May 2008 Entry: Bluffs Encounter

[dorpond]

I'm loving this map already Dorpond. Great, artistic use of colour and understated contrasts make it tremendously cool. I personally prefer darker shadows because they increase the atmosphere and add to the muted nature of a map, which I prefer.

What is on the ground that makes the villagers want to buid on top of the high areas. Is it something really dangerous perhaps or are you just bluffing?

Thanks for the vote of confidence!

Actually, my initial vision was an Orc type creature living on these bluffs. Down below on the ground I envisioned critters of some sort like giant beetles and such. The Orcs resorted to the high bluffs to get away from them and over time, called the bluffs home.

I also see this as being quite a challenge for a party. I see them facing the dangers of the giant beetles while making their way closer to the bluffs. The party can't really see what is on top of these bluffs but sees billowing smoke coming from one. They eventually get close enough to see a pathway going up and when they do, they face one of them coming down. The Orc-like creature sees them and tries to run back up. Does the party chase or take cover? Nonetheless, they look very tasty to the Orc who wants to let the others know it is feeding time.

Or.... is he bluffing?

[dorpond]

That's really sweet.

Something to remember, these are battle maps. You need enough open space in order to place minis. Don't get too carried away filling up the blank spaces.

Thanks!

Yeah, I thought the same thing while glancing at the mockup throughout the day. For a matter of fact, I already took out some of the mini bluffs down below so the party can have room to move and plan on removing many of the tents above.

Thanks a lot for your wisdom.

[dorpond]

Here is the latest revision. Man, I am going blind staring at this map for so long. It all looks the same after a while and eventually, I ask myself if I am doing more harm than good to the map. LOL

Please, as always, let me know what you think and where I can improve.

(am I doing this whole WIP image thing correctly guys? I am just telling this thread that it is a WIP. Do I need to do more for it to show in the thumbnails?)

[RobA]

It is showing up now.

-Rob A>

[dorpond]

It is showing up now.

My previous WIP is showing, not my latest.

Hey Rob, can you post a link on how to do get my latest WIP to shop in the thumbnail page? I am not sure if I am doing things right. I just don't want to have to rely on you guys everytime I post an update. Thanks bud.

[ravells]

I think that redrobes has to run the script for the thumbnails page to update.

[RPMiller]

Since there was a little trouble with the procedure and to help ensure that future challengers can find the directions I've created a new sticky thread from Redrobes' post, edited the directions to make them clear and simple and locked the thread to reduce clutter.

Each month one of the CLs can go in and edit the link to the new thumbnails page.

Hope that helps.

http://www.cartographersguild.com/showthread.php?t=2066

[Redrobes]

How you have done it in post #13 is exactly right. I run the script several times per day as I cant be away from here for too long

As soon as you start a new entry and I see it, I edit the challengers listing and run the script again so even if a fresh start then you get a placeholder on the thumbs page. Every name and image is linked to the thread for it so you can get the very latest results that way.

I used to do it all by hand, now its a script plus an FTP upload for all the changed stuff. Maybe one day Arcana will manage to get it embedded into the system and run every hour or something like that - that would be the ideal way to do it. I tried to make it a CGI script so that anyone pressing a web page button you run the script through but it takes a while and the CGI times out.

I'm sure if the script were run on the local server then there would be no internet accesses so it ought to run very fast and therefore not become an issue.

The script here is in Perl but Arcana works in PHP so there is some conversion that would have to be accounted for.

[dorpond]

Thank you RPMiller for posting that link and thanks Redrobes for giving more details on the way it functions. It is very helpful knowing what is going on

[dorpond]

I quickly slapped the map, as it is right now, into Maptool and did a quick walk-through to make sure everything lined up OK to the grid. Thank goodness my character was nicely centered on the bridges instead of walking on the ropes.

Funny though but those are some of the things cartographers have to think about when making maps for VT's.

Anyway, I recorded my walkthrough to give you guys a taste:
http://rptools.net/dorpond/demos/Bluffs/Bluffs.html