Tuesday, April 2, 2013

Blood, Gold, and Lizards: New Zwicke Starting Area

Here is the first of two maps of the starting areas.  They are representative of what the players will get as a starting map.  There is some coastline missing, but to show it, I'd have to include a bunch of boring unexplored hexes.

This is the New Zwicke area (1 hex = 3 miles):

New Zwicke, Player's Starting Map

The Jicarilla Lands are the lands the (more or less) friendly lizardmen call home, from Thorkil's River (the colonist's name for the river) south to the coast (just off this map), bounded on the east by the Wall Hills (there's more of the hills, but the colonists have not pushed into that part of the forest to find them).  By treaty, colonists may not enter these lands.

The Dark of the Forest is comprised of the forests north of Thorkil's River and west of the Arrow River (named by the colonists due to its fairly straight course).  The Jicarilla tribes consider the area cursed and will not enter.  If the idiot colonists want to enter that area and die, the Jicarilla will let it happen.

Estini is a logging village and represents the furthest point of colonial expansion in the area.  The lumberjacks here work the North Forest (not labeled), which are to the east of the Arrow River.

The Wedge Wood is named after its rough shape.  It is not currently being logged as it in not adjacent to a river and getting the timber to New Zwicke would be difficult with out any roads.  The Governor Governor does not seem inclined to build roads in that direction at this time.  Perhaps it has to do with the shares of the North Forest Logging Company he owns...

There is a Stone Quarry to the east of New Zwicke.  All those convicted of crimes in New Zwicke are sentenced to work the quarry for a period of time, based on the crime they committed.  This is rarely abused by the Governor Governor.  So far.

New Zwicke is protected by four watchtowers.  The thin dashed red line that forms a perimeter around the large town is the limit of The Watch's ability to see and, by definition, the limit of the town's territory.  The thicker red dotted lines indicate paved roads.  There are numerous unpaved roads amongst the croplands that are not shown.  The amount of croplands shown provides a surplus of food, which is sold to merchant vessels stopping at the port.

~*~

The terrain icons indicate the center points of the hexes at the next scale up (1 hex = 15 miles).  I might keep the actual symbols there in the final version of the map I hand to the players, but I will probably just put in a generic symbol of some sort.  That should help me keep the mapping accurate as the players explore.

That's it for now.  The map for Lucan's Clock will follow no later than Tuesday of next week.  I still need to name some areas and put some story behind the area, so it's not ready just yet.


2 comments:

  1. Just a question - which way is North? My mapping software only puts hexes 'flat-side' up as opposed to your 'point-side' up. I have been able to duplicate your maps atm, but would like to put a compass rose to show which way things should point if I were to print it out

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  2. North is towards the top of the image unless otherwise stated.

    Putting the point-side up allows for easier world mapping, if one were worried about handling the curve of the globe. At the moment. I'm not, but I may if I decide to get ambitious and it is a good habit to be in in case I decide to do a conversion later.

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