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Hi Folks,
I thought I'd run a kind of blog here as I re-learn how to use Campaign Cartographer 3 / City Designer 3 to map out the Make Glorious Nation of Stagfell & her capital, Stagfell.
Just a quick bit of background, I used to own CC2 / CD2 years ago, but sold it when we stopped playing D&D. Now that we've been into Pathfinder & playing Kingmaker for 18 months, I bit the bullet to repurchase CC3 / CD3 / DD3 again to map our kingdom. I'm also an ex-draftsman & I used AutoCAD / 3D Studio for about 11 years professionally, so I have a grasp on how CAD systems work.
First up, I started on the map of the complete Stolen Lands. I found an image from where somebody else drew a properly orientated map in CC (I think it was Leonal???). I imported the image & began to trace the rivers & lakes.
But I wasn't happy with how that was looking, using the vanilla CC3 styles. So it got pushed to the side while I went back to playing Elder Scrolls Online for a few days.
Yesterday I started thinking about it again & I found that I really liked the styles in the Cartographer's Annual Vol 6 / 2012. Especially the Jon Roberts city style. So I grabbed that & started playing around last night with mapping the city itself.
I started with a map 2000' x 1600' to give me plenty of room & traced over a picture of the Stag Lord's Fort to give me a rough size for where the castle will sit.
Next up was some random 10' roads to roughly block out where the city blocks would sit (and here was my big mistake, but more on that later).
I then focused on a section of 2 blocks (8 lots) & mapped in random 5' roads, followed by the major buildings, such as the breweries, guildhall etc. The rest was random buildings using the built-in street tools.
Here's the result: Stagfell 1
Now for the big problem...the scale is totally out of whack. A single lot is supposed to be about 750' square. Mine are nowhere near that. So tonight I'll rip that stuff out & block out a 750' grid then use that to fill out the proper distances. It'll mean there will be lots more buildings, but that works for me. It should look great when it's done.
Cheers,
Jim.
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Thanks for that info, Philip. In that case I'm roughly on scale then. I just went with my gut on what felt right.
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And Murphy's Law has struck. For some reason, whenever I add buildings, they're coming out as flat colour rectangles. Something to do with a feature called "varicolor".
So the experts at Profantasy are trying to help, otherwise this project will stall.
Sigh...
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After a couple of nights work, here's a map of the Stolen Lands.
This uses the Herwin Wielink Overland style from the Cartographer's Annual 2012.
Yellow areas are claimed. Red are explored.
You may also spot that the map has been orientated as north being up the page, unlike the Kingmaker Map Folio. Because of the changes to the hexes, I think I've wound up giving the group a couple of free hexes so the map would work.
Next up, I'm back into mapping the capital, Stagfell.
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Thanks Philip!
Later I'll post a version with the hex grid, and without the symbols or borders. Hopefully others can use it then as well.
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awesome stuff
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I am just starting my Kingmaker campaign next weekend. This map you have created for the stolen lands looks amazing. Makes me wish I had some skill dealing with a CAD based system. I tried to use CC2 years ago and never got anywhere.
Very cool stuff
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Here's the link to the new map: Spoiler Free Map.
This one doesn't contain any markings except for mountains / regions etc.
There's no countries marked either as I know borders / countries will change based on individual campaigns.
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Next up, I have the WIP map of our capital, Stagfell: link.
There's 14 city blocks worth of buildings there. I've also left some space for the players to add their downtime buildings.
Getting there... :)
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Just a quick update: yesterday I added all of the farms etc to our kingdom map. I think we're at 70 hexes & the amount of farms needed is insane.
Last night I wound up going bonkers & started expanding the map to cover Brevoy & all of Pitax. I started by tracing the map of Brevoy from the Inner Sea World Guide. Turns out my map wasn't too far out of whack with the official map. But since I've just re-entered around 120 hexes into Hero Lab, I won't be changing my map to fix it.
I've also drawn a version of Fort Drelev, ready for us to use as a battle map in the city streets this weekend.
I'll post them later sometime when I get the chance.
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Here's a link to the map of The Stolen Lands / Brevoy / Pitax / Mivon etc.
Be warned, it's a 16.5MB jpg file.
It shows what I think are the house borders in Brevoy, along with major towns & my best guestimate at major roads.
This version of the map should be useable by any GM running Kingmaker without giving any major spoilers, plus the Stolen Lands are left empty (no Fort Drelev / Varnhold) so you can place them differently if you wish.
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Now that is impressive. But can you make a version without borders, towns, etc.?
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Now that is impressive. But can you make a version without borders, towns, etc.?
Yes. Yes I can. :)
I'll try to get one done up tonight.
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Here's a link to the map of The Stolen Lands / Brevoy / Pitax / Mivon etc.
Be warned, it's a 16.5MB jpg file.
It shows what I think are the house borders in Brevoy, along with major towns & my best guestimate at major roads.
This version of the map should be useable by any GM running Kingmaker without giving any major spoilers, plus the Stolen Lands are left empty (no Fort Drelev / Varnhold) so you can place them differently if you wish.
Wow, what an incredible map! O_O
Thank you for sharing it - is there any chance you would be willing to share the CC3 file?
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I just started trying to incorporate other regions on our map and this is AMAZING! Yes, Please share the version without borders. A version without hexes would be nice as well.
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Here's a link to the map of The Stolen Lands / Brevoy / Pitax / Mivon etc.
Be warned, it's a 16.5MB jpg file.
It shows what I think are the house borders in Brevoy, along with major towns & my best guestimate at major roads.
This version of the map should be useable by any GM running Kingmaker without giving any major spoilers, plus the Stolen Lands are left empty (no Fort Drelev / Varnhold) so you can place them differently if you wish.
Seriously, dude . . . this is the most incredible thing ever!!!!! You're amazing, and I pray your life is truly blessed!
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The country division seems quite silly - Surtova for instance only has 24 hexes while Orlovsky has half the country.
If we get a good version I'll probably base mine off of Noble House Statistics.
Though that has its own flaws like having Stoneclimb (a Medvyed city) in Orlovsky.
I've divided book 1, 2, and 3 on my roll20 already as well as added all of the points of interest (plus a few more that are from this forum).
See divided Stolen Lands Image.
I believe I placed everything very close to where it is intended. The biggest issue for me was the Varnhold pass area. Let me know if you have any suggestions for things to be moved.
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The country division seems quite silly - Surtova for instance only has 24 hexes while Orlovsky has half the country.
I actually agree with you there & it has been something on my mind. I based the house borders on the map on page 66 of AP#31 Stolen Land. From there I tried to split the borders along physical barriers, such as rivers.
As for House Surtova, it's very limited in size because of House Lodovka to the east & Highdelve to the south is actually a House Garess city. Eagles Watch is the capital of House Orlovsky, so it really is limited in how large it can be. When originally mapping it out, it surprised me how small it really is.
As requested by an earlier post, I've uploaded a borderless map without any cities etc: Link. That way you can modify the borders etc any way you wish.
Wow, what an incredible map! O_O
Thank you for sharing it - is there any chance you would be willing to share the CC3 file?
Once I'm happy with the map (and I've fixed the layers etc), yes, I do intend on sharing the CC3 file.
And thanks to everybody else with the kind comments!
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In my mind, it fits for Surtova to be the size it is. The reason the Surtova family was the first ones to bend a knee to Choral and always make sure they marry their daughters to the heir of the Brevoy throne- the have a small area and the ground is poor for raising crops. By contrast they do have one of the best northern port in Brevoy and bring in a bit by fishing, etc. They make up for this shortfall by cozying up to the previous powers that be, which is part of the reason there is objections to Surtova's reach for the throne from regent.
Medvyed has a big area, but if you take the grozni forest out, its dinky. Orlovsky controls most of the northern lands, but they are mediocre for raising crops or livestock so aren't worth as much. Really Lebeda and Rogarvia are the only real prizes due to the great farming lands, which is my mind is half the reason Choral claimed the southeastern half of the swordlords old territory (the other half was to keep a firm hand on them!).
I justify the weird house sizes by the fact that all the Issian lands (everything but Rogarvia and Lebeda) belonged to allies of Choral, which means he was probably reluctant to destrict and cause strife. While it never says, it makes me wonder if he is the one that split the Rostland area into two separate areas.
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OldManJim: What font do you use on your map? I'm customizing the awesome work you've already done, and I want the map labels to be uniform.
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OldManJim: What font do you use on your map? I'm customizing the awesome work you've already done, and I want the map labels to be uniform.
It's called Saber Regular. I found it ages ago when looking for the same font Paizo uses for the Pathfinder books.
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OldManJim: What font do you use on your map? I'm customizing the awesome work you've already done, and I want the map labels to be uniform.It's called Saber Regular. I found it ages ago when looking for the same font Paizo uses for the Pathfinder books.
Awesome! Thank you!
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OldManJim, do you not see the issues I brought up about Varnhold pass? I tried to place the items in the region as best I could, but the geography just doesn't match up.
Also I really love the building icons. Any possibility of sharing them? Will need them especially with the borderless version now.
Thanks!
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OldManJim, do you not see the issues I brought up about Varnhold pass? I tried to place the items in the region as best I could, but the geography just doesn't match up.
I do recall having to fudge a few things around Varnhold when adding the symbols to my kingdom map. I'll take another look at it & see how I can fix it.
Also I really love the building icons. Any possibility of sharing them? Will need them especially with the borderless version now.
Unfortunately I can't share those symbols as it'd be against the licence for Campaign Cartographer. They're a part of the Campaign Cartographer Annual 2012.
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Unfortunately I can't share those symbols as it'd be against the licence for Campaign Cartographer. They're a part of the Campaign Cartographer Annual 2012.
As it so happens, I'm working on a hexmapping tool for my own use and have been developing graphics for exactly this reason. Still needs work and I only have one tile per terrain type so far, but I think it's coming along nicely, and will allow plenty of room for features like farms, cities, roads, etc.
So far I have tile-able graphics for forests, swamps, grassland, rivers, lakes/seas, roads, bridges, mines, quarries, and ruined towers.
Next on my list are hills, mountains, and cities.
Note: I rotated the map so that north is up, and flattened the hexes to accommodate an isometric view, as opposed to top-down.
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OldManJim: Any info on when you'd like to share your CC3 file?
Or ideally I'd like a version with no hexes.
I'd love to have a working version by next Sunday(17th), but I could always cut up this hex version for roll20.
Thanks for any info and your hard work!
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OldManJim: Any info on when you'd like to share your CC3 file?
Or ideally I'd like a version with no hexes.
I'd love to have a working version by next Sunday(17th), but I could always cut up this hex version for roll20.
Thanks for any info and your hard work!
I'll try to get a version with no hexes done this week for you.
I'm holding off on sharing the CC3 file until I have things as correct as they can be (Varnhold etc)
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Here's a version with no borders / hexes etc: Link
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The mountains around Tors of Levenies have some extra dirt around them that don't really blend in - I assume you forgot to fix that in this version?
The roads that you have on the original would also be much appreciated.
A matter of taste: The old lakes that have lighter edges and darker middles seem much nicer to me.
Sorry if I come off a bit nit-picky. My party and I are very appreciative of what you've created so far.
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If you do make any of those changes cities as well would be nice.
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Just a quick update that I'm currently working on getting things fixed around Varnhold.
When rotating the map from the KM map pack so north faces north, the map is tilted around 45 degrees. But if I align Restov & Pitax over the map from the Inner Sea World Guide, it's around 15 degrees.
From a quick inspection, my map looks pretty close to the KM map pack, but there are some minor changes required around Varnhold. I'll tweak the mountain ranges, along with the rivers & roads to match the map pack.
Once that's all done, I'll export a few versions of the map (this time with the correct layers showing).
It'll also require another change to the hexes I've entered into our Hero Lab kingdom portfolio. Sigh... :)
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Yay! Looking forward to any new versions.
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Bump to still express interest. I keep checking for an updated version every few days. :P
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I'm still having some issues around Varnhold. Haven't done much work on it in the last few weeks. Too many projects on the burner at a time... :)
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I'm about to get started on Kingmaker, and I really appreciate the work you've done on this OldManJim!
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I'm printing out the spoiler free map of the Stolen Lands that you made. I wanted to say thank you, it is very cool. Keep up the good work!
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In my mind, it fits for Surtova to be the size it is. The reason the Surtova family was the first ones to bend a knee to Choral and always make sure they marry their daughters to the heir of the Brevoy throne- the have a small area and the ground is poor for raising crops. By contrast they do have one of the best northern port in Brevoy and bring in a bit by fishing, etc. They make up for this shortfall by cozying up to the previous powers that be, which is part of the reason there is objections to Surtova's reach for the throne from regent.
Medvyed has a big area, but if you take the grozni forest out, its dinky. Orlovsky controls most of the northern lands, but they are mediocre for raising crops or livestock so aren't worth as much. Really Lebeda and Rogarvia are the only real prizes due to the great farming lands, which is my mind is half the reason Choral claimed the southeastern half of the swordlords old territory (the other half was to keep a firm hand on them!).
I justify the weird house sizes by the fact that all the Issian lands (everything but Rogarvia and Lebeda) belonged to allies of Choral, which means he was probably reluctant to destrict and cause strife. While it never says, it makes me wonder if he is the one that split the Rostland area into two separate areas.
The question you should ask yourself is "What lives in the Gronzi Forest such that Choral the Conquerer was afraid to enter it?"
Duma the Sly :)