Mapping software

[mattcolville]

Back in, like, 1999 I bought CC2Pro and City Designer and Dungeon Designer. Spent something like $150.

Could not figure it out. Did the tutorials but apparently there are OTHER, better tutorials I didn't do. Every six months or so I would say "dammit, I spent a lot of money on this crap, I'm gonna make it work," but every time I gave up. I'd try out Autorealm or one of the other programs. None of them did what I needed.

Then at one point I had some kind of breakthrough and managed to get CC2 to work. It's really a stunning piece of work. There's nothing like it on the market. Yes, there's a PROFOUND learning curve and if the software were used in business, they'd offer college classes on it. But if you can get it to work, you'll never use anything else.

 

[Legildur]

I'm a player and so don't use CC2 myself. But my DM from my PbEM game sends us CC2 maps on a regular basis. Anything from Region maps, down to city maps (and I do mean quite substantial cities, with all the bells and whistles - including street names), and even combat maps (1" grid and all). The level of detail can be incredible when you zoom in. The free CC2 viewer is all you need as a player.

I can't comment about the other programs, but just wanted to say that as an end receiver of CC2 products, I'm impressed.

 

[Zulithe]

As Thanee already said, PaintShopPro and Photoshop aren't mapping programs, however they are very powerful drawing programs that can be used to draw anything.... including maps. If you want a program dedicated to mapmaking (and therefore limited to mapmaking), there are a variety of programs with different styles of output. Dunndjinni, Campaign Cartographer, and Autorealm are some of the more popular, although there are others out there.

You may find my Guide to RPG Mapmaking webpage helpful (I'm a Photoshop user myself, however much of my advice is software-independent) in deciding what you think you'll be doing and what you might need to accomplish that. I do briefly discuss the various programs that are available. That particular page is located at http://melkot.com/mechanics/map-guide.html however feel free to peruse the rest of my site as well! ;-)

Denis, aka "Maldin"
===================================
Maldin's Greyhawk http://melkot.com

*bookmarked* Wow, loved it! I hand-draw 90% of my maps at the moment, but I've toyed with some photoshoped maps. I'll have to utilize my scanner and try some of your methods. I love the reference images from Italy also. Very inspiring.

 

[ssampier]

Using Photoshop or PSP is like using a pencil. What you can produce is only limited by your imagination. But it is from "scratch". The mapping programs (which really are specialized CAD programs) automate some of the mapping by giving you specific tools and symbol sets, and therefore make it easier to produce maps that actually look like maps.

Good point. I've briefly tried AutoRealm and PSP. I like the look of PSP landscapes better, but AutoRealm seems better with "vector" style objects like town and Dungeon maps. If only a program could do both Raster and Vector (with the integrated symbols). For instance, I took forever trying to make a simple lake look realistic in AutoMap (trying to follow a "simple" tutorial on the web).

But buying a program (any program) will not turn anyone into an expert mapmaker (and not everyone WANTS to make expert maps anyways!). CC2, and other similar programs, do make it easy to take shortcuts in design. People often don't really think too much about what they are doing, and the easiest thing to do is just drop buildings willy-nilly all over the place. That produces a not-so-realistic (fantasy or not) map....

I don't want to be an expert map-maker. But I'd like to make better maps, so my players can say, "Wow, this looks cool", rather than asking what's this chicken scratch.

Any advice how to make towns with terrain features, such as hill slopes or a gradual gradient? I tried dotted lines and doesn't give the "gradual slope" I wanted.

 

[booboo]

Fractal Mapper is easy to use dosnt cost alot.
I still touchup my maps with Paint Shop Pro 8 or Photodraw

 

[buzz]

It is the worst software purchase I have made in a long while and I wish I could have my money back. The software is slow....slow....slow.

Java will do that, depending on how powerful your machine is.

Was that the only issue? I've been looking into this app lately. The other apps in question won't run on my Mac without VirtualPC, so I'm not big on pursuing them.