Thread: Assault on Trenth. City and surroundings

Hi Dain, looks like a good beginning you got there... and lot of work left too. The land seems to be hoovering over the river so I would remove the drop shadow. Concerning scale, its always a question of the region size - take a real life example and use that for comparison. If an A4 printer is what your have access to, then there is no need to go bigger than you did (unless you wanna print on several pieces of paper). When I choose the scale for my Mountain Realms I was thinking about how long it should take to travel from one side of the map to the other - and then calculated backwards with 50 miles/day on horseback as a scale. In the city Breakwater I'm working on now I began with one scale - then after having placed a lot of buildings - I scaled down, and now I'm thinking about scaling down some more... I'm concidering how big my houses are and recalculating after that.
So scale is always tricky, and you are allowed to cheat - and if a player calls you on it - SMITE HIM! *lol*

Hi guys,
Here is an update of the map. I changed many things in terms of layer styles settings and hope it's for the best
I chose a big scale but I'm not really sure how to fill the north and west of the map. Don't want to add too much forests and open ground would be boring. Any ideas?

Comments are welcome, as usual

That's looking really good. The hedges might be a bit big, but perhaps they've been drawn big because they are important in some way? I have to say though, that I think your original hand drawn map rocks, it's got a vibrancy and character to it which is very hard to reproduce with digital maps.

very nice.. .I'm with ravs on the hedges/thin treelines - they are rather thick if you compare them to a house. Out here where I live in the almost country there usually is a single line of trees between fields (if any) - and they often stand far enough from each other that farm equipment can pass without problems. Sometime you can have a road there instead

Wow. I'm really digging your fields. The houses are a little colorful, but I don't think it detracts too much - might knock them back to see how it looks. Agree with Ravells: I love your hand-drawn map. Fancy digital maps are pretty and all but a little RPG map scrawled grid paper...or a napkin...always takes me back.

Not opposed to the huge hedgerows either. Check out the hedgrow insanity that took place during WWII. I reckon those hedges were pretty thick...believe even the tanks had trouble getting through them (though that may have been ditches too). This is going to look pretty sweet when done.
M

You always come up with something cool and new so I'm sure this one will kick as much as the others.

Hey this is great. Those fields look so sweet. I'll have to remember to check this again whenever I get around to creating some myself. I like what you are doing. Sorry, nothing to add other than that for now.

Dude, your countryside looks awesome. I love the hedgerows!

Excellent! Those fields are just corking! You've captured the bizarre randomness of field layout very well. Don't be lead astray by hedgerow widths too much! You have some single row hedges in the mix! Hedges often provide windbreaks and if your prevailing winds are high, well, thicker widths would be about right.
For some of the best in olde worlde hedgerows I would scan around Cornwall, UK in googlemaps satellite but it would seem you've already done something like already.
One issue I have in the fields is the blurry effect I get in patches, it kinda makes my eyes go wonky.

I'm not the guy to comment on drawing style but I do wax lyrical on logical issues occasionally! My pennies worth would be:

The bare patches - you wondered what to do here? If the land there is raised (nice scarp slope and so forth) you can make it moorland, loose scrub used for sheep and so forth. Try looking north of "Simonsbath, Exmoor" on googlemaps for that line between moorlands and agricultural...
If it's low-lying, which it appears to be, aaaaand that river is pretty wide, I'd make it marshes. Undrained flatlands. Like Norfolk used to be. That doesn't make it unusable though, it would be harvested for reeds, people would live in stilted buildings, have punts, hunt gamebirds and so on and so on. It's a lovely environment. Either of the above could yeild a good economy in peat diggings which can take a LOT of land. It's thought that the "Norfolk Broads" water system was all dug by hand for peat long ago...
This would be supported by the width of the river, and its "weak" erosion as evidenced by the sort of mini-peninsulas protruding into it.
The river needs some thought. Since the town walls are relying on the river as part of the defensive "line" then it must be deep enough for river traffic. It's certainly wide enough for barges and so forth. That would likely mean docks etc, if there is good trade, and the wealth to afford (and need) the walls in the first place!
Issues: the bridges. I don't see why these are outside the walls. As a defensive measure they make it easy for an enemy to cross over and surround the town. I would have put one bridge in, inside the walls, as it were. It puts the river crossing under town control, both for defence AND possible tolls! Money, money money! The road to the SE bridge looks a tad long and wandering?? Where are the interconnecting roads to "other places, yonder"? Are they rural meandering roads using contour lines or straight military (like roman) roads?
The buildings: I'm all in favour of different colours. Roofs can be tile, reeds, shingles, wood, even grass... what doesn't quite mix well for me is that you have those lovely random field patterns but the town streets are rather linear and gridlike.

There you are you see? I talk to much. I hope you take these as constructive comments!
Good luck and have some rep!