to suit my tastes is that I want it to suit my campaign that went on hiatus and will be coming back.

Over the time we played in the West (name of the campaign setting, very original I know) we bounced from Labyrinth Lord, to Pathfinder Beginner Box (with stops at LotR CODA, Arrowflight, Savage Worlds and even D6), never truly happy 100% with the way the system interacted with the setting.

I once heard someone say the system should bend to the setting, not the other way around, and I agree. Given that I have a strong set of things I need from the system for the setting, it get's a bit hard to do easily.

But enough of that, I have taken the bull by the horn and am in the process of hacking together a D&D version that will do what I need.

Why is it so important? Why do you care this much about it?

This is why...



This is the bazillionth map of the West that I have done in the past 6 years since the campaign began. My players have been MOST patient with me, so long as the story remains consistently enjoyable and they understand my need to tweak the map as I go. Sometimes my "tweaks" instead turn into wholesale redesigns.

This one though, well it is NEAR perfect to my desires, with only some slight issues in the area around that in land sea that need reworking.

I was happy, then my Mac crashed and after a restore, etc... I discovered the PSD (Photoshop) file of this map was gone. Poof! Everyone map PSD saved, but not this one. It's as if the gods of the West were punishing me or laughing at me.

Le sigh...

So long story short I have begun working on a fix/rebuild in Photoshop, but it is a lot of work and starting to depress me to be honest. I have also begun looking for an artist (Cartographers Guild for the win!) to redo the map for me as a black and white "fantasy novel" style map.

Either way, in two months (November) the campaign restarts and I need to have the map and my D&D hack ready. So lots of side work for me to get prepared.

That said as well though, I thought you might like to see the map as it stands right now.

Thanks for listening to my rant and I hope at the very least you like the map.

Cheers!

 

[AslanC]

So with two days stuck at the house during a heatwave, I decided to get the re-mapping work done while I prepare for the commission in the black & white style I linked earlier.


Click for larger

Gonna label it over the next couple of days.

Cheers!

 

[Lanefan]

What is the scale? How many miles across, for example, is that whirlpool thingy in the sea in the (I assume south) centre?

Lanefan

 

[AslanC]

What is the scale? How many miles across, for example, is that whirlpool thingy in the sea in the (I assume south) centre?

The total about 4500 miles North to South by 3600 miles east to west, the Eye of Astara (the whirlpool) is 300x300 miles

This is "roughly" the size of Europe, with a bit of Russia and North Africa inculded.

Cheers!

 

[Lanefan]

The total about 4500 miles North to South by 3600 miles east to west, the Eye of Astara (the whirlpool) is 300x300 miles

This is "roughly" the size of Europe, with a bit of Russia and North Africa inculded.

Ah, OK. That's about the size of the map I use for my current game, and I've run up against one (possibly minor but annoying) headache: unless you put some long-range travel options in place it takes ages to simply get from one place to another. On your map, say, you might run an adventure in the obvious big desert to the southeast and then run something in that swampy-looking bit of inland sea about 600 miles due north; the travel time alone will give your world a month or more to advance its plots.

If you're ready for this, great. If not, and your backstory is on any sort of pre-set timeline, consider adding some sort of teleport network to the world.

Lanefan

 

[AslanC]

Oh don't worry, for us, getting there is half the fun

Trust me

 

[AslanC]

So I've gotten more work done on the map, in the process of labelling right now.


Click for larger

Also decided to go with D6 instead of D&D, just prefer it that way

Questions about the setting are more than welcome!

Cheers!