Avynthar: The Mappening

[PixelFish]

Well, I was feeling pretty excited after discovering the Cartographer's Guild forums this morning, so I skibbled off and scanned in my map of Avynthar. Then I tossed a few sepia tones onto it for a start, but I'd like to do a more extensive paintover, get some more geographic features in, and so on.

Avynthar is the main continent in the world my novel takes place in. There is a High King that rules over the Thirteen Kingdoms of Avynthar, although there are at least one autonomous kingdom and a few independent city states and some rogue states and whatnot which do not bow to the High King. The three kingdoms at the heart of the continent: Illivhar, Gallitor, and Tavaris are known as the Three Civilized Kingdoms, because they have the High King's Court, the Keep of the Yn Greneiri, and the University at Tallandrith respectively. People in Cadenza and Innstak tend to snicker about the Three Civilized Kingdoms though. (Cadenza is the capital of Maltaias and while technically has to submit to the High King, they're like the California/Renaissance Italy of Avynthar: a lot of races and cultures coming together, and they are much more chill and not so stuffy. Innstak is a city of merchants and burghers, and they run the trading guilds on the western half of the continent.)

There are three major mountain ranges (although a lot of little subranges spiking off of them): The Cold Peaks, The Vall, and The Avynians. Lake Avar bisects the breadbasket regions. The southeastern coasts has climates similar to the area around San Diego, fading into a sort of piedmont region inland. The left lower coast is rocky, fading to desert on the interior of the Zaelt peninsula. The northwestern coast alternates with fens and marshlands along the coast, and highland hills, with a few patches of fjord like areas up by Eid. Vallada tends to be a lot of highland hills, with late snows. Dallakh is jungly near the shore, and tends to be rocky and barren in the interior.

The map was handdrawn and handlettered, although I'll eventually replace the lettering I think. (I like to doodle map contours. I find it very relaxing.)

I'm thinking I'll want to do several versions. Probably an illustrative version along these lines with little icons showing the production of various regions: fish, horses, wine, grains, incense, etc. (I played Civilization one too many times.) And probably a more topographic/realist version, just because I would find it handy for the novel.