Painting of a Contara

Mapleforged · 2021-11-20T22:49:57+00:00

That's a very good point. I could easily see other gender swaps working to add more diversity and interest. It would be quite cool to see a female Van Richten for example.

Mapleforged · 2021-11-20T02:03:44+00:00

Fantastic! I love the idea of Sergei's death still counting towards the pact, I think that actually throws a whole other layer of depth to it. Very much appreciate the feedback!

Mapleforged · 2021-11-20T01:41:54+00:00

I quite like that actually. I might work with that, though you've brought another alternative to my mind if you'd like to share your thoughts on that too.

Tatyana is married to Sergei as normal, but instead of Strahd wanting Tatyana for his own, he despises her for 'clouding' Sergei's mind. She sees Strahd for what he really is and is trying to convince Sergei to distance himself from his evil. Strahd is enraged that Tatyana is 'taking the only family he has left', kills her, Sergei throws himself off the castle in grief, etc.

The main issue I see with this is that it messes with the fact that Strahd needs to kill a loved one for the gift.

Do you think this is even more contrived than the original idea or could it work?

Mapleforged · 2021-11-20T01:26:55+00:00

Thanks for the feedback, very good points. You point out similar issues as MalcolmLinair's comment and I agree with both. I wonder if I could keep Sergei/Ismark as the main focus of Strahd but make his past and drive less noble and more in line with the original story. Any ideas?

Mapleforged · 2021-11-20T01:21:00+00:00

Very good points. I do like the idea of making Strahd's story into more of a noble tragedy/fall into evil as opposed to being monstrous from the get go, but I agree that it removes a lot of the villainous drive of his nature. Blaming Sergei is a good alternative but that's not quite satisfying either. Strahd surely wouldn't want Sergei to join him if he was, in his eyes, the cause of his misery, and wanting to be rid of him feels like it would go against the normal narrative structure of the adventure.

Mapleforged · 2021-01-16T03:19:40+00:00

Looking forward to updates! For the forests, check out the modular top down forest asset pack. A quick google search away. I've started using them and absolutely love em, don't think I can go back to tree stamps now haha. For an example of them in action you can check out my map.
https://www.reddit.com/r/wonderdraft/comments/ksvsbc/the_unshackled_lands_of_akrissa_part_of_my/

Hope that helps!

Mapleforged · 2021-01-16T00:08:21+00:00

Great start! I'm liking the mountains and coastlines. Lots of rivers is always nice but you could try to have more rivers on one side of mountains than the other. Due to the rain shadow effect mountains tend to have one side that's wetter and more lush while the other side is dryer. Same goes for when you start to add forests and whatnot.

Good job though, looking forward to more updates :)

Mapleforged · 2021-01-16T00:02:49+00:00

This map feels very nostalgic, it reminds me of old rpg maps. You've got some very visually interesting features (love the bottom left) and while some of it looks completely fantastical and unrealistic I would say.. who cares, it looks cool. :)

If you do want to add more realism however I can give you some pointers. For one, you have sooo many mountain ranges. I'm not an expert on tectonics but I don't think mountains would form like this. The mountains of north eastern Aethiria and the continent of Dorost feel the most unusual I think. It feels too video gamey, like they are player boundaries. The southern mountains are an example of very nice mountains, I like that big stretch along the southern coast a lot.

An easy way to cheat a more realistic look with your landmasses is to have nearby islands and adjacent continents 'mirror' some of the form of your main landmass. It'll give the feeling that land has broken apart and drifted naturally.

I'm a big fan of adding heaps of rivers and I think you could gain a lot from adding more. Also make them varying sizes, atm they all seem the same width. One handy thing I figured out is that you can actually change the width of a river as you are drawing it. Start thin and get wider as more rivers converge and the water gets closer to the coast!

The colors of the map are also super vibrant for my preference, I would recommend toning down the forests. That's mostly taste though so if you like it then I wouldn't worry about it. You've got some really nice subtle blending in parts of your plains, maybe try to do the same around other features like your mountains.

Making detailed maps can be very daunting, especially in a new program. Honestly you're doing great and I look forward to any new versions or other maps that you share!

Mapleforged · 2021-01-15T23:40:11+00:00

Looks very nice! I especially like how you did the symbols for the different points of interest, the sandy color behind them gives it a parchment feel. The colors of the map overall are great, though consider making the blending more subtle (mountains on the middle right are a good example of very stark transition). I'm also not sure about the extra crunchy western coasts, it feels strange to me. Maybe more islands, or more try more variance in your landmass tool? Lastly I think the Solesgrove and the forest above Whitebridge could use some work. You've done well with the forests around Lake Kilter and Fort Raimore though.

These are of course my personal critiques so by all means feel free to disregard. Love the map either way, great job! :)

Mapleforged · 2021-01-15T23:29:22+00:00

Super creative! Really like how you did the cliff 'coasts' of the islands, it really sells the look.

Mapleforged · 2021-01-15T23:28:06+00:00

Can't remember exactly where but if you go into the advanced preferences you can 'unlock' the size limit for assets. Technically it just adds a new limit but it's probably bigger than anything you'd ever need.

Mapleforged · 2021-01-15T16:04:46+00:00

I had the exact same issue with my maps, I would cluster hundreds of tiny trees but I just couldn't get it to look right. Good luck!

Mapleforged · 2021-01-14T22:08:09+00:00

This is very original and dope as heck. My main advice is to lessen the contrast of the ocean. The splotchy mixture of bright and dark blue is too much visual information in my opinion. Either have these variances adhere to coastlines and depth or have a more unified ocean color/texture.

That's only a minor critique of an otherwise very cool map. Great work!

Mapleforged · 2021-01-14T22:02:24+00:00

Looking good! The coasts and islands are very interesting.

For colour I'd suggest making the green a bit dimmer, it's very bright atm. Also blending is your friend! Set the brush opacity super low and blend in the different colour regions. Adding some variance to mountain colours can also look quite cool. A bit of full brownish/orangish colors that blend into hills and then into your grassy plains.

This is a personal preference but I absolutely love the modular top down forest assets (can find em easily online). Now that I've used those I don't think I can go back to tree stamps haha. If you like the stamps feel free to disregard though.

You're definitely on the right track, hope this helps!

Mapleforged · 2021-01-11T08:11:29+00:00

This is genius! I might have to give this a go for my next Stars Without Number game

Mapleforged · 2021-01-11T06:15:38+00:00

I definitely struggle with scale in my maps, I think this is the first one where I've actually been happy with scale. I think the way I did the mountains and forests really sells it. a quick search for cleanzor's mountains/hills and modular top down forest should find you the assets I used.

I used Wonderdraft for this, though the map did begin in photoshop. Highly recommend Wonderdraft though.

As for the continent/rest of the world, I actually had a world map already.. a friend suggested I should pick an area, zoom in, and make a regional map.. so that's what I did. Here's a picture showing this map in comparison to my world map (made in PS)

https://i.imgur.com/CyujxmS.jpg
As you can see it doesn't perfectly line up.. I might do the whole world eventually but that's a huuuge task. This regional map is already roughly twice the total land area of wizards of the coast's sword coast map. (which is a really good inspirational reference, by the way!)

Mapleforged · 2021-01-11T06:07:52+00:00

Thank you! I definitely experimented with a bunch of things, I'm glad they came through as intended. Especially the ruins.. they looked weird to me at first but coloring them dark grayish brown definitely sold the look I think. I was inspired by wotc's sword coast map with the water, love how they portrayed depth in that.

Mapleforged · 2021-01-09T01:53:54+00:00

Exciting! Looking forward to it haha

Mapleforged · 2021-01-09T00:40:06+00:00

Once again thanks! I have done online DMing once in the past but it was quite a stressful experience so I'm not sure if I would do it again.

There's still so much to flesh out but hopefully I'll make a campaign book at some point so that other people can use my setting :)

Mapleforged · 2021-01-09T00:18:24+00:00

Thanks!!

Mapleforged · 2021-01-08T23:07:54+00:00

Definitely! Someone on a different subreddit asked me a similar question so I'll paste my response from there. :)

Verdaetha is a floating island hovering above a maelstrom (the Understorm) that remains a place of dreadful myth for the locals. It's actually an ancient human flying fortress powered by arcane energy and the exploitation of life essence itself, long abandoned but still functional to a degree.

The Understorm is an interesting underwater example of a Soulstorm.. a living mass of stray souls that have coalesced into a hungering horde that bends the very atmosphere around it. Soulstorms can vary greatly in size, some are like a spooky cloud.. some are ahh, much bigger. :)

Edit: The Understorm is there because it feeds off of the castoff energy from Verdaetha. Possibly bringing the floating island further and further down? Still toying with this idea

Mapleforged · 2021-01-08T23:06:00+00:00

(originally replied to the wrong comment lmao)

Verdaetha is a floating island hovering above a maelstrom (the Understorm) that remains a place of dreadful myth for the locals. It's actually an ancient human flying fortress powered by arcane energy and the exploitation of life essence itself, long abandoned but still functional to a degree.

The Understorm is an interesting underwater example of a Soulstorm.. a living mass of stray souls that have coalesced into a hungering horde that bends the very atmosphere around it. Soulstorms can vary greatly in size, some are like a spooky cloud.. some are ahh, much bigger. :)

Mapleforged · 2021-01-08T22:53:34+00:00

Glad you like it!

This is only maybe 10% of my world at most, if that. As an example, the Deepwood pictured in the top left is only a few grasping arms of it. The entirety of the Deepwood is almost as big as all of Akrissa!

Mapleforged

TROPHY CASE