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Thread: valley region map for my warhammer roleplay

  1. #1

    Wip valley region map for my warhammer roleplay

    Ok so this is my frist atempt at a map, background story of the area is basicly :

    Krogersdorf is a village of roughly 200 humans and a small dwarven outpost located on a plateau in the foothills of the Worlds Edge Mountains. It was established in IC 2305 by a band of deserters from the army of Magnus the Pious, led by Ulf Kroger, shortly after the army repulsed the incursion of Chaos and brought the Age of Three Emperors to a close.

    While looking for a new place to call home without the need to worry about being punished for desertion, they followed a stream up into the mountains finaly entering a valley. This is where Kroger's band stumbled across the ruins of what once was a town known as Old Krogersdorf. They took shelter within its long-shattered walls. The old buildings still stand in the old ruins to the north of the new village, but the defenses have demolished to function as resource for a wall around the new village to keep wild animals and bandit gangs at bay.

    During the days of the initial settling Ulf Kroger and a few of his men went hunting and came upon a band of wood elves beset by a pack of beastmen. By their intervention the wood elves where saved from certain doom and managed to get away with only minor wounds. This has led to a pack of non-aggression between the wood elves and the villagers of Krogersdorf whereby they are allowed to forage and hunt in the deeper parts of the woods. However logging is restricted to the forest edge. Although they prefer to keep to themselves, each spring and autumn celebration they send an envoy escorted by a group of hunters to the town to renew the contract.

    Later a small band of dwarves of the Izenhart clan stumbled upon this town and having the intention to mine the silver rich plateau they settled nearby. Most of their time is spent in the mines but a few have established permanent residence in the town proper. The dwarven - Elven relationship is strained but neither party actively harasses the other, preferring to ignore each other’s existence.

    Located in the further Eastern reaches of Imperial wilderness, Krogersdorf was allowed to establish itself some 75 years before the eyes of the nobility fell upon it first contact was made by missionaries of the Cult of Sigmar, the first Emperor. Having lived in the wilderness so long, the Krogersdorfers chose to continue their worship of Taal, god of the wild places, and Ulric, god of winter, wolves, and warriors. The Sigmarites retaliated by slandering the villagers in the provincial and imperial courts, casting Krogersdorf into disfavor which continues to this day.

    The villagers are a hardy, closed community. They don’t rely upon any outside help, resolving their problems whiteout asking for outside aid. The high tax forces them to work most of their lives and has caused the villagers to foster a grudge towards the empire. Although not entirely rebellious they don’t think they should be punished for the crimes of the original founder. Recently tax collectors have disappeared mysteriously and an Imperial Magistrate was send to the village with a small contingent of forces to “protect the villagers from harm”

    just posting this so you'd get the feel of what it has to look like .. basically : secluded , in a valley , "wild" undeveloped country , lots of forest

    after allot of trail and error i managed to get myself a parchment like background and started the layout of the hill/mountains to start of with ( thx rammha for the mountains ) ... thats the picture called "campain map krogersdorf"

    after that I did the forest , used rammhas tree brushes and made a pattern , again took some trail and error until i was satisfied and i mapped the forest

    thats the picture called "krogersdorf" , i also sketched the position of the lakes ( 3 ) and rivers on the 2nd picture but i cant find a technique to draw them to my satisfaction ... It need to reseble the rest of the map style " hand drawn"

    I would appriciate any help with that ^^ or sugestions ...

    mostly i need somthign to outline the area's and im thinking of making a pattern with "waves" so i can draw in the lakes .... but before i can draw them in i need beleavable shorelines ...

    so :p im anxiously awaiting tips / help
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  2. #2

    Default

    I like your style.

  3. #3

    Default

    I like it.

    If I had a comment it is a careful one - I may not be very clear on this...

    You have beautiful mountains basically forming a wall around the center of the action. They look really really nice but they dominate the whole map. Anything you put in the middle has to compete with all the jagged peaks.
    Furthermore the mountains seem more stylistic than descriptive. I don't think from looking at the map that each mountain has a name, and is where the map says. Rather I think of old maps with regions that read 'here be dragons' - lots of mountain more as a warning than a description.

    I would suggest you pull all the mountains off the map, develop the core so you are sure of what the map has to say then put as much or as many of the mountains back as make sense. If the mountains are a frame reduce their size and impact. If they are descriptive of the geography give some of them names, reduce their number and increase their variety - more low varied peaks etc...

    It seems that there is a lot of flat very pretty paper with things on it. I don't feel like I'm looking at a piece of land. I say this guardedly because it is not necessarily a valid criticism. Many maps, especially early ones are a lot like this - if that is your goal take my comment as a compliment.. There are many maps with this feeling - they signify more than describe.

    You seem to be going from the outside in. What happens if you determine what you want to show and work back?

    There's lots of style and impact in the map. The pieces would make good brushes.




    Sigurd
    Last edited by Sigurd; 03-14-2010 at 08:20 PM.


    Dollhouse Syndrome = The temptation to turn a map into a picture, obscuring the goal of the image with the appeal of cute, or simply available, parts. Maps have clarity through simplification.

    --- Sigurd

  4. #4

    Wip

    thx for the feedback sigurd ,

    indeed i took a long objective look at my map and tbh the mountains where a little strong, .. ive "slimmed" them down a bit ... and slightly altered the color to a little lighter ...

    I was going for a "frame" of mountains as the village is located on a higher plateau/valley ... and they are surrounded by high peaks with only 2 ways in and out of the valley ( the spots left and right without mountains )
    ive left 3 "larger" mountains to be named

    the actually "creator" of the map was more of an adventurer then geologist. he did survey the region once his group settled there but he wasn't a professional mapmaker ( neither am i lol ) and im trying to go for a early type hand drawn map feel . the mountains are more style indeed , because there rather dangerous to explore , lots of nasty green skins ( orc , goblins ) and the adventurer dint really feel like accurately depicting them.

    im working from the outside in because i have a rather decent idea of how i want the lay of the land ot look like , after that ill fill in town location , monoliths , places of interest ect and ive worked with layers for each addition so basicly i can remove or alter anything without impacting anything else .. so alteration can be done while working

    and tbh ive always worked from outside in , its a habit i picked when learning to draw :p

    still haven't figured a good way to draw my lakes / rivers tho ...
    whatever i try it just comes out all wrong ... to think lines , to lite .. or it just look like a circle on the map ... need some hint/ techniques for this :p
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  5. #5

    Wip

    managed to get a lake / river effect i liked . not 100% ; but 80% close enough

    rivers = pen tool and draw a line , stroke 3pix line , wet edges , 75% opacity

    lakes where done with lasso tool , ctrl+backspace , deselect select another lake , rinse and repeat untill all where doen then layer properties , inner glow + stroke

    took me about an enitre day of experimenting ( im new to the whole PS tool usage :p )

    now i need to make a pattrn for the swamp / still figure a way to draw a doted line as roads ( has to be possible with pen ool but no idea how lol )

    and then its on to all the unique feature's like town , farms , castle , monoliths ect ...
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  6. #6

    Default

    First, make or select a brush shaped like the dashes you want on your road. In the brush settings, under Brush Tip Shape, there is a slider for spacing. Set it so that you get a dotted line; should be round about 200%. On the Shape Dynamics, set the Control dropdown box under Angle Jitter to Direction. Set Then stroke your path with that brush. If you select a round brush, you won't need the Angle control, of course.

    You may wish to experiment with the other brush settings, but I recommend you set Size Jitter Control to Off so that it won't taper the ends of your line.
    Bryan Ray, visual effects artist
    http://www.bryanray.name

  7. #7

    Wip

    thx Midgardsormr was exactly what i was looking for :p was making it harder then i had to be lol ...

    wel finished with the buildings , roads , swamp , basically all finishing touches :p

    all thats left are the names of area's , farmsteads , town , ect ... ill work on that during the week as im writing down my campaign plot lines :p usually come up with way better names during and also probably gona do some last minute alterations

    anyway any suggestions / finishing touches are welcome to my map ^^ my players will love you , and i will love you for the extra knowledge / insight ^^
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  8. #8

    Wip

    Hmm totaly lost track of time there :p 03:00 am in morning here and the last 3 hours ive been writing idea after idea down and i think ive just finished more of my campaign plot lines then i had before lol

    anyway also got all the location named while doing this and here's my final result ...

    the "finished" product a "hand drawn" style map ... for fantasy Roleplay of mine

    comments always welcome
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  9. #9
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    Default

    I like it. If I had just one criticism, it would be that maybe you could add a subtle shadow to the trees, since you have one for the mountains.

  10. #10
    Community Leader Facebook Connected tilt's Avatar
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    looking good - a couple of things stand out.
    1. when you use a bigger symbol, like the big three at the lake - it would look nice to have it drawn to that size instead of just resized, you'll be able to get more details in like that
    2. the lakes are very different in style than the rest, don't use gradient but lines like in the mountains
    othewise a very nice map
    regs tilt
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