NationStates Jolt Archive

Look at the map and tell me what you think. Does something need to be added? Taken away? Expanded upon?

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SarkadianPrincipality.png

Be gentle.


EDIT:

The 1, 2, 3, and 4 areas are places for neighboring countries. (I will start a thread for that at a later date)

EDIT 2: Second Edition::

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL.png

EDIT 3: Third Edition Map::

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL2.png

EDIT: 4 Fourth Edition Map:: [Redrawn rivers]

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL3.png

That's a good map. What program did you use to make it?

That's a good map. What program did you use to make it?

Microsoft Paint.

And thanks, glad you like the map.

On political maps, I've never seen deserts (or other land areas) given a seperate colour. From a far-out zoom (or with the black border lines not visable) the desert would look a different country.

Also, the top and bottom of your country being cut-off from the rest of the map (unless you have straight borders) isn't the best thing in the world.

Aside from that, I rather like it. Simple, to-the-point, and real-world like (no straight coastlines and such like I tend to have). You could always add mountains and the names of rivers and suchforth if you fancied it.

MSPaint, I should say.

Nice, but it needs more defined national and provincial boundaries, and roads if you can put them in.

On political maps, I've never seen deserts (or other land areas) given a seperate colour. From a far-out zoom (or with the black border lines not visable) the desert would look a different country.

Also, the top and bottom of your country being cut-off from the rest of the map (unless you have straight borders) isn't the best thing in the world.

Aside from that, I rather like it. Simple, to-the-point, and real-world like (no straight coastlines and such like I tend to have). You could always add mountains and the names of rivers and suchforth if you fancied it.

Yeah your right about the first thing (I was trying to make a sort of all in one map). And I will fix the border problem.

Yeah your right about the first thing (I was trying to make a sort of all in one map). And I will fix the border problem.

Yeah, an all-in-one map works from this level of zoom, but if you were to make a regional map in the same way, I'd suggest colouring the desert as relating to national colours. Good work though!

Yeah, an all-in-one map works from this level of zoom, but if you were to make a regional map in the same way, I'd suggest colouring the desert as relating to national colours. Good work though!

Okay, I made a second edition map (strictly political) and I touched up the borders like you guys suggested.

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL.png

I'm no cartographer, but that is bloody good.

National borders are usually in a distinct colour, like red. Makes it easier to understand the map.

I'm no cartographer, but that is bloody good.

Thanks.

Okay, I made a second edition map (strictly political) and I touched up the borders like you guys suggested.

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL.pngBoth good dang good maps for a person who is just making them for the first time, but still not as awesome as some maps so I will give its ranking at Pretty Good.

National borders are usually in a distinct colour, like red. Makes it easier to understand the map.

Alright.

This one is for you:

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL2.png

New distinctive borders (yellow, because I couldn't get red to work).

Both good dang good maps for a person who is just making them for the first time, but still not as awesome as some maps so I will give its ranking at Pretty Good.

Thank you.

It looks quite good. However, what's bugging me is the rivers; they don't branch like rivers should. The Mississippi system and the Congo are good examples of what they should look a bit more like; rivers are a little like trees that sprout from the coast and grow inland, branching as they go.

It may help you to define your mountain ranges (on a separate file or bit of paper, if you don't want them on your map itself) and then draw the rivers flowing away from those. They flow downhill, of course, and join up with the nearest rivers fairly close to their heads. These larger rivers will flow into other rivers every so often until you get one big river. Rivers will only very, very seldom split apart permanently; usually they may divide to go around an eyot, and while they may have an overflow channel in case of floods almost always if they have a choice of two channels they'll choose the path of least resistance. I can only think of one example where a river splits like that - it's a tributary river to the Amazon, so one mouth is the Amazon delta and another is in Guyana somewhere. I don't know why it does it so I can't really help you there.

So yeah, look at real rivers for examples. Think about where your mountains are and have the rivers flowing from those. It doesn't hurt to check out a book on fluvial geography, but I read that sort of thing for pleasure and your mileage may vary.

It looks quite good. However, what's bugging me is the rivers; they don't branch like rivers should. The Mississippi system and the Congo are good examples of what they should look a bit more like; rivers are a little like trees that sprout from the coast and grow inland, branching as they go.

It may help you to define your mountain ranges (on a separate file or bit of paper, if you don't want them on your map itself) and then draw the rivers flowing away from those. They flow downhill, of course, and join up with the nearest rivers fairly close to their heads. These larger rivers will flow into other rivers every so often until you get one big river. Rivers will only very, very seldom split apart permanently; usually they may divide to go around an eyot, and while they may have an overflow channel in case of floods almost always if they have a choice of two channels they'll choose the path of least resistance. I can only think of one example where a river splits like that - it's a tributary river to the Amazon, so one mouth is the Amazon delta and another is in Guyana somewhere. I don't know why it does it so I can't really help you there.

So yeah, look at real rivers for examples. Think about where your mountains are and have the rivers flowing from those. It doesn't hurt to check out a book on fluvial geography, but I read that sort of thing for pleasure and your mileage may vary.

I suppose you are right (its kind of hard to make accurate geographical discriptions on a map when you don't pay attention in Geography :D) I will work on the rivers straight away. And I'll see if I can work in some mountains without making the whole thing look weird.

As long as your International border is well-defined, a simple change of color is sufficient for internal boundaries. Looks quite good, I tried a similar set-up on ms-paint. My mouse is too worn to get fine details.

It looks quite good. However, what's bugging me is the rivers; they don't branch like rivers should. The Mississippi system and the Congo are good examples of what they should look a bit more like; rivers are a little like trees that sprout from the coast and grow inland, branching as they go.

It may help you to define your mountain ranges (on a separate file or bit of paper, if you don't want them on your map itself) and then draw the rivers flowing away from those. They flow downhill, of course, and join up with the nearest rivers fairly close to their heads. These larger rivers will flow into other rivers every so often until you get one big river. Rivers will only very, very seldom split apart permanently; usually they may divide to go around an eyot, and while they may have an overflow channel in case of floods almost always if they have a choice of two channels they'll choose the path of least resistance. I can only think of one example where a river splits like that - it's a tributary river to the Amazon, so one mouth is the Amazon delta and another is in Guyana somewhere. I don't know why it does it so I can't really help you there.

So yeah, look at real rivers for examples. Think about where your mountains are and have the rivers flowing from those. It doesn't hurt to check out a book on fluvial geography, but I read that sort of thing for pleasure and your mileage may vary.

Okay. I changed the rivers so that the flow North West to East - SouthEast. There are three major rivers (indicated by the fact that they are thicker) there are a whole bunch of minor rivers and tributaries that flow from the NorthWestern mountains (not on map) that combine to form the major rivers and two new lakes (just added them). Check it out and tell me if it is any better.

http://i218.photobucket.com/albums/cc288/Sarkadia/SecondEditionPOLITICAL3.png

NOTE: One of the rivers starts farther north than the map goes so it is drawn thickly from its beginning on the map until it hits the ocean.

Oh, and I made the route of the rivers more centralized since I have decided that (when I finally add it) the desert will be to the south instead of in the middle of the country.

It looks a lot better now, but there's still things you can do to improve it further. I'll do my best to list specific instances;

The river that flows past Deiash into Lake Rothwaryer shouldn't split in two to flow north into the Sea of Sirkenth as well. Think of it like a pot full of water. When you make a pair of cracks in the sides of the pot, the water level will go down to the bottom of the shorter crack, and *keep* going down to the bottom of the longer crack. Since our "pot" is a river it keeps filling up again, but it will exit the lower crack at the same speed. The thing about a river, as opposed to a pot, is that erosion will make this "crack" (read: river-bed) exactly as wide and/or deep as it needs to be to maintain an even flow. Basically, this boils down to "rivers and/or lakes will only have one outflow".

In this spirit, Lake Rothwaryer should only have one outflow lake. I'd recommend the one by Rynlora since major cities almost always grow by rivers (generally at the site furtherest downstream on the river that's fordable, or the furtherest upstream on the river that's accessible to boats. Note that coastal cities are more vulnerable to vikings and other pirates, and are basically a function of ships being deep enough to require a proper harbour. London and Paris are both built where historically ships stopped, and Rome is built where the lowest ford on the Tiber was historically).

- The southern river that runs from Lake Rothwaryer to Cerntai Province - which way is it flowing? At a first glance it looks like it's running downstream into Cerntai province *and* downstream into the Sirkenth Ocean (and downstream into Lake Rothwaryer). Needless to say, it can't run in two directions at once! If this is the case, I'd assume that the source is somewhere east of Suldania, and I'd split it in two so you have one river running east and one river running west, with their sources close to each other.

But at second glance it looks like it may be running west out of Lake Rothwaryer, which makes a bit more sense but it means you probably shouldn't have it branching off into the Ocean. If this is the case you've probably got a range of mountains along your eastern coast, and you shouldn't have those other rivers flowing from Lake Rothwaryer - but you can still have 'em flowing out of the mountains there. Separate them slightly from the Lake and you could pretend that the Lake is in a big mountain basin thing, flowing out to the west past Deiash, and the other rivers in the area would be flowing down the *other sides* of that mountain basin.

Think of your river systems like trees. The difference between trees and rivers is that with rivers you're working from the branches down rather than the trunk up; but like trees, rivers don't have multiple trunks (weird trees like mangroves excluded) or split their trunks in two partway and then rejoin.

--snip--
Ah yes. Like what Tsar said, rivers are like trees. There is one main river and from it branches out many tributaries (but the flow is the opposite: the tributaries converge to form a bigger and bigger river).

It is also rare that two river systems are connected naturally (exception is the Orinoco and the Negro-Amazon via the Casiquiare). So actually, your two major river systems would be problematic if you want it to be realistic hydrologically.

Rivers also rarely split into branches within its course and form islands within the river (exceptions include the Platte river in Nebraska). These rarities occur in short distances and flat lands. Like trees, rivers can also have many "roots", i.e., it can form many channels to meet the sea, usually this occurs in deltas (like the Danube and Mississippi).

But I have to say, you've got a great map. It's nice to see a fellow MSPainter creating maps. If you want to see at how rivers could look like, you can look at a map (http://img142.imageshack.us/my.php?image=brutlandandnordenbigmapdl2.png) I had made for another nation of mine. (It's made in MSPaint too, and I know the patience one should need for these maps. ;))