[Region 1][Map 07][Location 01] Fentor Cross Area

[Redrobes]

So with some new thatch buildings I have whooped up a town. Its all subject to change - especially if I make some more buildings and add some more variety to the small list that I am using currently.

If anyone has some Inns and Pubs already mapped and you want them located in Fentor Cross then now is an excellent time to whistle. I can shuffle the map about to make one fit in.

I will add some extra effects to make the roads and paths a little more defined and try to add contrast so that the roof and mud is not almost the same color.

[su_liam]

You wont believe how small this is on the area map. Its a dot. The Forts are actually on the map. They are literally one pixel. Gahhh !

After a trip to the coast, I took my son to the library. They have a big globe at the library and I wanted to give my son an idea of the size of this little planet of ours. The entire trip was less than a centimeter on the globe. Planets are big places.

[Redrobes]

Twiddling thumbs so I done a bit more. Maybe I should have an image that I can update as I can see this one going through hundreds of revisions...

Su-Liam, I agree. I wonder if we would have more cooperative effect if the area was smaller. I'm kinda keen to get to the battle scale mapping, get some characters installed into the inns, shops etc, maybe seed some plot lines etc.

Well there are plenty of unnamed houses, buildings of all shapes to find people and plans for. If anyone was no good at terrain and wants to get out the graph paper then send them this way. If anyone has some stuff already mapped from old times and wants to donate then ill make a thatch building for it and add it in somewhere.

[NeonKnight]

I like the map, but.....

The colors are too similar, it's hard to see the buildings.

[Redrobes]

I like the map, but.....

The colors are too similar, it's hard to see the buildings.

Absolutely. I need to make the green greener and the mud darker I think even if that would make it less realistic. Its a problem that thatch is a dark gray brown and so is the mud. I guess this is where artistic license will have to take precedence over realism.

I thought about tiled roofs but were in fen land and theres gonna be oodles of reeds. Probably no real shortage of clay either but there would be a significant amount of thatch still I would imagine so I have to find some sort of bodge up.

Do you (or anyone else) have any suggestions ?

[RobA]

Just giving them an outer glow or drop shadow might be enough to set them of. Cliché, I know, but it would separate them from the ground.

-Rob A>

[Midgardsormr]

Perhaps the townspeople make an unsophisticated pavement by mixing stones with a dense gray clay so they can move about without getting their boots sucked off by the mud.

[Gamerprinter]

In my neck of the woods, the topsoil is black-black, but the clay beneath is kind of a medium grey. So if you went grey with your mud, it would still be realistic, yet your brown thatched buildings should stand out against grey mud.

[NeonKnight]

Perhaps make the thatch a tad yellower?

[Redrobes]

I'll try them all; Thatch yellower, grass greener, mud darker and gray. The drop shadow is harder but theres a good chance I can automate that and the pavement is also hard. To do that properly would need hand modeling but I think I might be able to automate a little of that effect around the edge of the mud. I did cobble the town square. Maybe I could try to cobble more of the mud areas where the mud would be deepest.