Making a map. (unnamed setting worldbuilding thread)

[vaiyt]

Been working on this as a fun project for a while. This is a shrunk version of the map I'm starting to work on.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/vaiyt/mundomap%20with%20lines_zpsth2uzhpw.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/vaiyt/media/mundomap%20with%20lines_zpsth2uzhpw.png.html)
Those lines are from me trying to estimate where the tropical/temperate/cold areas are located and where deserts are likely to appear. Of course, magic may alter those, but I think it's good to avoid wiggly-river-from-pointy-mountains-itis and patchwork climates if I can.

What do you think so far? Is the distribution of the continents good? Any flaws I might be overlooking. I want to make sure I got the initial part down before doing the details.

(PS: Yes, those shapes are taken from blank maps of real countries and islands. The big continent over to the left is Switzerland turned on its side. You're welcome.)

[Corneel]

One thing I see is the 'can't unsee' problem with the Switzerland and Venezuela, but that might disappear when you start dressing them up a bit in deserts and forests.

Secondly, it's not clear from your description what lattitudes the lines on your map and the top and bottom of your map are (if you're going all the way to the poles, distortion form the projection on a rectangle will start to play a big role).

[vaiyt]

Thanks! I'll be retooling the map, but I'll answer your question. The lines are supposed to be at equal distance from each other, so the poles are at the top of the map and the red line is the equator. I don't like the area distortion of the typical cylindrical projection, so I just handwaved it. It was kind of a quick job.

[Corneel]

Well in that case I think that you'd have comparatively less temperate and subarctic zones and more desert and other subtropical areas as our world (and maybe also a bit more tropical/equatorial areas).

[vaiyt]

The whole projection thing has an effect on how the world is depicted. If I choose to maintain shape, areas will get distorted, which will make kingdoms closer to the poles appear much larger than they really are. If I choose to maintain area, shapes will get distorted, meaning straight paths will bend as they move through the north/south axis.

A campaign map might go better with a shape-constant map (makes it easier to plot those journeys there and back again), but I prefer area-constant in this case because my intention with the map is to show the political landscape of the world and how the different kingdoms relate to each other.

I'm going to experiment a bit with the Avatar route of using a pseudocylindrical map, see what I can come up with.

[vaiyt]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/vaiyt/worldmapnew_zpsq82erja9.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/vaiyt/media/worldmapnew_zpsq82erja9.png.html)

Here's a new version of the map. Keep in mind this is a much reduced version of the actual file.

How's the shapes and positioning? The only thing I can see so far is that I might want to cover some of those huge inland seas in the middle continent. Not sure about the land to sea ratio either.

[vaiyt]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/vaiyt/worldmapnewborder_zpszawhoxo8.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/vaiyt/media/worldmapnewborder_zpszawhoxo8.png.html)
Now with colors, fancy borders and somewhat appropriately positioned chains of islands.

Still, even at the original 4000x2000 size it's looking too small for me to put everything I need. I'll break it into chunks for each continent and blow them up to show all the countries and details.

[Murk]

So, this seems to be the entire world, and you want enough detail to picture single mountain ranges, forests and kingdoms? You want a realistic land/water ratio, and you don't seem to have that much happening at oceans?

I would advise to make it several, separate maps. Just one for each continent, smaller cut-outs for important areas. You can put them in the right position (or even with arrows "to ..."), and just skip out the seas. If you don't plan anything happening at seas anyway, just tell people looking at the map "this is a huge sea", and be done with it. That way you can picture each kingdom to great detail, without having a wall-spanning map.

And of course, if you're a map enthusiastic too and want a global world map just for being awesome, you can additionally put them all together, put in the seas, and lose the detail. You won't need it anymore, since you've got the sealess maps already.

Btw, I do like the fact that you're taking real-life shapes. All those Antarctica's, pieces of Asia and Switzerlands floating around are cool to look at.

EDIT: Well, it seems you just said you were going to do this already. Nevermind me then :)

[vaiyt]

Thanks for your feedback! It really means a lot to me to know people are interested.

Update!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/vaiyt/worldmap-continent1_zpswtlbgsil.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/vaiyt/media/worldmap-continent1_zpswtlbgsil.png.html)
Well, it was an attempt at least.

[Murk]

What scale are we looking at? For example: those lake-thingies in the middle of the continent: are they landlocked seas? Large lakes? Puddles of swamp?

[Gritmonger]

If you're looking for a really really rough estimation of what climates might be where, you could always plug in a really low resolution version of the maps into SimEarth...
http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/185

...it is far from high resolution, but for a quick, gross idea of what a mountain range can do to other areas and continents, it provides a decent (if very low resolution) starting point.

[vaiyt]

What scale are we looking at? For example: those lake-thingies in the middle of the continent: are they landlocked seas? Large lakes? Puddles of swamp?
They are ridiculously huge, considering this continent is basically Eurasia. The bigger ones seem to be at least double the size of the Caspian Sea. I asked from some advice in another forum, and it seems it's just not feasible to have such humongous lakes smack dab in the middle of a desert unless they're in the process of drying out, so I'm gonna fill some of them in.

[vaiyt]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/vaiyt/worldmapwip2_zpswc0hz9f9.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/vaiyt/media/worldmapwip2_zpswc0hz9f9.png.html)
I decided to keep one huge lake just to have something for the people in the region to kill each other over. :smallbiggrin:
This is missing the mountains, ridges and rivers, which definitely come next in line.

[vaiyt]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v133/vaiyt/worldmapwipm3_zps7rwqa9sq.png (http://smg.photobucket.com/user/vaiyt/media/worldmapwipm3_zps7rwqa9sq.png.html)

[BootStrapTommy]

A basic geography tips for mountains and deserts:
Are mountains between any areas and their neighboring bodies of water, especially in the direction from which the prevailing winds blow? That's a desert.

Also it might be good to think of mountain as colliding tectonic plates. There's a few places on the big continent that look like they might be suitable for additional mountains.

[vaiyt]

I did make a basic tectonic plate framework under the hood in this map, but yeah, most of the big continent is one big plate and I think I'll mess with that when putting up the smaller/lower ranges.

[vaiyt]

After a ton of work under the hood, I ended up with this.
http://anony.ws/i/2015/03/08/worldmapnewwithcloudsandchaos.png
There's floating landmasses and big swirly magical thingies now.

[Murk]

It's interesting to see how mountain ranges and islands circle around that big red dot in the center. I take it that is one of the Swirly Magic Thingies?
(I think basing a map on the actual plot or setting is always a good idea!)

[vaiyt]

Okay, I have a good amount of backstory ready, but one thing in particular has been bugging me: names. I figured out an RPG forum is the right place to ask about the ideal balance of descriptive names and invented languages.

Of course I know that the ideal way to do it would be to craft conlangs for each cultural grouping and give each place a meaningful name with an appropriate translation, but I'd like some tips on how to fake it reasonably well. :smalltongue:

[vaiyt]

This is not dead. I'll be working on a new, improved, better version of the map soon.

[00dlez]

Awesome work!

Working on something similar myself - a few questions if you don't mind:

1) Are you using some schmancy program? or just something with layers?

2) Did you do something special to take the initial flat map and transform it into the scaled, oval shape? Been a huge hang up on my maps getting them to actually reflect a sphere.

[00dlez]

Okay, I have a good amount of backstory ready, but one thing in particular has been bugging me: names. I figured out an RPG forum is the right place to ask about the ideal balance of descriptive names and invented languages.

Of course I know that the ideal way to do it would be to craft conlangs for each cultural grouping and give each place a meaningful name with an appropriate translation, but I'd like some tips on how to fake it reasonably well. :smalltongue:

I pick languages that no one is familiar with, do some google translating, and tweak it a little to not have it be an exact translation.

For example, instead of using Spanish for a Spanish/Portuguese inspired nation, I used Basque translations. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basques

[vaiyt]

Oh yeah! Time to dust off this thread. After about five iteratios of the map and countless tutorials, I've gotten to this.
http://s18.postimg.org/hxfffamzd/testworld2nd.png
I'm still polishing the coastlines and adding islands. Now it's also equirectangular so I can tweak it with G.Projector and Wilbur.

[vaiyt]

It's cosmology time!

This is the real high level stuff. Most of it won't even come up for characters except highly filtered.

This world is centered on the equilibrium between three forces: Chaos, Order and Nothingness. They relate to each other in that Chaos begets Order begets Nothingness begets Chaos, and Nothingness displaces Order displaces Chaos displaces Nothingness.

Chaos is everything and nothing at the same time. It is the sum total of all possibility, an ever-changing cauldron of all that could ever be. However, as much as it is infinite, it's also indistinct, impossible to define or understand (individuality is orderly). It naturally creates Order from itself because, being infinite, Chaos naturally contains orderly elements within its own essence. Being more stable, they displace and contain the chaotic mass around them.

Order is the realm of finite reality, of rules and objects. Anything that can actually be defined as a thing contains some orderly nature. Practically all life and significant objects in this world belong to the realm of Order, like for example the world whose map I posted above. Being where the fun things happen, it's the most important aspect to talk about, and the other two will mostly be referred when they affect it.

Nothingness is the principle of non-existence. Using terms like "is" and "something" ends up misleading, because the defining aspect of Nothingness (if one could call it that) is that it isn't. It's not possible to see or grasp except for the gaps it leaves in the comprehension of things that actually are. It always follows from Order because in order for things to define themselves they have to separate from what they aren't. It's the void that eats away worlds mired in entropy, and generates Chaos from itself, renewing the cycle.

Next: the intermediary realms.

[AuthorGirl]

Been working on this as a fun project for a while. This is a shrunk version of the map I'm starting to work on.

Those lines are from me trying to estimate where the tropical/temperate/cold areas are located and where deserts are likely to appear. Of course, magic may alter those, but I think it's good to avoid wiggly-river-from-pointy-mountains-itis and patchwork climates if I can.

What do you think so far? Is the distribution of the continents good? Any flaws I might be overlooking. I want to make sure I got the initial part down before doing the details.

(PS: Yes, those shapes are taken from blank maps of real countries and islands. The big continent over to the left is Switzerland turned on its side. You're welcome.)

The map is very cool! Distribution of continents: perfect to my eyes. Keep up the worldbuilding!!

[AuthorGirl]

I pick languages that no one is familiar with, do some google translating, and tweak it a little to not have it be an exact translation.

For example, instead of using Spanish for a Spanish/Portuguese inspired nation, I used Basque translations. ]

I speak Elvish! Ask me what you want to say!

[AuthorGirl]

It's cosmology time!

This is the real high level stuff. Most of it won't even come up for characters except highly filtered.

This world is centered on the equilibrium between three forces: Chaos, Order and Nothingness. They relate to each other in that Chaos begets Order begets Nothingness begets Chaos, and Nothingness displaces Order displaces Chaos displaces Nothingness.

Chaos is everything and nothing at the same time. It is the sum total of all possibility, an ever-changing cauldron of all that could ever be. However, as much as it is infinite, it's also indistinct, impossible to define or understand (individuality is orderly). It naturally creates Order from itself because, being infinite, Chaos naturally contains orderly elements within its own essence. Being more stable, they displace and contain the chaotic mass around them.

Order is the realm of finite reality, of rules and objects. Anything that can actually be defined as a thing contains some orderly nature. Practically all life and significant objects in this world belong to the realm of Order, like for example the world whose map I posted above. Being where the fun things happen, it's the most important aspect to talk about, and the other two will mostly be referred when they affect it.

Nothingness is the principle of non-existence. Using terms like "is" and "something" ends up misleading, because the defining aspect of Nothingness (if one could call it that) is that it isn't. It's not possible to see or grasp except for the gaps it leaves in the comprehension of things that actually are. It always follows from Order because in order for things to define themselves they have to separate from what they aren't. It's the void that eats away worlds mired in entropy, and generates Chaos from itself, renewing the cycle.

Next: the intermediary realms.

That is Very well thought out and gives me a few new things to think about for my own elemental system.

[vaiyt]

Aw man. Helping other people? I feel flattered.

Time for some more immediately useful cosmology: the intermediate realms. In the boundary where the realms of Chaos, Order and Nothingness meet, there exist places with the properties of both.

Between the realms of Chaos and Order lies the realm of Magic. It's the place where infinite possibility meets finite realization, where imagination can acquire form. Life in this realm is possible, but fickle and insubstantial. The two worlds are coterminous, and seep into each other naturally, both letting the inhabitants of the world of matter use magic to reshape reality, and letting the denizens of the magic world acquire substance and individuality. In places where the boundary is thin, it's possible to cross over without noticing, as the difference between the two sides dimnishes.

Between Order and Nothingness lies the realm of Oblivion, a place where echoes of things that ceased to exist dwell. It's a realm that material things can't cross over without losing their essence, and things from there can't cross back without acquiring a new nature. Many cultures in-universe have come to regard it as the realm of the dead, or their version of Hell.

There is also a realm between Chaos and Nothingness (the realm of Anti-Order or Negative Matter), but its impact on the stories of actual living beings (the ones who interest us here) is nil. It can be left alone.

[vaiyt]

Here's a bit where things are a bit experimental. Time to try and put my magic system into words.

Chaos is infinite but unrealized possibility, while Order is as concrete as it gets but limited. Magic is the stuff that bridges the gap. It seeps from the magical realm into the world of Order and acquires substance and reality by reacting to the psychic emanations existing there. That happens whether those emanations are intentional or not - anything can acquire a magical nature in this world with the right conditions.

What causes the process is meaning. Any concrete object that conveys a message is potentially magical. In this world, ideas and stories have power, but not in the literal, Discworldian "consensus becomes reality" sense. First, because even widely held beliefs are believed in a different way by each person, and all those disparate imaginations acting together have unpredictable effects in the final result. Second, because the closer magic gets to manifesting in the real world, the less moldable it is: sufficiently powerful ideas might just acquire a life of their own, resist further change, and even develop in new ways not bound by anyone's imagination.

Many magic schools cohexist in this world, but all of them involve rituals. The ritual is a gesture, action, object or rule that the caster imbues with meaning in order to mold magical matter towards a specific goal. It can be something like crafting a wand out of certain materials and waving it in a certain way, speaking a special language, painting stuff on one's body, making an effigy of the thing one wants to affect, and many others.
Rituals are more powerful the more meaningful, consistent and specific they are. Vague goals and arbitrary, lazy rituals are weak and unlikely to produce the wanted results, if any.
There's several ways a ritual can be made more meaningful:
- Including objects that relate to the goal in some way.
- Sacrificing something; the more meaningful the better. A single penny in a fortune is easily replaceable. The first penny you ever earned which you have treasured since you were a kid? Now we're talking.
- Rules turn the caster themself into a vessel as long as they uphold the prescribed behavior. The rule gets even more powerful if it's a geas, or something that prescribes a penalty if broken. The rule itself has to be established by a ritual.
-Rituals that have been done before or follow from pre-existing rules already have extra meaning attached and become more reliable.
-(still coming up with more)

Any meaningful activity is a potential ritual, even if not intended to be so. The more consistent the action and the more focused the mind of the person, the greater the chance for it to happen. People who are really good at an activity or train hard enough may inadvertently turn their practice into a ritual and start channeling magical properties. Even non-sentient creatures and inanimate objects may also trigger ritual-like connections unconsciously. These are really weak, but build up over time as they bounce off of each other in a positive feedback loop.

I guess that's enough. I'll leave the other important aspects of magic - soul, genii loci and religion - to the next post.

[vaiyt]

Here I expand the explanation of magic with three particular cases that are very important to understand the specific part of the setting the map is about.

Pure belief lacks the real-world connection to produce noticeable effects, but religion has the potential to turn belief into a powerful magical force. What distinguishes religion from other kinds of magical ritual is that it's not designed to manifest specific things in the material world, but to curry favor with supernatural beings. They can be pre-existing or not, but that organized belief around them has the effect of one big slow magical ritual that slowly makes them match the worshipped form.

Vague, broad ideas are magically weak, but religion attains its specificity from its pantheon. As rites develop, the rules that govern the gods and its actions become more consistent, giving more substance to them. A cascade effect starts, where the budding gods gain more and more independence, and begin to affect the development of the religion itself.

If that religion is allowed to reach full maturity, eventually it culminates in an event that embodies its essence. It may be the birth of a prophet under all the auspicious signs, it may be a catastrophe where the gods' powers are unleashed, it may be the realization of the long held wishes of a people. It depends on the nature of the gods themselves. That event marks the birth of a new pantheon, beings fully independent of their followers.

They don't need worship to exist, but are quite likely to keep requesting it, since it does make them immortal. Killing a god whose worship is active will lead to them being revived over time. Gods whose religions have died in the past might find their way into a new pantheon, antagonize more successful gods and be seen as demonic figures, or go find some other way to influence things.

[vaiyt]

The soul is the seat of a being's individuality and will.

Now, it's important to distinguish a true soul from the astral body, since the characters will often equate the two in-universe. The true soul is generally restricted to sentient beings, because a soul is formed when a being acquires a concept of itself. It's the being's essence, isolated from the outside world by a bubble that rejects anything that's not part of it.
It's extremely resistant to direct tampering, as it's like a self-contained pocket dimension. If destroyed or separated from the body, it usually causes the death of the owner's physical form in short order; on the other hand, the soul itself can linger long after the death of the physical body, and even continue acting on its own if a strong enough will drives it.
Souls are nexuses of meaning that draw in magical power; as such, they can be valued as resources, but most sentient creatures have taboos about messing with souls. After all, nobody wants THEIR very essence to be mucked with.

The astral body is the magical reflection of the physical body; it's what is referred to when characters speak of a "soul" of an inanimate object. The death of the physical body usually means destruction of the astral body as well, but the astral body can be tampered with, separated or destroyed without necessarily causing lasting harm (the opposite relationship to the true soul).
One's own astral body is the only source of magic that does not require an external ritual to manipulate, as it already comes with its vessel attached, the physical body itself. It's usually a limited source that requires special discipline to tap into, as it follows the pre-existing rules of the physical body.

A genius loci is the astral body of a place. They're the result of a location becoming meaningful enough to develop its own magical properties. The most important genius loci of the setting is the world itself, that is, the astral body of the entire planet, a force powerful enough to shape history through its actions.

[vaiyt]

A couple more concepts necessary to understand this world.

Crystals have a powerfully orderly nature, so they're able to "trap" the chaotic flow of magic and force it to be more stable. That makes good quality crystalline minerals highly sought after for the crafting of magitek items. They also make great focuses for rituals in general.

Soulstone (wish I had a better name) is a special type of crystal and the most mysterious resource of this world. It's a stone with the power to channel imagination into reality. It can induce dreams, awaken new senses and uplift minds. Soulstone is involved on the origins of several of the setting's sentient races.

Monsters appear where reality has thinned itself and raw magic leaks out into the world of order. That produces a rapid feedback loop where evolution is accelerated in crazy directions. Monsters are different from normal animals in that they continually grow stronger by struggling to survive, acquiring more positive traits via magic (but over time they can breed back into regular animals if the flow of magic shuts off). A monster that's grown strong enough to prevail against all rivals and dominate an entire ecosystem is a Monster King. When this process happens across an entire world without interruption, monsters are said to grow even stronger... but that's for another post.

Dragons are the universe's oldest extant monsters. Extremely powerful and adaptable, they've outgrown whatever their origin world was many eons ago, and spread through the universe like a scourge. They're much more common in the realm of magic, where mana is abundant and they can easily grow more powerful - the reason being that they feed on magic sources, their bodies being little more than shells surrounding a living tempest of power. The biggest among them are known as World-Eaters, beings capable of devouring the core of an entire planet - though theoretically nothing keeps them from growing even bigger...

bonus: slightly updated map
http://anony.ws/i/2016/01/05/testworld2nd2.png

[vaiyt]

Time to dust off this thing to give a preview of how the map might turn out.
http://anony.ws/i/2016/02/17/hitemap.png

[vaiyt]

Celestials are Monster Kings that have come to rule over an entire planet. They're invariably frighteningly powerful and possess, if not advanced intelligence, at least a level of cunning surpassing any normal intelligent being. A Celestial-dominated planet usually ends up reality-thin and highly warped by their presence alone, being fully visible from both the realms of order and magic. World-Eaters and Celestials are often at odds throughout the cosmos, as the former threaten the
livelihood of the latter with their hunger for magic-rich planetary cores.

Fey are native intelligent denizens of the magical plane. Their form is unstable, and therefore they vary wildly in appearance and character. Creatures that would normally be called fairies, elves, trolls, gnomes, pixies, tommyknockers, kobolds, yokai, ogres, and many others are all subtypes of the same species. All of them have magic as second nature, and behave/think in ways alien to orderly species.

Chaotic beings are an apparent oxymoron. The plane of Chaos should not be able to harbor life, but inside of it, some type of free-willed things appeared, as shifty and unknowable as the swirling mass of possibility around them. They are, by essence (if "essence" even applies to them), utterly incomprehensible, and only truly perceived by the severe reality-warping effects they have when approaching more orderly areas. Usually, when that happens, one or more eldritch abominations are "born" as the chaotic being's form stabilizes.

Giants are the last remnants of immensely powerful Titans that once ruled the world for millions of years. Titans were spawned by the spirit of the world (see genius loci above) to combat a threat to its existence, and after that they just hung around for a while. They, in turn created intelligent races to watch over, which in the beginning worshipped the titans themselves, before they grew proud and began to see nature's wrath as constraining their existence. They started believing in gods who would protect them from nature. Eventually, these gods took the fight to the titans, imprisoned or killed them and cursed their progeny. Giants are severely dimnished versions of their forefathers, but are still hugely powerful beings that harbor a deep-seated bitter rage against the other denizens of the world. In every culture, they're reviled as savage at best, and representations of primordial evil at worst.