Jason Payne from the CC3+ community has documented the overland mapping for his Realm of Aquilae fantasy setting in a terrain mapping guide, which you can get as a “pay what you like” product on DriveThruPG.com. It can be a useful resource for anyone creating their own terrain setup in CC3+. Check it out!
So, for my last map of the 2018 Annual, I decided to just create a small map highlighting the use of Sue Daniel’s bonus Domes addition to the 2018 Annual. I, personally, have used these domes in so many of my own maps, including our cooperative project Sanctuary, and I cannot say enough how much I love using them.
(Download the FCW file)
Sue’s done a lovely job on these, giving the mapper a variety of domes to choose from, including transparent domes. For this map, I’ve created a small, walled school of magic by using the varicolored Gothic style houses in CD3 and adding a variety of the domes on the multi-leveled sheets. I started this map, however, in the Asian Town style that comes along with this year’s annual rather than CD3, as I love Sue’s textures and vegetation.
I’ve done nothing special for this map other than, I’ve added a new tool, the Wall Round, for my walls by using the 10’ Wall tool as a template, and then changing the Draw Method to Ellipse/Circle. In Options, in Draw Method, I changed the Eccentricity to 1.00. In Outline Properties I made the outline an Extra Entity, changed it’s Properties to a 2.5 Fixed Width and put the outline on the proper Layer and Sheets I wanted. I then just placed the Wall Round on the corners of my walls and there you have it.
And so, dear reader, another year’s mapping of All the Annuals series has come to a close. I hope you’ve enjoyed the variety of maps I’ve been privileged to create for you using the 2018 Annual. It has been, as usual, a welcome challenge stepping out of my dungeon mapping comfort zone, and I hope I’ve inspired some of you to do the same and try out this annual. Happy mapping, Cartographers!
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.
News
- The brand new Token Treasury – Monsters 2 has just been released
- The February issue of the Annual 2021 is available.
- The Community Atlas project is running a mapping competition until the end of February where you can still win great prizes..
Resources
- Check out the most recent live mapping videos in our playlist on YouTube.
- Browse through the community’s Maps of the Month for January.
Articles
- Christina Trani continues her journey through the Cartographer’s Annual Vol 12 (2018) with the November and December issues, creating an asian town map, a set of deckplan geomoprhs and the resulting starship.
- Remy Monsen takes an in-depth look at the RPG Matrix process sheet effect in CC3+.
Every week we do a live mapping session on YouTube, showcasing a certain style or set of tools in CC3+. Here are the most recent Live Mapping videos with Remy and Ralf, as archived on YouTube:
Welcome dear mappers to another selection of wonderful maps created by our mapping community. See some of the beauty they produced in January!
The Temple of Isxiltahar (I pray I never have to pronounce this) is just one of the serials of jungle maps by Arcwynd on the community forum, which you definitely need to check out.
Continue reading »
Well, this issue had me worried. First, I had no idea how to go about putting together Geomorphs (it’s not a feature of CC3+ I’ve ever needed to use). And, second, I had NO idea what the deckplan of a ship should look like. So, I went with the trusty Mapping Guide for this one.
(Download the FCW file)
I’ve got to say, I’m pleasantly surprised how much I like this set of maps and how easy it was after I read about Geomorphs. I didn’t really put much thought into this, as I followed the mapping guide, and also cheated a bit and followed along with Ralf’s example map’s tiles.
Once I had my tiles of the ship’s rooms created, I set about creating the ship map. I opened a new map and made the background pretty large in comparison to the ship, as I knew I wanted to include a legend. Then I simply began inserting the deckplans by using Draw>Insert File>*choosing your own tile files*, and then laying them out on the starfield.
(Download the Geomorph tiles)
After I had my rooms arranged, I used the drawing tool for the Mirrored Hull. I really like this tool – all you need to do is draw the outline on one side of the ship for your Hull and it instantly mirrors it on the other side. I then added a few walls and an outer hull so I could have a maintenance tube along the outer wall with some entry hatches.
For a final touch, I decided I wanted a more sci-fi looking font, so I went online to one of the many free font websites out there and found this one with a public domain license, called Edge of the Galaxy. Otherwise, you reader, will get the standard font for this annual.
There you have it. It’s pretty elementary, but for a first starship? I am more than satisfied with my work and I hope those of you that have been hesitant to branch out of the “fantasy” world and into the “sci-fi” realm….go for it. I’m glad I did.
The second Annual issue of 2021 is a huge collection of symbols created by Sue Daniel: More than 300 ribbons, scrolls and seals to serves as titles, labels and other map ornamentation. Banners can be places at different widths, and parts can be combined to create multi-line scrolls and ribbons. The symbols can be used on an any map and the accompanying guide teaches you how to make the catalogs available in any style.
The February issue is now available for all subscribers from their registration page. If you haven’t subscribed to the Annual 2021 yet, you can do so here.
In my latest live stream, I did use the RGB Matrix Process effect quite a lot for changing the colors of fills ans symbols. I this article, I’ll dive a bit more into this effect and describe it in a bit more detail.
The effect itself is just a basic color-replacement effect, but all those text fields with numbers can look quite a bit daunting when you open it up for the first time, but you can use it to make some nice results. You can see some examples in this older blog article where I also touch briefly on this effect, but today I’m going to explain it in a bit more detail.
This is a lovely style, which compliments the Japanese Temple Annual. The tools and symbols you get between the two give you all you need to create a really nice Asian inspired city, town or village.
(Download the FCW file)
I honestly haven’t much to say about this map. I did get the coastline from a satellite pic in Google that I slightly modified, but other than that, I just mapped along as I felt inspired, starting with my cliffs along the beach. After that, everything just fell into place.
I really love a nice easy style like this. Thanks to Sue Daniel for another fantastic Annual.
The community atlas is almost at it’s 500th map, and will also be 4 years old this February.
For this occasion, we are having a mapping competition with the chance to win some nice voucher to use on ProFantasy products.
You can read all the details about the competition in this forum post, but the main idea is to create a dungeon with either a ice and/or fire theme.
There will be prizes for best map, and also a prize drawn at random from the submitted maps for the 500th map.
This contest is intended for every CC3+ user, no matter their skill level. Don’t hesitate to join even if you don’t feel your artistic skill can compete with the best. Even if you don’t win any of the prizes for best map, there is also the random draw which anyone could win.
The contest will be running until the end of February. Please head over to the forum post to check the exact details, ask any questions you might have, and have a look at the two maps already submitted.
Please, join in on the competition. It is great fun participating, no matter your skill level, and it is a great opportunity to challenge yourself, maybe do something different than your usual fare. And the more people who participates, the better the contest becomes.
