Do you have a favorite command in Campaign Cartographer that you use often? One that you wished hat a convenient keyboard shortcut to launch easily?
CC3+ may not have an easy-to use shortcut editor built in, but it still allow you to define shortcut keys for any command you want. All that is required is that the command is defined in the CC3+ menu, but even if it isn’t already defined there, it is easy enough to add it yourself. So if you’re like me and use the List command a lot, why not make it easy to access by adding Ctrl+L as a shortcut key for it?
The latest free monthly symbols by Mike Schley add more volcanic features to your overland maps.
Watch or re-watch the recent live mapping videos from our playlist on YouTube.
Check out the community’s Maps of the Month for December, providing more ideas and inspiration for your own mapping projects.
Articles
Remy continues his series on mapping out Rails & Trains in Campaign Cartographer 3 Plus.
Christina showcases the September issue of the Cartographer’s Annual 2016 with the “City Streets” style by Alyssa Faden in her latest iteration of the All the Annuals series.
Reminders
CC3+’s current version is 3.98. Check in Help > About and if your version is older, run Update 28 for CC3+ available from your registration page.
Fractal Terrains 3+ has been released and is available from among your FT3 downloads on your registration page.
Hello mappers! Another month, another annual. This monthly installment of the 2016 Annual is Alyssa Faden’s City Streets. This annual is perfect for mapping a section of a city in your world, for some zoomed in, regional maps your players can use in planning their way through city streets and shops.
For this map, I decided to map out a small district in a large town in my homebrew world. In this area, there are shops galore for my players to enjoy – know your players – mine love a shopping session. I just love the color scheme this annual affords. It’s bright, vibrant and by adding a tiny little Multiply 5% in Blend Mode, the map pops perfectly. I also darkened the buildings and the cobblestone background, as I prefer a darker map with more contrast, personally. This map took no time to put together and any mapper, from novice to master can easily put together a quick map for their gaming needs.
About the author: Lorelei was my very first D&D character I created more years back than i’d like to remember. When I decided to venture into creating maps for my and others rpgs, I thought I owed it to her to name myself Lorelei Cartography, since it was her that led me to the wonderful world of tabletop gaming in the first place. Since then I have been honored to have worked with companies such as WizKids, Pelgrane Press, and ProFantasy.
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Before we fully commit to the New Year (yes, yes, January is almost over, I know), let’s take a last look back at the wonderful mapping work of 2023, with the maps of the month of December.
Dak has mapped part of Krynn, the world of Dragonlance with the a recreation of this awesome map. This really takes me back, “Dragons of Hope” was one of the first D&D adventures I ever owned! Continue reading »
The monthly symbols by Mike Schley have been very popular and of course we continue this tradition into the new year. From the isometric city symbols we return to artwork for overland maps for a while, with a fiery first collection of volcanic symbols.
20 new symbols depict active and dormant volcanoes both for land-bound mountain ranges and volcanic peaks rising directly out of the sea, as well as lava pools and fiery chasms leading down into the bosom of the earth.
To download the free content go to your registration page and on the Downloads tab, click the download button for Campaign Cartographer 3 Plus. Mike’s new symbols are the last link in the list. All the content of the current year (only January 2024 so far) is included in the one download.
You can always check the available monthly content on our dedicated page.
Last year’s Cartographer’s Annual – Volume 17 – is now available as a complete setup, all monthly issues collected into one single package.
Subscribers who downloaded all the monthly issues don’t need to do anything, but if you skipped some issues or are a fresh owner of Volume 17, you can install everything in one go now. The setup is available from the registration page as usual. If you didn’t subscribe, waiting for it to become available as one single package, you can now purchase it from the Annual’s page or the store as usual.
Last year we saw some excellent new artists in the Annual, like E Prybylski, DM Geezer Jim and Monkey Frog Studios, along staples like Pär Lindström and Sue Daniel, as well as occasional contributors like Jon C Munson II. Topic and themes ranged from desert villages (oases) to winter trails and from steampunk streets to classic fantasy overland maps. My personal highlights this year were E Prybylski’s Overland style along with Sue’s Winter Trails.
As for my own work I probably had the most fun building Bairnemouth, the isometric City Under Siege, as I love coming up with a proper story for a map as I’m creating it. But revisiting the 13th Age style was also great, and with the Wilderness Tiles I got to use Sue’s battle map artwork from last year extensively, which I also enjoyed a lot.
For the coming year we are still looking to include more new talent and are actively looking for artists who are interested in creating an Annual issue style for us. Simon’s call here is still relevant.
The current Annual 2024 subscription has now started and the January issue is available. So if this retrospective on 2023 did wet your appetite, check it out here.
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Welcome to 2024 and a new year of mapping goodness with the Cartographer’s Annual Vol 18. We are starting the year with a reimagination of an older style: Fantasy Realms by Allyn Bowker.
As the editions of the most popular role-playing game change, so do the artists and the styles used for their maps. Allyn captured the flavor of the current style of 2009, and this reimagination changes the existing look to get closer to the style of 2024, coincidentally created by Mike Schley. We have added many new symbols, changed the used bitmap textures and generally updated the style to take advantage of the CC3Plus’ newer features which weren’t available in 2009.
The January issue is now available for all subscribers from their registration page. If you haven’t subscribed to the Annual 2024 yet, you can still do so here at the early subscriber discount (until January 10th).
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A few months ago, I started the Rails & Trains mini-series of articles. In the two prior installments (part 1 – part 2), we looked at how to make the tracks themselves, now it is time to round it out by looking at rail cars.
We’ll have a look at how to draw the insides of a rail car based on a real blueprint, giving us a nice scene for a handout or battle. I am going to base my drawing on a blueprint from the early 19-hundreds. I mainly picked these because it is difficult to find older blueprints online with proper dimensions, and because the trains of that time still had the same basic layouts as earlier trains, making it easy to adapt them to earlier times. Of course, my procedure here works fine with any blueprint, so if you’re mapping for a modern train, just grab the appropriate blueprint and possibly a different drawing style better suited for modern maps, such as SS3.
Both the December issue and bonus issue of the Cartographer’s Annual 2023 are available, bringing you a large selection of modular Wilderness tiles as well as the tools to create more yourself.
With this year’s Annual complete, the Cartographer’s Annual 2024 is now available and you can subscribe at an early adopter discount.
Resources
The latest free monthly symbols by Mike Schley add fire and smoke symbols to the Symbol Set 6 style (or other styles of your choise), turning those ruined battlements into a raging inferno.
Watch or re-watch the recent live mapping videos from our playlist on YouTube.
Check out the community’s Maps of the Month for November, possibly providing more ideas and inspiration for your own mapping projects.
We made the November issue of the Cartographer’s Annual available for free and integrated it into the Free Annual Sampler.
Articles
Remy delves into the practical use of maps within CC3+, such measuring the distance between locations.
Christina showcases the August issue of the Cartographer’s Annual 2016 with the “Scorching Sun” style in her latest iteration of the All the Annuals series.
Reminders
CC3+’s current version is 3.98. Check in Help > About and if your version is older, run Update 28 for CC3+ available from your registration page.
Fractal Terrains 3+ has been released and is available from among your FT3 downloads on your registration page.
Do you have a favorite command in Campaign Cartographer that you use often? One that you wished hat a convenient keyboard shortcut to launch easily?
Last year’s Cartographer’s Annual – Volume 17 – is now available as a complete setup, all monthly issues collected into one single package. 
