On the inside cover of Vornheim: The Complete City Kit there will be a version of this map.(By me, with some coloring assistance from Mandy Morbid.)
The version of the map in the actual book will be more fun to look at, but harder to read quickly, and harder to write on--both because of the actual colors I used (the book version is color-on-black unlike this one which is color-on-white) and because it will be printed on the inside cover of a book you may not want to write on. Plus it will be kind of small considering how much detail there is, which could get annoying.
So what we are doing is we are going to offer--for free--a color-on-white version of the map that DMs can download and print out that looks like this one, so you can use it if you like.
It will look exactly like the map in this post, only it will be way bigger.
It will be divided into 6 parts, each part will be 8 1/2 x 11 inches.
Or you can just download the whole thing and print out a 33 inch wide poster of it at Kinko's or whatever.
We were originally going to do this inside the book itself, but then that's 12 pages of the book that can't have anything but map, and I figured that's kind of lame. So now it's a free bonus. I think also it'll be automatically included in the pdf version, if I'm not mistaken (ask James.)
Anyway, point is, we all get to have our cake and eat it, too. I get my weird map on the inside cover, you get a use-friendly one, and you don't have to decide whether to write in the new hardcover book you just bought or try to photocopy it without fucking up the spine.
22 comments:
stunningly good map, plus the distribution plan is both practical and inspired. everyone wins. thank you.
Thank you.
Is there a release date yet?
Cartography is a hell of a drug.
Reminds me of Bard's Tale 1
Crap, now I want my city map to look at least this good. Looks like I'll need to get an art degree, dammit.
Seriously: awesome map. And thank you for the freebie download!
@Brian
All I did was try to copy the style of medieval Mappa Mundi--and those guys didn't have art degrees.
Then I colored it with regular magic markers, scanned it, and slid the "sepia" dial up on the color correcter.
@ZakS:
I was being self-effacing... which is a poor way to give a compliment. :) I was just saying I'm impressed.
@Brian
I was being pedantic, which is a poor way of being encouraging. I was just saying "Hey, anybody can make a spiffy map with a little effort, give it a shot"
Zak! That's Fantastic!
Looks like a million villages rather than a city. Try again. Try harder, Nancy.
@kent
The problem with everybody deleting you as soon as you troll is nobody gets to see how not funny you are. So I am leaving your comment this time as an eternal monument to the boringness that is Kent.
He's not only boring enough that he writes things like that, he's boring enough that it entertains him to click around the internet for hours on end looking for places to do it.
Oh, also, your mother has sex with farm animals.
how about a map to Kent's mother's house?
Mappa Mundi! Man thanks, I was digging in the back of my skull trying to remember that word, when I saw this.
This and other maps you've posted appeal to me like an abstract canvas. I also really liked the Gigacrawler series. Not so interested in the politics, but I really appreciate the aesthetics. Thanks for sharing.
In the D&D Experience, Stefan Pokorny shows of some of his medieval-style mappa mundi maps from his home campaign in the documentary.
A lot of older cities are a bunch of villages bolted together. So one could say that in Kent's rampant idiocy there is hidden and likely unintended wisdom.
Like. A lot. Reminds me of Steven Walter's The Island (his personal map of London), or of the map of Sigil for Planescape. I got the same 'apparent chaos; emergent order' vibe on first look; which, I suppose, is what a city is all about.
Fave touch: You can read parts of the city's growth and development in the street layouts, which - to me - is a hallmark of interesting design.
"This neighbourhood here - with the parallel streets - obviously planned by a surveyor. That one there, with the curving street - probably built around the contour lines of a slope. The city centre (palace, cathedral, etc.), obviously the original city core. Hmm, lots of radial roads; maybe too many for practical purposes. Obviously some (historic? arcane? ritual? aesthetic?) reason for that..."
No 'wiggly river down the middle, rule in some streets' cartography here. :)
@kelvingreen
While it's true that many cities are aggregates of villages, what actually happened is that dipshit misinterpreted the fact that I drew the buildings artificially distant & the streets artificially broad on purpose to give DMs room to write notes onto the map.
Well, I did only say "could". ;)
Will the book signpost the online version? In order to bring it to the attention of people who don't regularly read this or James's blog, like?
@Zom
Yes.
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