The Campaign Builder's Guild

Thats the one i started with, and Ascension's for photoshop. From those two I developed my own style for Gimp. Pasis's tut and Ramah's are popular as well.

Quote from: Magnus PymPerfect, really appreciated.

Then I really need to get started on some tuts. RobA regional mapping seems like a decent one to start with, do you have some you'd like to reccomend?

just go through here http://www.cartographersguild.com/forumdisplay.php?48-Tutorials-How-To and check out anything that looks interesting. Great resource, got me started on mapping awhile back (I've made some good money thanks to that too so you never know ;) ). If you practice various techniques you can get quite good at mapping.

update, had to start over from scratch to edit the relief and hightmap, still lots of work to do, but the crater and volcano turned out well.. any settlements? towns? hut villages?

http://lathorien.deviantart.com/#/d3aku05

There are settlements, though very primitive.

I guess the less primitive would be the Jamibians, which live on the northern coast beside the desert. Think of them as arabic countries from the Mahgreb (Maroc, Algeria, Tunisia, Lybia, Egypt). So habitations would be made from sun-dried earth, some wooden and some stone (especially the more important places such as the "palace")

The second settlement of note would be Gaya, The Shining City. It's in the Jungle of Luminous Earth (east of volcano). I had intended to put it near the lake. The city doesn't actually belong to anyone, but three tribes war over there, each claiming it as *THEIR* holy ground. The place is a huge tree of titanic size, truly unique. From it protrudes shining crystals (gems; saphire, amethyst, ruby, topaz, diamond, e.t.c).

For now, I havn't thought much about other notable settlements, but there will most likely be a couple more.

I thought I should keep the map as simple and natural as possible and actually showcase the settlements on "regional maps" instead of on the continent map. But if you think you can make something work, go ahead. Make sure you keep a version without any settlements though just in case it doesn't end up looking right :P

P.S: The jamibian settlement was intended to be placed pretty much where your northcoast mountains end, giving to the desert.

P.S.S: Oh and yes, the crater and Obsidian Plateau are a success, thought the crater seems to be mostly filled with water now.

Do the Jamibi build monuments? Piramids? I really want to do a zigurat.. I am going to wait untill i am done to post it up again, but here is a teaser of the obsidion plateu.. I think i can call this area done.. except the smoke comming out of the volcano

Yup, it's perfect! I don't think you need to put up a smoke effect, but if you think it'll look better, I trust you.

Yes they do; and it's pretty good that you -want- to do a ziggurat because I was just writing an adventure that happens in a ziggurat, a holy place built by the Jamibians over the years that serve as a monks trials ground and also place of worship to the Sun. (Or sun-god).

It's a lonely building in the desert though and several days of walk are required to get to it, which is also a part of the trial.

The way I was seeing the ziggurat, it's pretty much "squary" with ramps going up and down around it, of course it's made of dried-earth and stone. The roof has columns from which fire burns permanently. The inside is a complex, a sort of little maze.

Anyays, I don't see how we could make settlements look good on this map, but I'll leave that to you if you've got ideas!

He could probably pull them off with symbols, real buildings are of course out of the question as at this scale you wouldn't be able to see them.

Yeah I know that, but what I'm afraid of is that symbols might ruin the look of the map.

Anyways if Kapt's got a way to make it look pretty, i won't say a word except "nice!" :P

http://lathorien.deviantart.com/#/d3amv6k

Very nice Kaptn.

I did notice the ziggurat beside the desert mountains/dunes, but also Gaya, beside the lake in the Jungle of Luminous Earth. Very good.

The smoke effect for the volcano in the Obsidian Plateau is also pretty cool!

Thanks for fixing the swamp :P

Now the map looks much more realist than mine! hihi

Quote from: Magnus PymYeah I know that, but what I'm afraid of is that symbols might ruin the look of the map.

Anyways if Kapt's got a way to make it look pretty, i won't say a word except "nice!" :P

Well you can make symbols that look realistic. For example an actual overlay of a walled city, the only difference is that it isn't to scale. Just like well... *looks at map* ...like Lath just did in the map heh.

Dang it lath you have me wanting to get back into mapping again.

Quote from: Nomadic

Quote from: Magnus PymYeah I know that, but what I'm afraid of is that symbols might ruin the look of the map.

Anyways if Kapt's got a way to make it look pretty, i won't say a word except "nice!" :P

Well you can make symbols that look realistic. For example an actual overlay of a walled city, the only difference is that it isn't to scale. Just like well... *looks at map* ...like Lath just did in the map heh.

Exactly... look at the newest Tu'loras map in my deviant art stuff I got walled cities, and Mega cities, and villages. Its not ment to show every building but a symbolic yet realistic depictation of that specific town. Does it run along the river? On the hill over looking it? What parts are walled? Any major castles (not in this map but my own) with a town around it? These are all answered without a map if the actual town. Its ment to give the PCs the same jist of information they would get from looking at the town from afar. Or descriped by second hand account from people from the PCs past. Now the Tree and the Ziggurat is more or less what ya see is what you get. Same with the volcano. Now looking back on the map, there are some lighting issues and the crater should be lower rimmed and bigger but.. meh. I couldnt figure out a way of depicting the Gate being built on the plateau either, that annoys me too...

It looks great Lath, though I can't help twitching when I see the rivers in the bottom of the mainland. I blame Redrobes.

The gate shouldn't be placed anyways, it's way too small to be perceived from such a height.

Yeah, the crater is like... a sort of emptied volcano. Not what I had originally in mind, but I'm liking the idea anyways.

I changed some information in the post where I showcase the map, and of course, I've put your work there with due credits. Thanks again!

Say... the ziggurat and Gaya, were they added after everything or if you'd add other such things you'd have to do all over again???

added afterwards